HP - Shadow Monarch - Chapter 199 - The tournament begins.

[Chapter Size: 2000 Words.]
Third Person POV

Durmstrang Institute.

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Once again, the headmistress of the Durmstrang Institute began to give a speech, talking about the prohibition of walking around the school at night after curfew.
She said that anyone caught would be severely punished, citing the case of the "entire night," as she described it, when someone was seen trying to access the board.

Certainly, it was not well-regarded by the school officials, who were watching the two institutions, both Hogwarts and Beauxbatons, with suspicion.
Many were not in favor of the presence of students from these schools causing trouble so quickly, for trying to walk around their school during the night.

In any case, Snape didn't give much importance to it. He was thinking whether he should simply show up in front of the board or not, before the end of the tournament.
“Maybe I should just win this competition... this won't be difficult at all.” he ended up deciding instead of actually trying to sneak into the board.

“You’re whispering again.” Clarisse murmured next to him, though she didn’t actually hear what he said.
“Just some thoughts.” Snape said.

“Would you like to walk around the school? They’re going to show it to us and we’ll have some classes with the Durmstrang Institute students in the coming days while the tournament hasn’t started yet, since they don’t want us to miss our lessons.” Clarisse said, while Snape nodded, turning his gaze to all the Hogwarts students there, with some staring at him as always.

Be it out of fear, curiosity, or even some resentment. But he didn’t care.
‘It’s a shame I won’t have my exact classroom here...’ he couldn’t help but think.
“Alright... let’s check this place out to kill some time.” he decided.

He had his phoenix, which didn’t seem to have limits as long as she was already in place. Snape could return to England without anyone knowing it, but he would also have to do that at opportune moments and only when there was a real need to return, since he didn’t seem to have that problem.

In the end, breakfast finished and they followed some students that the professors ended up announcing as their guides, while Professor Rosaria would be responsible for the group and Professor Flitwick and Professor Longbottom were discussing how the tournament and its rules would work with the professor from _______.

Snape remained silent the entire time while the students were speaking in Nordic languages, but with a translation spell, it was easy to understand what they were saying as they showed the castle, warning about not going into certain places.

“You seem to be bored.” Rosaria approached Snape, where there wasn’t the stench she picked up from the other students.
“You could say that... this place is kind of tedious.” he admitted, not even feeling the urge to look at the paintings in search of new dungeons.
“Haha. That’s true. Here there’s only snow and the stiff faces of these people from the Nordic countries.” she laughed.

They continued moving through the castle, while Rosaria had to call out to some students to stop them from messing around. Snape stayed there with Pandora and Clarisse by his side if Rosaria wasn’t glued to him.

At noon, a new school arrived, the school from Brazil, which shared lunch with the students and the headmistress gave the same speech they heard last night, talking a bit about the tournament.

Snape wasn’t very interested in those students, seeing nothing special beyond students, with most of them, like almost everyone there, nervous.

The routine through the school continued, while Snape grew tired of it and went to look for paintings, disappearing from the group with his teleportation and invisibility, certain that Rosaria would cover for him.

He moved toward the paintings as he entered the portals, starting to accumulate more experience, though nothing that really surprised him.
In the end, he appeared at his home in England near late afternoon, using the place to train, as he couldn’t do so in Durmstrang due to the temperatures.

Snape completed all his exercises while opening the system and reallocating his points where he wanted. After that, he returned to northern Sweden.

He stopped on a balcony and kept looking at the snow covering everything. Durmstrang was in a mountainous area, even more than Hogwarts, and not to mention that it was at a high point, so he could see all the mountains if it weren’t snowing.
“I’ve never liked snow...” Snape commented with a sarcastic tone.

“Hey, you there mumbling to yourself.” someone said, coming toward him at that moment.

Snape merely turned his gaze to the side. There was a group of older students with a professor, and the voice he heard came from the student stepping forward in front of all the others. They all wore the uniform with the Brazilian flag.
“I heard you’re the best student from Hogwarts and the school’s favorite... but you don’t look like much...” he said in a mocking tone.
“But he’s really handsome.” one of the girls in the group said as the others laughed.
“Tsk. You can stop that, I’m having a conversation with this loser.” the student said with disdain.
“Don’t you have something better to do? Go bother someone else.” Snape said indifferently, turning back to face forward.

“What!?” the student seemed offended by his words and almost pulled out his wand.
“Stop that, Enzo. You should be focusing on the tournament, not challenging those you’ll face before it even starts.” the professor said in a stern tone.
“Of course, sorry... Professor.” the student returned to the group.

“Don’t worry, you’re the best in duels. You’ll soon show even the most arrogant students why they should respect the greatest school of witchcraft in South America.” he said sternly with one last glance at Snape before walking off.

Snape didn’t even care about them. He was already so powerful that he wouldn’t bother with schoolyard fights anymore unless it involved a torture attack or something more serious. Besides, he no longer cared about teenagers yelling at each other trying to prove they were better than everyone else.

In the end, Snape headed to the common hall, leaving that balcony, which the snow didn’t reach due to magic, and continued on as an invisible figure.

The Hogwarts students were already seated in their chairs when Snape appeared next to Clarisse, making her jump as he suddenly appeared out of nowhere, canceling his invisibility.
“Where have you been?!” she asked.
“Around.” Snape said, not wanting to mention things like being in three dungeons killing hundreds of monsters trying to kill him, while commanding an army at his disposal, or how he had been in England physically training before returning and standing on a balcony on one of the floors staring into nothing to pass the time.
“I see...” she said with suspicion.

“Sev! Did you know the school from the United States arrived!?” Pandora said, pointing to the fifth table now occupied, with only the last one still empty.

Snape just nodded, not paying much attention to them. He continued waiting for dinner, which arrived soon after with dishes flying to them, as there weren’t many house-elves here to teleport the food quickly.

Snape only snapped out of his uninterested responses when the last school arrived that night, as a group of people carrying staffs, coming from Africa, entered.
“Interesting.” Snape still had something he wanted to learn in this world, which was the magic made with glyphs, and this school was the most specialized in it, according to the runes professor and even Salazar when he spoke of his acquaintance who had founded this school on the African continent — the same one who helped make the Sword of Gryffindor.

Snape watched for a while as the same speech continued, and then they returned to their rooms once again, with Regulus always watching him, though that didn’t stop Snape from going out to explore the castle again, even if the young Black knew he was sneaking out and was probably responsible for the confusion the previous night.

Snape continued passing through all the paintings with portals he could find, returning to his room before dawn, without causing trouble, even though Durmstrang’s student security had been increased in an attempt to find a student using some spell, potion, or item that made him invisible.

Now all the students were gathered, along with the Swedish Minister of Magic, all the professors, and students from the five schools, plus the participants representing the Durmstrang Institute.

The rules were the same as they had practiced at Hogwarts, so it wasn’t too difficult. They would have three days before it began, with some reporters authorized to enter the school to cover the event and get to know the students.

The days went on as usual. The Marauders began playing a few pranks around, while the students started mingling, seeking information about their opponents or simply taking the opportunity to form international friendships.

Snape kept avoiding this pattern, searching through paintings while traveling to his isolated home in England to train.

Until finally, the tournament began, and everyone gathered in Durmstrang’s main area — one of the uppermost floors with an arena used for Quidditch, enhanced with a powerful space-expansion spell.

Snape stood with the other Hogwarts students while reporters took photos and tried to speak with the students, especially the favorites.

“Severus Snape, I heard you’re Hogwarts’ favorite! How do you think you’ll perform in this tournament?” one of them asked directly.
“I don’t know yet... we’ll see.” he replied without giving a definite answer, though he was confident he would win.

“Now we will begin the student selection. The rules are simple: each group of six students, with one representing each school, will face their opponents. Each victory earns three points, each draw one point, and each loss, zero points...” The Durmstrang headmistress began explaining to everyone there.

“The one with the highest score will be the winner of their group. After that, it won’t matter if they face students from their own school — they’ll have to duel. The one who wins moves on, the one who loses is out. The tournament will last three days...” She continued explaining as everyone paid attention.

“With that, good luck.” She explained a few more rules and then finished.

Each student picked a ball from one of the lined-up boxes so they would fall randomly into each group. Obviously, it was enchanted to prevent students from the same school ending up in the same initial groups, as the goal was to eliminate as many students as possible before the knockout stage began.

Snape ended up picking a ball from Group A and waited while his acquaintances and classmates finished.
“Looks like we’re done, let’s begin!” the headmistress said as everyone nodded.

A board appeared, starting to be marked by a piece of chalk writing on its own, listing the groups with all the participants.
Snape immediately recognized someone in his group — Enzo from Brazil.

All the students began talking about their groups while trying to spot their other opponents in the groups from the other schools. The stands were full of reporters and students, the latter obviously far more numerous.

In any case, it didn’t go on for long before the headmistress called everyone’s attention once again.
“Now let’s go to the first duel!” she declared as the board wrote the names of two opponents.

All the Hogwarts students looked at Snape at that moment, while he just shrugged and walked toward the dueling area, with the student from the Brazilian school jumping in with a grin.
“Lucky me, I’ll be quick with you, idiot.” he said, sounding like a bully — he just didn’t know Snape was an expert in dealing with this type, walking toward the place with a calm expression.

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Raccoon Here: Sweden is a monarchy, so I’ll put the prime minister instead of president. I’ll fix the previous chapter about that small detail later.