In Harry Potter as Neville Longbottom - Chapter 72: The New Professor - Wilhelmina Grubbly-Plank

The next day Hogwarts students filled the hallways filled with the gossip and praises for the new Professor Bill Weasley.

His intelligence had charmed the entire Ravenclaw while his teaching method conquered the Gryffindor. His friendly and goofy nature made the Hufflepuff students feel the joy of their studies while Slytherin – let us forget Slytherin. They hate blood traitors and the poor Weasleys are always a part of the shame and mockery for many pure-blood Slytherin kids.

Almost all students at the breakfast table thought that no other professor could ever be better than him, but they found their worldview shattering when they met another new professor – Wilhelmina Grubbly Plank or Professor Plank.

She was a witch with close-cropped grey hair and a very prominent chin. Her face was similar to Professor McGonagall’s in some manner. Professor Plank took over the Care of Magical Creatures subject and the first magical creature she bought for the class managed to win praise even from Slytherin girls.

After all, it was a golden Unicorn foal. Yes, it was the golden baby horse with one small little lump on the forehead that received all the shrieks and yells from all the girls in the classes across Hogwarts.

“Can anyone tell me what is this animal and how does it colour change with age?” Professor Plank asked the double second-year class which was Gryffindor with Slytherin.

Hermione and Pansy raised their hands at lightning speed before the other girls followed them.

In the end, Professor Plank chose Hermione after finding her most active and impatient.

“Professor, this is a baby Unicorn. Unlike the fully grown creatures, unicorn foals are pure gold in colour. Unicorns turn silver when they are about two years old, and they grow their horns at around four years old.

Unicorns do not turn pure white until they are fully grown, at about seven years old. They are more trusting when they are babies, and don’t mind boys as much.”

Hermione read out all the information she knew from her memory and Professor Plank gave her 5 points for her accurate answer.

Hermione smiled brightly and gave a provocative look to Pansy. Pansy matched her eyes, and one could feel the invisible rivalry spark between them.

The girls were going crazy and wanted to rush and catch the most beautiful creature they had ever seen. Even the boys could not ignore the magical beast which was shining in the golden light and felt it was truly a beautiful magical creature.

The Unicorn Foal was also curious about the human kids and had a calm trusting nature.

The professor allowed the foal to roam freely and choose the first person who can touch it. In the surprising eyes of both the house kids, the foal chose Pansy Parkinson and snuggled in her lightly.

This loving and surprisingly friendly behaviour even caught the professor off guard. It was not that the foals were not friendly but for the young unicorns, they will let only a few handfuls of humans ever touch them.

The conditions are still unknown to many human wizards, but the common feature is that these selected humans are mostly kind, brave and with pure hearts. Something that the unicorn kids relate with their instinct is the magical beasts.

While all the students were simply smitten by the beauty of the Unicorn, Neville was thinking of capturing it and plucking all its hairs from his body. For Neville, this was a walking treasure, and he felt his fingers rubbing together.

The happy foal suddenly felt dangerous malice from Neville’s direction and looked over. The eyes of the Unicorn foal clashed with Neville and the foal hurriedly hid behind Pansy.

The professor saw this behaviour and intervened timely.

“Ahem! Neville Longbottom, if I am not wrong, right?” Professor Plank asked and when Neville was going to speak, she stopped him before continuing further.

“I don’t know what kind of negative and malicious thoughts are inside your head, Neville. But I hope when you look at a magical creature, you will give it the respect it deserves and treat it with care rather than looking at it with the eyes of a breeder or merchant.”

Professor Plank is an old witch, but her voice is loud enough to cover the class.

The very fact that Neville Longbottom had malicious thoughts about the Unicorn foal managed to make him the enemy of all the girls inside Hogwarts by the end of the day.

Even Slytherin first-year students would look at him with eyes filled with disdain and disgust.

Neville felt he was simply wrongly targeted. He loved animals and his baby Diana was the best proof of that. Who would have thought that the baby unicorn was so sensitive that it caught the ideas Neville had inside his mind?

“You trust me, right Hermione?” Neville asked at the dinner table when he felt all the Gryffindor girls were giving him a stink eye and some were ready to fight with him for no reason.

“I do trust you, Neville. But tell me honestly, what exactly were you thinking?” Hermione asked in a low voice.

Neville without thinking too much confessed directly “I was thinking that its tail hair can be plucked and then used as a wand core you know. It’s not like I was going to harm it or anything. Besides, it has such a big and thick tail, it won’t notice if I pick a few of his hair you know.”

Neville had just finished speaking before Hermione simply smashed his face with the cheese and potato she had on her plate.

“Disgusting! You were thinking of plucking his tail! Are you even human, Neville Longbottom?” Hermione said loudly and before Neville could defend himself in response, a few plates of leftover food and glasses of milk and juices smashed his face.

In the end, Professor McGonagall had to intervene and calm down the kids while deducing 20 points for the shocking rude display of their behaviour.

Hermione felt her world collapsing as she lost more points than she earned in total. In these two days, she had managed to win over 15 points, but she lost 5 points bringing her total to 10 while Pansy had already gotten over 25.

This made her ignore Neville and the other boys for the rest of the week and try to furiously catch up and beat Pansy in the points war.