Already Kyle was glad he had decided to keep his distance. No sooner had the snowballs begun their onslaught than had he started to see first hand, up close and personal, just how violent the tree could be. He watched, eyes narrowed, waiting to see what would happen, and taking note of the icicles that fell from the branches... but were they icicles? It hardly looked like--

Suddenly, Kyle became aware of something headed straight for his face. One of his snowballs. He didn't have time to think, and therefore didn't duck, but instinctively held out a hand to catch the snowball that was headed straight for his face, and braced for impact. It exploded as it hit his palm, and showered him with snow. Cold, uncomfortable, but better than being nailed directly in the face.

Right then, the icicles. Staying vigilant, Kyle crept forwards - as close as he dared - and squinted at the fallen icicles, though the fact that it was night made things far more difficult.

Was this... were they... those looked like vials. The type the potion ingredients tended to be housed in. And there, not too far away. That was a cauldron, there was absolutely no denying it. Kyle's heart soared; if this was a Potions related challenge, then he might just get through it. He raised his wand, and moved it in arc.

"Accio Cauldron."

The spell was cast without much deliberation; Kyle thought he could see something inside the cauldron and he wanted to get a better look at it, but no way was he going to within possible range of the branches just yet. Again he held out his hand, this time to catch the cauldron, and recoiled a little with its weight. Once he had hold of it, he took the note from inside and read it. Then he read it again. And then a third time, for absolute clarity.

... Make your way to the passage beneath the tree.

Well, that made sense. A simple Immobulus was likely to stop the tree in its tracks, and allow Kyle to get closer, but the specific task was to brew a potion to aid him in doing so. Would it be cheating, or perhaps grounds for disqualification to immobilise the tree with a spell? Maybe not, but Kyle now remembered how he had apparently been followed through the entirety of the first challenge by a Ministry official. It wasn't outside of the range of possibility for there to be a similar set-up now, with someone here to cancel out his spell if he attempted to bypass the potion-brewing that way.

But what to brew?

His thoughts first went to the Mutatio Animalia potion - perhaps he could turn himself into a small animal, maybe a fly, and more easily navigate the branches - but that would take hours to brew, and Kyle only had one. Less than one by now, really. Next, he considered an Invisibility Potion; it seemed like the most logical thing... but Whomping Willows didn't have eyes. It didn't seem likely that the tree used vision to know when someone or something approached it, though Kyle knew - as he always did, though he was loath to admit it - that he could very well be wrong. The problem was, he really only had one shot at brewing a potion here, given the time limit, and he didn't want to risk an Invisibility Potion if it turned out that the tree used extrasensory methods to know when something approached, like... like the whiskers of a cat or kneazle.

If only he knew how to brew a Stealth Potion by heart. He knew of such a potion, and had read about the brewing process, but - having done so in his extra reading and having found it only recently - he was not at all confident that he knew the recipe verbatim. It was all very well brewing an impressive potion for the challenge, but it would need to be brewed correctly and with confidence, or he may lose points for an ineffectual potion or a complete disaster in a cauldron.

So, perhaps, rather than attempt to make himself less detectable... what if he brewed something that would allow him to withstand more hits from the tree? No other potions were making the cut; Kyle would instantly veto every possibility as useless or just too risky.

He narrowed his options down to a Strengthening Solution and a Girding Potion. Strength was more appealing, perhaps because it didn't smell and presumably taste like a public toilet, but Kyle couldn't find much sense in boosting his strength, unless he wanted to try and go up against the Willow in a good old-fashioned fist/branch-fight. Which he didn't want. At all. Especially as he didn't have the slightest idea as to where the right knot was.

Girding Potion it was, then. It wouldn't make him any less 'visible' to the tree, and it wouldn't make him immune to its hits, but it might give him a boost of endurance to push through to the passageway despite the onslaught, to roll with the punches, quite literally. Girding. Preparing for action. It made sense.

Never mind that he was already having doubts and wishing that he could think of a genuinely perfect solution, or that he could remember the recipe for that Stealth Potion - what had he been thinking, not focusing on learning it right now, when he was in a competition where it could have come in useful. Suffice it to say, that soaring of Kyle's spirits from earlier? Nowhere to be found now.

Right, so... now what? Where was he supposed to--?

... Oh. Oh. Now he saw. Now he realised.

The workstation. It was some distance away, closer to the tree than it was to Kyle, and almost certainly within the reach of the branches, and it did not look Summonable.

For a moment Kyle stood there, staring out at the tree, taking a second to think about how this had somehow become his life. This moment right here. He was about to willingly brew a potion under an angry Whomping Willow. Perfect. Really, so fantastic.

Looping the handle of the cauldron over one arm, Kyle stuffed the note into the pocket of his robes, before raising his wand again, and concentrating.

"Armanto!" Seconds later, he had conjured a large silver shield. He tested its weight with his non-wand hand - the same hand attached to the arm that held the cauldron - and quickly set it down again. The less time he needed to hold that above him, the better. Kyle was not the strongest Horned Serpent of the bunch.

Perhaps... he could get away with just a little more avoidance, though. Really, the more he could prepare for the potion whilst being out of harm's way, the better. Up went his wand again, and Kyle cast his mind back to the last time he studied this particular potion, and attempted to summon each of the ingredients from the fallen vials. Hopefully, they were all there.

"Accio Dragonfly Thoraxes ... Accio Toasted Dragonfly Thoraxes ... Accio Fairy Wings ... Accio Flying Seahorses ... Accio Doxy Eggs..."

He would leave the final ingredient until later, when he had decided what to pick. As for right now? He just needed to get on with it. Time was not about to wait for Kyle Baker.

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OOC clarification: Though there are two SS canon recipes for the Girding Potion and one on the HP wiki, I chose to use the version Lafay chose, because of the extra ingredient advantage in the potion and because I personally feel this method could also have been taught at Ilvermorny.