Jessica rubbed her hands together desperately and began to write, pausing now and then to rack her sleepy brain for more facts and examples.

She finally left off writing. He brain was jammed and numb. With a shiver, she looked up to hear the Professor ask a questions which she hardly knew, but she gave it a try. Shevery slowly raised her hand.

“Prime numbers are associated with holiness and spirituality. They have greater and much more mystic powers, influence over the mind, body and soul and permanence than other numbers. They result in more powerful enchantment and stronger spells.” she said hesitantly and, hopelessly, went back to finishing her essay.

Nadia thought of her answer before raising her hand, "Prime numbers are all numbers which can only be devided by one and itself, for that reason excluding one and zero, which cannot be divided. For this reason, primes are very unique numbers. The first four primes, under 10, are the very basic, simplest start and basis for other numbers derived of convinations of primes. All non-prime numbers result of two prime numbers added together, at that. All prime numbers but two are odd numbers."

She lowered her hand, wondering if that was correct enough.

Professor Fox nodded encouragingly. "A well attempte dtry Ms. Marvin, but I'm afraid that's not precisely what I'm looking for." Pausing and listening to Nadia, he continued, "Excellent answer Ms. Rey. Now, I will ask two more oral questions, then we will conclude this final.

"Question 6, oral: Please briefly explain why identity numbers are important."

Nadia distinctively felt the oral questions could be more challenging than the essay ones. She raised her hand as she cleared her throat. "Identity numbers Zero and One are called like that because in certain operations the numbers gives out as result the same number used as second in the operation. For example, sums by zero equals the other number and mutiplication and divition by one gives out the second number as well. This means that as identity numbers, the two numbers has properties that can be used to reveal the identity and hence nature of objects, spells, etc. and as well they work to help reveal hidden magic."

Nadia took a deep breath, she was not done. "Zero represents nothingness to which everything returns since everything can be reduced to zero; this are the bases of the Zeroth Law. Also represents change which happens because and with aid of zero, all other numbers as suceptible to change. One represents unity and identity, for it reveals the identity of other numbers. It also stands for the indentity of a particular that stands in relation to everything else, to 'a whole', which means one is part of the identity of all numbers." She finished dropping her hand and stopped to get some breath.

Erica took a much slower time than usual completing the last of the essay questions and instead of just jumping right into the oral questions as a couple of the students had, she double and triple checked all of her essay questions to make sure she was absolutely satisfied with them before continuing.
When that was done, she turned her attention to the other section of the final, seemingly dominated by Nadia. No real surprise there. And seeing as how Nadia had covered everything that Erica was going to say anyway, she just waited for the last of the oral questions.

Jessica nodded at the Professor and bent over her parchment. If anything, the next question was more difficult. Not knowing what to say, she clenched and unclenched her hands, relaxing her grip on the wrinkly quill. After a few minutes, her hand began to feel better. She gripped her quill pensively and pushed it to the surface of the bluish parchment. After a moment, she raised it again and placed it aside, not finding any more errors in her essays.

Though Nadia had already answered the next oral question, she gave it a try, well aware that the oral questions were way more difficult than most of the essay ones.

“Identity numbers – zero and one - are highly significant due to their magical properties,” Jessica began tentatively and shakily. “Zero is associated with the Zeroeth Law. This is the number responsible for the decaying of enchantments, spells, jinxes and every living being. One, on the other hand, increases the power of an enchantment, thus, it can be known as the exact opposite of zero. However, identity numbers work together forming a completely new wholeness. The properties of one work against zero and vise versa. As a result, identity numbers not only increase the lifespan of an object/ enchantment but also increase its longevity, permanence and stability. When working together, their qualities combine to form a spiritually complex enchantment which causes older enchantments to gain more power.”

She was breathless and soar-throated but not yet finished. She knew that her answer was irrelevant and silly, but that was the best she had. With a sinking heart, she went on.

“Identity numbers help in the enchantments used on powerful wands by increasing their solidity and supremacy,” she said very slowly. “If the wand length contains an Identity number – for instance the wand length is 10 inches or 11 – it will be physically more powerful and influential. As zero exhibits “emptiness” and one “wholeness,” the wand, as a result of complex transformations it goes through, is not only unique in every sense of the word, but also threatens to perform dark spells – those that help things to decay –more powerfully, given that the wizard using it is fairly powerful. The Identity numbers help to expose concealed jinxes and curses that may be protecting an area due to either their emptiness or wholeness.”

Professor Fox nodded approvingly to the students. "Everyone, well posed answers. Time is almost up, so those of you not yet finished writing yoru essays, please do so now as class wil end momentarily."

[OOC: I'll give everyone a day or so in case any stragglers show up, but if you have answered the essay questions, your character can go ahead and leave. I will try and post house points in the next few days however. Points are up. You can check them out in the Homework Notice, otherwise take a look at the points counter.]

Jessica bound her papers securely together. She looked over them for the last time and checked for any spelling erros she might have missed out. However, finding none, she gathered her quills and inkpot and threw it in her little pouch shaped pencil box.

Feeling highly relieved that her last answer - at least - was not wrong, she stood up, her flaming red locks swinging to hide her silvery blue eyes. She slipped her box inside her pocket and headed towards the door.

"Thanks Professor," she said to Professor Fox. "You make even an exam interesting. I don't see why I didn't try Airthmancy before. It's a lot more exciting than I thought it would be." With a polite smile, she left the room, relieved that at least one exam was finally over.

Come to think of it, she hadn't done too shabbily after all. She might have had made half a dozen mistakes or so, but never having attended many Arithmancy classes, it wasn't that bad. It was almost good, so as to speak. She exited and hurried down the corridor, unable to believe that in less than two weeks' time, she would be going home.