Angel now had to decide if she wanted to use oil or dragons blood, she decide that she would probably get a better reading because blood was supposed to do that right though she wasn't going to drink any of it even if the Professor tried to tell them it.

Angel then grabbed the vial, and removed the stopper before she poured it over the shell and looked at it, this was so amazing and it looked so amazing as well.

She found the poker and smiled, so now it was time to get cracking, why couldn't this be an egg, they were so easy to crack. She then giggled as she realised she'd need to heat it up.

"Incendio!" Angel pointed her wand at the poker and then started to get cracking with the shell... when she was sure there was enough cracks in the shell she put the poker in a bucket of water.

With step one completed, Janelle moved on to the next part of the task. She decided that she would go with the oil and picked up the vial with the yellow liquid. After opening the vial, Janelle poured a bit of it onto her shell. Then she picked up one of the pokers and grabbed her wand with her other hand. "Incendio", she said as she touched her wand to the tip of the poker. When it appeared to be hot enough, Janelle said, "Finite".

Moving quickly before the poker cooled, Janelle touched it to the turtle shell and gave it a push. All of sudden, cracks began to appear in the shell, creating a puzzle-like pattern. "Cool", she thought. Janelle spent a moment, mezmerized by the shell. Then she remembered to place the hot poker in the bucket of water. After a brief sizzle, the poker appeared to cool down. Were they ready to do their readings now? Janelle continued to study her shell while she waited to hear the next steps.

Dragon blood. That was Hady's vial of choice today. It wasn't that hard of a decision to make honestly as she had a love for dragons.

With her name already being nicely etched into the shell of the turtle she was ready to move on to the next steps. Selecting the vial of dragons blood Hady popped the cork out and carefully poured the red liquid over the shell watching it seep into the grooves where her name was carved. This was kinda cool.

After that was done Hady reached for the poker that was laying on her desk using a quiet 'incendio' on it with her wand to heat the tip up. Without wasting any time she touched the poker to the turtle shell and watched how a crack instantly ran down along the shell. Wicked!

Doing this a few more times each with just a light touch of the poker Hady grinned as the cracks meet one another and a few took on a small zigzag like pattern. When she was done she set the hot end of her poker into the bucket of water. She was all ready for the next step.

“They are!” Yoongi said as the Professor mentioned that turtles were fun creatures. But when he realised he had said that out loud he felt his cheeks starting to feel warm and he quickly cleared his throat. Don’t mind him, just , happy that she liked turtles as well…

He was very disappointed that she put the turtle back in the box and it was out of sight. But maybe it was for the best because he would not be paying attention with that cute thing walking around. Oh wait! Wait wait waaaait note taking must happen now! He quickly wrote down his notes about Plastromancy and that the oracle was the lower part …whatever that meant.

Looking at the shell in front of him, Yoongi was about to question the Professor about animal cruelty when she already explained herself. Well, it sounded good….she was off the hook for now… He examined his shell and when he found a place he could carve his name in he grabbed his phoenix wand to write his name.

Turtles were the most boring creatures ever. Sure, Grayson could see how they could be considered to be cute or whatever but they didn't DO anything. What was the freaking point?

He kept his eyes on the turtle up front right up until the moment Professor Cassie scooped it back up again. Alriiiiiight, so they were gonna be using the Oracle Bone then. And only had to carve their first names, yeah? Because Grayson Douglas Whitlock was kinda a long name. And even if you take out the middle name part, the name was still freakishly long. Seriously.

Picking up his wand and the turtle shell, Grayson went ahead to start carving his name onto the oracle bone. Name. First AND surname because, as Toby had mentioned, only putting one name could mix up the readings and there was no way he was gonna put all this hard work in just to do a reading for someone else. No. Tell him about his own future, please. and be accurate about it as well, mkay?

So carving. Grayson Whitlock. Long name was too freaking long.

Carving his full name B-E-N-J-A-M-I-N alongside his surname took a bit of time but it was appropriate. No more Benny for him. When it was finally done, he picked up the deep red vial and uncorked it. No need for a choice for him...dragon's blood would be what he used. He just hoped it was obtained without too much harm from the creature. Pouring it over his shell, he waited for it to flow along all of the hard surface before double checking what the next step was.

Right...red-hot poker.

Ben picked the cool one up and held it in his left hand as he reached for his wand once more. "Incendio." he cast on the tip of the poker, heating it up and hoping the heat didn't travel up the handle. When he figured it was hot enough, he poked the shell in front of him as directed. A mirade of cracks appeared in the oracle bone along the surface of the shell in reaction to the heat.

Success!

Then remembering the last bit, he quickly placed the poker in the bucket. He didn't want any more incidents in class for sure.

Okay so now that the oil was all over the shell and his name was properly carved, the next bit sounded easy. Just take the poker thing and heat it, then poke? Yeah, easy enough anyways. Again, Zander watched some of the others in the room go at it first before he took his own poker and heated just the end. Didn't need to heat it all up 'cause then he wouldn't be able to hold it properly. That'd mess the entire operation up, too.

So yeah, just the end. Once that was done he softly poked the shell and watched as little cracks appeared all over it. Huh. Who knew, would you look at that. The cracks looked kind of curious and Zander could only imagine what they meant. Of course he was having a pretty hard time imagining because he hadn't ever done this plastic oh mancy before.

Clearly.

Since he was done with the poker thing, he put that back in the water, like Professor Morgan instructed and went straight back at his shell. Except he left it on the table, afraid that he'd accidentally break it now that it was already all cracked up. Just wondering what it meant was all.

Her name looked pretty cool carved into the shell. Too bad it wasn't carved a little bit neater. That wasn't really her style though. It would look fake honestly. Okay so now that her name was done it was time for the blood. AJ picked up her vial and poured it all over the shell. The blood was kind of pretty. She couldn't help but to get a quick sniff in. Hmm... it didn't really smell different.

Once she got her fill of dragon blood smell, it was HOT POKER TIME. AJ picked one up and let her wand get this bad boy all warmed up. "Incendio." It was definitely looking red hot so it had to be hot enough to get the job done.

The poker was placed to the shell and it began to crack in several places at one. Cool. It made some pretty cool designs. She kept the poker on the shell until she felt like there was enough cracks to work with. If she was going to read about her future or whatever... she was going to do it right.

All done. The poker was put into the bucket of water, and was ready to see what her future held... again.

So, it's not based on the shell's pattern.

Somehow he felt like a fail Asian because he didn't know about this. But hey, he's Korean and not a Chinese. So... it's an excuse, okay?

Back to the lesson.

So they're gonna carved at the oracle bone. Hmm... First, Jackson grabbed an oracle bone, then he started craving his name. Wait... what name should he use? His Korean name or English name? Maybe he should try with his English name first: Jackson Hwang. Then he should decide whether he's gonna use dragon blood or oil. Staring at those two vials, he thought for a while. Blood or oil? Blood or oil? Blooo... no, maybe he should use the oil but... Okay, finally he grabbed the dragon blood's vial.

So the turtles, whether killed unnaturally or not, had to be dead in order for this form of divination to be done. He spun the little shell that was levitated toward his work area and considered this fact. Out of the corner of his eye he tried to observe some of the other students with tendencies toward animal welfare in hopes of gaining an amusement.

He went up and grabbed the phial of dragons blood and brought it back to the turtle shell. He grabbed the shell in one hand and with the other began to carve out his name. Rigorous P. Johnson. One of his many aliases.

Leah & Zander got cred for following him into the unknown. He'd be asking them about their wands later.

Oh good, no one seemed to have any issues with using Dragon's blood or the shells themselves. She had feared she'd have some try to say they couldn't do it, but she had a great class as always! Just look at the gas lesson even the girls were awesome in it! Turning her head she heard first Toby and then Cinna ask similar questions, "Well you both are dominantly called by your nicknames so I feel those would work. They aren't some crazy off the wall names just a shortened version of your full name. As for your last name Toby, you could try to carve small, but you could also just use Fuller or Thomas. I don't see the reading being off since they are both part of you whether you use them together or not. " Hoping that answered the question she turned as the next voice caught her attention.

SPOILER!!: Aj

Quote:

Originally Posted by PhoenixStar

Everybody got snaps in Cassie's class... even if you were wrong. Which AJ was by the way. And what do you mean that Zander hadn't been correct? AJ would have bet money that he was. Well then. This was why they weren't Ravenclaws, huh? Speaking of Ravenclaws, Eden was spot on with her oracle bone mess. And that was what exactly? How did they know this stuff? AJ knew hip bones, and things like that, but oracle bones? Pffft. Get out of here with that mess.

"We get to drink dragon blood?" Her eyes lit up for a second before she realized that wouldn't be happening. Of course it wouldn't be. "Oh, right..." It was for the shell. Made sense, but AJ kind of wanted to drink it. No reason why she did other than she was a bit out there. She bet it tasted magical.

Obviously she was going to pick the vial that had dragon blood in it. Now she needed to get this turtle shell cracking. First, she needed her name carved into it. Picking up her wand, she got down to business. Before her very eyes was Aubrey written pretty sloppily on the turtle shell. It was still get the job done though.

Hearing Aj she looked at her confused a second, had she not heard the direction, but then it seemed like she figured it out. "I would never make you drink any sort of blood. Nor would I ask you to do anything that could potential make you sick." Giving her a smile she looked around for anymore questions.

Seeing that everyone was finishing their shells, Cassie made her way back to the front of the room. Flicking her wand and allowing pictures of shells and meaning to appear on the board. "Now the readings are all based on the way the crack looks, but also the direction it's heading. Many times if the crack is heading downward it is meaning something more challenging or not great news, if it is moving upward it's usually more positive." She loved to think of it as uplifting since it was moving up.

"For the remainder of the class I would like you to look at your shell and jot down what it looks like and then follow the pictures I have put on the board or find the page in your text. Write down what the meaning of the cracks could be. If you have two different cracks you might want to pull them together and think of the meaning behind it. If the top crack is moving downward it could mean some challenges ahead, but the lower is moving upward could mean that you will come out on top and have good come out of the challenge."

Quote:

Crack is a straight line that moves upward before turning down: You will find yourself with a great opportunity to advance in your personal life.

Crack is going upward, but not in a straight more of a zig zag form: You will be faced with choice one will be a good choice the other will give you great complications.

Crack is going straight across: You will continue on the path you are on right now. You will maintain the mood and happenings that are in your life at this point.

Crack is going downward: You will be facing a situation that will involve negativity and sadness.

Crack is moving straight upward: Good things will come to you. You will find yourself faced with riches and success.

OOC: Hey everyone, if you haven't done the first two post for the cracking part go ahead and finish those up! I'm sorry Felix and Sarah I wasn't feeling good yesterday and didn't get to post with your answers! Just as the direction says have your charrie figuring out what their shells are telling them. I'll post to wrap up the lesson in the a.m. EST tomorrow! You guys rock!!

Alright. Shell carved? Cheque. Blood gotten? Cheque. He was missing the hot poker was all. He scooted away from the desk carrying his shell for a certain amount of paranoia and finding a poker, took it back with him where he could finish the process of getting that little shell to crack.

It was sort of destructive, this process and form of Divination. Playing with blood and fire and causing a slow, elegant ruin of an item. He felt this as he uncorked the phial of blood and poured the entirety of it's contents onto the surface where he'd carved one of his many aliases. Using his fingers, he rubbed the blood into the name to make it stand out more. Then, holding the poker and getting blood all over the handle end, he casted on it.

"Incendio." Fire ignited from the end of his wand and he watched the poker become red and orange with heat. When he thought it was hot enough, Cutty pressed it into the turtle shell. The sight was lovely, but the sound...the sound was what really got him. His personal moment of zen.

He had carved his name at the oracle bone: Jackson Hwang. He also already got the blood. So, what's next? The poker... right. The Korean boy then grabbed two pokers. So he already got everything. Moving on to the next step, okay?

He had decided to use dragon blood instead the oil. How much blood that he needed to drop at the shell? A drop? Two, Or the entire vial? Then he put like one or two drops of dragon blood at his oracle bone. It was enough, right? Jackson hoped so. Theeeeen.... With his wand, he cast the fire-conjuring charm to heat the pokers. "Incendio." He heated them until the color changed into red-orange. After that he pressed the pokers into the oracle bone.

Hmmm...

So, what should he do once the crack had done?

Norah held the vial of dragon's blood up to her nose to inspected it carefully. She wasn't entirely sure why she'd done it, considering there wasn't actually any way to TELL if the dragon it'd been taken from had been a happy dragon, but she couldn't just not try. The dragon had to be okay, right? They were tough 'n all that, they could get through losing a little blood and still be a-okay. Probably. Hopefully. She wsa just going to pretend it was a happy dragon 'cause she was already falling behind on this turtle thing. She took the stopped out of the vial and poured some of the thick, red liquid over the shell, lopsided carving and all. That was it, yeah? Wrinking her nose 'cause apparently even though the blood was a cool color it still smelled funny, she sealed the vial again and set it aside. Alrighty. Cracking time.

The fourth year picked up her wand in one hand and the poker in the other. "Incendio," she cast on the tip of the poker. She watched the flame with a little smile because the colors of fire were EVEN COOLER than the colors of dragon blood, then cast "Finite" when the poker itself began to glow orange. Did she just....poke it? It was called a poker, after all. Norah brought the glowing poker down and pressed it on the shell, jumping slightly at the sound of the crack. Nobody saw that, right? Real teenagers shouldn't get startled that easily.

Eden waited for the cracks to form..and placed the poker in the bucket of water next to her table. WELL THEN. She waited and...hmm. The cracks didn't look identical to any of those pictures, but she tried to pick out which one it resembled MOST.

Picture three.

So her life would remain...pretty much the same, then? She wrote this down and sighed. She was hoping for some uplifting things...but then..meh. MEH. She raised her hand a little. "Do you, personally, Professor, think it makes a different between using the oil and the blood?" she asked softly. "I would think blood...the dragon blood..it has magical properties...I would think it works better but I'm not sure." She was just CURIOUS.

Whew, okay, so 'Toby' was fine. He hadn't wasted a shell thing or anything and didn't need to start over. It DID look like he'd have to carve his full name, though. Toby nodded slowly and looked at the oracle bone, considering the professor's suggestion. Though really, there was no question about it. He wasn't going to choose just one name, it would be both. He looked up again and smiled. "Cool. Thanks professor!"

ALRIGHT. Time to get on with this carving then. Still using the Intaglio spell, Toby worked at the shell, trying his hardest to carved his entire full name onto it, making it kinda small like Professor Cassie had suggested. So, in the end, he was left with his first name in BIG letters... and then his double-barreled surname underneath and about half the size.

That had taken a while, and it seemed as though people were already starting to move on. Toby looked up at the vials and grabbed himself one that had oil in it, 'cause yeeeaaahhhh, still not feeling the whole blood thing. He poured that on the shell, then went and got himself a poker.

The heating it up part had stumped Toby for a moment, but he'd seen those around him use 'Incendio' to get the end nice and hot. That seemed to have worked for them, so he did just the same. "Incendio."

When the end of the poker was hot and glowing orange, it was time. He pressed the end into the shell, as intructed, until the shell cracked, then set the poker aside into the little bucket of water where it gave a great HISSSS and sent steam off the surface of the liquid.

Now that he heard Professor Cassie telling AJ about the blood, he looked over at his girlfriend with a quizzical look. Had she woken up on the wrong side of her bed with her head not on right? Tut, tut. Blood's not for drinking, AJ.
....................

The sixth year focused his attention on the board, studying the pictures and the meanings the Professor had magicked onto there. Since everything he needed was already on the board, he pulled his parchment and quill towards him before focusing on the shell. The dragon blood surely made it a whole lot easier to see the cracks.

The first crack Adi noticed was the one going straight across. "You will continue on the path you are on right now. You will maintain the mood and happenings that are in your life at this point,'' he read from the board. Hmmm. Maintain his mood? Yeah, he would. Moving on! There was a second crack going all the way upward in a straight direction. "Good things will come to you. You will find yourself faced with riches and success.'' Ooh! Adi liked the sound of that! Did that mean he would own that Hippogriff/Unicorn fast realllllly soon after graduating from Hogwarts? It was the main thing he had had mind focused on achieving. This question in turn made a question pop up in his head.

"Professor? Do these meanings have a time frame? I mean do they apply for... let's say a few weeks or month? Or will they come through within a few days?'' Errr, was that a stupid question? Heh. While he waited for an answer, Adi finished up looking for anymore cracks before scribbling down:

Annnnd... DONE!

Norah wrote down each crack meaning in her notes as Professor Cassie introduced it, doing her best to draw the crack like in the picture but failing miserably because apparently drawing turtle cracks wasn't a job for people with no patience. Lame. There went another job opportunity down the toilet. Pushing her parchment to the edge of the table again, she leaned close to her turtle shell and squinted at it, holding her nose 'cause that blood stuff was still having a funny smell that her nose didn't seem to be a huge fan of.

The crack started out going upwards except not really because it was doing some sort of zig zag thing. Huh. She wrote that observation down in her notes, then turned her head sideways to look at the shell some more. The second half and the first half didn't really seem to agree with each other, 'cause it had kind of turned into a whole nother crack branching off of the first one which meant one and a half cracks? What qualified as a whole crack, anyways? The first crack continued going up in a zig zag type thing like before, but the second, littler one was just going down. She added those two observations to her notes. Okay, so. What'd that MEAN?

Oh, Okay. Good. She had already carved Cinna in their but she thought she had enough room to go ahead carve in her whole name. "Awesome." Nodding toward professor Cassie and sent her smile before working on finishing her name up on the shell.

So these cracks where were they? Which way were they going? Well It looked like there was three very different cracks on her shell. One crack going straight across, meaning that she will stay on the same path and she would keep the mood and happenings of the things going on now. Hmmm. Was that suppose to be a good thing? She really wasn't sure how she felt about the things there were going on right now. Another crack was kind of a zigged one moving up toward the top. Choices one good and that would be complicated. Well. That might be a good thing. Then the last crack was going downward meaning facing a negative sititation that would be sad.

WEll then was a promising. Not.

OKay.... Yeah that was not confusing at all.

Kate thought her shell looked kind of weird, but she guessed that wasn't really the point she was supposed to be getting at here. Deciding she should really get a move on, she raised her wand and pointed it toward the turtle. She traced her wand in the shape of the letters in her name and pretty soon, her full name was carved into the shell.

Well, that was done. Now what?

Oh, right. The blood or the oil? Kate immediately wanted to go for the blood, because her mom was a Dragonologist, and Kate thought the connection was cool. Kate collected the blood and poured just a bit of it onto the shell. She watched with slight fascination as the blood trickled across the shell.

Really, the hardest part of this activity was categorising exactly what the cracks in the shell looked like. It was all pretty subjective, really. Someone might see things one way and someone else might define the same crack as totally different. But then Toby figured that was probably part of the magic of Divination, at least when doing your own reading; it was YOUR brain looking at the thing, and it would probably see what it needed to see. That made him feel more confident about things.

Toby's oracle bone had a crack that was going right down the middle. Except he couldn't tell WHICH direction it was going in, up or down. Not that it really mattered, because he'd already had a glimpse of the meanings behind everything, and seen what a downward crack meant. His brain had refused to accept that it might be that one, and already Toby was writing down the more positive prediction, along with a couple others he'd spotted.

Mkay. Done.

...

......

.........

Except no, he wasn't. He'd cheated. He'd not been honest and he'd chosen the prediction he'd WANTED and now Toby felt AWFUL and FULL OF GUILT. Disproportionately so. He was no stranger to lying, not really, but in this context it felt awful, because Toby had very strict personal rules about when it was okay to lie, and it was usually more to do with telling people he was okay when he wasn't. Dishonest Divination predicitions benefited no-one, and it was like CHEATING in his SCHOOLWORK. He couldn't take it. COULDN'T HANDLE THE GUILT. So he hurriedly added more to his parchment.

....... Toby sank down a little in his chair. Sudden sads had hit and it was all his own fault. He wanted to leave now. Was class over yet?

Okay, this part seemed pretty easy. There weren't too many cracks on her shell and they all tended to be on the big side.

Glancing at the board, Lux made a mental note of the different images before opening her notebook to a new page. The first thing that she noticed on the shell was a crack that moved upwards in a zig-zag manner. She wasn't sure what to think of that, but oh well. Maybe there was something nicer for her to interpret. Shrugging it off, she then made note of the crack that moved upwards in a straight line before going down. Okay, that was better...and the meanings could actually be related to each other.

The last crack moved across the shell in a straight line. She supposed the meaning for that one was good...at least nothing bad came to her from it, but she would not be on the same path forever because there was so much that she wanted to do with her life. So much would change when she graduated, and Lux couldn't wait.

Picking up her pencil, she recorded all her findings in her notes:

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lux's Notes

Crack moving upward in a zig-zag manner: You will be faced with choice one will be a good choice the other will give you great complications.

Crack moves upwards in a straight line before moving downwards: You will find yourself with a great opportunity to advance in your personal life.

Crack moves straight across: You will continue on the path you are on right now. You will maintain the mood and happenings that are in your life at this point.

It seems that I will be faced with two choices: one with a good result, and the other with a complicated result. Given the fact that I will also find myself with an opportunity to advance in my personal life I'd say that the two readings are related to each other. It also seems that I am going to continue on the path that I am on now - which means the great opportunity for personal advancement will be turned down. I don't understand why I would turn down a great opportunity that is beneficial to me, so I am not sure what to make of this.

Kate should really get a move on. It looked like they were nearly ready to wrap things up, and she still needed to get a poker and start poking around. She selected a poker and pointed her wand toward the end of it. She spent a few moments heating it then ended the spell and put her wand away for now. She pushed the heated end into the shell, making a small crack.

Things were moving along now. Good. Kate put the heated end of the poker into the bucket of ice. Her ten minutes were probably close to being up, so next step now? Yes.

Zander stared at his turtle shell for a while. A very long while. So long that all the cracks sort of looked like one giant one now? And the more he thought about it... None of the other cracks were anything major. One stood out more than the rest and the other ones were like little baby ones that probably didn't even count.

Maybe this is what Professor Morgan meant by the preference between the oil and blood. It got Zander thinking, y'know? Like.... Would he have had more cracks if he chose to use the blood instead? Interesting. Not that he really cared all too much either way. He was really just in this class 'cause he'd done well on the OWL. And 'cause Professor Morgan was nice despite all the... erm... Anger potion things that had happened. And, divination wasn't all that bad, so long as he followed along with the class.

Which meant he had to get a move on because it looked like everyone else was already getting to their interpretations!! Oops.

Right. So the big crack on his looked like it was going from the left to the right... Which meant, uh a straight across crack? That sounded about right. He quickly glanced at his notes to see what that meant and huh. Interesting.

Quote:

"Crack is going straight across: You will continue on the path you are on right now. You will maintain the mood and happenings that are in your life at this point."

Okay, he could work with that.

Quote:

The crack on my shell is going straight across which means I'm not really going to be doing much. Well, not like that. But I'm staying pretty much in the same circumstances that I'm in now. Nothing is really gonna change, which is weird and I'm not sure if I like that. But I'm gonna stay in the same mindset, which is hopefully wrong because I've got a lot to learn before NEWTs next year. And Professor Flamsteed wants to see me change my mindset about stuff too so this can't be a good sign. But uh, yeah. No change. Staying constant. Straight path, basically.

And they were moving along to the next step now. Luckily it appeared to be a rather simple step with no real skill needed. First things first though she needed to copy down those notes. Picking up her quill which had been set aside earlier at the beginning of the lesson Hady also took out a piece of clean parchment and began to neatly write down what each crack meant.

As she was taking notes the snakette couldn't help but to glance of at her turtle shell. She was silently hoping for something good honestly cause who wouldn't be?

Done with note taking she carefully pulled the turtle shell in front of her to examine the cracks running through it. Most of the lines crisscrossed through another line. It was sorta hard to tell where one line began and another ended. SIGH. Maybe this wasn't going to be as easy as she'd thought.

Quote:

Crack is going downward: You will be facing a situation that will involve negativity and sadness.

Crack is going upward, but not in a straight more of a zig zag form: You will be faced with choice one will be a good choice the other will give you great complications.

Crack is a straight line that moves upward before turning down: You will find yourself with a great opportunity to advance in your personal life.

My turtle shell had four cracks on it. The longest one was running downwards in the center of the shell, this is supposed to mean a situation is coming my way that will bring sadness. I'm not entirely sure of these next two as they both were a bit zig-zaggy and ran into each other... so it appears that sooner or later I'll be faced with having to make some type of choice about something. The last crack that goes up before turning down means an opportunity to move forward in my life.

Setting her quill down Hady's eyes moved from what she'd written on her parchment to the cracks on the turtles shell. Most of it was rather conflicting. How was this supposed to play out? Was something bad going to happen, then a hard decision be made before something really good? It didn't make much sense to her right now so after another moment of rereading it Hady pushed it aside. She wasn't going to stress herself out about it right now.