Tenacius totally believed in the validity of his answer. Its gravy that his Professors look to be quite amused with it, regardless of its on the ball or not. But upon Hirsch's reply, it does sound like he wasn’t too far off. "Right don’t break whats inside." he nodded in acknowledgement. Honesty that could be his life's anthem right now.

But right, now for the figurative breaking part-- the one that deals with numbers. With rapt attention he watched Tanner do the spell. Yes complicated indeed. Fascinating, but incredibly complicated. He didn’t even know how to position his arm just so the wandstroke would look right. Was it like trying to pipe some icing on a cupcake? He could try it that way...

Point wand down and turn turn spiral up..... The Curly Top tried it several more times. After a few tries his arm ached. Is he doing this right? Looking to le Profs for confirmation....?

It wasn't long before the man started walking around the classroom and in between the desks again. Who wanted to stay standing in one place? It wasn't right and it wasn't in Hirsch's style. Besides, with this way, he could see how the students were doing, even reassuring them if they needed it. Like Tenacius, for example. The young Gryffindor got a smile and a nod from the Defence Professor who'd managed to catch the wand movement in time.

It was like piping cupcakes, wasn't it?

It was then that he spotted Miss Valentine's hand up and he turned his attention towards her instead. Would they get blisters if the spell went wrong? Er. He glanced over at Tiara - what was it that she had said? - before looking back at the Ravenclaw and shaking his head. "No. The object of this spell is the curse itself, not the box," As Tiara had mentioned. "So if you got this spell wrong, you won't be affected by the curse because the object of the spell isn't the box. In short, this spell only deals with the curse on the box, not the box itself." Here's hoping that he hadn't confused her even more. "If you get it right, the numbers will pop up over the box. If not, nothing will happen to you."

"And bear in mind that some cursed objects can give you effects that make blisters look and feel like a small prick on your finger. But you won't have to worry about that here." Smile.

Azura looked over at Professor Tanner as she said to keep trying, at least it seemed like she had the pronunciation and the movement down yeah? If she knew she had that right, then all she really had to do was concentrate on the spell..

She could do this.. Magic came easy to her.. Running, kicking, jumping.. not so much.. But this.. this she could do.. She had gotten the gravity spell on the fourth try.. so..

The teen cleared her mind and took a deep breath as she concentrated on the box, the spell and hand movement.. She slowly started to spiral her wand upwards while saying "Arithmos Revelio Scindo." Her wand ended up somewhere around her shoulders when she was down and she looked over at the box for a moment.. hoping to see golden numbers..

But nothing..

Fwoopers..

Well.. She wasn't giving up! No she wasn't! She moved just a little closer and took a deep breath and concentrated again. "Arithmos Revelio Scindo.." She said as she ended her wand movement right around her shoulder again and she eyed the box..

Was that..

Were those golden numbers?

Were they?

They looked kinda faint.. Azura had to squint.. Was she getting it?

One more time??

One more time!

The purple eyed teen took another deep breath, centered her mind and started her wand movement as she said Arithmos Revelio Scindo!" She looked up at the box and let out a little breath.. Those WERE numbers! And they were clear enough to see!

"Professor Tanner, I think I got it!" Well.. mostly anyways.. They could be seen yeah?

Curse-breaking was not Hady's 'thing'. Therefore she didn't know all to much about it other then what one could read about in textbooks. Okay, wait so that wasn't entirely true. She did know a fair deal about the career since it was her bestie's chosen profession but that still didn't make her an expert. Which was why she had pulled out a sheet of parchment and her self-inking quill, the one that now used a lovely shade of orange ink. Were you proud of her Adi?!

The sixth year took down every single bit of information that was said between both professors. If this stuff was as dangerous as she knew it to be she wouldn't be taking any chances and messing about even if the current box they were to work on wouldn't harm her. "Arithmos...Revelio...Scindo," Hady whispered to herself as she finished up the last few lines of notes. Setting down her quill she continued to repeat the incantation several more times. It was longer and a bit different then the ones she normally used. "Arithmos Revelio Scindo, Arithmos Revelio Scindo."

Sure that she was was saying it properly she was ready to move on. Pulling out her wand she held it straight out in front of her at waist level. Slowly she made a clockwise spiral moving upwards until she came to finish at about the height of her chin/shoulder area. The movement was a little strange but after doing this a few more times it wasn't so bad really it just took some getting used to.

A few more silent minutes of practice and Hady was confident enough to really give it a true go. Shifting her weight in her seat this time she aimed her wand at the box a few rows up front. Slowly she started the wand movement with the clockwise spiral moving upwards, "Arithmos Revelio Scindo!" she recited clearly finishing at about chin level once again.

Her eyes were trained in on the box but she saw nothing. Just a box. No golden numbers. Not even a shimmer of numbers. Nothing.

Tiara watched Azura for awhile. She seemed to be struggling, but again, that was normal. Then the girl seemed to spot something. Following her gaze, Tiara noted a faint glow above the cursed box. Oh keep trying..! Success! Clapping, the professor exclaimed, "Oh well done, Miss Kennedy!"


"No need to worry, Miss Lynch. Keep trying. It is complex spellwork, after all," she reassured her.

OOC: I'd like to move on tonight, but we'll see. Could be tomorrow depending on how fast you guys are posting.

"Oh that makes sense," responded Kitty with open relief. She smiled faintly."Thank you Professor." Now she wouldn't have to worry about getting blisters if she failed the spell.

Right. With that out of the way, Kitty could practice the spell in earnest. She was pretty certain that she had the pronunciation nailed so the next step would be the wand movement. Pulling her wand out tightly she brought it out at waist level. That was what Hady had done nearby and she looked like she knew what she doing. Then she brought it up in a clockwise spiral motion, stopping when she reached her chin. She repeated this slow movement several times. Kitty's practice went on as long as Hady's practice.

Now was the time to try it. Kitty took a few deep, silent breaths and closes and opened her eyes. Then she brought her wand up at waist level and muttered the incantation. "Arithmos Revelio Scindo, Arithmos Revelio Scindo, Arithmos Revelio Scindo," She muttered this repeatedly until at last she shouted it. "Arithmos Revelio Scindo!"

Golden numbers started appearing in her view. Faint, but unmistakably they were numbers.

"I did it!" Kitty squeaked and turned to beam at the professors.

"Thank you for clarifying, Professor Tanner and Charlotte." She gave them each a small smile before beginning to practice.

Juno first practice the swirling up circular motion and stopped just at her head. She did this multiple times because she wanted to make sure the motion was correct. This kinds of spells could be really difficult.

She then repeated the phrase, "Arithmos Revelio Scindo. Arithmos Revelio Scindo. Arithmos Revelio Scindo. Arithmos Revelio Scindo!" When she felt she had said it enough, she stood firm, closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and exhaled. When she was ready she put her wand in the proper beginning place. She swirled her wand in a clockwise motion while slowly moving her arm upward, "Arithmos Revelio Scindo!"

AND....nothing happened.

This wand movement was awful. Jaemin watched the professor do it, blinking slowly as his empty hand hovered above the desktop and absently started trying to duplicate it. He didn't lift his arm up the way she did, but even without that it just seemed so intricate, and he wondered why it was like that. What was it supposed to be doing? Why didn't they have classes dedicated solely to this?!

The small Slytherin felt around in his pocket for his wand, and gave the wand movement a few tries through, this time properly. Clockwise spirals, up up up until it was near shoulder level. The spell echoed in his head, and he did his best to get the timing to fit it. It was worse than the gravity spell, Meeeeerlin.

He was pretty sure he had that part down. Now... now he just had to make sure he could say the spell right, and hopefully it would work. Jaemin set his wand down, humming to himself, and looked up at the box the professor had cast upon. The numbers were still there... he wanted to make them show up too.

"Ah-rith-moes," he murmured softly, eyes drifting down to the desk top as his fingertip tapped against it with every syllable. "Ruh-vel-ee-oh. Sin-doh."

He repeated it a few times more, fingertip still tapping lightly away with each part of the spell. He'd spoken easier spells, and he's spoken harder ones, so this was nothing hugely awful. It was just long, which meant the timing for getting the wand movement right was gonna be weird. Jaemin picked up his wand again, lightly turning it in his fingers until it felt comfortable, and went about combining the spell with the wand movement.

"Arithmos Revelio Scindo." He started off with a point right at the box, then started the weird curly spiral movement. His hand was getting up too high... too high. It was going to pass his forehead. MEHHHH. He gave it another shot. "Arithmos Revelio Scindo!"

...nothing, though his timing was a little better. The small boy looked around the classroom as others got the numbers to appear, frowning a little because it was frustrating to not be able to get it as easily as they seemed to. He squinted at the gold numbers, then had a sudden thought.

"Professors?" he raised a hand curiously. "Is there only one curse on the box? If there's more than one, do you have to do the spell for each curse, or does it get them all at once together?"

Would they all get the same numbers, or would their spells possibly catch different curses and spit out different numbers? New spells were so interesting, even if they were sorta... difficult.

Tighter spirals?

She could do that.

Nodding in appreciation for the tip, Esme continued to make the clockwise spirals with her wand, this time making them even tighter. Was this good enough? Once she had performed the movement enough times to make her feel satisfied that she was doing everything correctly, she decided to give the spell another try.

"Arithmos Revelio Scindo."

Nothing happened, so she was clearly off with her timing. UGH, this really WAS difficult. Professor Tanner definitely wasn't lying there. Another try and she was STILL off. Third time WASN'T always the charm but she was still not going to give up. Nope. She would succeed in the end. "Arithmos Revelio Scindo. Arithmos Revelio Scindo. Arithmos Revelio Scindo..." On and on she continued trying to get the spell right until...

... "I DID IT!" Yaaay. Did Juno see that???? Kitty got a thumbs up because she had also managed to do the spell correctly.

"Arithmos revelio scindo." Olly started by pointing his wand at the box, and as he said the incantation he worked the spiral upward. By the time he was done, though, his hand was reaching way above his head. That was much higher than it was supposed to be. He was not surprised when nothing happened. So he tried again. "Arithmos revelio scindo." Again he started with the point, but this time he tried to move upward more slowly. It went pretty well and his wand hand ended up about eye level, but still nothing happened.

The wand movement was weird, and it seemed pretty unspecific. Why wasn't there a specific number of spirals he had to complete by the time he was finished? Wasn't magic usually pretty specific like that? Maybe that was one thing that made this spell a bit more complicated than others. Part of his problem was also probably that he was focusing too much on the wand movement instead of the spell. Spells needed a lot of focus, and that was often a problem he had with making them work. Olly tried again.

"Arithmos revelio scindo." This time he tried to let his arm do it's own thing without thinking about it too much. He let it do whatever felt most natural. His spiral ended close to his shoulder and the whole thing had felt a lot better than the others, but apparently not good enough. He still had not many any numbers appear. But how would the professor know which students had made which numbers appear anyway?

Char's spiraling wand and arm lifting had a natural flare to it, though in a controlled way. It was perhaps obvious that she wasn't too worried about the wand movement

She beamed at Juno and then went right back to practicing the wand movement and the incantation together, working on getting the timing right and natural.

"Arithmos Revelio Scindo!" Or, physically, twirl twirl twirlytwirl twirl twirl. It was feeling pretty good! And with her understanding of what the spell meant, the intent part shouldn't be TOO hard, Char thought.

"Arithmos Revelio Scindo!"

Just wait until she told her dad that she could break curses!

Hadleigh lifted her head to catch sight of Professor Tanner walking around and stopping near her for a few seconds. Her encouragement was met with a smile and firm nod. Complex spell or not she was sure she would get it. If younger kids around her were getting it then so would she. Cause really how hard could it be when these second and third years were seeing the numbers appear.

Flexing her fingers around her wand more comfortably she went over the incantation in her head. She knew for sure that she was saying it correctly so there was no problem there. There wasn't a problem in the wand movement either or Professor Tanner would have mentioned it. So if nothing was wrong she would continue with what she was doing.

"Arithmos revelio scindo!," Hady called out clearly and slowly while making the clockwise spiral from her waist up to shoulder level. When it didn't work she tried it again speaking more slowly, firmly and picturing the numbers floating above the box in her mind. She was seeing it so clearly in her head that she even blinked a few times to prove it wasn't there but wait...that was- golden numbers! Clearly floating above the box. Not bright blinding ones but the numbers were there and readable. This was good enough for her right now.

He caught the look from Professor Hirsch. Alriiight he is on the right track.

So pipping away some imaginary icing on this imaginary cupcake. Giant imaginary cupcake. Giant imaginary cupcake with a scary exterior but a yummy interior. Ok now he was hungry.

Now that he can visualize what he was doing, the wand stroke didn’t seem to hard anymore. It was saying the spell that’s the next hurdle to overcome. "Artemius Revelius...." No that didn’t sound right. "Artemy Revelio Sin.. Sin..." gah why cant they have English spells for once eh? Now he understood the perks of doing things non-verbal.

He staaaared at his notes for what this spell actually looked like Arithmos. Revelio. Scindo. Arithmos. Revelio. Scindo. Arithmos. Revelio. Scindo. Get that through your thick skull Gryffindor.

"Arithmos. Revelio. Scindo. Arithmos. Revelio. Scindo...." he repeated it to himself over and over, first towards his notes and then now with his wand doing the clockwise piping swirl in the air "Arithmos revelio scindo."

✨✨twinkle twinkle golden numbers hello! ✨✨

"Oh! Oh! Look!" he beamed pointing at the sparkling visage floating ahead of him.

This was boring. Writing notes was boring, especially considering Daxton did not actually need to write anything down to remember it. Looking busy was a poor trade-off for doing something so mind-numbingly dull. So, once he had written as much as was necessary, he set his pen down and folded his arms on his desk, covering up his notebook so nobody could read what he had put - a habit he had formed in lessons to prevent anyone, staff or student, from snooping and reading even his most innocuous thoughts.

Now that he had nothing to do, Daxton could focus his time on his bitter thoughts. Bitter thoughts about Hirsch, and about the combined class which had meant that Arithmancy - which Daxton usually liked - today required spellwork. Probably Hirsh's fault, his idea. Leaning forward and resting his chin on his arms, Daxton reflected on how it probably would have been better if he had skipped the lesson today, given that he could not practice the spellwork, and was therefore wasting his time there.

Looking bored and glazed over - but deceptively so, as he was, as ever, incredibly alert to his surroundings and ready to react to any potential attack - Daxton began to think about spells and curses; the ones he was working on trying to cast non-verbally, the ones he was attempting to invent and develop. He looked very much as though he would prefer to be anywhere but in that Arithmancy classroom... and that was exactly the case. Without practicing spells - which he refused to do in front of others - practical lessons automatically became boring, and boredom plagued Daxton day in and day out, and he found it intolerable. He would do anything to avoid it.

"I see good progress from many of you!" she said to the class with evident pride. "If you have not managed it yet that is alright, you will have more opportunities in a bit." Tiara waved her wand and a list of ten numbers' meanings appeared on the board. "These are selected meanings for the digits, which I took from your textbook, I believe in chapter two." She didn't have the order memorized, after all. "You should be quite familiar with them if you take Arithmancy. Keep them in mind, because breaking the curse depends upon them."



Here came the information overload portion of class. "Right. There are four major parts of a curse: the basis, kernel, range, and cline. The basis is always first and tells who or what the curse affects. The second portion is the kernel, sometimes called the core, and tells what the curse does. Third is the range, which tells you how the spell is activated or what triggers it. Last is the cline, or type, which is the two single numbers you see at the end; it tells what kind of spell it is and its severity." With another wave of her wand, the other half of the board summarized the information.

Tiara performed the arithmos revelio scindo again and the same numbers appeared over the box for all to see.

28 . 080 . 527 . 4 . 9

So now to break down the parts of the curse. "So for this particular curse, we see the basis is 28. Remember, the basis is what the spell targets or affects. From the meanings of 2 on the left side of the board," she pointed towards it, "I would guess humans are affected, and from the 8 I would guess movement. Put it all together, and a good hypothesis is that the curse will affect humans' ability to move." Not permanently dangerous, since this was a classroom exercise.

Next came the kernel. "The kernel is what the spell does, remember, and for this curse it is 080. Looking back at our list of meanings, I see 0 being nothingness or cessation, while 8 is self-mastery and movement. Put them together and it leads me to conclude this curse will stop my movement and immobilize me." Once more, Tiara paused momentarily to give them time to catch up.

"Okay, that leaves the range - what triggers the curse to take affect - and the two parts of the cline, or how serious the curse is. Keeping in mind this is all new to you and I do not expect perfection, I would like to hear your ideas of what the range and cline mean. You may guess just one or both, and no guess is bad!" Well... almost no guess was bad.

Ahhh. So one would have to reveal a curse, crack it, disable it, and then check for more curses... over and over again, until you probably got no more numbers. Then that'd mean you could open the box, right? Jaemin nodded slowly, looking at the list on the board as Professor Tanner explained the first two digits' meanings and what could be inferred. This sort of stuff wasn't really... something he felt strong and comfortable with. Straightforward stuff was his forte. But...

The range was 527. Each number had multiple meanings, but it wouldn't be difficult to pick which ones would be most likely, right?

"The range is humans, physical touch, and magic... so either magic or touching it could make it go off then, right? But the Cline says endurance but also short-lived..." he frowned. "I dunno how it can be both, cause endurance means long-term, doesn't it?"

Maybe it meant it was practical and short-lived. Was the first number the type, and the second the severity? Or were they meant to be understood together, as indicators of both at the same time? The whole 'multiple possibilities' thing made this difficult. Why couldn't everything be clear and have a single meaning? Defense stuff was supposed to be straightforward, so curse breaking should be too.

Azura put her wand down as she got the spell and returned to her seat, her full attention was on Professor Tanner, though she did drop her eyes a bit to scribble down some of what all of the numbers meant and what they all were.

Also, it seemed a little complicated, but this was better than.. you know.. getting cursed. And Azura was never one to shirk away from hard work. She peered up at the numbers meanings again as Professor Tanner asked them to guess what it meant..

Uhhhh..

The teen raised her hand.. "I have a guess about the Cline Professor.. The first number Four, seemed to say that it might effect our brain, or our ability to think clearly, perhaps connected to how we use our bodies seeing as number 9 has power and strength.. Maybe.. some sort of Jelly Brain Jinx? Or some curse like that spell?" She said as she looked up at the numbers again.. Not sure if what she had said was correct.. But that was her best guess.. So..

Woo?

Kitty beamed with confidence as Professor Tanner complimented her spell work. "Thank you," she said with a shy, but pleased smile.

Then it was time for them to try to figure out what the numbers represented. She liked this challenge, as it reminded her of the riddles Ravenclaws had to answer to get into their common room. Kitty repeated all the numbers out loud. "Right, so the range is 527. Five stands for change, freedom, physical world, physical touch - so I'm going to take the last one (physical touch) since you took the last ones for the earlier numbers." She continued reading. "Two stand for harmony, unity, relationships, collaboration, duality, humans - so I'll take humans." One more to go. "And seven stands for analysis, wisdom, spiritual focus, magic - so I take magic."

"Just from reading the final words of every number, we have physical touch, humans, and magic. So my guess is that the curse only is triggered if it is touched by a human."

Did she do that right?

Text Cut: Catching up

Whoa, was there treasure in that box at the front of the room? Did they each get a share? Or maybe only the person who was able to open the box could have it... Never mind, that was beside the point?

Fiyero considered Professor Hirsch's scenario for a minute. What would he do to open a box he thought was cursed? Well, he wouldn't touch it, that was for sure! He could use a spell, but that's what everybody was saying. He needed to come up with his own answer! Okay, so use a spell... but which one? What about a shield charm? he thought, momentarily forgetting that he didn't know how to perform a shield charm. Then the curse might rebound and open the box...

That sounded dumb! After hearing his classmates' answers, he was almost glad he hadn't said anything. Then the professors started speaking again. So using spells on a cursed object could be dangerous? Good to know... Professor Tanner said something about using a spell on the curse itself; Fiyero wondered how that would work. He didn't know you could use spells on other spells! He watched intently as she performed a complicated-looking spell, and a bunch of gold numbers appeared. That sounded hard, but it wasn't going to stop him from trying!

He drew his wand, pointing it at the box. "Arithmos revelo scindio." No that wasn't it! "Arithmos revelio scindo!" he said, trying to copy Professor Tanner's wand movements exactly; nothing happened. Let's try that again! "Arithmos revelio scindo," he said a bit louder this time, but the timing of his spirals seemed to be off.

Fiyero sighed; here's hoping third time's the charm! "Arithmos revelio scindo," he said, swirling his wand in tight spirals until it reached the level of his shoulder. This time a couple very faint numbers appeared. Why was it just a few of them instead of the whole sequence? Still, he'd done a bit better that time; at least he got something to appear! He'd just raised his wand for one more try when Professor Tanner spoke up again. Darn! He almost had it!

Fiyero listened to Professor Tanner, jotting down some of what she said in his notes. He tried to follow along, but he was even more confused than ever! Why did all these numbers have so many different meanings? Not to mention the fact that some of the meanings conflicted with each other...

He scratched his head, trying to riddle it out. The first set of numbers was 527, so that meant... physical touch, humans, and magic. In other words, exactly what that other guy had said. There was no need for him to repeat it, was there? He decided to come up with his own answer instead.

After spending a couple of minutes lost in thought, Fiyero raised his hand. "The first number of the cline is 4, and one of the meanings for that number is complexity," he guessed, "So it might be a really complicated curse. The other number 9 can mean short-lived or immediate, so maybe the curse is fast-acting but doesn't last very long..." He knew he was probably wrong, but oh well... at least he'd tried!

Professor Tanner was applauding her.

Esme resisted the temptation to bow and instead smiled at the woman. Yes, she had managed to do the spell right with that little hint. Teachers really were very helpful but then that was part of their job. Some just weren't very good at it was all. Anyway they were moving on in the lesson and this was the part where the numbers were explained... and it ACTUALLY made sense. Huh. Here she had thought that everything in curse breaking would be over her head.

There wasn't really much for her to say, however, because others had already mentioned what she would have. Yep, Esme was staying quiet for now.

527

Echo was looking down at her paper, trying to figure out what the range would be. First she looked at the first number which was a 5, so any change or physical touch.... She would guess physical touch. Having her notes with her proved to help alot. Smirking she continued. Now that we have figured out that it effects humans so the correct answer was right in front of her "Humans". now the last number was a 7, and it seemed a bit tricky to her, analysis...wisdom...... spritual focus.... and magic.. the first three of those options didnt really work to well, with how it would be "activated" so magic would have to do. Echo added this to her notes.


Starring down at her numbers and the selection that she had come up with she blinked... it was right in front of her.

"Professor, I think its "activated" by touching the box but it will only activate if a human is a witch or wizard.. i dont think it will work on normal humans" hey it was worth a guess right, Echo actually hasnt worked this hard in any of her other classes so it was good to get her mind moving.

Hadleigh gave Professor Tanner a smile, "Thank you Professor." Practice normally paid off in the end and here proved no different. It took a few tries but in the end the golden numbers were there as they should be and that's all that currently mattered to her. And then it wasn't. Now the numbers were being broken down into different sections and given meanings. Oh geez. This was why she was NOT going to be a cursebreaker. It was confusing.

Almost instantly she grabbed up her quill and quickly began to write ALL of this down. The entire breakdown process. It was enough to give her a headache already but at least this was just a lot of guess work for the time being, her life didn't depend on whether or not she got this correct.

After taking a few moments to breakdown the number 527 into three different single numbers of 5, 2 and 7 she then checked the meaning for each. Going over the meanings she raised her hand. "I would guess that the 'range' numbers means that the curse is activated by a magical humans touch, therefore a witch or wizard." It made sense to her anyhow. Simple yet practical.

Ok he already knew that curse breaking is complex, but it was also tricky. He looked at the cipher and then at the numbers and back and forth. Anything here can be combined to produce a completely different result. So the Gryffindor lad scratched his noggin and wrote his notes down. Think think think like he's never thunk before.....

Then raised his hand when it was his turn to speak. "Sir, the Range 527 could mean that the spell is activated either via human physical touch or via magic. So basically whoever interacts with it physically or magically can trigger the curse." Did that sound about right? He hoped so.

"And as for the Cline 4 and 9.......whatever this spell is its probably complex and that it has an immediate effect that ends endurance.... oh is that why the effect-- I mean the Kernel-- is that movement just ceases?"

And then a thought "Professors, is the spell on the box some kind of Petrificus Totalus? You said the spell being used as a 'curse' for this lesson isnt that bad.... But if it was a real curse, might be some kind of Petrification effect?"

Jaemin took the first crack at it. Tiara nodded along. "I like your thinking on the range. You are absolutely correct that human magic or human touch will activate the curse. Keep thinking on the cline. This stuff is difficult and there is not always one possibility." That's what made curses so dangerous. One could never be 100% sure they had figured it out completely before they performed a counter of some sort.


Tiara pointed right at Azura. "Now that is the type of reasoning you need to have to break curses." Not that no one else had good thinking! "That is a well-reasoned option, Miss Kennedy."


Interesting method. "It certainly does not always need to be the last word, Miss Valentine, but you did pick up on an interesting pattern. You are correct that human touch triggers the curse, but what about the magic part you mentioned?"


Fiyero had been quiet, but now he chose to speak up after putting some time into thinking. Tiara's eyebrow went up as she listened. This first year had potential! "Really, Mister Jones, I doubt I could have said it better myself. Bravo!" She beamed.


Nothing from Esme? Not a problem. Perhaps her guess had already been mentioned.


Oh! Tiara could definitely see how Echo would get to that line of reasoning. The professor paused a moment in response and thought about it. "I can see where you would get to that, Miss Duchannes." She hadn't heard that particular answer before, and it intrigued her. "It is not true, unfortunately, but it is a very creative and well-reasoned response." Impressed, she was.


Same twist that Echo had come up with. "More like any magic performed by a human, rather than humans with magical blood," she clarified.


Sir?! "I am the one asking the questions right now, Mister Salander," she said, resisting the urge to call him 'miss'. "Although I am sure Professor Hirsch is listening to all the answers with rapt attention. Please do the same yourself." Tiara tried hard not to smirk.

She focused in on the last portion of his answer now. "This is a good segue. The range is 527 - the 2 refers to humans, and the 5 and 7 refer to physical touch or magic. Therefore we can infer that if a human either performs magic upon or touches the box, the curse will be activated." Now for the cline. "The 4 tells us it is a complex, specific spell; the 9 tells us the effects of the curse will occur immediately but be short-lived." So all in all, they had done a good job thinking things through.

"Mister Salander is correct in his guess. The curse I placed on this box is a modified version of the Full-Body Bind. If any human attempts to touch or cast a spell on the box, they will immediately be frozen in place for several seconds, then released."

"Which leads us to how we break this curse." She had been in the lead for a while now. Perhaps it was Roderik's turn again? "Let me hand it over to Professor Hirsch before you start making any guesses." She stepped to the side and let her colleague take over.

How these students were understanding the Arithmancy part of this, Hirsch didn't know. It was a lot of information to take in and, if any of them were like him, they'd probably be itching to get into the practical activity. He'd never been good at the theoretical subjects and relied mostly on his stamina to get him through.

Regardless, he was quite impressed when the answers started to pour in and the students gave their thoughts. Quite a few of them were on the mark, even. Smiles and nods were given out and a certain Mr Salander got himself an amused smirk as well as a small wink for the pronoun use. He didn't really care, but that might have had a lot to do with the fact that he wasn't the one taking the answers right now.

Oh, his turn? Excellent.

Clapping his hands once to gain everyone's attention, Hirsch started speaking, "Okay, so, the next step a curse breaker takes is probably one of the more dangerous parts: breaking the actual curse itself." Should he give a moment for the excitement to settle in? No? Okay. "You've brought up the numbers, figured out what the curse on the object could be using Arithmancy and now you just need to crack it."

Sounds simple, right?

Wrong.

"Now, we're faced with a bit of a problem: you have a cursed box that you're trying to open but you can't touch it and you can't cast any odd spells at it to make it open so how exactly do you go about opening it? How do we break this form of the Body Bind Curse?" Did anyone have any idea?


OOC: HAI lovelies So be as creative as you want with your answers! The lesson won't continue until, roughly, tomorrowish where we'll be starting the main activity ^^