Chapter 166: gatron & the Giant Chessboard
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The DADA professor again?
Plenty of students exchanged odd looks.
It was starting to feel like every little stunt sohow drew in the DADA professors—first Lockhart, now Wilkinson. And Wilkinson arrived even faster than Lockhart had. Things hadn’t even properly started before he was already there.
Everyone wondered if Tom would just pack up and walk away like last ti.
"Professor, you actually know gatron?"
Instead of brushing him off, Tom surprised everyone by starting a conversation with Wilkinson.
"Hahaha!" Laos bood a laugh. "Back when I was a student, I couldn’t wait for sumr holidays so I could get ho and watch Transforrs cartoons."
"You had a TV at ho, professor?" Justin Finch-Fletchley asked, eyes wide.
Laos shook his head with a grin. "Nah, the old folks at my house hated them. But our neighbors were Muggles, so I’d just perch on their windowsill and watch through the glass."
That got a chorus of laughs and nods from the Muggle-borns. Quite a few of them had done the sa—if the family banned television, well, there was always the neighbor’s.
"Anyway," Laos clapped his hands, "let’s see if your gatron’s got as much style as the one I rember on screen."
Tom gave a small nod, signaling Daphne to begin.
Under the cheers of the crowd, gatron roared to life. This ti, there was no safe mode—he went straight into full combat mode.
But Daphne and Hermione hadn’t co unprepared. After losing last ti, Hermione’s competitive streak had pushed her to cook up all sorts of counter-strategies.
One conjured water with Aguanti, the other froze it into ice with Glacius. In no ti the grassy field had beco a skating rink.
With their shoes transfigured into skates, the girls zipped around faster than ever.
gatron, anwhile, slipped and stumbled, even falling twice.
"Brilliant," soone muttered.
"Use the ice to hobble him. At the very least, it keeps them from losing right away."
The students watching praised their ingenuity. Tom only smiled.
"Alright. Phase two."
He snapped his fingers. The chatter cut off instantly as gatron suddenly rose into the air. Daphne and Hermione skidded to a halt, wide-eyed.
"gatron can fly without transforming?" Daphne stamred.
"Of course," Tom said casually. "Borrowed a little from broomstick enchantnts. Flying is nothing special."
"Nothing special?!" Hermione nearly jumped out of her skin. "That’s completely unfair!"
gatron didn’t wait for protests. His palms opened and energy blasts began firing every two seconds.
At first the girls darted and dodged with their skates, but soon the ice was cratered and shattered. They had to revert their shoes to boots, stumbling across the broken ground. Hermione even tried to freeze gatron’s gun ports shut, only to rember that he breathed fire after.
That was always her weakness. Calm and brilliant when she had ti to think, but under pressure her nerves frayed and mistakes piled up.
In the end, both girls burned through their magic reserves, holding out just enough to avoid defeat but unable to claim victory.
"Interesting," Laos murmured, rubbing his hands together.
A line of glowing script suddenly scrawled itself across gatron’s arm, sliding down from under his sleeve: {Defeat is written in your fate. Refuse to fight, and history will rember you as a coward.}
Laos coughed and imdiately changed his tune. "Perhaps... the other students could try, Mr. Riddle?"
"Of course," Tom agreed smoothly. "Sa rules as before. Five to a team. If you can force gatron into hard mode, you win."
The kids who’d already picked out groups jostled and shoved, desperate to be first.
In the end Tom handed the opening slot to a team of fourth-year Slytherins. They were his housemates, after all—he had to show a little favoritism.
Malfoy watched with burning envy. But he knew his limits. Beating up a pixie was one thing—facing gatron was another. And the older students didn’t want him dragging their teams down either.
So he sulked on the sidelines, trying to save face by loudly "analyzing" the battles like so sort of expert.
"Honestly, casting a Stunner on a pile of tal? Are you dumb?"
"That weak little charm—you call that a strategy? Looks more like a love tap."
"...Wait, Tarantallegra actually worked? Huh, clever. Oh, never mind, his arms are still free. Fail."
Tom, anwhile, was quietly noting down every weakness exposed by the students’ attempts. More field data ant more upgrades later.
Noticing Astoria still hovering loyally at his side, Tom decided to let her join in.
"Hey, Astoria. You’re pretty good at wizard chess, aren’t you?"
"It’s not
being good," she said primly. "It’s just that my sister’s terrible."
"Astoria!" Daphne shot her a look.
"But it’s true. I can give you half the pieces and still win. What am I supposed to do about that?"
"Then how about a match against ?" Tom flicked his wand, tossing a miniature chess set into the air. "Engorgio!"
The board expanded, black and white squares stretching until it spanned the lawn, the pieces growing to adult height.
"This is just like the challenge Professor McGonagall set last year," Tom explained. "You can pick a piece to replace and lead the board yourself, or team up with others to fight."
"Co, commander!" the white queen bellowed. "Lead us to victory over the vile black fiends!"
Lee Jordan and other Black students clenched their fists, biting back retorts. They knew the queen ant the black pieces, but it didn’t make the phrasing any easier to hear. In their mind, they already tagged this queen as a racist.
"Alright, I’ll try," Astoria said eagerly.
She’d never been a powerhouse at spells, but this wasn’t about strength. This was about brains, and that was her turf.
"No bullying Astoria, understood?" Tom ordered the white and black pieces.
"Yes, Creator!" they chorused.
"Can I join too?" Cho Chang stepped forward.
"Of course. Just step into the square of the piece you want to play, and it’ll step aside."
Soon, a few more girls hurried over asking to join, and Astoria, soft-hearted as ever, agreed to them all. In no ti, the white side was completely taken over by students—except for the king and the queen, the latter of which she had claid herself.
It was only once the match began that Astoria realized the problem.
Every piece that got taken out wasn’t just a carved statue anymore—it was one of her classmates. And every ti she had to sacrifice a piece, she hesitated.
The black side didn’t make it any easier. Those enchanted chessn were downright despicable. After knocking soone out, they’d pull faces and taunt, or spray a stream of water from above to soak their opponent, then shove them off the board with their shields—or the backside of a horse.
"Haha, crush those racists, brothers!" Lee Jordan shouted, cheering on the black pieces. Only for them to nod back and carry on the ’battle’ with a more fiery spirit.
"..."
What was happening wasn’t painful—it was downright humiliating. Even Lee felt a flicker of pity for the white pieces... though definitely not for the queen.
Astoria shot Tom a rare pouty glare. She was already regretting letting so many people replace the original pieces.
The commotion drew an ever-growing crowd. Ron and Harry showed up too. The mont Ron spotted the oversized board, his eyes lit up.
"This is it! This is just like the set McGonagall used—I won that ga!" he shouted.
No one paid him much attention. His three older brothers had already elbowed their way to the front, eagerly offering Astoria advice.
Harry’s eyes, though, kept drifting back to gatron. He rembered his cousin Dudley’s tenth birthday, when Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon had gifted him a Transforr toy. Dudley had guarded it like treasure, never letting Harry so much as touch it.
Compared to Tom’s creation, that plastic toy was rubbish.
A sudden thought popped into Harry’s mind: if Dudley ever saw this gatron, he might fall in love with magic on the spot.
Not long after, even the professors were drawn over by the noise. Professor McGonagall and Professor Flitwick arrived together, followed by Professor Bathsheba Babbling from Ancient Runes and Professor Sprout.
"What a brilliant piece of Transfiguration, Mr. Riddle," McGonagall said, her eyes twinkling.
Creating wizard chessn with such lifelike intelligence wasn’t simple. Tom’s pieces were impressively refined; their reasoning was close to human thought. Even if those thoughts had been carefully instilled by Tom, to the onlookers it felt like they had real souls.
"And the spellwork is remarkable," Flitwick added, his high voice carrying easily over the crowd. "If this were in class, I’d give you three hundred points on the spot!"
Tom seized the opening with a smile. "No rush. I’ll take the points next lesson."
He was stockpiling credits for his research into ancient magic, and right now he needed every bit.
Flitwick blinked, then chuckled. "Very well! But only if you agree to teach your classmates those mimicry charms you put into the pieces—their movents are flawless."
"My pleasure," Tom said without hesitation.
As the sun sank lower, the gas wound down. For the finale, McGonagall herself stepped onto the field. But instead of playing with Tom’s set, she conjured her own army of black pieces on the spot, squaring off against him directly with pure Transfiguration.
Tom also made new white pieces, the best he could create right now.
And in the end... he lost.
McGonagall’s Transfiguration was still unmatched, her chessn moving like direct extensions of her will. And in the process, she shared a stream of insights and techniques that Tom eagerly absorbed.
Ron wanted his turn too, itching to relive his glory on a giant board.
But he’d arrived too late, queued too late, and by the ti dinner rolled around neither he nor Harry had gotten a chance. Plenty of other students left just as frustrated, grumbling at having waited all that ti for nothing.
"Mr. Riddle." McGonagall hesitated a mont, then said, "This is an excellent training tool. At the very least it teaches students teamwork, strategy, and exposes them to high-level Transfiguration. Would you consider setting it up again tomorrow?"
Tom handed her the board without hesitation. "Professor, it’s yours to arrange however you like."
"Thank you for this, Mr. Riddle. Slytherin will receive thirty points," McGonagall said warmly.
Of course, she herself could have conjured a set of equal or even greater sophistication. But a professor’s work was always a test, a trial. From a student, though, it was play—it was joy.
Professor Laos scratched his cheek awkwardly. "And, uh... about gatron. Any chance I could borrow him?"
He hadn’t exactly contributed much, so even he felt a little sheepish asking.
"You can," Tom said, "but I need him back on Monday. I’ve got upgrades in mind."
He handed gatron over and keyed the enchantnts to Laos’s magic so he could control it. Tom was ticulous about magical locks; he couldn’t risk just anyone peeking into his constructs and their built-in ssaging systems.
"On behalf of the students, thank you, Mr. Riddle," Laos said with a grin. "Oh, and—Slytherin gets another ten points."
Smart move. Tom gave him an approving nod before excusing himself and heading back to the castle.
By Sunday morning, both the chessboard and gatron were set up again, this ti under McGonagall and Laos’s supervision. Tom didn’t show—he had other plans. With Laos’s signed note in hand, he made for the Restricted Section, hunting down the rare volus missing from his collection.
Lady Greengrass had already drained most of Britain’s pure-blood libraries for him, but the Restricted Section always held treasures the old families didn’t. Tom intended to fill the gaps.
"Riddle?"
He’d barely stepped inside when soone called his na in a low voice.
Turning, he spotted Cho sitting alone at a window table, a book in her hands, radiating quiet, studious charm.
Because of that awkward "Story" incident, Tom felt a twinge of embarrassnt. Still, running into her two days in a row almost felt like fate.
Since she’d already spoken, he had no choice but to walk over.
"Chang. What a coincidence," he said.
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