In an instant, the two closed in on each other. Neville uhe first attack, openly thrusting his foot forward while one hand protected his head and the other remained poised to strike.

  Neville's fighting style could be summed up in one word: Fierce!

  He started with a head-guarded kick aimed straight at Draco's vital points, moving at incredible speed - this was .

  Used to Neville's style by now, Draco barely mao dodge the kick by stepping aside. He dared not directly block this brute's attacks, having learhat lesson many times before.

  Neville's strength is really something else. We're the same age, but I 't match him at all, Draco thought glumly.

  His only advantages over Neville were teique and speed. He could only try to find opportuo wear down Neville's stamina or look for ces to deal damage while dodging.

  Mind rag, Draco shifted his footwork, spinning as his fingers straightened into a bde-like formation, rapidly striking at Neville's throat.

  The two knew each other's styles well by now. Just as Draew of Neville's fieress, Neville was well aware of Draco's craftiness.

  A feint, Neville thought.

  His guard arm swept down, easily defleg Draco's throat strike. As expected, there wasn't much force behind it. In his peripheral vision, he caught a dark shadow aiming for his knee!

  Neville quickly raised his froo block Draco's kick while his loaded punch shot straight for Draco's face, seemingly apanied by an impressive whoosh of air.

  Of course, this is an exaggerated description - fights between twelve-year-olds aren't quite so dramatic, at least not to observers. But for the two batants, it felt very different.

  Their nerves were stretched to the limit, their senses slightly enhanced by the hormones c through their bodies.

  Draco's soul nearly left his body as he watched the seemingly unavoidable fist growing rger before his eyes.

  With no space to dodge outward and create distance, he had an idea and ducked into Neville's embrace.

  Then, immediately spinning, both hands tched onto Neville's extended pung arm. Using the momentum, he pulled forward and down, keeping his body close to Neville's, bending slightly with a small step - and with a powerful thrust of his hips, Neville went flying!

  A momentum-based shoulder throw.

  It all happened in a fsh - Harry and Ron only saw Draco dodge Neville's straight punch, lean in, and suddenly Neville was flying forward.

  They were dumbfounded.

  "This..." Ron was stunned, pointing at Draco while staring bnkly at Harry.

  "..." Harry had no response, just staring dumbly at the two fighters.

  There's a favorite saying among Hogwarts students:

  Huh?

  "Wait, are these really wizards?" Harry finally found his voice, voig what everyone was thinking.

  When did Malfoy get so skilled?! Huh? Did he evolve i behind our backs?

  The two finally snapped out of their daze - oh crap, Neville went flying!

  "Neville! Are you okay?!" they called out urgently.

  As for the airborne Neville, he wasn't pa all. He slightly adjusted his position mid-air, nded with a breakfall to disperse the force, rolled ond immediately stood up.

  Draco wasn't surprised, grimag internally - he would have been shocked if that was enough to take down this tough guy.

  Following his style of taking any advahout mercy, Draco charged in before Neville could fully regain his stance.

  Below the ptform, Professor Flitwick's eyes were sparkling with excitement.

  What is this?! What a wonderful way of fighting!

  Though outwardly the kindly Charms professor, he was actually a true battle maniaside. His long-dormant fighting spirit was reignited by the exge above.

  He suddenly grabbed Dumbledore's arm, as Dumbledore clearly khe name of this fighting style.

  "Albus, what is this?!" he asked eagerly, uo hide his excitement.

  Though they'd only showip of the iceberg, Flitwick could tell this was a fasating bat method. Even though the two seemed somewhat inexperienced with the teiques, there was still an i beauty to it.

  The beauty of violence!

  This was a beauty he'd never seen before as a wizard!

  Dumbledore expined with a smile: "This is fighting. If I remember correctly, it's a Muggle bat method, also a petitive sport, using the body as a on to defeat oppos through various teiques." He then poio Glenn, "This was taught to Neville Longbottom and Draalfoy by Glenn. He is their teacher."

  Professor Flitwick's burning gaze immediately turo Glenn, who felt the stare and nodded slightly in aowledgment.

  "I have a feeling that if I could incorporate this fighting style into magical dueling, my dueling skills would improve by several levels," Flitwick muttered, turning his attention back to the two grappling oform.

  Beside him, Snape gave a cold ugh. He had long sihis bat style. Even he had to dedicate signifit effort to preventing Glenn from getting in close during their practical training sessions, or he might lose. The energy spent on this was even more than dealing with Glenn's spells.

  Embarrassingly, noe could only win by stantly maintaining distance from Glenn through maneuvering. Though he could blod deflect Glenn's spells, his own spells were increasingly uo hit Glenn. He had to rely on his adult-level magical power to tinuously restrict Glenn's movement space with spells, f him to take hits directly - only then did he have a ce of winning.

  Thinking about this, Snape's expression darkened further. He, a reasonably capable professor, had to resort to such methods to win, and with great difficulty at that. Glenn was simply too agile, too hard to hit with spells. If others found out about this, what would bee of his dignity as a professor?!

  No, I must secretly learn some of these "fighting" teiques, or I might lose face when training Glenn in magical dueling.

  Losing to his own student - where would he put his face as a professor!

  No one knew what Snape was thinking behind his stern expression, except for you readers.

  But clearly they wouldn't directly ask Glenn for instru - they o find a way to learly.

  Their gazes suddenly met, and after cheg each other's eyes, they reized felloirants wanting to learn Glenn's fighting style.

  The two potential battle maniacs, who rarely ied normally, began whispering together.

  Meanwhile, Hermione, leaning against Glenn with one hand propping up her head, was muttering something quietly.

  "Parry and ter punch, elbow strike and khrow and ground strike, side strike to throat, hook... oh? A feint? Has Draproved retly?" Hermione poked Glenn, asking softly.

  She had beeing their movements. The teiques Neville and Draco were using were just basic fighting moves she had learned years ago. She could easily identify and predict their teiques based on their wind-up movements and the situation. She hadn't expected Draco's feint to fool her.

  Glenn expined beside her: "It's easy to ge punch trajectories before they're fully thrown, just by slightly adjusting the rotation a's normal to be fooled - let's see how Neville responds."

  "Oh, I see." Hermione nodded seriously. Looks like I'm still not w hard enough - I'll have Glenn give me extra practice this weekend!

  Draco's fighting talent was indeed impressive. That uppercut he ged into a hook at the st moment - now to see how Neville would defend.

  Well, true to his Gryffindor nature, Neville simply chose not to defend when he couldn't. He took the right hook directly, but turned his o the right, dispersing most of the force.

  "Not good!" Draew he was at a disadvantage and tried to quickly step back, but it was too te.

  Neville immediately grabbed him in a d smmed him hard to the ground, transitioning to ground fighting.

  It's over, Little Dragon's expression turned ugly. He knew he couldn't beat Neville in ground fighting. To avoid unnecessary injury - he didn't want to go to css with a swollen faorrow, and moreover...

  Damn, how did I fet we still have training in the Forbidden Forest tonight!!

  Neville!

  He quickly tapped Neville to signal his surrender, and the tter promptly released him.

  "Neville wins." Glenn's cold voice came from the stands, deg the match over.

  Though they didn't really uand what happehe greatly impressed Harry and Ron immediately cheered!

  "Well done, Neville! You took down Malfoy!" Ron pumped his fist while Harry beamed with joy. Though slightly resentful about Neville's secret evolution, they were still good friends after all.

  But at that moment, Neville felt no joy at all. Reminded by Draco's trembling voice, the fetful Neville finally remembered what had been nagging at the back of his mind.

  Oh no, we're done for!

  His expression also turned ugly as the fight ended and he realized how depleted his energy was - this would definitely affect tonight's training.

  That demon Glenn wouldn't take their exhaustion into sideration!

  He only cares about Hermione!

  The two quickly said goodbye to Glenn, Hermione and the professors iands, rushing back to their dormitories to rest. Draco even ignored Harry and Ron's mockery in his hasty retreat.

  "Strange, Malfoy didn't argue with us - that's not like him. Could it be he's too em~bar~rassed about losing?" Ron and Harry supported Neville while sarcastically enting about Draco.

  Neville smiled bitterly and shook his head, dealing with his new fanboys while hurrying them back to the dorm.

  He needed rest - his survival tonight wasn't guaraherwise!

  Hermioretched fortably as she stood up, pulling Glenn with her. "Let's head back too, have some umpkin juice to warm up." Glenn nodded, about to say goodbye to the professors when Flitwid Dumbledore stopped them.

  "We have an idea..." Flitwick began.

  Glenn raised an eyebrow.

  ?

  He could smell trouble brewing.