Chapter 1054
Holiday Homework
Chapter 1054 Holiday Homework
The red train made a regular clattering sound, and the scenery outside the window slowly changed. At first, you could see a church with a red brick spire peeking out, but then it was replaced by a vast expanse of white snow.
While Michael and Theo fell silent, the box was unusually quiet. Ryan took out his holiday homework and asked Wade for help in a low voice.
"On the Impact of the Seventeenth-Century Fairy Rebellion on the Relationship Between Wizards and Fairies" - a holiday assignment. Professor Binns required a three-foot essay, but I only wrote the beginning.
Ryan said somewhat awkwardly, "I don't know how to begin."
Vader knew his friend well and knew that this kind of magical history assignment was actually not difficult for him.
Even first-year students could easily get by with this kind of assignment by simply copying the content from the textbook and excerpting a couple of passages from two extracurricular books related to the history of magic.
After thinking for a moment, Wade said, "I guess it's not that you can't write, but that you have too much to write about, so you don't know where to begin?"
Ryan seemed to have had something he had kept hidden for a long time exposed, and immediately nodded excitedly, saying:
"Yes, this is it!"
He turned and pulled a thin notebook from a crevice in his suitcase, whispering:
“You know, I have quite a few Muggle relatives. During the holidays we visited an uncle, and I… I saw a few books in his study.”
Wade asked, "What kind of books?"
Ryan stammered, "It's about... about their... wars without magic."
Wade raised an eyebrow but didn't say anything.
Ryan continued, "After reading it, when I was writing my thesis on the history of magic, my mind was filled with those words from the book."
Wade: "For example?"
Ryan said, "For example—the productivity of fairies, and their production relationship with wizards; and the magical world's dependence on fairy arts, that's what the book calls... the economic base, right?"
He looked up at Wade.
"Also, the things produced by fairies belong to the wizards, but the fairies don't agree to that. Isn't this a conflict of property rights?"
He looked down at the messy words in his notebook, as if he could see the chaotic thoughts that had been swirling in his mind from that time until now.
"I don't know if I can write it like this."
Ryan lowered his eyes and said, "This is different from what Professor Binns said. I'm a little confused about what's right and what's wrong..."
"Or perhaps these ideas of mine shouldn't even have appeared in the assignment in the first place?"
“Of course it shouldn’t happen!” Michael, who had been listening at some point, interjected.
He frowned slightly: "Although I didn't quite understand, Ryan, don't you feel a little sorry for the fairies? They're not human!"
“I know,” Ryan said gently. “I know what they are, Michael, and I also know that many humans died at the hands of goblins during previous rebellion wars.”
"Fairies have killed wizards, and wizards have killed fairies. Both sides have each other's blood on their hands. This is an undeniable and unchangeable fact."
"I just wanted to..."
He turned his gaze to Wade and said softly:
"Even if the fairy rebellion is suppressed, the root of the problem is not solved, so the rebellion will definitely happen again, and people will die because of it."
"So I think... I think..."
Wade understood what he was struggling to say: "You think the reason the fairy rebellion war happened was fundamentally due to the exploitation and oppression of one race by another?"
Ryan breathed a sigh of relief and nodded slightly.
Theo looked at him with concern: "Ryan, you didn't tell me that you actually thought this way."
“I’m sorry,” Ryan said, looking at him with clear apology in his eyes. “I didn’t know how to discuss these things with you.” Theo was a pureblood and knew nothing about Muggle books, so he might not even understand what Ryan was saying.
But Ryan knew that Wade definitely understood.
"It's a good thing you didn't write those words into your paper."
Michael quipped, "Otherwise, Professor Binns would definitely have given you a big 'T'."
"It's one thing to sympathize with the enemy, but to sympathize with a fairy..."
He shook his head and didn't continue.
At Hogwarts, a T stands for "terrible," the lowest grade a professor can give a student.
It's only because Ryan and Michael are friends that he doesn't know what he would say.
Wade didn't speak immediately. He reached out and took the notebook in front of him, flipped through it, focused on the passages of the original text that Ryan had written down, then pushed it back and smiled.
“I think your idea makes a lot of sense, but it’s not something that can be explained in a three-foot paper, or even a hundred feet might not be enough.”
He encouraged, “You can treat it as a long-term project and study it slowly. Maybe it will take ten or twenty years before you can explain this issue to others and even tell us how to completely resolve the conflict between the two races.”
"However, for now, you can consider these aspects—"
He took out a piece of parchment and wrote three lines:
[Mismatch between contribution and compensation]
[Contractual Spirit and Craftsman's Rights]
Financial Monopoly and Profit Distribution
Ryan peered out, his eyes flickering slightly, as if he understood something, but a greater fog still shrouded his heart.
“Wow, Wade!” Michael exclaimed dramatically. “Can he really fit all that stuff into three feet of space?”
"Of course, you can't write your homework like that."
Wade calmly said to Ryan, "Before you figure out your own ideas, you might as well follow the existing rules a little. For example—write a paper that Professor Binns will approve of."
"Don't mistake the goblin rebellion for a Muggle war. They may look similar, but they are fundamentally different."
"For example, the question of who owns a weapon is actually a matter of different understandings of trade between wizards and fairies. What we consider a fair and reasonable exchange of equal value is seen as a form of robbery by them."
"As for the economic base, you just need to simply list the facts in your paper."
"For example, in the late 17th century, wizards tried three times to limit the goblins' power in Gringotts, but all of them failed. Why was that?"
“I know that!” Theo quickly said, “Because only fairies can maintain the vault system. If a wizard tries to mess with them, he will find that he can’t take his money out safely!”
"Look!" Wade said with a smile, "If you start from this angle, first list the facts, then analyze the reasons, and finally predict the problems that may arise in the future, isn't the paper much easier to write?"
Ryan nodded: "I know how to write it now... Thank you, Wade."
He took the parchment, stared at the three lines of text, and remained silent for a long time.
Michael nudged Wade with his elbow and whispered, "Seriously, you actually said such a long string of words right off the bat... You've thought about the same thing Ryan's been thinking about, haven't you?"
Wade raised his eyebrows and laughed, "My holiday homework is the same as yours, have you forgotten?"
“Of course I know.” Michael looked at his expression and said, “But I think your reasons for considering these things are definitely different from Ryan’s.”
“Perhaps,” Wade said, resting his arm on the window and gazing into the distance. “But our anxieties about the future are probably the same.”
Michael looked away and muttered, "...Maybe I should find a couple of Muggle books to read?"
(End of this chapter)