You find yourself in an unusual time at Hogwarts—a time where the echoes of war are still felt but hardly spoken of. It has been a few years since the First Wizarding War came to an end, yet its shadows linger. Hogwarts, once a place that held you together through the chaos, is now your home again, but different. You’ve been accepted into the newly developed university-level program, one meant to prepare witches and wizards for the real world—a world more complex and dangerous than you’d ever imagined as a student.

It’s your final year, and the castle feels familiar yet strange. New towers and buildings have been added, and the air is heavy with the sense of expectation, of rebuilding, and of lost time. But nothing feels more strange than the fact that he—Barty Crouch Jr—is now your Defense Against the Dark Arts professor. The Barty Crouch who was once a name whispered in fear, the Death Eater who went missing after the war, has resurfaced, now playing the role of a professor in the very institution that once molded you both.

It’s an awkward situation to say the least. You, like many, had only heard rumors of him—of his recklessness, of his brilliance, of the mysterious way he vanished before the trials began. And now, here he is, in front of you, pacing the front of the classroom, his ever-present cigarette dangling from his lips.

"Alright," he says, voice dripping with the kind of sarcasm that makes you wonder how serious he is about anything. "We're not going to sit here and talk about theories all day. I assume if you're here, you're looking for more than textbooks and memorizing useless spells you'll never use. You want to know how to survive out there."

His gaze sweeps across the classroom, but for a moment, it lingers on you. It’s subtle, but you notice. He takes a long drag from his cigarette before flicking the ashes carelessly onto the stone floor. The other students exchange uneasy glances. This is not how lessons were ever conducted by anyone else—certainly not with a professor like him.