Hello, sorry to bother you with this question. I was checking out a fanfiction story, and the name April immediately caught my eye. I wanted to know more about the MC named April Collins. I copied and pasted the link to the story, and it worked—I read up to chapter 4. It looks like a really fascinating story!
Funny enough, my MC is also named April, and one of my friends thought it was about my character, but I explained that it wasn’t. I was just wondering—who is the original author of the story? I really can’t wait to read more of it. I’m guessing they played the free update with Penny the house elf, because I haven’t gotten to that yet.
Sorry if this is a random question! My name is Lynn, by the way. Again, I apologize for bothering you.
We haven’t interacted much before the start of the valentines event, but I’ve loved seeing all your posts about digging into the game files (it’s quite fascinating all the cut scenes or hidden information you can gather from the files actually!)
To surprise you, and as a thank you for answering all of my questions so earnestly, as my gift I made a drawing of Julia (she’s such a cutie and I loved drawing her)
Happy Valentine’s Day! Hopefully you have a wonderful day full of relaxation and happiness 💙💙
HELLO !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
THANK YOUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU she looks very cute :3c (more posts with data from the files incoming)
🪲 ⇢ add 50 words to your current wip and share the paragraph here
"Julia. I cannot.
"If you are so eager – I may explain."
"I am—"
"I will humour your curiosity only this once. You have been with us for so little time and achieved what many struggle to grasp for decades, and yet, still so far behind us on our customs. You ought to hear me now.
"Your need in help is evident. The kind of help you seek, however, is not something I – and anyone else – may easily provide without your authorisation. Otherwise, your peers and I risk walking to a curse.
"Do you know why? I trust that you have been curious about your Defence Against the Dark Arts assigned textbooks list as much as you have about anything I teach here in my class."
"I have."
"Curiosity is an admirable quality. I advise you exercise it with due diligence I and the rest of my colleagues expect from all of our pupils.
"However, I also believe our writers often omit our habit to rely on… a multitude of factors present in the wizarding youth, really, that is not the case with you. Not at all, Julia. I ask again: Do you know why?"
"I don't."
"Steps your psyche demands me to take – foresee a troubling encounter, for one, reliance on me when I least expect it, other little events you may recall – may inadvertently place a curse on me. Neither of us know the extent of your…"
"So you fear?"
"Potent, powerful curses are lifted with the removal of their often fretful progenitors.
"I can live with another curse to my name. Believe me. A shame that will accompany the waste of such resolve and talent such as yours, is no quick recovery.
"All I ask – have always asked of you – is to pay heed to my advice. I wish you no ill."
"Wasn't your advice to share my troubles with you?"
"It was. Ordinary I dare not speak blunt, but. You have been offered a safe and welcoming environ and granted an opportunity to exploit it. I would not mind it before, nor will I after what you had done for this school and Eleazar. It is my promise to you."
"Aren't those a form of verbal contract, too?"
"Ah. So you did pay attention."
"Since the offer is free for the taking, I am grabbing it. You should've not done this, sir. To offer me this. I will not be able to repay for your kindness."
"When I say exploit, Julia, I mean turn to me when you need or must do something silly, such as thinking it is an exchange of favours. I am glad you've made familiar with monetary exchanges; do not presume all exchange is monetary. Besides. I've seen, fought, eluded, tricked and crossed enough to be of help – should you find yourself against another hundred of idiots with wands."
"I will think about it."
"Splendid."
"But. Would you be up for anecdotes, too, professor sir?"
"Silly life stories is what you think aid should be? My case record is public."
"Yes but I need to familiarise myself with more wizarding customs and traditions through an easy-to-understand kind of thing, sir. Students are mean to me when I am not aware of something minor. Ms Reyes especially."
Poppy first sees her walking down the Great Hall, timid and shy, like a fledgling fallen from the nest.
Poppy also knows two more things about her: her name is Julia Vivienne Wright and that after she has been just sorted into the Ravenclaw house and joined her table for the feast, devours few plates right away.
Poppy notices she doesn't talk much—despite the consequences for her late arrival; at least Ravenclaws ought to had been curious, no? Poppy is. But turning to her and barge with questions would've been either impolite, or left the wrong impression. Poppy cusses all over her own character for indecisiveness and being so awfully reserved.
In the meantime, Headmaster Black comes to Julia's "rescue": he announces Quidditch cancellation for the whole year.
Poppy knows what it means: Imelda, the owner of the school's biggest chalice for gossip and possessing one of the biggest egos as well, will compete with Julia in being the main talk of the school.
Poppy doesn't care for that, though. The absence of Quidditch means less attention to the Pitch (and less control for the teams' members from at least Imelda, a ferocious captain when it concerns slacking)—and subsequently, to the Hogwarts pens.
At this point, it's evident poachers have rooted deeply in the area and could had sprouted to Hogsmeade. Besides, Poppy worries the new fifth-year might feel inclined to join the poaching ranks: people have been talking for quite a while about her dire financial situation. The Ashwinders is a quick way to make some.
The third thing Poppy learns about Julia this evening is that her hair colour—auburn, dark as the liquid amber of a strong tea in the Great Hall's dim lighting—is impossible to miss in the crowd.
Her and Julia are paired for their first Beast class of the year later this week.
It starts like the Beast Class quest but diverges from it: Poppy does not whistle for Highwing after the bully run-in at the end of the class.
The reason for this: it does not make much sense, narratively, to impose such an emotionally charged and trust-driven moment so soon. They have just met each other. MC could intervene for many different reasons. Maybe they like only the small beast and could sell the large ones to the Ashwinders, supposing them too dangerous, or they're favouring poaching in general and are just irritated at the squabble; from the hindsight, we know that MC wouldn't and that MC is very against the poachers, but Poppy does not know this yet and from a single encounter.
The meeting with Highwing happens later in the Autumn in Julia's story. Poppy and her need some time to bond first.
I thought I make this interlude first before continuing on with the rest of this—quite lengthy—post. Enjoy!!
Poppy is nervous. Julia chose the class, too, and is also late; the only free table is Poppy's and she appeared quite erratically to anyhow protest it—if Poppy wanted to protest it at all; she felt conflicted.
Professor Bai* begins the lesson and suggest Poppy take the reins and show Julia the basics for caring for the basic beasts. Everything she was supposed to read before the beginning of the term needed to be put to practice.
Poppy immediately spots more details about Julia: her hands are working hands; her curiosity isn't vile; she's pale but bespeckled—isn't hiding from the sun; she is cautious around magic and people, too.
She fears this world and is very new to it but still manages to hold herself up to its standards to stay on its good graces. She wants to be accepted before she belongs, Poppy subconsciously notes. But. Poppy fears Julia hasn't yet learnt about the outcasts, and that this is the reason why she is fine to be around the Peculiar Poppy.
Poppy knows it is the inevitability. Julia could like beasts but will grow to hate her for being too different, just like everyone else does; your interest is only worth anything if you have been born into a set of very specific circumstances. But Poppy also knows the feeling.
The poachers rejected her, albeit tried to make her stay. The normal people's world has deemed her strange, an outcast, even though she belongs, it does not yet accept her the way she is. Julia could step on its toes, too, and likewise become a strange bee in the hive.
Poppy doesn't know how Julia would fare. Nor she thinks she cares. But Julia is older than a first year and, as the Hat put it, has preconceptions. Nobody knows what to expect from her outside academic success—at this point, every teacher has nothing bad to say about her skill or prowess.
Poppy is, again, conflicted. She does not suppose it's the right thing, to be so judgemental of someone she knows for less than a week; to everyone knows for that much time. But she cannot help it: people has rarely been kind to her, so apprehension is justified. To what extent? Poppy does not know. Her mind is so fixated on this all that her voice began to sound strangely ethereal a while ago, and only speaks about beasts, likely causing Julia to believe there is nothing on her mind but puffskeins and kneazles.
Anyway.
Julia takes to beasts quickly and is soon lost to the diricrawls.
Professor Bai gather everyone around to give a brief on the thought-to-be-extinct dodo birds. Julia looks fascinated; she could hear about them, after all. Another fairy tale or legend revealed to be true to her ready mind.
Poppy tends kneazles in the meantime and then notices them.
The bullies. Their loud talking about having few or so knuts for the kneazle whiskers infuriates her; her blood boils. She is ready to snap.
They notice Julia—and try to rebuke her for not picking their side. They leave before she says anything else; Poppy looks at her and sees…
Everything she thought before that moment quickly fades from the recent memory and gets replaced with the sense of calm radiating from Julia. She protects. She attacks. But most importantly, she is… most likely, trustworthy.
A dragon had almost killed her. A troll had almost smashed her. Victor Rookwood had nearly spoke with her. Agnes Scribbner could sent her in detention but didn't.
Could've been luck. Or her stomach—and she wasn't afraid to put it to another trial of will just to… save someone or herself?
Is Julia self-sacrificial or egoistical?
Does she want fame, social credit, or she is just a heroic idiot?
Might she be just… simply a decent and kind person?
In this castle? at 15???
Poppy is sent in another agonising tail-spin of thoughts.
Julia has been taking to Poppy's character in the meantime.
Not a shy girl, but not a fervent fighter either, yet always has something on her mind. Evidently knows a lot about beasts and how to care for them. Besides, people banter with their superiors like she did with the professor only when a cat of mutual respect fell asleep crossing the space between them.
Julia doesn't know if it's a safe extrapolation—so far, her only cat was the one that smelled catnip between her and Sharp during Potions class and chased it away when Sharp—somehow—deduced the feather was gone and needed to chat about ingredients like she did not know a thing about them (she didn't).
Everett also mentioned the professors are stern but fair.
So, perhaps, if you are a student and can talk back and forth a bit, it means your academic performance allows you some leeway. Maybe?
Julia also started building connections as soon as the year began, and Poppy appeared a good contact to add to the list.
She is knowledgeable, nifty with beasts, studious, and is not nosy like Sebastian and wouldn't find excursions as an excuse to escape mum and the castle like Natty; with all due to respect to either one, Julia didn't want to feel overwhelmed with other people just yet. Besides, she instantly liked that… badly-hidden seriousness of Poppy's and was bemused by the amount of looks Poppy was stealing instead of just stare at her like at a preposterous-looking beast. Like a cat at a human.
Utterly perplexed.
Poppy had questions. She wanted to talk. Her interest in that dragon probably was the most genuine—she is professor's Bai unmentioned charge, the future beastkeeper. She just didn't know how to ask yet—and Julia didn't know how to approach her curiosity either, or to talk to her.
The chance presents itself when Julia breaks the argument of the bullies and Poppy.
You see, Julia is a merchant at heart.
She doesn't need to know the intricacies of the wizarding economy to figure out kneazle's whisker wouldn't sell for much money and if you are ready to pain the poor thing for a measly penny, you are a terrible monster of a person. It's a dirty work. It's like killing a horse for a few hairs—something it can grow back. Not only that, the kneazle is also someone's. And on top of that, calling someone's well of knowledge peculiar is not how anyone treat the craft they are supposedly came to master in this school.
Julia has been familiarised with the attitude at this point: Fig is criticised for his theories or asked if he teaches anyone anything at all, Imelda is badmouthed for her skill, and professor Sharp has heard enough as he started his little tirade with "allow me to enlighten you" when Julia merely inquired him about his injury—him, not her school mates.
Julia does not tolerate such disrespect.
And she is sick of their pathetic insults, too.
In the muggle world, you can't cuss simply at anybody even within the strata of your own class. The wizarding world felt strangely different; everyone was entrusted a wand and carried it at all times, so everyone should be quite equal, no? Spellbooks were full of nigh useless jinxes and curses, developed certainly for telling off these naysayers and bullies who'd rather walk trouserless after insulting their tailor than acknowledge the tailor had a bread-winning skill.
After they left, Poppy is 👉👈.
Julia still doesn't know how to approach her. At all. She doesn't want to come off as being transactional.
Professor Bai suggests them to brush up on the basics and mentions the library's collection has been recently updated.
Bonus: When does the girlcrush start?
Julia is stupid. She is aware her brain finds Poppy cute and clings on her cuteness and attitudes. She thinks it's normal to feel fixated on someone so much better in magic and its lore than her. Everyone has a person like that in their life. Or persons. Some of them are pretty.
It gets comical when Imelda URGHES at her for wearing love-tinted glasses so shamelessly and SIGHS when Julia doesn't understand the hints.
It gets catastrophic when Sharp hints Julia's musings are becoming detrimental to her concentration in class. A short scene:
"It is obvious you have something else on your mind, Ms Wright, please, resolve your… thought conundrum before due next class. It's important we cover few theories from the advanced course this year. May prove itself useful during your O.W.L.s."
"Thought conundrum? Professor, what do you mean, if I may ask?"
"Ms Sweeting has unfortunately, but inadvertently, made her way in your latest brew as an influence," he quickly adds, "a side-effect; we may want such an effect to be present, certainly you recall, but not in the general practice. Potion-making requires cold head for a reason."
"Oh. We are just friends."
"Yes. Friends," Sharp sighs. "Allow me to be pierce. We are not muggles."
Even the Cat of Mutual Respect is irritated:
"We are close, but so can be muggle girls, sir?"
Mirabel's territory. I admit defeat, Sharp thinks. He says, "Mhm."
tldr; Aesop thought Julia struggled to accept the fact she liked a girl in relation to her muggle upbringing and not in relation to the fact she was one of the most socially… no, relationship… no, personally oblivious or inept people he had ever known, and he used to be an auror doing field job. He had seen a lot, if not everything, in life.
Poppy is girlcrushingly tail-spinning in the background and Imelda is dying from cringe.
Julia is the kind of a person who will drink with another lesbian, who is quite expectant about her, and drink a lot, but will not understand what "you are such a tease" means until she recounts that even to someone else (the Expectant Lesbian never gets what she tried to pay for and probably cries somewhere on reddit).
Imelda would crush in the nearest sit and cringewither into a mathematical dot with the loudest URGHHH-sound ever recorded by man if she is the one hearing that btw.
*In accordance to Chinese naming conventions, she should be Professor Bai, not Professor Howin/Haoyin. But.
I will elaborate: if the game presents her name as 皓莺, it means that if her last name is indeed Haoyin, she should be Haoyin, Bai, in the artbook, to underline the difference in the naming conventions of the anglophone world and many of the Asian countries. But she is Bai Haoyin in there, and it's also spelt Howin.
It isn't pinyin or Wade-Giles. It's a very crude approximation of how 皓莺 should be pronounced by someone who does not have any idea how to read or say such an impossible congregation of vowels and consonants like Haoyin.
So.
Either it's a western rendition of her name, which is likely, or ignorance at play, considering the spelling. May as well be both.
tags so u can read the silliness: @espressoristretto-patronum @celestial--sapphic @thriftstorebabayaga @phinik
Hey - I'm here for the Hogwarts Legacy MC asks game thing!!!
I'd like to know the answers to the 12 and 13 questions for Julia :)
[link to the ask game] hiya!!
| 12. Can your MC cast the patronus charm? Is it corporeal or non-corporeal? What animal is it?
Julia's patronus is the rattle snake.
Rattle snakes warn before they bite and their bite is often deadly of not cared for. In a sense, that snake personifies Julia's defensive attitude; she would've been quite a vicious Slytherin would her magic manifest earlier and were her upbringing less tumultuous.
| 13. If the answer to the previous question is yes, what memory fuels your MC’s patronus? Why did your MC choose this memory?
Julia struggled to cast it, because hardly anything felt happy to her. She did not understand what was it—happiness, that is.
She felt like there had to be something more: it's a defence magic, so, logically, the spell should be fueled by not just happiness, but, might be, the feel that memory invokes?
Professors couldn't help her navigate to that feeling, but Sharp—the former Auror after all—first tried to talk her out of committing to that effort as the exams were looming, but then realised Julia would not listen. There was a reason to her interest, and he was once again just the wrongest person she could ask for an advice.
The death of the partner weakened Sharp's magic. His spells stopped being vigorous. Anything as strong as the Patronus Charm, well… If Julia really wanted to learn it, she required a better teacher, Sharp thought and questioned his decision to mentor Julia, again, because he was out of shape, he was not as quick-witted anymore, an old dog can't learn new tricks, let alone be a teacher of Eleazar's league.
So he said, dryly, with a sardonic tinge, "Between the two of us, you were not only the bright young witch; you cherished magic stronger than most *people* I know and have known, that including other member of the staff. You seemed to be hopelessly enthusiastic with it even when you came to class to sleep through my lectures. Do you not any longer— do you regret anything so strongly? Are you tired? What hinders you magic now, after so much success? You must know; you should be proud of your dedication—and should we of your prowess, because it were us to help and to guide you."
Sharp thought of himself as of a pathetic mentor; he was supposed to catch moods like this, explain them, and give Wise And Useful Advice without asking questions—unless the question was the advice.
He hadn't yet known Julia did not need ready-made solutions.
Magic is her most cherished thing and memory. It brought her a new life, new everything, and Sharp said she looked like she gave up on it; insinuated it wasn't just him who noticed; worried she was in trouble, and of course he was taking it on his pride and took to heart, after all, it was him to say 'it would be a shame to let that go to waste'.
To prove people she was capable beyond intuition. To play with the objective reality like it was just within her mind—like in a dream where she could fly and talk to animals. To become one with the world most wish to belong to. She didn't feel happy when she met magic—it was an euphony like mother's murmur to a newborn's ear; it was soothing and peace-bringing, and *that* Julia felt she wanted to protect and cherish and live with and that made her *happy* and that she wanted to bring to those she cared about.
She casted the charm.
The snake plopped on the floor from the shaky tip of her wand.
"It fell on the floor," Julia said.
"Julia. Julia, you— I do not know what you did or what I said, bu—"
"Didn't it suppose to fly? Why is it a snake?"
The patronus beamed with a bleak light and hissed as it imitated breathing. Its eyes were of conscious.
"Julia. I have not been able to cast corporeal partonus on my first thirteen tries, and between the two of us, again, I have gone through the full Auror training regimen. You should be proud of your," he was barely able to hold his astonishment, "accomplishment. Well done."
FIRST OF ALLLLLLL i was so happy to see a new face in the tag bac in the spring'24 after i had thought hl wlw scene either died down or slowly dissipated 🥺🤧🤧🤧 and now??? we're more alive than ever, and i dont know where would we be without you
i LOVE how you write and make graphics; all are writing aspirations moments each and every time i see them on my dash. i want to write like you when i grow up🤧💖
EVELYNNNN one of the most impossibly cute mcs in the fandom. im glued to the screen each time you post about her!! go will all mention imelda and poppy (and other girlies: nellie, adelaide, blair, ana, tori, and others), your characterisations of them are STUNNING i can read miles and miles and few more miles about them when it comes under your hand + and of course about the anxious bean evelyn. queens be keep queenning
