The system categorized teaching into four levels.
Absent-minded Teaching awarded roughly 100 experience per student.
Effective Teaching granted around 500 experience.
Immersive Teaching yielded approximately 1,000 experience.
At the highest level was Breathtaking Teaching, which rewarded an astonishing 5,000 experience for every student taught.
The exact amount would fluctuate slightly depending on the lesson itself, but the difference was never significant.
Copying talents, however, came at a staggering cost.
A White-quality talent required 10,000 experience.
Blue demanded 50,000.
Purple doubled that to 100,000.
A Gold-quality talent required an incredible 500,000 experience.
As for the legendary Red-quality talents…
The price was a full one million experience.
None of this surprised Severus.
He had already anticipated it.
In the future, once he developed his own original spells and those spells spread throughout Hogwarts, every student who learned from them would become a steady source of experience.
At that point, experience would pour in continuously without him having to seek it out.
Unfortunately…
That future was still a long way off.
For the foreseeable future, personally teaching young witches and wizards remained his primary method of earning experience.
And Lily Evans was undoubtedly an ideal student.
Not only was she intelligent, but her natural aptitude—especially in Potions—was extraordinary.
[Master Craftsman — Gold] [You possess extraordinary dexterity.
Intricate work comes naturally to you, allowing you to accomplish tasks that others struggle to perform.
Potions and alchemical creations personally crafted by you permanently gain a 50% increase in effectiveness.] It was a talent Severus coveted immensely.
If he could someday copy it onto himself…
Combined with his own [Master Inventor] talent, the results would almost certainly exceed a simple addition of their effects.
Because of that, Severus quietly added another objective to his long-term plans.
Over the next two years, before Hogwarts began, he intended to earn as much experience from teaching Lily as possible.
Accumulating five hundred thousand experience would not be easy.
But there was no need to rush.
He still had plenty of time.
…
A gentle breeze swept across the hillside.
Beneath the old willow tree, Severus and Lily sat facing one another with a Wizard’s Chess board between them.
The enchanted pieces were fiercely locked in battle.
“You foolish woman!” The black king slammed his jeweled scepter against the board in fury.
“Do you even know how to play?” “My entire army has been wiped out!” “I’m about to lose my head!” The furious outburst startled Lily so badly that she hurriedly clasped her hands together.
“I-I’m sorry!” “I really am trying!” Despite her desperate apologies, the black king’s fate was already sealed.
Following Severus’s calm instructions from across the board, Lily steadily cornered the opposing monarch.
Finally…
A black knight charged forward.
With a single swing of its sword, the enemy king was cut into pieces.
The shattered crown rolled across the board before stopping right in front of Lily’s hand, as though silently protesting its commander’s incompetence.
Severus calmly reset the chess pieces.
“One hour of study for every game you lose.” He glanced at Lily.
“At the moment…” “You owe me five hours.” Lily’s face instantly filled with despair.
She had made a terrible mistake.
Originally, she’d thought magic would be nothing but fun.
What she had forgotten…
Was that studying was painful no matter what world you lived in.
Whether it was a Muggle school or Hogwarts, every diligent student eventually had to endure mountains of books and endless lessons.
What made things even worse…
The person urging her to study was someone she genuinely liked spending time with.
Every time she thought about slacking off, guilt crept into her heart.
Lily…
Severus is giving up his own free time to teach you.
How can you be so ungrateful?
With a defeated sigh, Lily obediently picked up One Thousand Magical Herbs and Fungi.
Under Severus’s patient guidance, she did her best to force the bewildering botanical knowledge into her head.
Thankfully…
His teaching was genuinely excellent.
Whenever a plant appeared in the book, Severus would casually wave his wand.
Silvery magic gathered in the air, forming lifelike three-dimensional models of the magical plants before her eyes.
The illustrations seemed to come alive, allowing Lily to observe every leaf, root, flower, and seed from every angle.
Even the driest sections of the textbook suddenly became vivid and easy to understand.
[You have completed an Effective teaching session for 1 student.] [Total Experience Gained: 560] Seeing the system notification, Severus quietly ended the lesson.
He noticed Lily staring enviously at the wand resting in his hand.
Smiling faintly, he held it out toward her.
“Would you like to try it?” Lily blinked.
“Really?” She looked from the wand to Severus, unable to hide her surprise.
“But…” “Isn’t your wand incredibly important to you?” She carefully studied his expression, trying to see if he was merely teasing her.
Instead, all she found was calm sincerity.
Severus met her gaze and asked softly, “Lily…” “Would you ever betray me?” “Or try to kill me?” “Of course not!” Lily shook her head without the slightest hesitation.
“We’re best friends.” “Even if I were the one who died, I’d never do anything to hurt you.” “In that case…” Severus smiled faintly.
“What do I have to worry about?” “Go ahead.” Only then did Lily finally reach out.
Before taking the wand, she carefully wiped her hands on her clothes, afraid of getting even the slightest bit of dirt on something so precious.
Holding it gently, she stared in fascination at the elegant wood grain and intricate carvings running along its length.
“A wand is indispensable to every witch and wizard,” Severus explained.
“Before you begin your first year at Hogwarts, a professor will visit your home, deliver your acceptance letter, and take you to Diagon Alley to purchase one.” After a brief pause, he added, “Actually…” “If you’d like, I could lend you the money in advance.” “That way, you could buy your own wand now instead of waiting another two years.” “You’d be able to practice simple spells yourself instead of just watching my demonstrations.” Lily’s fingers tightened slightly around the wand before she slowly shook her head.
“You’re already a very, very good friend.” “You’ve helped me more than anyone.” She lowered her gaze.
“And because of that…” “I don’t want to lose our friendship.” Severus looked at her in silence.
Lily continued softly, “If I keep accepting things from you…” “If I only know how to receive and never give anything back…” “Won’t there come a day when our friendship changes?” “I don’t want that to happen.” Her voice carried both unease and determination.
Severus understood exactly where those feelings came from.
Petunia.
Although Lily had followed his advice and consciously tried to avoid provoking her sister, their relationship had continued to drift apart.
The gap between them had only grown wider.
For Lily, who had spent her entire childhood in Cokeworth, Severus had gradually taken Petunia’s place as the person she trusted most.
After experiencing the pain of watching her relationship with her sister deteriorate, she cherished this new friendship more than anything else.
No matter how Severus tried to persuade her, she stubbornly refused to borrow money to buy a wand.
She was unwilling to allow money to become part of their friendship.
Watching Lily happily wave his wand through the air, trying over and over again to produce even the smallest spark, Severus found himself unexpectedly moved.
She truly possessed a rare kind of sincerity.
Perhaps that was why, years later, Lily Evans would become someone admired by nearly everyone who knew her.
Whether among her classmates at Hogwarts or within the Order of the Phoenix, there were countless people who respected her, trusted her, or quietly fell in love with her.
But…
What did any of that have to do with him?
Right now, he was nothing more than a ruthless study machine.
Ignoring Lily’s pitiful attempts to bargain for a break, Severus mercilessly opened the next textbook and began the day’s lesson.
Time passed quietly.
The seasons changed one after another.
On that quiet hillside beneath the old willow tree, two children spent countless mornings studying together.
For Lily, those days gradually became the happiest part of her childhood.
Whenever she looked up, the first thing she saw was always the black-haired boy patiently teaching her magic.
Before either of them realized it…
Two peaceful years slipped by in the blink of an eye.