These highly persuasive words almost fooled Andrew.
But he couldn't quite put his finger on what was wrong—he just had a feeling that this wasn't right.
It wasn't until they reached the Ravenclaw common room and saw the huge crowd gathered outside that Andrew finally had an epiphany.
Although that upper-year student had repeatedly tried to give the impression that the "Ministry faction" was the largest organization, the truth was, the most numerous group was the ungrouped.
Those who had been rejected in the selections, those who withdrew because of ideological differences, those who couldn't get along with existing cliques and sought like-minded companions elsewhere, or those who were naturally distrustful of groups—this loose alliance of individuals made up the true majority.
And the reason this became so obvious so quickly was because… today's doorknocker question was too hard. Everyone was stuck outside the common room.
On a normal day, people would have already returned to their dorms. At most, a few students might hang around the common area. If that had been the case, this situation might've left Andrew puzzled for days. But now, just by estimating the number of first-years, he could immediately tell what had been wrong with that upper-year's speech.
"So it's not that the Ministry faction dominates… It's that the whole house is split into many factions, and everyone's just picking whichever suits their own beliefs. Even the Ministry group is just the largest single faction—not the majority."
Andrew felt like laughing—but decided to at least try to respect the upper-years.
"Today's question is: What laws are violated by casting Sonorus on a Mandrake in the Great Hall?"
…
What kind of ridiculous question is this?
Andrew wanted to curse. Hadn't they just said at dinner that the raven-shaped bronze knocker usually asked logical riddles?
But after thinking about it a little, he realized it wasn't such a bad question. As dumb as it sounded, it actually tested the students' familiarity with wizarding laws—and their ability to spot legal loopholes.
"There's no real answer to this one."
The upper-year Ravenclaw who had led them up hesitated, then gave up.
He turned and quietly explained to Andrew and the others, "Even those who specialize in exploiting legal loopholes can't figure this out. The Hogwarts library includes all historical versions of wizarding laws. That means unless you've memorized all those outdated, conflicting statutes, you've got no chance at answering."
All versions…
Andrew immediately understood how hard this was.
After some quick discussion between upper-years and prefects, they came up with a solution—once they magically expanded the doorway area, they began bringing out sleeping bags.
Watching how skilled the upper-years were at this, one question immediately popped into Andrew's mind:
Why are you all so good at this? Just how many times have you slept outside the common room?!
So he found a third-year-looking student nearby and asked, "Sorry… if we have class tomorrow, what about our textbooks?"
"Just answer tomorrow's question and go in—whether you want to shower, get your books, whatever. Once it's past midnight, the door knocker will change the question. If you're still awake by then, you can go in and take care of things. Or you can get up early tomorrow. There's a public restroom on the fifth floor."
"That's great…"
Andrew was sincerely impressed.
"Yeah, this is all based on years of experience. The bathroom even has hot water. But showers haven't been sorted out yet—requires too much alteration."
Wonderful. Andrew now realized that the area outside the Ravenclaw common room was essentially their second common room.
"Still, I'm a bit worried—what if no one can answer tomorrow's question either?"
The older student's calm expression froze. After a helpless sigh, he said, "Then we have to report it to the professors. It doesn't happen often, but… it has happened."
…
Great. So this is what it means to be in Ravenclaw—your exclusive course: floor-sleeping 101.
Andrew still had a bunch of questions, but the upper-year who'd kindly answered him was clearly exhausted—after all, they'd spent the whole day on the train.
Even Andrew, who was usually full of energy, was feeling extremely tired. After a few minutes of silence, his eyelids were drooping.
He didn't even have the energy to look for his roommates—many of the other first-years had already found a random corner and dived head-first into their sleeping bags.
"Guess I'll do the same…"
He picked a not-too-bad spot, climbed into a sleeping bag, and drifted straight off into sleep.
——
"So sleepy…"
At the door knocker, the prefects and a few student leaders from house groups yawned as they waited for midnight to pass.
"Really jealous of the first-years… They can just knock out and sleep."
Looking at the sea of sleeping bags, a prefect leaned against the wall, speaking with envy.
Not every Ravenclaw could just lie down and wait for morning.
Even if the question reset after midnight, it usually wasn't something one could answer immediately—it often took a while to think through. Once someone got it, the answer would be passed down.
If you understood the logic or memorized the answer, you'd be free to enter and exit for the day. If you didn't, you had to wait for someone to let you in.
In Ravenclaw, where wisdom is the highest virtue, solving a question no one else can answer instantly earned you respect. It was a simple, harsh rule—yet every student recognized its validity.
If you can't even get through the door, who's going to trust you to lead a group to accomplish anything?
So even prefects, after losing several chances to solve the door's riddle, would see their authority fade. As a result, although everyone talked about sleeping, no one was actually willing to crawl into a sleeping bag.
"Alright, it's past midnight!"
The Quidditch team captain checked the time, yawned, and stepped in front of the knocker.
"A hundred golden Snitches, one is defective. You have a single brass scale, no weights. What's the minimum number of weighings needed to find the defective one?"
The new question was posed.
After making sure everyone heard it, the house team captain yawned again, guessed a number at random, waved at the others, and happily went off to sleep—no one cared if he got it wrong as long as the Quidditch team kept winning.
Wrong answer—he lost his chance to try again today, but it didn't matter. He'd just wanted to test the difficulty. Mission accomplished.
As the others looked on in envy, he crawled into his sleeping bag and happily fell asleep.