"You should've seen my OWLs," Ash said with a bit of a prideful smile, "Top marks all around. And no, my dad didn't pay for them." Ash was lazy, sure, but he wasn't a complete lost cause. Very few knew that beneath that party boy persona he actually did know what he was doing. Teachers often found it infuriating that he appeared to sleep through some classes and still performed well on exams. But Ash never advertised this. Not because he thought it would hurt his reputation, but because he didn't need good marks to make a name for himself.
He went on, "True, we'd probably have better luck finding a phoenix in Nepal or the alps. I heard they're big fans of mountains and don't like being domesticated." He read that too and once the two of them were in the car, he started the engine. It would be a short drive, but it was still a nice night for one period. The car pulled away from where the Blackstones were staying in Indonesia and continued out of the path and in the direction Lyra had told him.
"A phoenix as your familiar, huh?" he said as he relaxed behind the wheel of the car, "Aiming big and not settling for small. You'll have your work cut out for your and maybe if you're lucky, it choosing you means it won't be a pain in the ass to keep it around."