Harry Potter: A Certain Ancient Rune Professor of Hogwarts (TL)

Chapter 385

At night, the ancient rune office.

A golden mist coalesced into illusory humanoid images, floating one by one in front of Felix. Niffler Valen stood on the small square table, reaching for the golden shadows.

“Igor Karkaroff, former Death Eater, one of the betrayers of Voldemort. Suspicious: sneaked into the entrance hall and had come into contact with the Goblet of Fire alone – minor suspicion;”

“Ludo Bagman, once accused of helping the Death Eaters to pass information. Suspicious: showed a strong welcome when Harry became a champion – suspicious, but had no time to commit the crime;”

For a longer period of time, the Goblet of Fire was in Dumbledore’s hands, and if something went wrong, it would not have gone undetected.

“Barty Crouch Sr, was the Head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement, a tough guy, transferred from his core position due to the implication of his son being a Death Eater. Suspicious: wife and son died one after another because of this incident, his future was destroyed, do not rule out the possibility of polarization; plus physical weakness, clashed with Fudge during the World Cup – suspicious, but no time to commit the crime, the same as Bagman;”

“Madame Olympe Maxime is suspected because of being a half-blood giant, in the war years, the giant clan was a hardcore supporter of Voldemort. Suspicious: not found yet.”

“Uagadou, Ilvermorny, the students of both schools’ information is incomplete, can not be judged …”

Felix pondered silently until finally when a figure with fake eyes and a face full of scars appeared, he waved his hand and let the golden mist dissipate.

“No matter who did it, one, or a group, their goal is Harry, they want Harry to die. But it could be done without causing this much trouble, perhaps there is a deeper intent …”

“And is Voldemort already resurrected now or not? Is he trying to make Harry as his first sacrifice after the resurrection? A stage to announce his return? If resurrected but does not show up, it is only possible that he is secretly seeking his old troops, and with Dumbledore’s intelligence network, he should be able to find the clues … Well, I’m not doing that bad, it’s time to write a letter to a few old friends.”

He glanced at an improved version of the Marauder’s Map, as his gaze lingered over Moody’s name briefly, before wrapping it up. “Gotta make time to include the four magic school quarters.”

He looked back and saw Niffler Valen staring at him, so he smiled as he tapped Valen’s long beak twice.

Before he went to sleep, he thought carefully, as he seemed to have forgotten something … “Oh, yes,” he waved his hand, making the fireplace burn with turquoise flames, and then Felix muttered in a small voice: “Don’t blame me for blocking your fireplace, disturbing me half a dozen times a day, no one can stand it.”

The next morning.

Harry opened his eyes in a daze and got startled at the sight of Ron – he seemed to have been up all night, and the shadows under his eyes were simply deeper than Mr. Crouch.

” That cat is looking for you.” Ron said in a hoarse voice, “It kept scratching the door and I let it in.”

Harry lifted the curtain of the four-poster bed and saw Crookshanks crouched on the cupboard beside the bed, the seemingly squashed cat face staring unblinkingly at him, its tail sweeping aimlessly and scattering a stack of Rune cards.

“Something wrong, Crookshanks?” He asked.

On the cupboard, the ginger cat stretched out one of its claws, pointed outside, and let out an oozing howl as Seamus, who was sleeping on one side, rolled over.

Harry and Ron looked at each other, Harry asked tentatively: “You want me to go outside? Is … Hermione looking for me about something?”

The yellow eyes of Crookshanks showed an approving look.

So Harry changed out of his pyjamas, in between dressing, he took the time to look out the window, it is dark outside, probably it is only four or five o’clock, he could not help but yawn.

Yesterday he went to bed very late, and today he woke up early, he did not even sleep for a few hours.

In the common room, Harry and Ron saw Hermione waiting quietly out there, she covered herself tightly, head wrapped in a scarf like the one worn by Beauxbatons students.

Harry once saw her in a similar outfit, it was because Hermione had mistakenly taken a polyjuice potion with cat hair. In between recovery periods, together with partial human transfiguration: a magical spell was said to be used by vampires to hide their fangs, to cover up the facial hair on her face.

“Hermione, what’s going on … and Ron, I’ve been meaning to ask for a while now, did you all stay up all night?”

“I couldn’t sleep – oops, don’t ask for now, Sirius is here.” Hermione said urgently, her vocalization sounded strange, like she had a piece of candy in her mouth.

“Who?” Harry came to his senses with a start.

Outside the door of the Gryffindor common room, Sirius is having a conversation with the Fat Lady portrait. The Fat Lady talking enthusiastically, she recited the lines in a deliberately subdued theatrical singing voice –

“The little boy with a bruised nose – who returns by night – the hard work in the dark – ah ~ at last, he becomes a fearless champion! –”

Sirius frowned, feeling more and more irritated by every moment. What the hell is this singing!

“Can’t you just let me in?” He asked for the fifth time without giving up.

“Oh, no,” the fat lady paused and said solemnly, “I have a professional code of conduct, you are neither a student nor a professor, and you are not allowed to enter even with a password …”

The door opened from the inside, her portrait turned to the side, Harry, Ron, and Hermione came out.

“Sirius, what are you doing here? Hermione told me, but I didn’t quite believe her!” Harry asked in surprise.

” Otherwise, how could I sit still when something so big happened, you should have informed me first, this is when the two-way mirror comes in handy.” Sirius said without a smile, he looked at the two behind Harry, “So, the three-person team has been officially recognized? Have you figured out what to name your group yet?”

Ron glanced at him and didn’t say anything.

Harry glared at his blabbermouth godfather, and Sirius immediately raised his hands in surrender, “Okay, no offence – you guys should know what I’m feeling right now.”

“Did Professor Hap inform you of this, Mr. Black?” Hermione asked pointedly, still speaking in that strange tone, and Harry gave her an odd look.

“Call me Sirius – yeah, the books in the old mansion more or less helped.” Sirius said bitterly as he wrapped his arms around Harry, “Let’s find an empty classroom and have a nice chat, and you guys come over here, anyway, we’re on the same rope now …”

“I hate that.” Harry muttered.

Sirius grinned and reached out as he messily rubbed Harry’s hair.

They sought out an empty classroom and each went over what they knew, and Harry and the others learned more useful information, such as that Karkaroff had been caught by Moody back when he was a Death Eater, but he had escaped punishment from the Ministry of Magic by giving up a list of Death Eaters, and a dozen years later, transformed and became Headmaster of Durmstrang.

“We finally know why Karkaroff is so afraid and hates Professor Moody.” Harry said, looking at Ron, who responded absent-mindedly, as they had discussed this topic before.

When Harry mentioned that the first task would have something to do with Dragons, Sirius stood up in a flash and walked back and forth in the empty classroom.

“How could they possibly let you deal with something like that!” He yelled.

Harry had to admit that he hadn’t seriously considered how to deal with a dragon other than at the time during the light show when he and Sirius had had a conversation when they saw the Dragon magic lamp. He had been more worried about the possibility of Hogwarts not getting the trophy and the potential cold shoulder they might get last night but on the contrary, he hadn’t thought about how he is supposed to fight for his small life amidst the claws and flames of a dragon in front of a large crowd.

“Maybe more than one.” Sirius said, “Don’t forget, you are competing as a group, the difficulty must be higher than in previous years – of course, I’m not talking about your level of difficulty, but the level of those who were once champions.”

Harry noticed that Ron began to shake rhythmically again. He gathered his courage and said, “We’re not that far behind, Hermione defeated a student of Ilvermorny – the one called Victor, he was the first champion to be selected, normally, the more qualified you are the more you will be selected first, right?”

Sirius looked over at Hermione, who had wrapped her head up so that her expression was not visible.

“I, uh, I …” she stammered through her veil.

“It looks like none of you are ready for this in your hearts.” Sirius pointed out the right point.

Harry opened his mouth and realized helplessly that what his godfather had said was right, none of them were prepared. He couldn’t help but think about the other champions – like Cedric – would they also have been too worried to sleep? Or would they be thrilled to hear the news about the Dragon?

To make his mind more positive, he asked, “How are we supposed to defeat a dragon?”

“Defeat a dragon?” Sirius repeated.

“That’s right … we talked about it last time, didn’t we? At the Quidditch World Cup light show,” Harry said in a lighter tone, “you said it was possible to use some vision obscuration spell, brilliant idea, maybe we can use Conjunctivitis Curse, but we had to aim right …”

Sirius glared and said, “You don’t sound like you’re dealing with a dangerous 5X class creature that can burn you to ashes in one breath, but rather a Niffler or something, in your mind, does defeat result in simply losing your pocket money?”

“Burned to ashes?” Ron said with a shudder.

“Yes, the Fire that Dragon spews out is not ordinary fire, shield charm may not be able to protect you against it, and simply with a tail whip, you will be smashed into mush even with a magic shield … If there is no good way, your wands are no better than toothpicks.”

…

At the table in the great hall, Sirius joined Harry and the rest for breakfast, they all had little appetite, and in addition to the problem of having to think about dragons, they also had to face the other people’s strange looks and gestures.

“Ignore them, they will only say some sour words.” Sirius said: “If you really can not swallow this, I suggest you to find the most unpleasant one and beat them up.”

Hermione glared at him, and when she finally took off her hood during the meal, they could see that she had an extra row of blisters on her mouth.

“I thought you were the calmest of the three, I didn’t think …” Sirius said as he looked at her.

“It doesn’t matter if you’re calm or not, I’m just worried … ouch!” Hermione covered her mouth, and after that time, she no longer dared to speak out loud.

“You better go to the hospital wing.” Harry said.

Hermione grunted twice.

…

“There’s nothing to worry about.” Felix said, standing in front of the six Hogwarts champions.

That evening, he gathered the six in classroom seven for targeted instruction.

“Since you’re all bound together, it’s certainly not for the purpose of losing, and when you think about it, you have quite a few advantages.”

“Advantage?”

Felix waved his wand, and the silvery-white smoke behind him gathered towards them, quickly becoming invisible. They had stayed in the seventh classroom these days and were not unfamiliar with the change at hand.

They waited quietly, and after a few moments, the fog cleared before them, and they found themselves standing on a hillside, with soft brown dirt beneath their feet. The fog further away had not yet cleared, but they could vaguely see the emerald green peaks and black rock walls, as they found themselves in the midst of the mountains.

A dark shadow swept low over their heads and flew into the depths of the fog.

“Where is this place?”

Collins Foley asked, pursing her lips. The one thing that had been recognized by them, the students who had participated in the selection, is that most of the scenes are close enough to reality that they are traceable, except for Professor Hap’s inexplicably ugly creatures.

She knelt down and plunged her hand into the loose dirt, grabbing a handful of blades of grass along with it, a feeling that seemed very real.

“Romanian Dragon Sanctuary.” Felix said softly, “Thanks to Mr. Bagman, for inadvertently leaking the information, which has given me no worries in this process. I hope he won’t be reprimanded by his superiors when he returns.”

Hermione is the first to ask: “So the task we will challenge, is all those dragons from the Romanian Dragon Sanctuary?”

“That’s right,” Felix said, “I’ve been at the sanctuary for a couple of days, and I know a bit about the various species of dragons there … This is your first advantage.”

The six men shuddered for a moment, then Harry looked uround, and peered up at a huge dragon passing through the sky.

“I think I hear the sound of human voices?” Cedric said hesitantly.

“Let’s go down and take a look.” Felix smiled as they walked down the hill to see a group of people fighting off a wounded Romanian longhorn dragon, half of its wings broken and bloody, but they still remained very cautious, the dark green scales on its neck expanding outward as if a small green shield had been inserted, its long golden horns always aimed at the person is considered the most threatening.

“Watch out, it’s going to breathe fire – Charlie, use the stunning spell!” A wizard shouted.

Ron’s eyes suddenly widened, and he pointed at one and shouted, “That’s Charlie, my brother! He’s in Romania! Oh my God!” He watched as Charlie led the charge and seven or eight men chanted a stunning spell together, and after a series of dense, dazzling red lights, the towering body of the dragon slammed heavily into the ground.

They felt the ground beneath their feet shuddered a bit as they gulped in unison.

Felix said from the side: “You can come closer to have a look.” As he spoke, the time in the area seemed to freeze, and the dragon and dragon trainers did not move. They came closer and looked up close at the dragon, which was flipped over on the ground, and couldn’t help but smack their lips, it was so big, at least six or seven times bigger than Cedric and Roger Davies, the tallest of them all.

The only thing that could be considered as consolation is the fact that this dragon’s tail took up a third of its body length.

“Longhorn like to fend off their prey with their horns before roasting it, then drag it back to the nest with their claws, occasionally skewering it with their horns, or wrapping their tails around it.” Felix described.

Harry looked at the two long golden horns on the top of the dragon’s head, there is no doubt that they can impale all the prey in sight, he imagined the image of him hanging on it, and his face could not help but turn grim.

The six men followed Professor Hap forward with their hearts racing, unaware that they had come to a camp where most people were ignoring them. Felix introduced the scene from the side: “This is the scene I saw when I first came here, behind the camp is a fireproof-fenced enclosure, there are several dragons within it, I have played with all of them, one of them is particularly interesting …”

“Professor Hap, are we just going to watch?” Cedric asked, “I mean, you are supposed to have us fight the dragons to gain experience, right?”

“That’s the last step.” Felix said, “First, it is necessary to dispel your fear of dragons, what is the best way to eliminate fear? You should all more or less have some idea how to do it …

You need to understand them first, and Headmaster Dumbledore has found a teacher for you, his knowledge about dragons is much richer than mine.”

As they spoke, the curtain of a tent in front of them lifted, and from inside came out two identical old men.

“Mr. Scamander, what do you think?” Felix asked courteously.

“Interesting, very interesting … an eye-opener.” The two old men said in unison, and they looked at each other with smiles on their faces.

————

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