Harry Potter and the Secret Treasures

Chapter 609: Band-Ended Skoots

Chapter 609: Band-Ended Skoots

Each of the skrewts was now approaching six feet in length. Their thick gray armor; their powerful, scuttling legs; their fire-blasting ends; their stings and their suckers, combined to make the skrewts the most repulsive things Evan had ever seen.

The students looked dispiritedly at the enormous boxes Hagrid had brought out, all lined with pillows and fluffy blankets.

“We’ll just lead them in here,” Hagrid said, “and put the lids on, and we’ll see what happens.”

But the skrewts, it transpired, did not hibernate, and did not appreciate being forced into pillow-lined boxes and nailed in.

They probably thought it would be very boring. As soon as the lid was closed, the Blast-Ended Skrewts suddenly became violent.

After a few bangs and screams, Hagrid yelled “Don’t panic, now, don’t panic!” while the Skrewts rampaged around the pumpkin patch, now strewn with the smoldering wreckage of the boxes.

Many students had fled into Hagrid’s cabin through the back door, and Evan, Colin, Ginny, Gabrielle and other classmates remained outside trying to help Hagrid.

Together they managed to restrain and tie up the ten skrewts, though at the cost of numerous burns and cuts.

In Evan’s view, Hagrid was simply going further and further on the road to disaster.

These skrewts were gradually getting out of his control and became dangerous creatures like the Manticore.

The sensible way to deal with these skrewts was to kill them before they killed anyone. But Evan was sure that Hagrid would never do this.

In fact, he did not blame Hagrid for his choice. He devoted more and more energy to the study of dangerous magic.

In fact, after bringing back the ancient magic text to decipher it, Evan was also ready to summon a demon.

Although there were sufficient reasons, the matter itself was terrible, evil, and incredible.

If someone had told Evan about these things in his first year, he would definitely think that person was mad!

At that time, his understanding of Dark Magic was still on the level of waving the wand and casting a few spells.

The Avada Kedavra was really powerful and effective, but not as evil as imagined.

Evan thought Dark magic was no more than that, but with a deeper understanding of magic, he discovered that he was wrong.

In order to become stronger, Voldemort did more cruel things on himself than what most wizards could imagine.

Evan was sure that Voldemort had also summoned a demon, but what he did with the devil was definitely beyond everyone’s expectations.

Back to Hagrid, who was now likely to be killed by more and more violent skrewts at any time. Or worse, that is, these things were reported by Rita Skeeter.

After the end of the first task, the woman did not leave school to return to London.

She camped around Hogwarts, looking for all the opportunities she could take advantage of, hoping to get more exciting news.

Evan knew she was an illegal Animagus and wanted to catch her when she became a bug. Or, more directly, give her a good beating and make her stop talking nonsense.

But Evan couldn’t do that. He also doubted whether this could be effective.

Even in the face of the Ministry of Magic, Fudge and Dumbledore, Rita Skeeter did not hesitate to spread rumors.

Perhaps only a Dark wizard like Voldemort, who killed people at will, could make her feel frightened.

Evan had planned to bring out the fact that Rita Skeeter was an illegal Animagus, but this woman was very careful and never deformed when someone was around. She never approached a strong wizard in a deformed state.

Obviously, Evan was one of the people she was determined not to approach.

Evan couldn’t follow her everywhere around the school, waiting for her to transform. He didn’t have time for that.

Looking at Rita Skeeter coming from the edge of the Forbidden Forest, he thought it was time for Dobby to practice!

“Well, well, well … this does look like fun.”

Rita Skeeter came over and leaned on Hagrid’s garden fence, watching everyone join forces to trap a skrewt into the box.

She was wearing a thick magenta cloak with a furry purple collar, and her crocodile-skin handbag was over her arm.

“Who are you?” Hagrid asked Rita Skeeter as he slipped a loop of rope around the skrewt’s sting and tightened it.

“Rita Skeeter, Daily Prophet reporter.” Rita replied, beaming at him. Her gold teeth glinted.

“I remember you. Dumbledore said you weren’t allowed inside the school anymore,” said Hagrid, frowning slightly as he got off the slightly squashed skrewt and started tugging it over to its fellows.

Rita acted as though she hadn’t heard what Hagrid had said, and she asked, beaming still more widely, “What are these fascinating creatures called?”

“Blast-Ended Skrewts,” grunted Hagrid.

“Really?!” said Rita, apparently full of lively interest. “I’ve never heard of them before … where do they come from?”

If possible, Evan wished Hagrid would stop talking.

He walked over and gently stepped on Hagrid’s foot. The latter stopped and looked at Evan in confusion.

“You’re here too, Evan!” said Rita Skeeter as she looked around. “So, you like Care of Magical Creatures, do you?”

Evan didn’t want to talk to her. He was ready to drag Hagrid back, but when he looked up and saw Hagrid beaming at him expectantly, he had to nod. “Yes, many of us like this course. Hagrid is a good teacher!” said Evan.

“Lovely,” said Rita. “Really lovely. Been teaching long?”

“This is only my second year,” said Hagrid, a dull red flush rising up out of Hagrid’s wild black beard out of excitement.

“Lovely … I don’t suppose you’d like to give an interview and share some of your experience of magical creatures, would you? The Daily Prophet does a zoological column every Wednesday, as I’m sure you know. We could feature these … er … Band-Ended Scoots.”

“Blast-Ended Skrewts,” Hagrid said eagerly. “I’d like to be interviewed and share my experience of taking care of these cute little guys. Evan’s newspaper has done it many times, but I think the Daily Prophet may be better!”

“That’s good. We’ll meet in the Three Broomsticks on Friday for a good long interview,” said Rita with satisfaction, turning her head to Evan, “I’ve already written about the first task and your overcoming of the dragon. You’ll like what I think of you, Evan. however, I still need to know…”

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