Harry Potter and the Secret Treasures

Chapter 637: Catching Rita Skeeter

Chapter 637: Catching Rita Skeeter

Rita Skeeter’s Animagus form was a beetle, and it was not easy to find an inconspicuous insect. 

Especially knowing that Evan’s magic power was very strong, Rita Skeeter was more afraid and would not come to him easily.

Although she was ostentatious, she was cautious in character and seldom appeared around wizards with high magic power.

That’s why she was eavesdropping everywhere, but her Animagus form had never been spotted.

Maybe waiting for her luck to run out, Rita Skeeter would be caught some day, sooner or later. In the original book, Hermione was successful with that.

That woman was too greedy. She had no limits to what she could do, and it was not surprising that she would be caught!

But Evan didn’t have much time to play this peek-a-boo game with her, nor was he ready to let Rita Skeeter cause more trouble.

When he saw that she had just confronted Harry and Hermione, he suddenly had the idea that he could lure her to the bait.

Waiting was not a solution, but taking the initiative to attack would solve the problem earlier.

This was a well-dug trap. Evan intentionally let Rita Skeeter see the research notes related to black magic.

He was sure that she would never give up the delicious food sent to her mouth, and would certainly not stand the temptation to come back to investigate.

Evan Mason, the young wizard currently in the limelight in the wizarding world, was secretly studying taboo dark magic. Just thinking about this kind of heavyweight news was too exhilarating for Rita, and she would never let go of such a scoop.

In fact, she was currently investigating in this direction, which was also the big news she had been preparing.

Rita Skeeter had long been investigating the reason why Evan’s magic power was far greater than that of his peers and even most wizards. She didn’t know the existence of the Philosopher’s Stone and Slytherin’s Locket, and naturally thought of Black Magic.

Some Dark magic could allow a wizard to quickly increase his strength in a short period of time, as Voldemort did, using taboo Dark magic to transform himself into a Dark Lord with strength comparable to that of Dumbledore in a relatively short amount of time.

But no matter how she investigated, there were only rumors about Evan’s use of black magic.

It was neither accurate nor worth investigating.

Even if Evan used some restricted black magic that had not been banned by the Ministry of Magic, it would not be surprising and it was not something to make a fuss about.

He used similar magic in the first task, but Rita Skeeter knew that she needed to link him to forbidden evil Dark magic.

However, the black magic Evan brought out was completely forbidden. As could be seen from the two pictures, it was exactly what Rita Skeeter needed.

Since she had seen this, Evan was sure that she would take the bait.

He put the parchment away and looked up to see Ron sitting opposite him staring at him with strange eyes.

Evan smiled, but Ron recoiled, maybe just seeing the parchment.

Hermione was the only one who knew about Evan’s study of Dark magic. Neither Harry nor Ron knew about it.

Although Ron might have seen it, Evan did not intend to explain anything. He would not really cast such an evil curse anyway.

Studying black magic and learning to use taboo Dark magic are two completely different concepts. Evan studied these things in order to get the principles and better learn the Defense Against the Dark Arts and related ancient magic knowledge rather than torturing someone’s soul.

Besides, this kind of thing was getting darker and darker, and it seemed better to let it go.

Ron took a deep breath and tried not to look at Evan. He said in a low and worried voice, “You just shouldn’t have said that, especially you, Hermione! You must have upset her. She’ll be after you next!”

“Let her try!” said Hermione defiantly; she was shaking with rage. “I’ll show her! Silly little girl, am I? Oh, I’ll get her back for this. First Evan and Harry, then Hagrid…”

“You don’t want to go upsetting Rita Skeeter,” said Ron nervously. “I’m serious, she’ll dig up something on you!”

“I don’t care. My parents don’t read the Daily Prophet. I don’t care about the rumors she says. She can’t scare me into hiding!” said Hermione. “I’m not as vulnerable as Hagrid. Let her try.”

“All right, all right, we’d better be careful. Don’t expose anything. I’m leaving!” Ron paused and glanced at Evan. “You know, I’ve a date with Lavender at Madam Puddifoot’s Tea Shop. It’s almost time!”

He stood up, waved and left the pub in a hurry, with a very bad expression on his face.

“We should leave too, and wait for Sirius at the Shrieking Shack,” said Harry. “Calculating time, he should be there too!”

“Hold on, Harry, we’ll stay for a while. I’ve got something to figure out!” said Evan, shaking the quill in his hand.

Harry sat down and talked to Hermione about Rita Skeeter.

A few minutes later, a pudgy big beetle crawled into the pub through a crack in the window.

It slowly moved closer to Evan’s position along the ceiling, ready to see what the boy was writing!

Evan was there, his right hand constantly writing complex magic formulas. His left hand quietly held the wand upright to aim at the ceiling above. 

The beetle climbed cautiously over Evan’s head, with a burst of joy. It was about to succeed…

Before it could see the details of the parchment below, it was suddenly hit by a stream of air, and its limbs were petrified and lost their responsiveness!

With a bang, it fell heavily and landed on the table.

The markings around the beetle’s antennae were exactly like those foul glasses Rita Skeeter wore. Yeah, that was Rita Skeeter’s Animagus form.

Rita Skeeter was stunned to find herself under the Full Body-Bind Curse. Then she saw Evan looking at her with a wry smile.

She felt her head was short circuited, and it took her a long time to realize what had happened.

Her heart sank suddenly. It was over. She was caught by the three young devils.

Especially when looking at Evan’s expression, it was obvious that he already knew she was an illegal Animagus.

“Weird, how could there be insects, but now it’s winter?!” said Harry, seeing the big beetle in front of Evan.

“This is not an ordinary beetle,” said Evan with a smile. He took out a glass bottle and threw the beetle in. “Hermione, don’t you want revenge? You’ve always been wondering how Rita Skeeter overheard Hagrid’s secret conversation!”

“What are you talking about, Evan?!” Hermione looked strangely at the glass bottle with the big beetle in his hand, and looked closer. She seemed to think of something, and then said incredulously, “You mean, this insect is…”

“Yes, it’s her!” Evan pointed at the glass bottle with his wand, cast an Unbreakable Charm on it, and handed it to Hermione. “Here you go, Hermione. I believe you will help her learn that spreading misinformation is a very bad behavior!”

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