Harry returns from Hogwarts Legacy

Chapter 318 New Semester

The troll took Ron's roar as a welcome.

Its shoulders slumped down, and it opened its mouth wide to roar.

Ron could even smell the troll's incredibly foul breath.

Before they could react, the giant launched the first attack.

After roaring, the giant strode forward with heavy steps and began to charge towards the crowd.

"Impedimenta!"

Cedric, as expected of someone who had been trained by Harry using the emerald glow, was the first to react and immediately cast a Barrier Charm on the giant monster.

The Barrier Curse struck the armored giant, causing only a brief moment of stagnation.

These giant monsters were armed with specially made armor by the fairies under Lanlock's command, giving them a strong immunity to spells.

Of course, while this armor is powerful, it still cannot protect against the Killing Curse.

But here's the problem: these students who are still studying at Hogwarts certainly wouldn't use a spell as overly advanced as the Killing Curse.

After all, not everyone is Harry, with the Philosopher's Stone and ancient magic, who can use various spells without any emotion.

"Do something!" Cedric roared back, casting the Barrier Charm on the troll once more.

The group then seemed to snap out of their daze. They weren't exactly afraid of the giant, but its size of over four meters was quite imposing, and the armor it wore certainly attracted their attention.

"Bomb him with the Explosion Charm, Seamus!" Hermione shouted, raising her wand and joining Cedric in casting Barrier Charms on the troll, occasionally throwing out two Disarming Charms as well.

But the troll seemed unafraid of the disarming spell. With a swing of its spiked club, it deflected the spell, rendering it completely ineffective against the club.

Seamus had also prepared his spells, and he had certainly noticed the troll's absurdly strong spell resistance—this kind of magical creature naturally possessed incredibly strong spell resistance in its skin, and now it was wearing a specially made suit of armor…

Fortunately, Seamus was quick-witted. Instead of blowing up the troll's body, he used a spell to blast the ground in front of the troll.

Environmental destruction is still quite useful. While the troll curse resistance is strong, a brain the size of a walnut is indeed not enough.

In its view, the beams of light emitted by the little stick waved by the little person in front of it had no effect on it, so it didn't pay much attention to them.

However, as it continued walking forward, it accidentally stepped into a crater created by Simo.

Its forward momentum faltered for a moment, and it stumbled, nearly falling to the ground.

"Now!" Cedric shouted, "Reducto!"

The curse struck the giant on the forehead, sending it staggering backward.

Others followed suit, using their own favorite spells.

Ginny also raised her wand, and after a moment of preparation, she aimed it at the troll's head and smashed it to pieces.

"Reducto (shattered to pieces)!"

A dazzling light appeared and struck the giant's head accurately.

With a bang, the giant's head was blasted to pieces by the magic spell.

The headless corpse swayed and then collapsed to the ground with a thud.

Seeing the giant fall, everyone couldn't help but look at Ginny with the eyes of someone witnessing a miracle.

“Ginny, what’s wrong…” Hermione asked, her eyes shining.

"Looks like Ginny's future boyfriend needs to watch out," the twins chuckled. "Look at that, such a powerful 'shattering to pieces' technique, I really doubt he can even last a round against Ginny..."

“If it were me dueling Ginny…” Cedric grinned, “I absolutely wouldn’t dare use the Ironclad Charm to take Ginny’s Shattering Charm head-on—my god, that’s just too terrifying…too terrifying…”

Ginny also came to her senses. She knew she had a bit of talent for the Shattering Curse, but she hadn't expected it to be so powerful.

"Is this what a born master of the Smash Curse is like?" Zhang Qiu exclaimed in astonishment and envy. "He's really strong..."

“It looks like they’ve won,” Mr. Bagman said from the platform. “Let me see—it was Ginny Weasley who finally defeated the troll. Let’s congratulate her… her Shattering Curse was truly extraordinary.”

“I’ve said it before, Ginny has quite a talent,” Mrs. Weasley said, clapping her hands beside her.

"Well done! Beater!" Mr. Weasley also stood on the platform, clapping and cheering.

Mr. Bagman waited a moment, then said again, "Alright, you've defeated the first enemy. Now... there are even more powerful enemies waiting for you... Of course, there's nothing new. The giants you'll face will change from one to two!"

Ron grinned.

“I really wish I could take a break, but that seems like a pipe dream,” he said, shrugging. “But it’s still much better than having spiders around.”

“That’s true,” Cedric said breathlessly. “If it were an eight-eyed giant spider, I’d rather turn around and leave right now—at this level of difficulty, we’d be facing an overwhelming horde of eight-eyed giant spiders.”

Ron looked up, and just imagining the scene made him feel tired and disillusioned.

“I’m tired. Let it all end,” he sighed. “I really hope this never happens to me in my life.”

A fulfilling holiday always goes by too quickly, but the students in these duel huts don't think so.

During their summer trial, they encountered magical creatures including, but not limited to, giants, fire dragons, venomous beasts, venomous leopards, and thunderbirds.

Some trials were conducted in groups, while others were conducted individually.

What impressed them most was that Harry actually managed to get them a chimera so they could fight alongside him.

This creature is a mythical being native to Greece, known for its extreme bloodlust and violence. It has the head of a lion, the body of a goat, and the tail of a fire-breathing dragon; it is also called a chimera.

The Ministry of Magic classifies it as the highest level of creature—of course, classifying it as a 5X-level magical creature is not because its strength is 5X, but because 5X is the highest level.

Unlike the fire dragon, there is only one record of a wizard successfully killing the Chimera, and this wizard later died from exhaustion after falling off his Pegasus.

The famous Cafey's Flying Crossbow Quidditch player, "Dangerous" Day Llewellyn, was killed by a Chimera while on vacation in Greece.

They fought with all their might, but only managed to draw with the chimera, until the chimera got bored and let them go.

“I never want to run into a chimera again in my life,” Ron declared angrily after the match. “We don’t have much of a chance to run into a chimera again either,” Hermione replied wearily.

Soon, the day of school's start arrived.

They traveled from the Isle of Wight to King's Cross Station.

Harry didn't forget to bring Anne along, but now that Cassandra and Pappy have graduated, Anne is the only friend left from a hundred years ago.

"There are a lot of new books to buy in the new year, but I've already bought them all for you," Sirius said with a grin. "Now, we need to cross Platform Nine and Three-Quarters—as usual, let's not attract the attention of the Muggles."

“What I don’t really understand is, is there some kind of ritual that has to be performed before we leave King’s Cross?” Harry asked, puzzled. “Why can’t we just take a carriage back to school?”

“Oh, it’s the rule,” Sirius said, scratching his head. “I don’t know exactly why, just think of it as a kind of magical ritual at Hogwarts.”

"So how did everyone get back to school before there were trains?" Ron asked a thought-provoking question.

“You talk too much!” Mrs. Weasley shoved Ron against the platform wall. “Next, Ginny—”

They passed through the wall one after another and arrived at the familiar platform.

Ron remained seated on the ground, clearly not expecting his mother to push him like that.

They barely exchanged a few words on the platform before the train whistle sounded, signaling everyone to board.

The students on the platform began to hurriedly board the train.

"Hurry up, hurry up," Mrs. Weasley said impatiently, giving them all a hasty hug. "Get in the car now, and remember to write if anything comes up—especially you, Ronald, I don't want to go a whole semester without a letter from you—until you complain about your Christmas presents!"

“I understand, Mom!” Ron said with a sigh.

They didn't carry any luggage; it was all in Harry's wallet.

Cedric and the other older students returned to their respective groups, especially the Sewesley twins, who immediately began searching for Lee Jordan as soon as they got on the bus.

Such like-minded brothers are hard to find even with a lantern.

“Let’s go,” Ginny said, turning to Anne. “If we ask quickly, we can still save them seats.”

“Oh, okay,” Annie replied softly, squeezing into the carriage with Ginny.

After squeezing around for a while, they finally found a carriage big enough to accommodate them.

Just then, Ron pulled Hermione from behind and squeezed through.

“Hey, Ginny,” he said breathlessly, “Oh, Annie…it’s packed everywhere, I can’t find a seat!”

"What are you talking about?" Ginny turned her head, glanced into the private room behind her, and said, "There's still room in there, it's just Crazy Girl Lovegood by herself—"

"Huh? Is this okay?" Ron was a little scared. He thought Luna was a bit crazy, like Dumbledore—but not in the same way.

“Don’t be silly,” Ginny said, laughing. “She’s fine.”

She opened the door and pulled Annie into the private room.

Ron, Hermione, and Harry followed them inside.

“Hello, Luna,” Ginny said, “may we sit in these seats?”

The girl sitting by the window looked up.

She had a head of messy, dirty, waist-length golden hair, very light-colored eyebrows, and one eye that bulged outwards, which gave her a perpetually surprised expression.

This girl exuded a distinctly eccentric air about her. Perhaps it was because she had stuck her wand behind her left ear just to be safe, or perhaps it was because she was wearing a necklace made of corks from butterbeer, or perhaps it was because she was holding the magazine upside down while reading it.

Her gaze swept over Ginny and landed on Anne.

"Mm," she nodded in response.

"Thank you," Ginny said, smiling slightly at her.

They sat in the carriage, and Luna looked at them through an upside-down magazine called "The Quibbler".

She didn't seem to blink as often as most people; she just kept staring at Anne.

Annie felt a little uneasy under her gaze. She didn't know if she should say something, since she felt it would be inappropriate not to say anything after all that staring.
“You’re Ginny, I know that.”

Luna spoke softly, her voice ethereal. She turned to look at Hermione, Ron, and Harry, calling out their names.

“And you?” Luna looked at Anne again. “I don’t think I’ve seen you at Hogwarts before. Are you a student transferring to Hogwarts this year?”

"How did you know?" Anne asked curiously.

“You don’t look like a freshman, because you must be over eleven years old,” Luna analyzed in her ethereal voice. “And almost every year Hogwarts has transfer students, so I think… since you’re already on the train, you must be a transfer student at Hogwarts, right?”

“You’re so clever,” Anne said sincerely. “Are you a Ravenclaw?”

“Exceptional intelligence is a person’s greatest asset,” Luna said in a singing voice. “You have many harassing flies around you, Anne… many harassing flies.”

"A harassing horsefly?" Annie asked in confusion, looking around but seeing nothing.

“Ignore her,” Ginny whispered in Anne’s ear. “There’s no such thing as a harassing fly—”

Luna sighed softly, raised the upside-down magazine high to cover her face, and fell silent.

"What exactly is a harassing fly?" Anne asked Hermione curiously.

After spending so many days together, Anne already knew that Hermione knew a little bit about everything.

In her opinion, Hermione must know about harassing horseflies.

“Oh, it’s something like a mosquito or a fly. It’s an invisible creature that floats into people’s ears and messes up their brains.” Hermione reached out and tapped her temple with her index finger. “Luna believes such things exist, but who can say for sure? After all, no one has proven that it doesn’t exist, right?”

“If you look at it from that perspective, then the harassing flies should exist.” Ron pulled a bottle of Muggle beverage from his pocket, twisted it open, and took a sip. “But I think Muggle drinks are stronger—what’s this? Oh… Fanta, apple flavor, I like Fanta.”

(End of this chapter)