From Hogwarts to Strixhaven.

Chapter 232 Centaur
"I... have never felt so good..." Lupin opened and closed his palms in the moonlight. His five fingers were covered with fur, but the nails were dark and sharp like wolf claws.

"I have to say, you look much better than before..." Sirius admired Lupin.

Lupin's new gray hair looked neat and smooth, making his body, which was between human and beast, look not like a monster, but an intelligent creature full of dignity.

"What a wonderful change..." Ivy also moved closer to observe Lupin's new form. "Perhaps your identity as a wizard has changed your transformation this time... You look more like a human, not a bloodthirsty monster. Come, give me some of your blood."

Lupin poked his finger lightly with his claws, and blood immediately gushed out.

Ivy produced a small crystal bottle, put the blood into the bottle, and helped Lupin heal his wound.

"This is so unfair!" Sirius said angrily, "You're covered in fur, yet you can still show your stomach muscles!"

The hair on Lupin's abdomen was lighter and shorter, and under the moonlight, it showed different shades of color, and it actually outlined the structure of his abdominal muscles just as Sirius said.

When Sirius thought of Lupin's severe malnutrition before, the abdominal muscles he saw now made him feel even more unfair.

"I told you, Sirius, I've never felt so good... My body is full of strength, as if the mountains I've been carrying for years have been lifted off my shoulders. It's just that..." Lupin's narrow wolf face showed a human expression of confusion, "I'm so hungry..."

"In addition to various magical animals, there are also many ordinary animals living in the Forbidden Forest. Why not try your skills?" Ivy made his suggestion. He really wanted to see what the new werewolf Lupin was capable of.

Lupin showed his fangs: "That's exactly what I meant!"

After saying that, the gray werewolf kicked his feet and rushed into the dark woods in the blink of an eye, leaving only a sentence in the distance: "Sirius, help me get my clothes!"

"What?" Sirius was about to transform into Animagus form to keep up with the werewolf, but he had to stop.

By the time he had gathered up Lupin's neatly folded clothes and stuffed them into his pocket, the gray werewolf had long disappeared.

Ivy waved his wand and cast a 3rd-level transmutation spell, Flying, on both of them. This spell allowed them to gain a flying speed of 10 feet per second.

"I cast a spell to give you the ability to fly. As long as you use your brain to imagine, you can fly." Ivy took the lead and flew into the air, turning around and calling out, "Let's follow him and see how far Lupin can go."

"This is amazing!" As a good duelist, Sirius had good coordination skills and mastered the tricks of flying in a short time.

Under Ivy's guidance, the two crossed the treetops of the Forbidden Forest and tracked Lupin's footsteps.

For a forest that maintains its original magical ecology, the nights in the Forbidden Forest are far from peaceful. The giant octopus spiders roaming deep in the forest, the dark magic creatures lurking in the dead branches and rotten leaves, the Forbidden Forest is not short of danger.

But this is certainly not a problem for werewolves, and Ivy feels like he's back home.

Although the Forbidden Forest was no longer what he remembered, Ivy could still easily keep up with the werewolves jumping through the woods.

Suddenly, the gray-white werewolf stopped, and Ivy and Sirius also lowered their altitude, watching Lupin's movements with bated breath.

The gray hair was like a ray of moonlight that occasionally passed through the leaves, fleeting and disappeared in the blink of an eye.

Just as Ivy and the others were about to look for Lupin, they heard the sound of dead branches and leaves being trampled violently not far away. Many frightened wild deer jumped out from the darkness and disappeared into the darkness in the blink of an eye.

Sirius, holding Lupin's wand and clothes, rushed to the scene of the riot first, followed closely by Ivy.

There was a doe corpse lying on the ground, its neck broken by the werewolf as easily as a dry branch. The bright red blood had stained the fur around the werewolf's long snout, adding a sense of solemnity to him.

"How did you do that!" Sirius fell to the ground, swayed for a moment, then stood up again, and squatted in front of the doe impatiently.

"Instinct... It's as if I was born a predator and know what kind of prey is the most delicious..." The werewolf made a low guttural sound, as if he himself did not expect that his movements would be so fast and handy.

"Honestly, I'm a little envious." Sirius exclaimed in amazement, once again sizing up the dead prey in front of him, "It's quite big."

Someone's stomach rumbled, and the three of them looked at each other in the woods and couldn't help laughing.

"Call out your house-elf, Ivy!" Sirius shouted happily, "We'll have a deer feast!"

But before Ivy could make any move, unusual movements occurred in the forest again.

It seemed as if an entire cavalry unit was moving through the forest, and the chaotic sound of horse hooves made people feel uneasy.

"call out--"

Lupin slightly turned sideways, swung his sharp claws in front of him, and caught an arrow with a bone arrowhead in his hand.

"Unclean creature, you are not welcome in the Forbidden Forest!"

The three of them saw who the archer was - a large group of centaurs surrounded them, and each of them drew his bow and arrow.

"Get away from it!" A centaur with black hair and half a black horse body shouted at Sirius, as if he was a victim of a werewolf.

Sirius threw away Lupin's clothes and took out his wand from them. In Sirius' eyes, the suddenly appearing centaurs were the ones that should be watched out for.

"Stupid human wizard!" However, his action was misunderstood by the centaurs. The black centaur took two steps forward and raised his hoof to kick Lupin. The werewolf just jumped back slightly and escaped from the centaurs' attack range. But there were more than one centaurs surrounding this position. Immediately, a reddish-brown-haired centaur shot an arrow at Lupin, who was in the air with no support.

"Armor protect you!" Ivy recited clearly, and an invisible barrier formed around Lupin, successfully blocking the arrows shot at Lupin.

Ivy then called out several bright balls of light, illuminating everything in the dark woods.

"Oh--" A low cry came from the centaurs, and they retreated nervously, pausing their hooves on the ground.

"This is a misunderstanding!" Ivy shouted, "We are in the Forbidden Forest to cure the lycanthropy curse! He is different from any werewolf you have ever seen!"

"That's right!" Lupin wiped the blood from the corner of his mouth with his hairy arm. "I just hunted a doe in the Forbidden Forest, and I was too hungry... If this is your territory, I can give it back to you."

The tall werewolf's speech caused a commotion among the centaurs.

“Is that him?” the centaurs whispered.

"That's right..." "The wizard who confirmed the activities of Pluto..."

"Didn't you expect you to be famous, Remus?" Sirius relaxed a little, turned around and smiled, "How come I didn't know you had a nickname called Pluto?"

"...I've never known any centaurs..." Lupin said in confusion, "You guys always accompany me when I come to the Forbidden Forest. Have you forgotten?"

"We're not talking about him." A centaur with platinum hair and a silver-maned horse body answered the two people's confusion. His hair shone silver under Ivy's magic. "It's him."

Following the centaur's finger, Sirius and Lupin saw Ivy.

"Me?" Ivy was very interested in chatting with the centaurs about astrology.

In the original book, the centaurs do not appear very often, but every time they appear, they are full of mystery, as if they can really get a glimpse of the future from the movement of the stars.

The centaurs learned of Voldemort's resurrection and the wizarding war he brought about in advance through the changes on Mars, and they also warned Harry in mysterious words.

Ivy was very interested to hear what astronomical phenomenon he corresponded to in the eyes of the centaurs.

"Tell me about that Pluto you mentioned," Ivy asked with a smile.

The silver-maned centaur frowned and took a few steps back, looking at his fellow centaurs uncertainly. Unexpectedly, the centaurs all avoided his gaze.

"It started with Mars." The silver-maned centaur said with a very solemn expression, as if he had made up his mind. "We believe that Mars foreshadows war, conflict, and violence. It was like this more than ten years ago. Mars has always dominated the sky. Although it has its dim moments, we all think that it only means temporary peace. Maybe ten years, maybe even longer, the wizards' war will always come."

When talking about "war", Sirius and Lupin could only think of the war that almost tore the wizarding society apart. They exchanged glances with each other, wondering what they were thinking.

The silver-maned centaur had no time to pay attention to their expressions: "But the stars changed last year. Mars first became abnormally bright, and the person it heralded came to our forbidden forest, attempting to murder an innocent life to restore his strength... However, just when the brightness of Mars reached its peak, it suddenly disappeared, and was replaced by the flickering, dim and obscure Pluto..."

The silver-maned centaur sighed and continued, "We noticed you... You were just a foal last year, but now... Your power is getting stronger every day, but Pluto in the sky is getting dimmer... This is too abnormal... We don't know what you mean. We have studied the stars for more than a dozen centuries, but we have never seen a sky like that..."

"Perhaps..." The silver-maned centaur hesitated, "You can help us solve this puzzle?"

"Felzeran!" The centaur who had just kicked Lupin tried to stop his companion. "Stop talking. We should observe instead of questioning face to face... If we hadn't encountered this werewolf in the Forbidden Forest, we wouldn't have... Wait... Why can werewolves talk?"

Perhaps there is no such thing as social etiquette in the centaur society, and the means used by the black-haired centaur to change the subject seemed too clumsy in front of the wizard.

"Because of my magic." Ivy said loudly, "I freed him from his pain and turned the curse of lycanthropy into a talent. From today on, a new form of life was born. Perhaps you don't understand whether my coming is good or bad, because the definition of good and bad is not clear. For those who want to punish others with the curse of lycanthropy, this is certainly a bad thing, but for those who have been troubled by the curse of lycanthropy, this is a relief. Just like you centaurs would rather wizards call you 'beasts', werewolves should seek true equality in wizard society instead of hiding in disgusted eyes."

"We have lived in this forest for a thousand years, and will continue to live like this in the future..." said the silver-maned horseman Fizeron, "I always took it for granted before, but your words... let me see different possibilities... Perhaps, we should go deeper into the society of human wizards..."

"Fezeren!" the black-haired centaur said sternly, "Don't forget the oath we swore to never disobey the guidance of the stars! Even if we haven't figured out what Pluto's changes mean, it doesn't mean you can get close to wizards!"

"Bane." Another reddish-brown-haired centaur called out to the black-haired centaur Bane, "Fezeren just wants to find out what the astrological signs mean. If it is necessary to get close to the wizard, I believe most of my companions will understand..."

"I believe in your determination, Fizeron." Bane sighed, "But wizards are arrogant and dangerous. We can't take risks..."

"Baine, I..." Fezeren was about to say something else, but was interrupted by the impatient Baine.

"You can discuss this matter after you go back. We are here to check for uninvited guests in the Forbidden Forest." Bane glanced at the gray werewolf that Lupin had transformed into. "Since the deer is your prey, you can take it away. But remember, don't kill for the sake of killing. Don't get lost in the pathetic black magic again."

After saying that, Bain turned his horse around and left first, followed by the other centaurs. Fezeren stood there, glanced at Ivy, and followed his companions.

Soon, the sound of the horses' hooves faded away, leaving only bowl-sized footprints on the ground.

"I saw quite a lot of guests tonight..." Sirius exclaimed, "So, Ivy, did you meet Voldemort in the Forbidden Forest?"

"Yes, he possessed last year's Defense Against the Dark Arts professor and wanted to regain his strength by murdering unicorns, but I happened to see him," Ivy replied.

"That is to say, the Order of the Phoenix may be reorganized at any time. I must ask Dumbledore..." Sirius said thoughtfully, "But for now, let's quickly taste Lupin's prey!"

(End of this chapter)