Who let this Dementor into Hogwarts!

Chapter 463 Which good brother sent over a brain?
Unfortunately, Cohen and Hermione transformed the plush puppy into a live dog as soon as it was handed out, and the dog even sat on the table wagging its tail to block the view from the podium.

So only Harry and Ron have this extra assignment.

“It’s okay, Cohen will help us,” Ron told Harry after class.

“How can I help you?” Cohen shook his head regretfully. “Hermione doesn’t have to do the first draft of the assignment, and I can’t catch any troublemakers these days. You can’t hit a smiling face, right? They even gave me gifts, look—”

As he spoke, Cohen picked up several packages he had received during the class and waved them in front of Ron.

"Does this count as bribery?" Hermione asked.

"Does it count? You could say that, you could also think of it as protection money," Cohen pondered. "They hand over gifts, and then I don't arrest them or put them in solitary confinement... By the way, when you guys first returned to school, didn't you say something like, 'We're back late because of Harry's matter'?"

“Oh!” Harry suddenly remembered, “because I had a nightmare at Christmas—I saw myself turn into a snake.”

"And then?" Cohen asked, feigning interest.

“I was crawling down a weird corridor…” Harry recalled, “and then I saw Kingsley and Mr. Weasley blocking the middle of the corridor—somehow I wanted to bite them, but thankfully they reacted quickly and immediately chased me—I mean the snake—away with a whole bunch of spells.”

“At first I thought it was a nightmare from spending too much time with the basilisk,” Harry continued, “but Hermione thought this wasn’t normal…”

“This is certainly not normal,” Hermione said seriously to Harry. “That’s why we need to wait a little longer, because Tonks will be going back to headquarters at noon to bring back a letter for Mr. Weasley, so we can ask Tonks if what you dreamed about was real.”

"So you got the answer?" Cohen asked.

“No.” Ron sighed. “Tonks didn’t come back. It was Darrow who came back. Harry said he didn’t see him in his dream, so we didn’t tell him about it—now we can only wait for Professor Dumbledore to come back and talk to him.”

“That might take a while, since Dumbledore hasn’t been back to school these days,” Cohen said doubtfully. “But you can talk to Sirius, he won’t disbelieve you—to be honest, I think he’d love to have something to do right away.”

“He’s definitely ‘busy,’” Ron said. “He hasn’t been back since Christmas, and Harry thought he was going to live outside—you have no idea how enthusiastic he is about the Order of the Phoenix’s outings.”

“You can’t expect someone who’s been in prison for twelve years to want to be locked up in a dark room, can you?” Cohen wisely said.

“So, Cohen, do you think this could be true?” Harry asked.

“It depends on your perspective. If the dream feels very real even after you wake up, it might actually be real,” Cohen said. “After all, you have some connection to Voldemort—”

Cohen pointed to the scar on Harry's head.

But Harry's expression was not good—he didn't want any connection with Voldemort.

Especially ideologically.

Cohen didn't tell Harry to reject the link, nor did he tell Harry about Occlumency.

What if he actually masters it and Voldemort can't fool him next time?
How can Cohen then bomb the Ministry of Magic?

If the minister wasn't Edward, Cohen would have taken this opportunity to blow up the Ministry of Magic—because of the sadness of his beloved father's defeat in the election.

If the minister were Edward, then Cohen would have even more reason to blow up the Ministry of Magic—because blowing up one's own ministry would not require a reason, and it would effectively demonstrate the "power" of the Norton family.

This year, your Ministry of Magic is definitely going to be blown up.

Looking at it this way, Cohen felt he needed to urge Voldemort again.

There's no problem implementing the original plan directly. Infiltrate Harry's mind, trick him into believing Sirius Black has been arrested—and Sirius even goes out to work without returning home, making it impossible for Harry to confirm the details. A fire breaks out in the back hill, and Cohen puts it out—but don't ask who started the fire.
-
So Cohen had the Earl send the urgent letter to Voldemort that afternoon. It was during the period of the change of Minister of Magic, when the Ministry was quite empty, which was perfect time for Harry to go and get the prophecy ball.

After finishing that, Cohen planned to start unpacking the mountain of gifts to see if there was anything useful or that could be eaten as a snack.

However, Cohen soon discovered a strange package.

It looks square, like a box, with damp edges, as if it's filled with water.

Cohen was more concerned with one thing he could see—this box had the power of a soul.

[Soul Strength: 30]

What clown's scare box?

Which student stuffed a box that turned out to be a living person into their body?
There were so many gifts that Cohen couldn't quite remember when or who gave them to him—anyway, even if someone were to slip a bomb in, it wouldn't pose any danger to Cohen.

All other gifts paled in comparison.

【Hello? 】

【? 】

Cohen was somewhat surprised to hear the voice of thought coming from the box—this was the communication pattern between Dementors.

Who put a Dementor in here?
However, the voice didn't sound as hoarse and deep as the Dementors'; it sounded more like a mix of many human voices.

"Could you change my water?" the box said. "If you have hands."

"Of course I have hands," Cohen replied.

"You have hands?!" the box asked excitedly.

"What a joke! Even Dementors have hands," Cohen said.

Cohen unwrapped the gift.

Then Cohen understood why the box was so surprised by the fact that "you have hands"—

The gift was a small water tank, which contained neither Dementors nor any shapeshifting humans.

Inside was a pink brain with a pearly white tinge from being soaked for too long.

A ring of illusory thought tentacles surrounded the brain, but because the water tank was too narrow, these seemingly illusory but actually tangible tentacles were squeezed to the edge of the water tank.

[Oh, you're not the brain—how can you hear us?] The brain shifted slightly in the tank, a difficult movement for it, as it appeared to be deformed from being squeezed by the tank.

[Because I have some...blood relatives, and we communicate in the same way.] Cohen wasn't sure how to articulate this concept.

"This feels familiar," the brain said. "I've seen life forms very similar to you before; one joined us, and we gave it a place."

(End of this chapter)