The Silent Witch of Hogwarts

Chapter 704 Chess Pieces on the Chessboard

Voldemort retreated, and his Death Eaters were forced to retreat due to the combined attack from within and without.

However—this retreat was only temporary. Voldemort and his Death Eaters had only temporarily returned to where they had started in the morning; they were far from being defeated.

Instead, after they turned their firepower around, Hagrid's spiders were driven back in disarray and eventually retreated into the Forbidden Forest, too afraid to come out.

The centaurs also suffered heavy casualties and were clearly unable to provide any further assistance in the next battle.

The situation inside Hogwarts is equally dire.

Moody and Heero were killed by Voldemort, and in addition to them, the Ministry of Magic and the Sorcerers lost almost a third of their manpower, and of the remaining two-thirds, only half were still able to fight.

As for the Death Eaters—judging from the principal's office window, their numbers were no different from before.

It was obvious that just one more attack would cause the entire Hogwarts to collapse.

"So—how much longer?" Xirui asked Loila earnestly, "How much longer will it take to inscribe the magic circle?"

"It will probably take another day," Loila said, taking a deep breath. "My clone is working non-stop."

"One day—" Scrimgeour shook his head slightly: "Voldemort will likely launch an attack soon."

"The UMNO party can immediately join the battle." Although Emma's face was pale, she stood bravely beside the group.

"I will also join the battle," she said, gripping her wand.

"Emma!" Loila immediately pulled her back upon hearing this: "You're still a child."

"This kind of fighting is not something students should be involved in."

"No—Miss Royla," Emma said, sniffing slightly, "I'm from the Rozier family just like my sister, and my sister has never been afraid."

"I don't know either."

"This isn't a matter of being scared or not." Loyal was unusually a little angry—Miss Hilo had just…

You just sacrificed yourself, are you going to die too?

This is absolutely unacceptable—looking at the girl in front of her who bore a resemblance to Miss Shiloh, Loira refused to let her step onto the battlefield again.

"Alright—Loila," McGonagall spoke up, shaking her head sadly. "To buy you some time."

"Everyone must get into the fight."

“That’s right.” Scrimgeour nodded. “The next time Voldemort attacks—everyone except you and Lupin will be involved in the battle.”

"We're severely understaffed, aren't we?" Lupin spoke up at this point, looking at Royla and saying, "Remember what I said?"

"Now that you're the headmaster of Hogwarts, you should act like one."

He paused for a moment, then said, "Like Headmaster Dumbledore."

Do you treat all of you like pawns, like Dumbledore?

Loila could use herself as a pawn, just like him, but if she used everyone else as pawns—

Seeing Loila's disheveled appearance, Lupin smiled slightly: "But Miss Shiloh actually fell in love with you—I never expected something like this."

"I love Lady Loila deeply too!" Shirley exclaimed immediately, "She just said it before I did!"

"I like Miss Royza too!" Emma suddenly spoke up at that moment.

"Looks like our principal is quite the heartthrob," Scrimgeour suddenly said, a remark that seemed out of character to everyone, which made them laugh.

For a moment, everyone in the principal's office burst into laughter.

Seeing everyone's smiles, Loila's face, which had been slightly flushed, fell silent again.

This is certainly not true happiness—it's just a kind of—making the best of a bad situation.

"Clatter".

Just then, there was a knock on the principal's office door, and Miss Tonks walked in.

"Voldemort has sent men," she said seriously. "He said he wants to negotiate."

"Negotiation?" McGonagall frowned slightly.

"They're definitely here to take Royla and Harry again," Lupin said quickly. "We can't accept that—"

"That's right, absolutely unacceptable!" Emma and Shirley shouted at the same time.

But then Loila coughed and said, "I think it's acceptable."

"Huh?!" Loila's voice stunned everyone present.

"What I mean is—we can pretend to accept it," Loila quickly explained, otherwise it would look like she was surrendering on her own initiative.

And Mr. Potter was also brought along.

"What we need right now is time—so maybe we can pretend to agree to this," Loira said slowly. "As long as we can buy time—that's enough, isn't it?"

Loila's words silenced everyone present for a few seconds.

Then Scrimgeour slowly said, "But in that case—Voldemort isn't a fool either."

"He won't give up the attack until he sees you and Mr. Potter."

"Can we use the magic circle?" Lupin asked slowly.

“That’s possible—but I remember that if something goes wrong with the clone—” Scrimgeour said slowly, “it will affect the original, won’t it?”

"Miss Hamilton is also responsible for activating the magic circle—it would be terrible if anything went wrong."

"Um—we can hand Mr. Potter over first, can't we?" Loila pursed her lips and said softly, "If the clone has an accident, the original will faint—but it won't be in any danger to his life."

"Hmm————" Loila's words made everyone nod slightly.

"So it seems—this really is the only option," Scrimgeour said. "If we can delay Voldemort for even a few hours, it will be very important to us."

"Um."

Thus, Harry's fate was decided at this moment.

After deciding to give the clone of Harry to Voldemort, Scrimgeour coughed and said, "Then bring in Voldemort's messenger."

"Master, they actually agreed to our request," Bella said with a smile. "They must be scared."

"Or perhaps they're stalling for time." Voldemort sneered. "That Hamilton has quite a few strange spell arrays."

"And I believe that some of those people would definitely be willing to die in Potter's place."

"You mean—" Bella pursed her lips and lowered her voice.

"The person who comes may not necessarily be Potter," Voldemort said, raising an eyebrow. "But that doesn't matter."

"No matter who comes—the result will be the same."

"Their strength will only grow weaker—while ours will only grow stronger."

"Kill him when that Potter arrives."

"Then we will launch another attack."