My Hogwarts has a serious problem.

Chapter 42. Hermione's Christmas

The snow outside isn't falling very heavily.

Hermione lay curled up in bed, staring blankly at the snowflakes outside the window for a while, when she heard her mother calling from outside the bedroom.

"Get up quickly, you need to eat breakfast on time, otherwise it will be bad for your stomach later."

"Okay."

She dawdled in bed, changing out of her pajamas, putting on wool socks, letting her slightly messy, fluffy long hair fall loose, and slipping on her slippers to go to the bathroom to wash up.

When she arrived in the living room, Mr. Granger had already finished breakfast and was sitting on the sofa reading the newspaper.

"Go eat breakfast quickly, then you can open your presents."

Hermione suddenly perked up and ran to her little Christmas tree in her slippers.

Sure enough, there was a small pile of gifts there.

Mrs. Granger's voice came from the kitchen.

"Hermione! Eat first!"

Hermione responded loudly, clearly dissatisfied.

"Mom, I don't want to open the presents, I just want to look at them!"

As she spoke, she began counting the gift boxes of varying sizes under the tree on her fingers.

"Dad's, Mom's, Grandpa and Grandma's, Grandpa and Grandma's, Aunt Percy's, Uncle Coulson's, Uncle Mike's, Cousin Senior's, Nancy's, Helen's..."

After she finished counting, she became unhappy.

She stomped her foot and stormed off to the restaurant for breakfast.

Mr. Granger put down his newspaper and looked at his daughter, who was inexplicably throwing a tantrum, with a puzzled expression. "What's wrong? You got more gifts this year than last year."

The little girl viciously chopped the fried egg on her plate into four pieces with a knife.

"It's nothing, I just didn't see that conman's gift! I even prepared it specifically for him, planning to give it to him when he got back..."

She spoke softer and softer until the Grangers couldn't hear what she was saying.

After finishing breakfast, Hermione opened her gifts with little interest.

The gifts the adults gave her every year were pretty much the same, and her friends at school didn't offer any surprises either.

"I'm heading out!"

After tidying up all the unwrapped gifts, Hermione changed her shoes at the door and called out loudly.

"Make sure you wear your gloves, scarf, and hat, so you don't lose them while running around outside!"

"Okay, okay!"

The cold air outside made Hermione instinctively shrink her neck. She tightened the scarf around her neck, hopped around a couple of times, and then, braving the light snow, jogged towards the neighbor's yard.

Upon reaching the gate, she skillfully pulled a small bunch of keys from her pocket, deftly selected one, and opened the gate.

She first ran to the garden to look at Lynn's most treasured flowers.

Unfortunately, due to the season, Hermione couldn't save them; they all withered in the autumn, and now only a few dead branches remain.

Now, there are several small mounds of earth where the flowers used to be planted. They are the graves of the flowers. She thought that even if the flowers died, she would wait for Lynn to come back and give him an explanation. So she dug a few holes and buried the withered flower branches in the ground.

After making sure that the "graves" hadn't been dug up by those mischievous stray dogs, Hermione opened the door and went into Lynn's house.

It remains as spotless as it was when Lynn left.

Just as she promised, Hermione would come here to clean every week.

At home, her mother always complained that she didn't take the initiative to share the housework, but she was very diligent when cleaning Lynn's house.

With practiced ease, Hermione picked up the mop and began her week's cleaning work, starting with the innermost room on the second floor.

By the time she had mostly finished her work, it was almost noon.

She looked at the clean and tidy room, breathed a sigh of relief, then rubbed her slightly flushed face, put her scarf, hat, and gloves back on, locked the door to Lynn's living room, and walked out into the yard.

As she locked the gate, she saw the snow piled up in the yard and thought to herself that she would have to come back in a couple of days to clear it away, otherwise Lynn's lawn would be ruined once it melted into water.

On the way back, as she thought about it, the little girl's mood was as unpredictable as the London weather, and she suddenly became angry again.

She was angry with herself.

After all that busy work, it turns out that the person didn't even deliver the promised gift.

Hermione, Hermione, you're such an idiot!

She returned home sulking, only to find Mrs. Granger already preparing lunch.

"Where did you go gallivanting around all morning again?"

"Nowhere."

Hermione grew angrier the more she thought about it, replied listlessly, and then ran upstairs to her room.

She lay on the bed, buried her face in the blanket, and felt more and more aggrieved. The more aggrieved she felt, the more she wanted to cry.

Just as she was pouting and her eyes were red, about to secretly cry out, a knocking sound suddenly came from outside the bedroom window.

Hermione forced back her tears and turned to look out the window.

An owl was watching her through the glass.

Seeing that the little girl had noticed it, it pecked at the window glass with its front beak.

Hermione was initially surprised, but then she became excited.

Because she saw the small but cleverly wrapped gift box under the owl's claws.

She immediately swooped to the window and opened it for the owl to fly in.

An owl from Hogwarts gracefully shook the snowflakes off its wings outside the window before flying into Hermione's room and tossing the gift box into the little girl's hands.

Hermione couldn't wait to open the gift box.

Just as she expected, the gift was sent to her by Lynn.

Inside was a pendant, on which hung an extremely small crystal ball. Inside the crystal ball was a castle, and just like the weather outside, magical snowflakes were also drifting inside the crystal ball.

"Hogwarts?" Hermione brought the crystal ball close to her eyes and finally managed to make out the sign on the castle.

At the bottom of the gift box, there was a note left by Lynn, which read:

This is your future castle.

Upon seeing this sentence, Hermione's face suddenly flushed slightly. She felt that Lynn was subtly praising her as a princess.

Smooth talker!

She cursed under her breath, then couldn't help but glance at the pendant in her hand, and happily put it around her neck.

The owl, which had come from afar, circled above Hermione's head for a long time. Watching the little girl's silly smiles and angry expressions, it felt that Hermione had no intention of giving it any reward for its hard work, and finally flew away from her room in a huff.

Hermione was currently rolling around on the bed clutching the pendant, completely oblivious to when the owl had left.

After a while, she realized she had gotten a little too excited and couldn't help but scold herself in her mind again:

Hermione, Hermione, you're such an idiot!

(End of this chapter)