Ancient Wizards Return to Hogwarts...

Chapter 13 Not Every Magical School Is Hogwarts

Snapped!

A thin, transparent rope was tightly wrapped around Rice's neck, but Rice didn't even blink, because a tiny, extremely thin yet incredibly strong shield appeared around his neck, holding the rope in place.

As the wizard hidden in the shadows made his move, the other four wizards also drew their wands and launched an attack on Rupert.

In their plan, Rice would be instantly killed by the hidden boss, and they would only need to deal with Lupet. However, the strongest link in the gang went wrong, and their previously invincible tactics failed, leading to their defeat.

Faced with the enemy's attack, the battle-hardened Lupert cleverly jumped to the side, dodging all the incoming spells.

Having dodged the attack, Lupert drew her newly acquired wand, but before she could retaliate, a blinding flash of light, accompanied by a loud bang, exploded in the dead end, and the four people opposite her rolled their eyes and fainted.

After easily knocking out the four men, Rice shook his wand again, and a plume of black smoke billowed from the tip of the wand, drifting towards the corner of the alley.

He collapsed to the ground, completely unconscious!

A figure clad in a black robe instantly appeared from beneath the wall, casting a stun spell at Rice. After casting the spell, he didn't even glance at its hit rate, immediately beginning to visualize the place he would apparate to.

He had already realized the strength of his opponents in the brief exchange, and now he had no intention of continuing to fight Rice and his group; he just wanted to escape this hellish place.

The teleportation spell Apparition requires first concentrating on visualizing the destination in one's mind before instantly appearing at that imagined location. This process is very brief; a skilled wizard may not even need a second.

"Give me a second, just one second! As long as I can get to that place!" the black-robed wizard roared hysterically in his heart. Fortunately, the apparition technique went very smoothly this time. He could feel intense pressure coming from all directions, and the scene before him gradually dimmed.

The black-robed wizard knew his Apparition spell had succeeded, and his unease began to subside little by little...

Suddenly, a different feeling appeared; the surrounding air seemed to freeze, "locking" me in mid-air.

His apparition failed!

The black-robed wizard looked up blankly, then met the boy's deep, icy eyes. The boy's gaze was devoid of any emotion, like a tourist looking at a fish stranded on the beach.

The wizard couldn't help but shudder; his intuition told him that he was doomed this time.

After casting the Anti-Apparition Charm, Rice slowly lowered his wand and patiently untied the thin rope wrapped around his neck.

As the black mist flew toward the black-robed wizard, it gradually condensed and took shape, transforming from a wisp of mist into a black veil. By the time it reached the wizard, it had become as solid as steel needles.

Soon, the black mist bound him tightly, rendering him unable to move.

Lupert ran to where he had been hiding and found a transparent cloak. The cloak was so transparent that it blended almost seamlessly into the ground, and it was impossible to spot without bending down for a closer look.

"This guy actually has an invisibility cloak!" Lupert was incredulous. Why would these down-on-their-luck wandering wizards have such an expensive item as an invisibility cloak? How could they afford it?

"You can keep it."

For wizards who can use the Disappearance Charm, an invisibility cloak is practically useless; only a half-baked wizard like Lupert would treasure it. Therefore, Rice had no interest in the invisibility cloak; he was more curious about the thin rope.

After examining the rope in his hand, Rice discovered that it was an ingenious prop with a steel wire core and an outer layer of invisible beast fur.

Having seen through this, Rice couldn't help but applaud this brilliant idea in his heart.

The fur of invisible beasts is usually used by wizards to weave invisibility cloaks, but this was the first time Rice had seen it used to wrap steel wire—it was incredibly creative and undeniably effective for a sneak attack. If it weren't for the magical fluctuations in the rope, Rice might not have even noticed it. For an ordinary wizard, being caught off guard would have been highly likely.

After taking the most valuable magical items, Rupert searched the four unconscious people again. However, this time she was greatly disappointed; she couldn't even find a single Galleon on them, as if they had spent all their money on invisibility cloaks.

Of course, it wasn't all for naught; the wands on the four of them could be sold for some money, which Rupert readily accepted.

"The wizards of a thousand years from now are far too weak." Rice walked slowly to the black-robed wizard and reached out to pinch his cheek.

In his view, there was no need to interrogate the remaining four henchmen. The core leader of this group was only this guy in front of him, and all the intelligence was focused on him.

Upon hearing Rice's words, the black-robed wizard was first startled, then realized: Who can live for a thousand years? Even the longest-lived wizard in the magical world, Nicolas Flamel, only lived for a little over six hundred years. This guy was just bluffing and talking nonsense.

However, even if the other party was talking nonsense, it did not prevent him from having the upper hand, so after a little thought, the black-robed wizard decided to temporarily admit defeat.

"I believe this is just a misunderstanding..." The black-robed wizard's voice was muffled because his face was being pinched.

"Shh—" Rice had no desire to talk to him. He forced the other man to look into his eyes until the other man's gaze became unfocused.

Rice is an expert in Legilimency. Although his current body is somewhat weak and he cannot unleash the full power of many spells, Legilimency, a magic that relies on the strength of the soul, is not greatly restricted. He can still easily read the memories of controlled wizards.

"Who ordered you to do this?"

"Anthony McMillan, he's paying us forty gallons to teach you a lesson."

"If you manage to capture me and Lupert, what will you do to us?"

"We'll play with you for a while, then we'll take care of you—John said you have a lot of money on you, we can split it up and then blame it on Anthony, since he's the one who sent us to teach you a lesson." The black-robed wizard frankly revealed his thoughts, which made Lupert furious, and he kicked him several times.

In the course of their questioning, Rice had already clearly ascertained the group's intentions and origins: McMillan had hired thugs to attack people, and the hired men, driven by greed, wanted to use the McMillan family's influence to commit murder and robbery.

The situation is not complicated.

"Are you a student at Hogwarts?" After hesitating for two seconds, Rice asked a question that he was quite concerned about, as he was afraid that the other person would say that he was a student at Slytherin House.

"No, it was magic taught to me by monks from the Secret Order."

"The Secret Order?"

It was the name of a magical organization that Rice had never heard of. There were quite a few Muggles with that name, but Rice figured it was probably just a coincidence with what the black-robed wizard had mentioned.

"Have you heard of it?" Rice looked at Lupert and asked her.

Lupert frowned and said uncertainly, "It seems to be a magical organization active in Europe that teaches magic to young wizards who can't go to school. I met a wizard from Montenegro before, and he was a member of the Secret Order—I just don't know if it's the Secret Order he's talking about."

"Similar to Hogwarts?"

"That's incomparable." Lupert shook his head: "Hogwarts is the best magic school in Britain and even the world. It completely monopolizes the wizarding student body in the British Isles. How can the Secret Society compare to it? There are only a few magic schools that can be compared to Hogwarts."

These words delighted Rice. If the occasion weren't so inappropriate, he would have definitely asked Lupert to give a proper introduction to the current magic school.

In fact, magic schools like Hogwarts, which teach without discrimination and admit all young wizards born in the British Isles, are very rare.

Other magic schools would define a general sphere of influence and then admit young wizards with exceptional talent. Different schools had different preferences: Durmstrang students had to be able to accept dark magic; Vagabond students couldn't rely too much on wands; those who didn't speak French could never get into Beauxbatons, and so on.

Hogwarts owes its current state to Helga Hufflepuff, one of the four founders of the school. It was her insistence on accepting all students that made Hogwarts unique. Without Hufflepuff's sacrifices, some young wizards might have faced a truly tragic situation—receiving their acceptance letters, rushing to Hogwarts, only to be told they failed the entrance exam—how devastating that would be for an eleven-year-old!

Since magic schools don't have the concept of repeating a grade, their lives will undoubtedly be ruined.

After learning from Lupert that the "Secret Order" was actually similar to a magic school, Rice's interest in the organization vanished considerably.

Out of habit, he casually asked, "So, do you still keep in touch with the Secret Society?"

"Yes, we have an alumni directory. If there's anything I can help with, a message will automatically appear in the alumni directory, and you'll get a reward after you do it well."

"Oh?" Rice became interested.

Even in the early days of Hogwarts, they didn't control their graduates like the Secret Order did. This "alumni directory" sounds more like the bulletin board used by mercenary guilds to post bounty missions.

After questioning him for a while, Rice learned that the guy's invisibility cloak was obtained by accumulating points through "helping out." And what he did was very simple: intelligence gathering. The Secret Order needed all kinds of intelligence, so he subscribed to several newspapers and submitted his daily summaries of the news from the newspapers and the information he had overheard in Knockturn Alley.

The rewards offered by the Secret Order are also quite good, including magical items such as invisibility cloaks, as well as potion ingredients, potion recipes, and magical spells of varying value.

After prying everything out of the black-robed wizard, Rice's understanding of the Secret Order underwent a complete transformation.

His experience told him that this organization was anything but simple. So he decided to strengthen his ties with it, ideally infiltrating it to find out their objectives.

The key to joining the organization is right in front of you.

Rice easily obtained his "yearbook" from the black-robed wizard. It was a small booklet with a black leather cover, and the wizard's name, Serge, was written on the title page. The booklet looked unremarkable, no different from the three diaries that Ten Nate had in the stationery shop in Diagon Alley.

As for how to use it...

Sergi's authority was shockingly low; he didn't even have the means to contact the secret order proactively and could only passively wait for his superiors to contact him.

This left Rice speechless for a moment, but he quickly came to terms with it: it was precisely because Sergi was insignificant that he could easily extract information from him.

Having extracted the last drop of information, Sergi lost all his usefulness. Rice took away his wand and personal belongings, loosened his restraints, and let him leave.

"Aren't you being too lenient with them? After all—" Lupett was about to advise Rice to be tougher and not be so lenient when Rice's next move silenced her.

The transparent rope was tied into knots around the necks of the four people, and then tied to the protrusions on the walls on both sides of the alley, just like a clothesline.

"Have you ever killed a rat?" After dealing with the four wandering mages as casually as hanging up a few pieces of clothing, Rice posed a question to Lupert.

"They must have captured it during the transformation."

Rice: ...

I almost forgot about her werewolf identity, but that's not important.

"Simply swatting a rat to death isn't the most effective way to exterminate it. Experienced Muggles will seal the rat's back door with string and then release it back into the nest. The rat will eventually go berserk because it can't defecate and will kill all the other rats in the nest."

Rice said meaningfully.

……

McMillan met Sergi again.

"How did it go? Did you get it done?" He asked eagerly as soon as he saw Sergi.

"Yeah, all done," Sergi replied blankly.

"Great—" Before McMillan could finish speaking, Sergi slapped him across the face.

Surprisingly, the slap didn't produce any crisp sound. Serge's hand seemed to melt and stick to McMillan's face. The next moment, his entire body, except for that hand, turned into a puddle of mud, blending into the filth on the ground of Knockout Alley. No one could tell that a living person had ever stood there.

The hand he left behind also softened rapidly, sealing McMillan's eyes and ears like dough, robbing him of his hearing and sight.

What happened in the corner of Knockturn Alley had nothing to do with Rice and Lupert. The two had already returned to Diagon Alley and bought more than a hundred galleons worth of books from Flourish and Blotts and the secondhand bookstore next door.

Rice originally planned to spend at least two hundred Galleons on books, but he gave up after Rupert told him that most of the books could be borrowed from the Hogwarts library.

Next, he and Lupert rented two rooms at the Leaky Cauldron and settled down in Diagon Alley.

(End of this chapter)