Ancient Wizards Return to Hogwarts...

Chapter 188 The School Best Suited for Neville

He went straight to the auditorium, which was already empty. The students, having eaten and drunk their fill, had all returned to their respective common lounges. Those who were clean went to wash up, those who wanted to play played games with their friends, and the rest had already gone back to their dormitories to sleep.

Rice walked down the marble staircase into the foyer, then turned left and entered through a side door.

Rice was very familiar with the castle's structure, so he knew that only the passage behind this door could lead to the area directly beneath the Great Hall; the other passages were not.

Behind the door was a stone staircase, below which was a wide, bright stone corridor. The walls of the corridor were decorated with oil paintings of food. After seeing the subject of the paintings, Rice knew he had come to the right place.

However, in this stone corridor, Rice unexpectedly ran into an acquaintance.

"Neville? What are you doing here? And what's wrong with you?" Rice asked with surprise, looking at Neville standing in the corridor, who looked like he had been doused in vinegar.

Neville looked at Rice blankly: Isn't this the question I should be asking?

This is the Hufflepuff common room. Why would a Slytherin like you be here?

"I forgot to—" Neville started to say, but then quickly shut his mouth.

He was about to say that he had forgotten how to enter the Hufflepuff common room, but then he suddenly remembered that it was a secret that all the students of the house had kept for thousands of years, and he couldn't reveal it.

That would really be a social disaster.

In Gryffindor and Slytherin, a password is required to enter the common room, while in Ravenclaw, a question about the door knocker is required. Hufflepuff is similar; you must select the correct barrel from a pile of large barrels placed on a dark stone trough and strike the bottom of the barrel to the correct melody. Only after striking correctly will the barrel lid open to access the common room.

Unlike the other three houses, the entrance to the Hufflepuff common room has an expulsion device. In the other three houses, you won't be punished whether you give the wrong password or fail to answer the question correctly. Here in Hufflepuff, if someone wants to enter the common room, they will knock on the wrong barrel or not in the correct rhythm, and the lid of another barrel will burst, soaking the intruder in vinegar.

Clearly, Neville, whose memory wasn't great, suffered in this regard and was thoroughly humiliated by the jealousy.

He usually hangs out with his Hufflepuff classmates, and the friendly and united Hufflepuff badgers know Neville's terrible memory, so they always take him along. But tonight, before the dinner party ended, Neville had an upset stomach and went to the restroom. When he returned, the Great Hall was empty. Now, Neville, unwittingly alone, was locked outside the lounge.

"Did you knock on the wrong barrel?"

"How could you—I mean—" Neville almost blurted out the secret again, but thankfully he stopped himself before he could finish.

Seeing Neville's appearance, Rice knew exactly what had happened to him. He even knew how to open the door to the Hufflepuff common room, but considering the current "customs" of Hufflepuff School, he couldn't very well tell him how to get into the common room.

"I know the consequences of coming in the wrong way—do you need me to help you get all this stuff off you? It really smells awful."

"Oh, thank you!" Neville awkwardly took two steps forward, letting Rice use a cleansing spell to remove the vinegar stains from his robe.

After cleaning the vinegar off his robe, Rice waved his wand to wipe away the lingering smell of vinegar in the corridor.

"The Cleaning Charm, one of the most practical household spells invented by wizards. Before this spell was invented, wizards had a series of spells for doing housework, such as 'spells to remove dust from the floor,' 'spells to remove water stains from the floor,' or 'spells to remove grease from the dishes,' numbering in the hundreds. The wizard who finally summarized these hundreds of spells into one 'Clean and Fresh' spell is truly a genius," Rice exclaimed sincerely.

Perhaps this is the allure of spells: a vast number of incantations are condensed into just a few actions or notes, allowing even those unfamiliar with the workings of magic to unleash them, greatly reducing the difficulty of casting spells. No wonder that in the end, Hogwarts couldn't find a wizard who understood the flow of magic.

Neville listened in bewilderment, not understanding why Rice made so many exclamations after casting a cleansing spell.

"So what brings you here?" He decided to bring the question back to the beginning.

"I'm looking for the Hogwarts kitchen. I missed dinner tonight and need to get something to eat," Rice told Neville, explaining his analysis of the kitchen's location.

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"Your intuition is spot on!" Neville gave him a thumbs up and then led him to an oil painting depicting a huge silver bowl filled with fruit.

"The kitchen is right behind this painting. All you have to do is this." Neville extended his index finger and gently scratched the pear in the silver bowl. The pear wriggled and chuckled, then transformed into a large green doorknob.

"The students at Hufflepuff all know where the kitchen is. They usually go in to get something to eat when they're hungry at night," Neville told Rice how to get into the kitchen. However, before opening the door, he reminded Rice to try not to tell anyone where the kitchen was, because if too many students knew the location, it would cause a lot of trouble for the kitchen staff.

If students are eventually banned from entering the kitchen, it will harm both themselves and others.

Neville grabbed the doorknob and pulled hard, opening the door to reveal a large room with a very high ceiling.

The room was the same size as the auditorium above, with many gleaming copper pots and basins piled up against the stone walls, and a large brick fireplace on the wall facing the door.

As soon as the two stepped into the kitchen, a house-elf came running towards them, shrieking, "Mr. Longbottom? It's Mr. Neville Longbottom!"

Neville smiled sheepishly: "I used to come here often with my friends to get food—"

Before he could finish speaking, a voice rang out in the hallway: "Neville, is that you in the kitchen? Have you forgotten how to come in again?"

Neville laughed, a genuine laugh. He first poked his head out from the kitchen doorway, loudly responding to his friend, then retreated back into the kitchen, saying to Rice, "How long I'm stuck outside depends mainly on when my friends realize I'm missing. Okay, I'm going back to the lounge now. If you want anything to eat, just tell the elves; they're very easy to talk to."

After speaking, Neville left the kitchen and went back to the lounge with his friend.

After witnessing Neville's ordeal, Rice felt that Hufflepuff was truly the most suitable house for Neville.

Sigrún has taught at the Iceland University of the Arts as a part-time lecturer since and was Dean of the Department of Fine Art from -. In – she held a research position at Reykjavík Art Museum focusing on the role of women in Icelandic art. She studied fine art at the Icelandic College of Arts and Crafts and at Pratt Institute, New York, and holds BA and MA degrees in art history and philosophy from the University of Iceland. Sigrún lives and works in Iceland.

Update delivered, second update coming later.

Here's a photo that's supposedly the prototype for Bella.

Uェ*U

Uniony Valkyrie Mitford

Thank you to Starry Nightmare for the donation.

(End of this chapter)