Ancient Wizards Return to Hogwarts...

Chapter 361 Helga: Hmm, can we reconcile? Rice: At this moment?! You must be joking!

"It's just a fire crossbow bolt, why are you all so surprised?" Daphne looked up at the excited students in the auditorium and said disdainfully.

She'd had the fire crossbow bolts for a year, and they'd been gathering dust under her bed for ages.

"How dare you say that? What a waste!" Rice was speechless. He really didn't know what Professor Flitwick was thinking, giving such a good thing to this guy was a complete waste.

"Should I lend it to the college team?" Daphne also felt that her behavior was not quite right, so she found a way to make amends.

"Forget it, I think it's better for it to just gather dust under the bed." Rice didn't hesitate at all, directly dissuading Daphne from her idea.

Unlike Helga, who bought fire bolts for the students at his own expense, Rice had absolutely no interest in the Slytherin Quidditch team members; watching them win was more painful than losing himself.

"Okay, okay." Daphne obediently followed Rice's advice.

The Great Hall was bustling for a long time, with students from Gryffindor and Hufflepuff crowding around their team's Seeker, eager to catch a glimpse of Firebolt and, incidentally, touch the flying broomstick that was so expensive they could only dream of owning it.

As Harry and Cedric walked out of the Great Hall with their fire bolts, surrounded by their friends, their eyes met inadvertently in mid-air. In that instant, the air was filled with the smell of gunpowder.

Both of them understood how much a good broom could affect a Seeker.

"This year, Hufflepuff will be the owner of the Quidditch Cup," Cedric said firmly.

"No, the Quidditch Cup will belong to Gryffindor," Harry retorted.

The smell of gunpowder in the air grew stronger.

"Hmph!" Malfoy snorted coldly after hearing their conversation, and swaggered through the gap between them. The rest of the Slytherin Quidditch team members followed behind him, and they squeezed a path through the two groups of people.

Watching Malfoy and the others walk away, Cedric suddenly said, "I can accept anything as long as it's not Slytherin winning the trophy."

"Me too." A smile appeared on Harry's face.

The relationship between the two sides miraculously improved, and the two groups walked outside together.

Standing behind them, Rice, who witnessed the entire conflict, was so angry that he was trembling all over. Even after returning to the common room, he was still thinking: What on earth is Malfoy thinking?

Has Slytherin become the glue that holds the other houses together?!

"Alright, don't be angry." Seeing that Rice looked unhappy, Daphne pulled him to sit at a table by the fireplace in the lounge and tried to comfort him.

"I'm not angry, I'm just annoyed that I'm in the same house as those idiots," Rice said angrily. "Why can't the house introduce an expulsion system to send unwanted students to other houses—Hufflepuff House would be perfect! Helga Hufflepuff wants everyone, so why not just shove Draco and the others there!"

Daphne imagined Malfoy appearing at Hufflepuff, and then her expression gradually became uncontrollable.

"I don't think Diggory at Hufflepuff will accept him—"

"Then let him transfer schools. There are so many magic schools, surely one of them will accept him for the money." Rice even had the pessimistic thought that as long as Malfoy was in Slytherin, the school's reputation would never be able to be reversed.

Daphne: "Which school is so blind...?"

Astoria, who had been eavesdropping on her sister and Rice's conversation, noticed that Rice was sullen. So she took out a delicate little lunchbox from her bosom, opened it, and found it filled with ice cream that was emitting a slight chill.

"Stop looking so glum, have some ice cream, it's raisin yogurt flavor." Astoria chose to address the root of the problem, "Malfoy being sorted here is all the Sorting Hat's fault—it should have just sent him home."

Rice seemed choked up and couldn't respond.

The Sorting Hat's logic was devised by the four of them, yet who could have imagined that this logic would persist for nearly a thousand years? How could they have foreseen that a thousand years later, a wizarding family would have fallen to such a state...?

Fortunately, the rich aroma of the yogurt ice cream and the sweet and sour raisins dispelled Rice's displeasure. Although it didn't meet Rice's requirement for "pure" ice cream, the ice cream was still quite good due to the suitable ingredients.

Salazar Slytherin demanded only one thing remain pure: ice cream. Ice cream had to be a single flavor; cream ice cream was pure cream, vanilla ice cream was pure vanilla, and nothing else should be mixed in.

After calming down, Rice began playing some puzzle games with the Greengrass sisters, such as Wizard's Chess. They didn't leave the lounge until late at night and return to their respective dorm rooms.

The next morning, Rice woke up in his quiet dorm room—if there was anything good about this year's Slytherin students, it was their emphasis on family. Unlike Rice, all his roommates had chosen to go home for Christmas.

Being forced to stay at school during a holiday meant for family reunions is undoubtedly a great source of amusement, but this student left behind is Rice. Even if Malfoy had seven times the courage, he wouldn't dare to make such a bold statement in front of Rice, so he wisely kept quiet, only complaining about it to a few of his cronies on the train back to London.

The first thing Rice does after waking up is to unwrap her gift.

In the years since he woke up, he has met many people and made some friends, so the Christmas gifts his friends sent him piled up into a small mountain at the foot of his bed.

At the top was a large yellow package, with a letter attached to it.

Rice opened the letter and found that it was from Helga.

The letter read:

Salazar, can we make peace? I need your help. If possible, how about we make some doll accessories together for Christmas? And Merry Christmas!

Rice looked at the letter Helga had sent and sneered: "At this very moment?! Helga, are you kidding me?! And why should I do all this hard work for you during the beautiful Christmas holidays? If you don't use a holiday to rest, what kind of holiday is it?"

He tossed the letter aside and opened the gift Hufflepuff had sent.

At this moment, he felt slightly embarrassed because he hadn't prepared any Christmas gifts for Helga at all—they didn't play these games; they used to get together for a nice meal and exchange a few spells, and that was enough for the holiday.

After the gift wrapping was torn open, Rice gasped: Helga really went all out!

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.

First update delivered. Second update before midnight tonight~

(End of this chapter)