Ancient Wizards Return to Hogwarts...

Chapter 456: A duel is declared against the entire faculty and students of the Iphamoni Magic School; all challenges are accepted.

Serafina stared in disbelief at her blood-soaked hand and the wand that was now just a handle, frozen in a daze.

She never expected this to happen before the fight started.

She couldn't even withstand a single spell from the little wizard in front of her? Her wand was even shattered? Even Grindelwald back then couldn't make her suffer such a loss!

"You're old, your spells are weak and ineffective, and your body's reaction speed is as slow as a snail." Rice's icy voice echoed in the hall.

Rice was actually lying. While Serafina was indeed advanced in years, her personal strength hadn't actually declined significantly. For wizards, unless they were too old to move or suffering from dementia, they could retain most of their power.

Kreis was unwilling to admit this, as it would bring him endless trouble. So he simply shifted the blame to Serafina, claiming that she had aged terribly.

In any case, most of the people present had never fought a wizard of this age, so who could know whether what he said was true or false?

"Stop!" Dumbledore's voice rang out from outside the Great Hall, and then the students present saw Headmaster Dumbledore rushing in from outside the door in a hurry.

Dumbledore rushed into the Great Hall and was stunned for a moment when he saw the situation.

The situation was somewhat different from what he had expected. There were no malicious individuals causing trouble in the Great Hall; instead, it seemed as if a conflict had broken out between Hogwarts students and Headmistress Seraphim of Ilvermorny!

Moreover, based on the conversation he had just overheard outside the Great Hall, and the blood-soaked palm of Principal Serafina, it seemed that this renowned and experienced witch had suffered a loss.

As a wizard of the same era as Seraphina, Dumbledore was well aware of the former Minister of Magic's capabilities. Although she excelled in political maneuvering, her combat abilities were by no means a weakness. Even after retiring and being rehired by Ilvermorny School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, there were never any rumors of her being incompetent or senile. In other words, even if Seraphina had been careless and underestimated her opponent, the young man who defeated her was no ordinary person.

Dumbledore looked at Rice. His impression of the student was very weak; he only remembered that his name was Rice Lint, a fourth-year Slytherin student, and one of the representatives of Hogwarts in this year's competition. In the first stage of the competition, he had scored no points and was at the bottom of the leaderboard.

That was all Dumbledore's impression of Rice!

Oh, right, he's also a good friend of Daphne and Astoria.

Hmm? This is a bit unusual. A thoughtful look flashed across Dumbledore's eyes as he thought this.

He buried the name "Les Lint," which he hadn't paid much attention to in the past, deep in his heart, and then began to think about how to solve the current troubles.

Dumbledore's appearance quickly brought Seraphina back to her senses.

She knew she had made a huge fool of herself this time, and that anything she said now would only make her face get trampled on again. So she simply said, "Albus, you've taught a good student," and prepared to leave hastily.

She couldn't stand being in that auditorium for even a second longer!

"Professor Piccolo, please wait a moment." Seraphina wanted to leave, but Dumbledore wouldn't let her go so easily. He wanted to resolve the issue as soon as possible, or at least find out what had happened.

If Serafina were to return to Iphamoni in a fit of anger, the situation would become very complicated.

"What, Albus, you want to test my old bones too?" After being stopped by Dumbledore, Seraphina felt her blood rushing back to her head, which had already cooled down.

"You've misunderstood." Dumbledore strode over to Seraphina, personally using magic to remove the splinter from her wound and stop the bleeding.

Then he pulled out the Elder Wand.

Looking at that familiar wand, Serafina's eyes flashed with extremely complex emotions.

This is the Elder Wand, the Death Wand, the Wand of Fate; only the most powerful wizards in the world can wield it. Its previous owner was…

Gettler Grindelwald!

However, Dumbledore didn't use the Elder Wand to show off his achievements; he simply wanted to help Seraphina repair her shattered wand.

First, a Summoning Charm gathered the wreckage of the wand together, then a Restoration Charm returned a brand new wand to Serafina's hands.

"Thank you, Albus." Dumbledore's actions had greatly diminished Seraphina's anger. She turned and gave Rice a deep look, vowing to remember the little wizard's face.

"I doubt I'll ever forget you, boy from Hogwarts. You're right, I might really be getting old..."

The young man standing not far away was so young, so spirited and talented, that Serafina, who was gradually calming down, felt a rare sense of aging.

Of course, her anger did not subside; she simply planned to vent it in a different way.

Rice was baffled by her gaze, taking Serafina's stare as a provocation, so he glared back without hesitation.

Seeing that the two were about to clash again, Dumbledore felt a headache coming on and quickly said, "Both of you come with me."

With Dumbledore's intervention, the escalating conflict was extinguished once more, and Rhys and Seraphina followed Dumbledore out of the Great Hall.

Daphne took a step forward with her left foot, but Rice stopped her with a look.

Helpless, she had no choice but to stay in the auditorium.

After Dumbledore and the two parties involved had all left, the entire Great Hall erupted in a cacophony of voices. Everyone was discussing the brief but intense conflict that had just occurred.

"What happened? Rice killed Professor Piccoli in an instant?"

"I didn't see it clearly. I only saw their spells clash, and Professor Piccolo's wand shattered—"

"A broken wand can actually be repaired?"

"Huh? What's going on with Ifamoni's group?"

During the heated discussion, some people gradually noticed that Iphamoni's students seemed strange. Upon closer inspection, they discovered that they were unable to make a sound!

Rice left in a hurry and forgot to lift the silencing spell on them.

"Sit down." Dumbledore found an empty classroom on the first floor of the castle to use as a meeting room. He hoped to resolve the conflict between the two here.

A conversation in the Great Hall was out of the question; Dumbledore knew Seraphina's temperament quite well. With so many students watching, she would only make the most extreme choice.

"Can I, this old codger, know what happened?" Dumbledore gave a wry smile; he still didn't know the whole story.

"A student from Hogwarts attacked my students and stole a treasure that has been passed down since the founding of our school."

Rice's eyebrows twitched twice, and he snorted coldly.

"Why don't you mention that this treasure belongs to Salazar Slytherin? It doesn't belong to Ilvermorny at all. Every second you possess it is a desecration of Hogwarts. Besides, it wasn't an attack; they handed it to me willingly. And you were the one who used the disarming charm on me first, weren't you?"

Serafina's face darkened again.

"Little friend, let me tell you about the history of this magic wand—"

"I know better than you do," Rice interrupted her directly. The only reason he was still willing to talk to Seraphina was because of Dumbledore, the current headmaster of Hogwarts.

He felt he had been reasonable enough.

"Listen carefully, this wand is not Salazar Slytherin's first wand. His first wand broke shortly after he embarked on his adventures. This is his second wand, which he made together with Godric Gryffindor, another founder of Hogwarts."

Together they killed the hidden black wizard Pochi and his serpent king, and then made this wand with the basilisk's horn as the core and the serpent wood as the shaft!

Salazar, wielding this wand, embarked on his epic adventures with three friends. In his twilight years, Salazar gifted the wand as a coming-of-age present to his adopted son, Gaunt, the progenitor of the Gaunt family. The wand then served as a family heirloom, passed down through generations in a strict order—if it were to appear at Ilvermorny School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, it could only mean that someone from Ilvermorny stole or plundered it!

Dumbledore and Seraphina were both dumbfounded.

No, were you there? How do you know so much about these details that have been buried in the long river of history?

Most people would be quite impressed if they knew that Salazar Slytherin's wand was made of snake wood and basilisk horn, but you actually knew that it was his second wand?

"Is this just something made up?" Serafina thought to herself.

Dumbledore's idea was a little different.

"My family has a Slytherin diary from back then, and it's written very clearly in there."

Serafina: !

Dumbledore raised an eyebrow.

"Okay..." Serafina felt like she'd been tricked by Rice's words. All that he'd just said was completely unrelated to what she was going to say.

"The founder of Iphamoni was by no means a ruthless opportunist," Serafina said solemnly. "The events of that year were like this..."

She told Rhys and Dumbledore about the feud between Isolde Thayer, the founder of Ilvermorny School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, and her aunt Gomley Gaunt.

In short, Isolde, with the help of her friend William, killed her aunt who came for revenge. During the battle, Slytherin's wand went into hibernation, and Isolde, who couldn't speak Parsley, was unable to wake it, so she could only bury it in the ground in front of the school castle.

Later, a snake tree that could not be cut down or destroyed grew where the wand was buried. Legend has it that Slytherin's wand still awaits its new master beneath the tree.

In recent years, Evamony has taken in a student who can speak Parsley, and he successfully dug up Slytherin's wand from under the Snake Tree and awakened it, supposedly by gaining the wand's approval.

After hearing the story, both Rice and Dumbledore frowned.

"Isn't this still stolen?" Rice's words made Serafina's face flush with barely suppressed anger.

"You can skip the details and look at the essence of the story: Isolde stole her aunt's wand while running away, and killed the wand's rightful owner when her aunt came looking for her, didn't she?"

Dumbledore remained silent. In his view, although Rice omitted many important details, the underlying truth remained unchanged: the person who stole the wand killed its original owner, buried it in the ground in front of his own school, and refused to return it.

Serafina was silent for a while before finally managing to say, "The wand belongs to the Ivermony School of Magic. Albus, you know that when a wizard dies in battle, his belongings belong to the victor."

Rice took a deep breath.

"You mean you won, so the wand is yours, right?"

Serafina remained silent, clearly acknowledging Rice's statement.

"That's great!" Rice laughed.

In the past, there was indeed such a rule in the magical world. It's surprising that even at the end of the 20th century, Principal Ilvamon still believes in this medieval stuff.

But it's not a big problem. He agrees with these rules. It's just a life-or-death duel, right? Who's afraid of who? That suits him perfectly!

"Professor Dumbledore, the problem is solved." Rhys turned to Dumbledore and said very seriously, "I challenge the entire faculty and students of Ilvermorny School of Witchcraft and Wizardry to a duel to determine who will possess the Slytherin wand."

He looked at Serafina.

"You can send anyone you want, I'll accept them. But I want to make it clear beforehand that this is a life-or-death battle, and one side will definitely lose their lives."

Dumbledore and Seraphina both widened their eyes.

Neither of them expected Rice to be so resolute.

What they didn't know was that for Rice, keeping this wand at Ilvermony School of Witchcraft and Wizardry was an absolute disgrace.

If Ilfamoni had kept something like the chair Salazar had sat in, Ras could have reluctantly accepted it, but this is a wand!

Now that he knows the whereabouts of the magic wand, he will not stand idly by; this is a matter of principle.

Rice wouldn't mind using his blood to defend who owns the wand.

"Once we're on the dueling stage, there's no distinction between age and seniority. I'm telling you this beforehand, so don't blame me afterwards," Rhys said abruptly, something that Dumbledore and Seraphina didn't quite understand at first.

Rice's meaning was actually quite simple: once he stepped onto the dueling ring, he wouldn't hold back.

After he finished speaking, the classroom fell into a long silence.

Seraphia felt utterly overwhelmed. She had thought that bringing Dumbledore along would subdue this unruly young wizard, but instead, she had been outmaneuvered by him.

She could tell that the boy named Rice was not joking; once someone stepped onto the dueling ring, someone was bound to die!

For a fleeting moment, Serafina considered accepting the duel outright. She would go into battle herself, even if it meant dying on the dueling field!

Dumbledore keenly sensed that the situation seemed to be sliding into an irreversible abyss. He took a deep breath, preparing to speak up and try to mediate—the two people in front of him must not be allowed to step onto the dueling ring.

Just then, the classroom door was suddenly pushed open with a bang.

Defense Against the Dark Arts Professor Smith White and Alchemy Professor Arius walked in together.

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, goodnight everyone~

(End of this chapter)