Ancient Wizards Return to Hogwarts...

Chapter 497 Rhys Lint: With great power comes great responsibility

"Cedric?!" Rice's pupils dilated in shock when he saw Cedric.

The current Cedric exudes an overly strong sense of everyday life.

He wasn't wearing a wizard's robe, but a white vest and baggy shorts, with a straw hat on his head. He was sitting on a small stool, eating a watermelon that had been cut in half.

A talisman was pasted on the bottom of the watermelon, which seemed to have a cooling effect. Even in the height of summer, the watermelon emitted a wisp of cool air.

Watching Cedric enjoying his melon and Yang Qingyue sitting opposite him, Rice couldn't help but sigh that Cedric had really adapted to local customs.

When Rice came over, Yang Qingyue warmly brought him a small stool and even shared a slice of watermelon with him.

"Uh..." Rice wanted to refuse, but seeing how much the two were enjoying their food, she joined them.

Taking a bite, this melon is indeed crisp and sweet.

After the three of them devoured the watermelon in a flash, they began to chat.

"Have you finished talking with Grandpa?" Yang Qingyue asked curiously.

Rice nodded, telling him he had gotten what he wanted. Cedric sensed from Rice's words that he was most likely going back to England.

Sure enough, after a few more words, Rice said he had to leave.

After that, Rice looked Cedric up and down and asked him if he wanted to travel together.

After a moment's thought, Cedric politely declined Rice's offer.

The scenery of Penglai and the opposite bank these past few days has captivated him, and he wants to stay here longer during the summer vacation.

As for the so-called underworld invasion, Cedric felt he could handle it. Rice was right; underworld invasions were a calamity for ordinary people, but for people like them, they were the underworld's calamity.

……

While Rice and Cedric lingered on Penglai Island, the outside world underwent a dramatic transformation.

News of the breached borders has spread to every corner of the underworld, and countless spirits are stirring with restless thoughts, harboring inappropriate ideas.

They yearn to return to the world of the living.

After a brief period of calm, the first spirit bypassed the underworld guards' patrol and crossed the barrier, followed by the second, the third...

Countless spirits broke through the defenses and headed to the mortal world, just as they had done thousands of years ago.

The guardians of the underworld wanted to stop them, but there were too many undead crossing the border, including some extremely powerful beings. In addition, some of the guardians also chose to join the group of undead crossing the border. These reasons rendered the reorganized border of the underworld virtually meaningless.

Muggles suddenly realized that the times seemed to have changed.

People around me either undergo drastic personality changes overnight or their entire families disappear. The surrounding security situation also begins to deteriorate rapidly, with murders in the streets becoming frequent.

There are even rumors circulating that those criminals were possessed by monsters!

Panic is spreading rapidly.

Most Muggle governments displayed astonishing slowness and hypocrisy in the face of this upheaval. They all adopted the same explanation: the so-called supernatural events did not exist, and the current chaos was caused by Albanian gangs.

The dramatic changes in Eastern Europe and the subsequent collapse of the Soviet Union led to a rapid deterioration of the security environment in Eastern Europe, with Albania, a fortified country, facing the most severe problems.

After the economic collapse, Albanians turned their attention to the military equipment donated by their brother nations. Albanian gangs then swept through the underworld of Europe—while other gangs might pull out something like a Chicago typewriter, the Albanians had armored vehicles and rocket launchers; their firepower was on a completely different level.

The Muggle governments shifted the blame to Albanian gangs, and many people actually believed them. But a few days later, the politicians were thoroughly humiliated.

Mount Olympus was enveloped in a flash of lightning, and then a sound that covered the entire Balkan Peninsula completely shattered that illusion.

Zeus and the Olympian gods have returned.

Seven hours later, the Greek government announced that it had changed its faith and reverted to the Greek pantheon.

The world was stunned. Ancient legends returned to reality, shattering the peace of the past in just a few hours. Now everyone knew the source of the chaos: the seal on the underworld had broken, and the spirits of the dead had returned.

As for why the seal was damaged, the Muggles found the answer themselves—it's almost the new millennium, so isn't it normal for some unusual events to happen?

When the ancient Greek gods first returned, Muggles were merely astonished, and even a little curious, because these were deities from mythology.

It is said to bring countless benefits to people—ancient Greek mythology often features stories of mortals offering sacrifices to gods and then gaining great power.

Just as people were reveling in the changes in Greece, the refugees who fled Greece dealt them a heavy blow, pouring cold water on everyone's enthusiasm.

The gods brought only boundless disasters.

In order to regain their power, they launched a blood sacrifice without hesitation, turning all of Greece into a living hell, as did the other countries in the Balkans.

The tyrannical gods forced large numbers of Muggles to flee their homeland, while in return, large numbers of the dead began to use it as a base to invade the mortal world.

The Greek gods showed remarkable tolerance in this regard. As long as the dead verbally acknowledged that their faith was in the Greek pantheon, they could land within their sphere of influence and restore their power by reaping human lives.

In an instant, the entire Balkan Peninsula became a hellish place, and it spread at a terrifying speed to the surrounding Apennine Peninsula and Asia Minor.

The returning spirits chose to break through the weakest link in the magical world.

Strangely, Britain remained largely calm, with even the minor disturbances caused by the dead being rare. Upon realizing their birthplace was Britain, the returning spirits all chose to quietly slip away, heading towards the European continent.

The reason they were so sensible and polite is simple: none of the four people who were famous even in the underworld back then ever returned to the underworld...

Don't tell me they reincarnated! That's just "fooling ghosts." Even they could withstand the erosion of the reincarnation mist, so with the strength of those four, there's no way they couldn't withstand it.

The fact that they didn't appear in the underworld can only mean that they are still alive!

That was horrible.

They were ruthless individuals who triggered Ragnarok and constructed the seal between the underworld and the mortal realm. The undead, not yet insane, naturally tried to stay as far away from these four's homeland as possible to avoid being caught by them when they did bad things.

After leaving Penglai, Rice learned about the changes on Earth.

He had anticipated this, but these events did not slow his pace back to Hogwarts.

After receiving the Divine Travel Pill from the nameless old man, his heart had already flown back to the Scottish Highlands before he even got there.

As a wizard, Rice naturally didn't need to travel by plane or train like Muggles—he used to fly because he was interested in this Muggle technology, but now that he had a full understanding of airplanes, he naturally had no need to fly.

However, when it came to choosing a way to return, Rice decided to refer to the formation that Yang Qingyue had used before.

After sketching a magic circle on the ground in a seemingly professional manner, Rice stepped into the circle, and with a flash of light, his figure disappeared.

The next moment, he fell into the icy seawater.

For ordinary people, this would undoubtedly be a disaster, but for Rice, it was not a big problem.

After rising from the water and floating to the surface of the sea, Rice began to determine his location. He then realized that he was several hundred kilometers away from his target location and had been teleported to the Atlantic Ocean.

Fortunately, it's not far from the mainland; Rice can even see the coastline with the naked eye.

"I still need more practice," Rice thought to himself. A few percent error may not seem like much normally, but when the numbers are in the tens of thousands, the error becomes extremely alarming.

The Scottish Highlands are nearly 10,000 kilometers away from Penglai Island, and this "small error" directly caused Rice's location to deviate by several hundred kilometers.

"Is it possible that Hogwarts' defensive magic is misleading my new teleportation magic?" Rice seriously considered this question.

Just then, an airplane flew overhead. Feeling a premonition, Rice looked up and immediately realized the plane seemed to be in trouble—an evil spirit from the underworld was eyeing it.

That fierce feeling could be sensed even from thousands of meters away.

"Poor passengers." Rice felt no sadness for the passengers' plight; all he wanted now was to get back to Hogwarts.

"Hmm?" Just as Rice was about to abandon the new teleportation spell and use Apparition instead, he suddenly realized a problem he had overlooked.

The modern definition of "territory" seems to differ from that of their time. It's not just land; the sky and the sea are also considered territory.

According to the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, the territorial sea shall not exceed 12 nautical miles in width, while the United Kingdom stipulates that the territorial sea shall be 3 nautical miles in width.

Rice made a rough estimate and concluded that, if that were the case, the plane was currently still within British territory.

Considering Dumbledore's promise to guarantee safety within Britain, Rice felt he should take action.

The evil spirits chose to cause trouble within Britain to challenge Dumbledore's authority, who is the current headmaster of Hogwarts.

Is this a slap in the face to Dumbledore? This is a disregard for Hogwarts' dignity!

Rice considered himself a rule-abiding person, so he swayed and shot straight into the sky.

Meanwhile, the Boeing 747's massive cabin was completely silent, save for the roar of its engines.

The source of everyone's silence was now standing in the partition between business and economy class, staring excitedly at the panicked crowd inside.

It looked exactly like the demons in church sculptures, with pointed ears, bat wings, slender fingers, and fangs.

The evil spirit walked up to the first row of economy class seats and gave the people there a "friendly" smile.

"Come on, give me a reason not to eat you—I'll count, there are ten of you, so I'll only eat seven, because seven is the most magical number!"

Upon hearing its words, the passengers looked terrified, and some people in the first row burst into tears.

It wasn't that no one had tried to resist before, but those people were controlled by the evil spirit in ways beyond everyone's comprehension. It didn't kill them, because simple killing wouldn't please it.

Of course, a little punishment was necessary, so several blood-red things were wriggling at its feet, which was why all the passengers were silent.

The crying did not stop the evil spirit's actions; it only excited it further. It looked at the three passengers on the far left, awaiting their answer.

"I...I'm getting married soon..."

"I have a family to support, and my son is only six months old."

"Please, please let me go! I'll do anything!"

Some people gave their reasons, while others tried to bribe the evil spirits.

Just then, a voice rang out from behind the evil spirit.

"No one will die here today, you demon."

A look of surprise flashed across the evil spirit's face. It tried to turn around to see who had the audacity, but before it could turn around, it flew up and crashed heavily into the wall at the stern of the cabin, leaving a dent in the wall.

Before its brain could even react, it was pulled back by a strong suction force, and then a strong hand grabbed its neck.

"Such a weakling dares to cause trouble in Britain?" Rice's eyes were full of disdain.

The demon before them was not even as powerful as Voldemort without his domain; even the Aurors of the Ministry of Magic might be able to defeat it.

Why would such a weak creature be qualified to enter the underworld? Rice was completely baffled.

"I am the nineteenth demon under Abaddon, the Lord of Destruction... You cannot kill me! My lord will avenge me!" the evil spirit managed to utter.

"Abaddon, the Lord of Destruction?" Rice heard a somewhat familiar name.

"Yes, one of the four lords of the underworld, the Lord of Destruction who symbolizes war and death! He is a great demon who has roamed the underworld for thousands of years!" Seeing that the tactic of introducing himself seemed to be effective, the evil spirit hurriedly began to introduce his master to the suddenly appearing powerful figure.

Rice felt a memory deep within his mind being stirred. He thought about it carefully and finally remembered who Abaddon was.

"So it was that little bug that escaped a thousand years ago," Rice laughed. "What, can a cowardly runaway represent war and destruction now?"

"Huh?" The evil spirit was stunned; its mind couldn't even process what the other party was saying.

Rice was too lazy to waste words with it and simply evaporated the blood from its body.

A point of light emerged from the evil spirit's dried corpse. This was the evil spirit's true form, attempting to escape—if it could escape back to the underworld, it would eventually regain its power there.

But Rice was prepared. With a swirling of magic, the light spot was shattered into fragments and dissipated into the air.

The evil spirit was thus completely annihilated.

The passengers in the cabin were stunned.

Only now did they realize: were they saved?

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.

Tomorrow's update will still be at midnight.

Attached is a picture of Cedric enjoying a melon.

(End of this chapter)