Hogwarts: Me? Fight Voldemort?

Hermione clenched her teeth, her two fair arms turning red from the blood rushing to them.

She really didn't expect the wood carving to be so heavy; it looked like it should be very light.

Fortunately, the alley was not far from the pawnshop; it was only a few dozen meters away on foot.

The man sitting at the counter in the shop was a middle-aged man with a thick beard wearing a red baseball cap and gold-rimmed glasses. His most distinctive feature was the hairy black mole on his left cheek.

This is the shop owner who bought that gift when Jimmy enrolled. That 1,500 pounds was no small sum, and he's here today to make up for the shop owner's loss.

If the price was right, he sold his wood and stone carvings to this unfortunate man.

When the shopkeeper saw the two children carrying a box in, he got up, leaned on the counter, and chuckled, "Hey, you two little guys, you're here to sell something?"

The two carefully placed the cardboard box, with a thin wooden board underneath, on the ground.

Jimmy took off his backpack and removed the suitcase covering the cardboard box.

Then, he said to the shop owner, "Yes, I have some wood carvings. Do you buy them here?"

“Oh, of course! If they’re valuable and won’t cause trouble for your parents.” The shopkeeper came out from behind the counter, squatted down in front of the cardboard box, and carefully took out a beautifully crafted wooden carving from the hay inside.

Jimmy copied the designs of various artifacts and ornaments from Hogwarts. Hogwarts Castle is a huge resource library, and the castle, which does not emphasize defensive functions, contains many handicrafts that are only found in aristocratic manors.

Moreover, the portraits hanging all over the castle are not all of wizards; there are also many lesser-known painters and sculptors. Jimmy consulted with the figures in several of the paintings when making these wood carvings.

The act of asking for advice is actually just copying or plagiarizing; once you show it to them and confirm that it can be sold, you're done.

Of course, wood carvings also include figurines created from imagination, such as a majestic knight, a down-on-his-luck vagrant, and a scarred old soldier...

The sculpture is so lifelike that even the details of the expression on the wooden face can be clearly seen.

"My God! Is this the kind of box you use to store these works of art?"

The fat boss's mole twitched with exaggerated expressions. After confirming the pure artistic value of these wood carvings, he knelt on the ground and eagerly took out the remaining wood carvings one by one, gently placing them on the ground to the side.

"Look at the details of this wood carving, it's so exquisite, the wrinkles on the face and the eyes... It's a pity it's not painted, oh! They don't even have any protective varnish!"

"How much would you offer for the two remaining stone sculptures?"

Jimmy then took out the stone carvings for the fat shopkeeper to appraise. One of the stone carvings was Hogwarts Castle, and the other was the white-bearded wizard Dumbledore without his glasses, but the description on the bottom said Gandalf.

The Lord of the Rings trilogy can be considered the Western version of Journey to the West. It is a work that pioneered the Western epic fantasy genre. Many Europeans and Americans love the novel Lord of the Rings. The stone statue of Gandalf, like the statue of Sun Wukong, has cultural symbolic significance and its price is definitely not low.

Furthermore, Jimmy believed that Dumbledore's image was very much in line with Gandalf's character, so he put a lot of thought into the carving. The stone statue was carved in a gradient style, with more and more details as you went up and less and less as you went down.

The undulating lines beneath him, resembling walking on water, echoed his resolute face gazing ahead, as if an old man were truly facing challenges head-on.

Hermione couldn't help but break into a daze upon seeing the stone sculpture. She leaned close to Jimmy's ear and whispered, "Why did you carve the headmaster out of there?"

"It's alright, the principal won't mind," Jimmy replied quietly.

The fat boss really liked the sculptures and was confident they would sell, so he offered a higher price than Jimmy had expected.

The wood carvings were £30 each, and the castle stone carvings and Dumbledore's version of Gandalf together were £800, for a total retail price of £1000.

The portly shopkeeper readily paid and ushered Jimmy and Hermione out of the shop. The two looked back and saw that the "Open for Business" sign on the glass door had been turned over, obviously because he wanted to contact the seller or have some maintenance done on the handicrafts.

Jimmy didn't care at all what the fat boss would do with the stuff; all he knew was that he was rich now. Clutching the pounds, he happily told Hermione, "We're rich now! Let's go spend some money!"

He didn't intend to make pounds by crafting handicrafts, because such behavior actually violated the Secret Service Act, and the large-scale flow of magically enhanced items into Muggle society posed a risk of leaks.

The wonder of magic is even more exaggerated than large-scale industrial manufacturing in the ordinary world, just as Jimmy said when he first met Professor McGonagall.

How many washing machines can one wizard replace?

If you really want to make money off Muggles, open a laundromat; you could make a fortune every month.

why not?

Because the "Secrecy Law" does not allow it.

Hermione hadn't read the Secret Code yet. She hesitated for a moment, then gave up trying to persuade him, thinking that earning money through her own abilities didn't seem like a problem.

"Don't waste money, a thousand pounds is too much for us..."

"Don't worry, I have excellent money management skills and can control myself from spending money recklessly."

Jimmy walked briskly, preparing to take Hermione to a nearby supermarket that often had near-expiry food to buy snacks to sell at school.

Chapter 62 He jumped up and kicked!

Jimmy only plans to sell it this way once. If his snack business gets too big, the Ministry of Magic will still warn him.

Now is the time to take advantage of youth and "naivety" to quickly accumulate initial capital, so of course we should go all out without restraint.

As they walked out of the secondhand market toward the bus stop, a woman's voice suddenly came from behind them.

"Jimmy?"

Jimmy was chatting with Hermione about which snacks to buy when he subconsciously turned around and saw an unexpected acquaintance.

Three months later, Aunt Benelli still looked stunning. She wore a brown trench coat, skinny jeans, and tall leather boots, walking on the road with the remaining snow. She looked like a beautiful leading lady in a TV series.

Jimmy saw her and stared wide-eyed as if he'd seen a ghost, backing away. This crazy woman was anything but normal on the surface.

Hermione, who also turned around, saw Benelli staring intently at them and asked curiously, "Someone you know?"

Sure enough, Aunt Benelli smiled kindly and asked, "Long time no see, Jimmy. How have you been lately? And this gentleman beside you..."

A glint of ruthlessness flashed in her eyes, and her gaze toward Hermione was filled with malice, but the malice vanished in an instant and went unnoticed by Hermione.

Jimmy's ability to read people hadn't diminished; he saw the unfriendly look in Benelli's eyes and immediately tensed up. "Ah, Aunt Benelli, I'm fine, but something's come up, we have to go!"

After saying that, he pulled Hermione up and started walking down the street, constantly moving towards areas with more people.

It was still the Christmas holiday, and the streets weren't as deserted as last time. Jimmy wasn't nervous when he heard the footsteps speeding up behind him; if she dared to grab someone, he would just yell for help.

Soon after, Aunt Benelli caught up with him and stood next to Jimmy, pretending to be familiar with him, saying, "Why haven't you come to see me for so long? I wait for you there every day. You used to be there every time."

Jimmy replied, "Because I've gone to school and I probably won't be going back there."

Hermione looked at him, then at Aunt Benelli, and felt that something was off.

Benelli's gaze locked onto Hermione, and he asked with a smile, "Really? Is this little girl next to you your classmate? Where do you go to school?"

Hogwarts School is not something ordinary people can know about, so Hermione remained silent, thwarting Benelli's attempt to extract information.

"We really have something to do, could you please not come with us?"

Jimmy originally wanted to save money by taking the bus, but now he has to take Hermione into the London Underground station, while Benelli is still relentlessly following him.

“You’ve hurt me so much, Jimmy. I trusted you so much, and you betrayed me.” Once underground, her personality seemed to darken as well. Benna questioned her with a mournful and malicious tone, “Why did you run away!”

“I don’t like people who keep diaries; they’re not serious,” Jimmy finally revealed his reason, which was exactly what Benelli had expected.

Hermione grew increasingly suspicious of their strange conversation, and she looked warily at Benelli.

At this moment, Benelli almost dropped all pretense, his eyes filled with malice. "No, I can't accept that reason. You gave me something, and your departure has almost made me lose everything."

"Can you please find someone else? If this continues, I'm really going to call the police."

Jimmy saw the police officers on duty in the subway and pretended to walk towards them, trying to scare Benelli.

Benelli, far from being alarmed, instead sneered, "On what grounds?"

After listening, Jimmy turned a corner and went to the automatic ticket machine, where he bought two subway tickets, giving one to the wary Hermione.

They boarded the subway and headed in an unknown direction, with Benelli following closely behind like a guardian, much to Jimmy's annoyance.

“Aunt Benelli, as I said, thank you for taking care of me, but you should change your hobbies instead of clinging to something that is destined to be impossible. You can't stay like this forever, and neither can I.”

He said it both subtly and clearly: smelting pedophiles is illegal, and the old lady should give up this idea as soon as possible!

Aunt Benelli was stubborn, or perhaps inflexible. She said harshly, "You've ruined everything for me. I can't go back."

"Then let's leave it at that..."

As the subway pulled into the station, people began to disembark, creating an empty seat.

Benelli seemed to sense something and stood between Jimmy and the subway entrance.

Jimmy shrugged, and just as the subway doors were about to close, he immediately kicked Benelli in the waist, yelling, "Take this!"

Benelli was caught off guard and rolled out of the carriage.

Jimmy also picked up the LV bag that had fallen to the ground and smashed it on the crazy woman's head, interrupting her from getting up.

The group of people in the carriage were stunned by the sudden turn of events.

Hermione also cried out in surprise, asking, "Jimmy! Why... did you kick her out?"

The doors closed at that moment, and Benelli, disheveled and standing up, slammed into the subway doors like a demon.

She stared at Jimmy through the glass window, her eyes filled with a kind of obsessive desire to devour him, yet also with a fierce, ghostly malice.

Jimmy clearly saw Benelli mouth several words, as if he were saying: I will catch you.

The London Underground has no guardrails. Benelli followed the train for a while, then picked up his bag and waited quietly for the next train.

Jimmy, who remained in the car, also got off at the next stop with Hermione. On the way, he had explained everything to Hermione, including his past experiences and the evil deeds of that old aunt Benelli.

Hermione no longer blames Jimmy for kicking Benelli; instead, she thinks they should call the police. However, calling the police won't do much good, as they don't have substantial evidence to charge Benelli, and he'll likely be released on bail after a few days at most.

"Don't think about her anymore. Anyway, I'll rarely go back to London in the future, and we might not even see each other again."

Jimmy dismissed Hermione's idea of ​​calling the police. After all, they wouldn't see each other again, and it was uncertain whether Benelli would even recognize him when he grew up.

After taking a taxi to a nearby supermarket to do some shopping, Jimmy and Hermione completely forgot about Benelli.

For the next few days, they didn't leave Granger's house. They packed their bags and put price tags on various snacks. Since they couldn't practice spells, these were the only simple things they could do to pass the time.

The week-long holiday came to an end quickly. Uncle George and Aunt Mia watched the two of them reluctantly as they entered Platform 9¾ at King's Cross Station. Back on the train, Jimmy and Hermione felt a sense of relief, as if they had been freed from their constraints.

Finally, I can cast spells.

On the train, Jimmy used Hermione's large suitcase as a trolley, selling snacks and drinks in each carriage. Owen and his three friends, who had been waiting, snapped up a huge amount of snacks and drinks.

The young wizards in the nearby booths also flocked to the stall, and Jimmy's booth was bustling with activity. The sweet and spicy strips he bought from the Chinese supermarket were very popular, and he earned quite a few Galleons.

Chapter 63 Mobile Vending Machine

The Snack Witch found out about the snack-selling business again. When the two colleagues met on the train, the scene was very awkward. In the end, Jimmy, feeling guilty, gave in first and fled back to his compartment.

He thought to himself, "If I can't steal the snacks from the witch on the train, I can bring them back to school and sell them."