The days at Hogwarts

Loren waited in silence.

After a long silence, Dumbledore slowly opened his mouth: "Loren, you already know about the Horcrux, right?"

Is this all you have to say?

"Yes, Headmaster, I know that the diary is Voldemort's Horcrux, and the tiara is also Voldemort's Horcrux. If nothing unexpected happens, he has more Horcruxes. Don't worry, I have kept it a secret for you and it won't be leaked." Loren chattered away all at once.

The refining of Horcruxes also belongs to the category of alchemy. It is normal for him to know about Horcruxes after learning from the most knowledgeable alchemist in the past few hundred years. In addition, the incident with the diary before school started, even if he didn't know the plot, it was easy for him to deduce these conclusions.

Dumbledore had anticipated this situation, and he felt more relaxed after hearing this. He began to talk about what he wanted to say leisurely: "During the summer vacation, I visited Mr. Bob Ogden. He worked in the Department of Law Enforcement of the Ministry of Magic at that time. The case he took over was related to Voldemort's mother and her family. Mr. Ogden was already very old and in poor health, but fortunately, when I found him, he was still able to talk to me soberly."

Loren picked up the teacup and took a sip... Dumbledore talked a lot, and he only remembered that there was a man called Bob Ogden, and he was dying.

"From him, I learned that there might be clues about Horcruxes in a certain place, or even that a Horcrux was hidden. I wanted to go there alone to investigate."

Well, Dumbledore found the Gaunt ancestral home.

"But I was adding chocolate to my hot cocoa on a moonlit night. You know, the elves don't put enough chocolate in their hot cocoa at night because they think it's unhealthy."

Loren drank his tea expressionlessly, his eyes blank, watching Dumbledore's beard move with his lips.

"After drinking that cup of hot cocoa, I suddenly felt that I should take you with me." Dumbledore said, taking a sip of tea.

Loren had finished the tea in his cup. He put it down and looked at Dumbledore with disdain: "Principal, next time you talk about something, you can ignore the process and just tell me the conclusion."

"As I get older, I tend to be more verbose." Dumbledore smiled slightly, "Do you have any other questions?"

"There is no question about Voldemort, but - if we can leave the castle, Headmaster, can you take me to Windsor Castle? I haven't got the unicorn horn there yet." Loren said.

……

In a corner of the library.

"Polyjuice Potion!" Loren looked at the three people in confusion.

I was only away for half an hour, not half a day, right?

How come after you came back after a delay, you already identified Malfoy as the suspect?

"Even if it's not Malfoy, he must be a student from Slytherin House. We can just sneak in and find out the news." Hermione replied.

Ron put his hands on the table and said excitedly, "Yes! This is Hermione's idea. We can use Polyjuice Potion to transform into the appearance of Malfoy's two followers and get information about the Chamber of Secrets!"

Harry nodded, "Yes, Hermione has calculated that we only need to break about fifty school rules."

Only use, violate school rules, fifty...

Loren muttered these key words silently, leaned closer and stared at Hermione with narrowed eyes: "Hermione, blink if you feel threatened."

"Don't be ridiculous!" Hermione pushed his face away, pulled out a piece of parchment and calculated carefully, "The formula of Polyjuice Potion is in the "Powerful Potion" in the restricted area. We have to find a way to get a signed note from a professor so that we can borrow the book from the library."

She was writing and scribbling on the parchment, talking to herself and thinking:

"But there's no reason for us to borrow that book."

"If we pretend to be interested in the theory, there might be some hope."

"But no professor would be so easily fooled..."

Looking up, Hermione found that the three were staring at her with strange expressions. She subconsciously shrank closer to Loren: "Is there a problem?"

"Hermione..." Loren sighed, "Since you have decided to break the school rules, why don't you just go to the restricted area at night and steal the formula?"

Ron nodded in agreement, "Yeah, I remember we saw that book during last year's night tour."

"..."

Hermione was silent.

When it comes to violating school rules, Hermione is still too young, and subconsciously she is still a serious little wizard.

Harry noticed Loren's choice of words and looked at him in confusion: "Did you mean 'you'?"

"Yes, you guys! I am a good student who abides by the law. I don't want to go out at night with you guys. I have done my best by not reporting you." Loren's face was full of righteousness, and he seemed to be shining.

Hermione, Harry and Ron: ???

Are you law-abiding?

Who encouraged them to go on their first night tour?

Who persuaded Hermione to come to the restricted section of the library?

The three of them looked at each other and nodded in unison, reaching a consensus through their eyes.

Twelve o'clock at midnight.

In the boundless darkness, under the witness of the bright stars and the moon, the world entered a new day. The common room was empty, and in the dormitory, the little wizard who had not yet gone to bed could hear the long bell ringing outside.

In a Gryffindor boys' dormitory, Neville's snoring could be heard in the dormitory, and Seamus had curled up in his quilt and fallen asleep.

Harry and Ron climbed out of the four-poster bed, looked at each other in the moonlight, and in tacit understanding, they stepped off the bed and tiptoed to Loren's bed without making any sound.

The two men carefully grabbed the four corners of the quilt and suddenly pinched them together, wrapping the person in the quilt tightly.

“Wuwuwu—you—wuwuwu—are dead!”

Loren covered himself with the quilt and made some "mmm" sounds, but the noises were drowned out by Neville's snoring and did not cause any ripples.

Together, they carried the bunched-up quilt and stumbled down the spiral staircase to the Gryffindor common room, where a few embers were still flickering in the fireplace and the armchairs seemed to have turned into dark shadows.

A light flickered on and Hermione was waiting for them in a chair in her sky-blue pajamas.

"Leave it to you." Harry and Ron said, put down the quilt and walked towards the portrait hole to open the door to the common room.

"This is too much. You actually want to force me to go along with you!" Loren broke free from the quilt and saw Hermione standing beside him.

He was heartbroken: "I thought you were a good student like me, but I didn't expect that, Hermione Granger, you have thick eyebrows and big eyes..."

Before he finished speaking, Hermione, who had an expressionless face, could no longer tolerate this mischievous person. She put her arm around Loren's shoulders and led him out. The advantages of Gryffindor's gift were clearly revealed at this moment.

An unknown fragrance wafted from the girl's pajamas, and Loren suddenly calmed down, but he still stiffened his neck to show that he was forced, and was taken out of the lounge like this.

"You are a beautiful woman...you are as strong as a mountain..."

Loren kept muttering all the way, but Harry and Ron pretended not to hear him. If Hermione became impatient, she would slightly apply force to the arm that she was holding on to him, and Loren would stop saying strange things because of the pain.

The library was pitch black. Hermione turned on the light and reached the restricted area with ease. She took down "Powerful Potions" from the shelf and copied the page about Polyjuice Potion.

"Grass lacewings that have been boiled for twenty-one days, sap grass picked at the full moon, two-horned beast horns, African tree snake skin..." Loren looked at the formula while reviewing and analyzing the effects of each medicine.

Yes, he had learned Polyjuice Potion from Snape last year and knew it by heart.

He didn't say it before because he wanted to tease Hermione, but now they were in the library and Hermione was already halfway through copying, so he didn't dare to say it for fear of getting beaten.

"Bang!" A very slight sound came from behind a bookshelf.

It couldn't be the professors or Filch, hiding behind the bookshelves, so it had to be someone or something else.

Loren and Harry turned their heads to look at the bookshelf almost at the same time, their hands on their wands, the Piercing and Disarming spells on their lips, ready to cast a big one at any time.

Ron and Hermione didn't notice anything unusual, but when they saw the two men's alert movements, they reacted and held their wands in their hands.

Loren looked at Harry and tilted his head slightly to signal. After confirming each other's intentions, the two slowly moved to the left and the right, moving towards the bookshelf.

In the dark and silent library, their breathing echoed in each other's ears.

After slowly approaching, they both quickened their movements, leaped out of the bookshelf, and pointed their wands.

"Nothing?" Harry looked at the empty space in front of him in doubt.

Hermione walked forward and examined it carefully for a while. She reached out to touch the books on the bookshelf, but then retracted her hand: "I heard it just now. However, this is a restricted area. Maybe it was these strange books that made the sound."

The books in the restricted area are always weird, and many of them can make sounds.

There were no other unusual circumstances, so the few people accepted this explanation and returned to their original place to continue copying the formula for the polyjuice potion.

Loren turned his head and looked at the place where the sound came from thoughtfully. The sound just now seemed a bit like the sound of Apparition.

He shook his head and put the idea behind him. Dumbledore was the only one in the castle who could teleport, so he was obviously overthinking it.

After finishing copying, Loren, Hermione, Harry and Ron walked out of the library and went back to the common room while discussing what to do next.

"Lacewings, leeches, slugwort and two-eared grass," Hermione pointed at the ingredients one by one, "These are easy to get. They are in the student lockers in the Potions classroom. We can use them ourselves..."

"And a little something from the target person." She paused and continued reading the ingredients below: "Powdered horn of a two-horned beast and fragments of African tree snake skin. These two materials are difficult to obtain. We need to think of other ways."

Harry and Ron had never paid attention to what materials were in the student lockers, so they could only watch Hermione figure out a solution.

"There must be some in Snape's storage room. Let's find a way to go in and get some." Hermione's lively eyes rolled around.

"Professor Snape has been researching a new potion formula recently. He has collected all the horns of the bicorns and stored them separately. You won't be able to find them even if you sneak into the storage room." Loren sighed helplessly, "Forget it, let me find the ingredients for the Polyjuice Potion."

Hermione pursed her lips and smiled: "Don't you want to go along with us?"

"I obtained the materials through legitimate means, and I did not violate school rules..."

"You went on a night tour."

"You threatened me!"

The group returned to the Gryffindor common room laughing and joking. After entering the hole, Harry looked back strangely. He had a strange feeling that he was being watched all the way.

There is someone behind me, in the invisible corner or in the shadows...

He often had this feeling when walking at night or when he was alone, but he just thought the castle was too cold and lonely at night and didn't take it seriously. This feeling disappeared after entering the lounge, as if the sight that had been following him was blocked outside the portrait hole.

The next day, Myrtle's girls' bathroom.

"Crucible, stirring spoon..." Loren took out a complete set of equipment needed to make polyjuice potion from his suitcase, and then took out the materials for ten batches of polyjuice potion.

No one asked him how he got it, as everyone knew that Loren had a good relationship with Snape.

"Liquid grass, liquid grass, each portion is collected on the day of the full moon." Hermione counted the materials with a satisfied smile on her face.

She had long been dissatisfied with the practical operation of the Potions class. Any potion could only be prepared once, and there was no second chance regardless of success or failure.

Now, we have ten sets of materials. We have never fought such a rich battle before.

"Excuse me, why do we have to brew potions in the girls' room in broad daylight?" Ron leaned against the wall, looking around, the corners of his mouth twitching slightly.

It felt like at any moment someone would burst into the ladies' room and discover these four perverts.

wrong.

Three.

Hermione is a girl, she won't be considered a pervert.

"Because no one will disturb us here." Hermione had already set up the cauldron, added water to it and started boiling the lacewings.

Harry didn't seem uncomfortable at all. He looked at the cauldron that was beginning to steam and asked, "How long will it take to set it up?"

Hermione recalled the cooking process in the recipe and estimated, "The lacewings need to be cooked for twenty-one days. Okay, if you include the other ingredients, it will take about a month."

"One month?" Harry raised his voice unconsciously, then lowered it again when he remembered that they were in the girls' room. "Hermione, if Malfoy is really the heir, one month is enough for him to send half of the Muggle wizards to the school hospital."

"It's okay," Loren comforted, "There's room for you in the school hospital."

Hermione couldn't help but burst out laughing.

Harry's mouth twitched. Am I discussing with you whether the school hospital can accommodate you? I'm talking about the little wizard!

Ron came over and put his arm around his shoulder. "Hey, Harry, there's no other way now. Let's leave professional matters to professionals. You should now concentrate on preparing for Quidditch on Saturday."

Harry's eyes widened and he pulled Ron to go out. "I forgot we have Quidditch practice today. Wood must be going crazy now!"

"If you can knock Malfoy into the hospital at the game on Saturday, we won't have to worry about this."

"Use the Wronsky feint..."

They are really considering the feasibility of this plan.

Loren fell into deep silence as he watched Hermione holding a notebook in one hand and stirring the cauldron clockwise with a stirring spoon in the other.

It's confirmed, Snape is talking about you.

He squatted down and held Hermione's hand, guiding her to master the rhythm of stirring: "You should pause for three minutes after every 15 turns of stirring. This will reduce the cooking time by three days."

Turn, pause...

Turn, pause...

Wait, Hermione realized belatedly: "Do you know how to make Polyjuice Potion?"

"Yes, Snape taught me how to make Polyjuice Potion last year, but all the potions I made were used to pay off debts."

Hermione's fist hardened again: "Then Mr. Morgan, why didn't you say anything during the night tour last night?"