The days at Hogwarts

Hermione, Harry, Ron, Seamus and Dean all shrank their heads, not daring to meet Professor Sprout's gaze.

Only Loren held his head high with his chest puffed out, as if to say, "I don't know what you're talking about, but it's not me," with a self-righteous attitude.

Professor Sprout was so angry that he glared at him a few times, and then Hermione and others around him felt even more guilty, thinking that the professor was glaring at them.

"Those whose names I call will stay, and the rest of you can go."

Professor Sprout's words made Loren's neck choke, and his old-fashioned attitude became less confident.

"Harry Potter, Ron Weasley, you two stay, the others can go back."

"Great!"

Seamus and Dean cheered immediately. They walked up to Harry and Ron, jumped up and high-fived them in celebration. Their actions were so cocky and really deserved a beating.

Before Harry and Ron could beat them up, the two of them ran away with other unrelated little wizards and their figures quickly disappeared on the grass.

Loren and Hermione were still waiting there. They did not abandon their friends, mainly because Loren wanted to watch the fun.

Professor Sprout walked up to Harry, stopped, and knocked the heel of his right gardening boot against the thick sole of his left gardening boot, knocking the dirt off the sole.

"Do you know why I kept you two here?" Professor Sprout said casually, his feet moving non-stop.

Harry and Ron probably guessed it and nodded dejectedly. Harry muttered quietly, "Sorry, Professor. We will write our papers seriously next time."

Ron nodded and said, "Yes, Professor, we promise."

"I remember your promise, boys." Professor Sprout looked at them and said in a cheerful voice, "But if you do something wrong, you will be punished. I want you to take down the socks and scarves that Mandrake wears for the winter."

"You know how?"

Harry and Ron nodded obediently.

"Do you know where the mandrake is?"

Harry and Ron nodded obediently.

"Good boy!" Professor Sprout praised, "Get started. I'll lock the greenhouse before dark."

Ignoring these little wizards, she stepped into the greenhouse in her heavy gardener boots, muttering to herself as she walked away, "The Mandrake will be ready soon after I take off my socks..."

Hermione looked at the professor's receding back thoughtfully, nodding her little head uncontrollably.

"It's the end of January now, so by the time we have our final exams, it will be almost ready." Loren had a similar look on his face.

The two men nodded in exactly the same manner, at a slow and even speed, with an arc that was neither too big nor too small, vaguely similar to a certain old man with a white beard.

Harry looked at the two of them in confusion: "Are you and Professor Sprout exchanging secret signals? What do you mean?"

"You must not have been serious when you copied my paper." Hermione gave him a look of disdain. "If you read the second half carefully, you will know that we are talking about the maturity time of Mandrake."

Seeing that the two were still a little confused, Loren reminded them: "Mature mandrake can be used to prepare potions to wake up Colin and Justin who have been petrified."

"And Mrs Norris," Hermione added. "Filch will be pleased to hear that."

"We still have several months until our final exams, which is not fast enough." Ron said in a miserable tone, "Come on, Harry, we have to take off the socks of those noisy guys. Don't forget to wear earmuffs."

Ron dragged Harry in, his expression as tragic as if he was going to die.

Loren smiled and pulled Hermione towards the greenhouse: "Let's go. We may not be able to finish it before dark if we rely on just the two of them."

"I, I..." Hermione looked left and right, not daring to look Loren in the eye, and said hesitantly, "I need to go to the Forbidden Forest. I have something to do with Hagrid."

The little witch lied tremblingly, afraid that Loren would notice something. The place she and Professor Flitwick had agreed to meet was at the edge of the Forbidden Forest, so she could only use Hagrid as an excuse.

"Is that so—" Loren drew out the last word, leaned close to the girl, looked at her eye to eye, his face full of suspicion.

The distance was too close, Hermione could feel his hot breath, like a flame, making her feel uneasy.

"Would you like me to come with you? I haven't seen Hagrid and Fang in a while?"

"No!" Hermione pushed him away, her eyes sparkling, looking at him warily, like a little squirrel guarding food.

Loren rubbed his chest, feeling a little painful from being pushed, and muttered, "If you don't want to go, then don't go. Why are you pushing me... Do you need me to pick you up when we return to the castle?"

Hermione felt a little guilty, so she stretched out her hand and patted his chest gently to comfort him: "No, no, I'll be back before dark. I'll come to see you."

Afraid that her lie would be exposed, Hermione was unsure and quickly slipped away.

Loren smiled, turned and walked into the greenhouse...

Hermione has been behind his back lately, as if she is busy with something that cannot be told to him. However, everyone has secrets, and Hermione will not ask if she doesn't want to tell him. Putting herself in his shoes, Hermione also respects him in this way.

Anyway, it's impossible for Hermione to defect to Voldemort.

Well, he wouldn't...

Weekend, Gryffindor common room.

Most of the little wizards were playing and running outside, so there were few people in the room and it was quiet.

Next to the burning fireplace, Loren was lying on a soft sofa with a copy of The Tales of Beedle the Bard covering his face. He was breathing evenly and sleeping soundly.

But the space in the fantasy book is completely different.

In the alchemy laboratory, in an inverted hemispherical red brick house, Loren and Flamel huddled together, discussing the phantom of the heart constructed by light and shadow in the air.

"As described in 'The Wizard and His Hairy Heart', the heart's senses have been blocked for a long time, so it has become wrinkled and covered with black hair." Flamel said and waved his hand.

The healthy, full, beating red heart withered like a flower, and the full muscles lost moisture and became dry, like shriveled and wrinkled bark. Just like the process of food becoming moldy, long black hairs emerged, and there was even a faint stench of decay.

"hiss--"

The scene before him made Loren feel cold in his heart, but he quickly reacted and was a little speechless, "Flamel, this is a heart, not an apple."

"You should have read those anatomy books. The heart will never age in this way."

Flamel spread his hands and said helplessly: "That's what it says in the book. The magical world is different from Muggle medicine. You can't use Muggle thinking to guess magic."

"Is there really such a magic that can move such an important organ outside the body and still maintain vital signs?"

Loren blinked his eyes and said, "Don't tell me that wizards are like this. They can survive even if their hearts are taken out."

"Of course not," Flamel was stunned for a moment, "Maybe this is just a fable. It is not in line with magic, nor with Muggle medicine. At least for hundreds of years, Nico has not seen this kind of magic."

Loren still didn't give up. He felt that the stories in "The Tales of Beedle the Bard" were not that simple.

There are five short stories in total. The Deathly Hallows that appeared in "The Tale of the Three Brothers" are real, and Loren has seen the Elder Wand, the Resurrection Stone, and the Invisibility Cloak. "The Fountain of Good Luck" was confirmed by Dumbledore; and "Babbitty Rabbit and Her Croaking Stump" was based on Animagus.

What's left are "The Wizard and the Hopping Pot" and "The Wizard's Hairy Heart".

After restoring the hairy heart in the air to the appearance of a healthy heart, Loren began to stare at the heart, recalling the clues mentioned in the story in his mind.

The cold, powerful and wise wizard owns a huge castle and amazing wealth. He has no emotions and is glad to have inherited the estate after his parents' death.

Until a witch appeared and gained his trust, the wizard showed the witch his hairy heart hidden in the magic box, claiming that he had closed his heart and his emotions.

The heart was isolated from the senses for a long time and turned into a hairy heart. The witch asked the wizard to put the heart back so that she could feel emotions and desires... The wizard, dominated by desire, killed the witch, and then because he didn't want to be controlled by the hairy heart, he cut out his heart and committed suicide.

When the servants arrived, they saw only two hearts and two bodies.

"A cold, wise wizard... who does not mourn the death of his parents..."

"...it closes off emotions...it can survive if the heart is removed from the body...it will die if the heart is destroyed."

"Why do I feel an inexplicable sense of familiarity?" Thinking of this, Loren's eyes lit up and his voice unconsciously rose a little, "Isn't this a Horcrux?"

There is no sense of incongruity when Voldemort is introduced to replace the wizard in the story.

Cold, full of wisdom, excellent magical talent, no emotions... Not to mention the heart being separated from the body, the soul can survive. If the heart is destroyed, then it will die. Isn't the heart the Horcrux that holds the soul?

Flamel's eyes lit up when he heard this. He waved his hand and changed the heart back to a hairy heart again, fading the outline of the heart until only a shadow remained. The black hair on it turned into rising black magic power, twisted and evil.

"The hairy heart may just be a symbolic device. If the heart is replaced with any vessel that holds the soul, the story will still hold true," Flamel said.

Loren clicked his tongue. That made the story more complicated.

Speculating in the direction of conspiracy theories, who was the person the wizard killed to create the Horcrux? Could it be his parents?

Why did the witch approach the wizard? Did she come there to kill him from the beginning?

In the story, only the servants survived. Was the death of the wizard and the witch really that simple?

The story is by no means as simple as Beedle the Bard describes it.

Loren looked at the changing phantom of the heart. The black magic rising from it looked very much like the crown of Ravenclaw. He sighed quietly, "It has been thousands of years since Helpo invented the method of making Horcruxes. No one knows how many people have tried..."

Flamel didn't care too much. He said casually, "Believe me, Loren, immortality is not as good as you think. Nico didn't want to live after six hundred years. I think he has persisted long enough. At least in the past six hundred years, he has not found any traces of other immortals."

Loren nodded noncommittally.

The virtual consciousness flashed, and someone in the real world was calling him. Loren changed his mind and his consciousness withdrew from the space of the fantasy book.

"Horcrux?" Flamel's disdainful voice sounded, and he waved his hand casually. The floating shadow of the hairy heart turned into countless tiny rays of light and dissipated in the air.

When his consciousness returned to his real body, Loren felt that the book on his face had been taken away and his eyelashes were being played with, which made him feel itchy.

When she opened her eyes, it was Hermione who had just returned from outside. Her face was flushed and she couldn't stop smiling. She sat on the armrest of the sofa, and The Tales of Beedle the Bard was placed beside her. Her naughty little hands hadn't been taken back yet.

Even with its eyes open, the tender little white hand was still playing tricks. Loren bit it, and the teeth hit each other with a crisp "crunch" sound.

"Ah!" Hermione retracted her hand quickly and dodged nimbly. After she reacted, she pushed his head away and couldn't help giggling.

"Did you pick up gold Galleons? You look so happy." Loren shook his head and propped himself up, changing from lying to sitting position.

"What's it to you?" Hermione snorted. The little witch had experienced Apparition many times today with Professor Flitwick, and she had vaguely grasped that wonderful feeling.

She began to change the subject: "Why didn't you go to the Quidditch field with them? When I came back, I saw Professor Black riding a flying motorcycle chasing a flying car. Dozens of flying brooms followed them, and there were a lot of onlookers around."

Loren tutted his words and gloated, "If Professor McGonagall knew about this, the new Professor Black would also be put in detention."

"Professor McGonagall doesn't seem to be available. She should be busy marking Animagus exam papers."

Chapter 234 Spring is coming

Chapter 234 The Spring of 1993 Has Come

Professor McGonagall was marking the papers even slower than they had expected, and she had not revealed any information about the results in either the Transfiguration class or the Transfiguration Club.

On the first weekend of February, Lee Jordan fell into an ice hole while skating on Black Lake and was eventually lifted ashore by the tentacles of a giant squid.

This event announced that the frozen Black Lake had begun to thaw, heralding the arrival of spring in 1993. After a few months, the giant squid reappeared and aroused the cheers of the young wizards.

All the snow melted, and without the cover of ice and snow, the stone walls of Hogwarts once again heated up slightly under the warm sun, making people feel that the temperature was gradually becoming warmer.

At dusk, in the third greenhouse.

Loren, Harry and Ron had just finished checking the growth of the mandrake.

After getting away from the mandrake, they took off their gloves and put the gardener's aprons and earmuffs back into the tool shed, leaving only the boots on their feet. The three of them stretched their legs and lay down at the door of the greenhouse to bask in the sun, waiting for Hermione here.

"I originally asked Neville to stay and help us, but he seemed to have forgotten about it and ran away as soon as the get out of class was over." Ron tilted his neck to let the golden sunlight shine more fully on him.

Harry swung his feet, and the hard soles of his gardener's boots made a dull sound. "Maybe he's too anxious. Professor McGonagall's test results haven't been announced for several months, and Neville can hardly sleep."

"It seems that he is not only worried about the test results..." Loren has already laid down, squinting his eyes to feel the afterglow of the sun. Even with his eyes closed, he can still feel the red color.

"What do you mean?"

"Say it quickly!"

"You only said half the words, you..."

Harry and Ron asked a few more questions, but they couldn't get any results, so they gave up. In the end, they lay lazily on the ground with him, accompanied by the faint fermentation smell coming from the third greenhouse, like three salted fish drying in the sun.

"Tell me, what has Hermione been busy with lately? I can never find her when she's not in class." Harry twisted his neck and changed to a more comfortable position.

"Ha!" Ron thought his guess was very reasonable. "She must have been learning Animagus behind our backs. When Professor McGonagall announces the test results and Hermione gets first place, she will stand up and tell us that she has actually learned Animagus."

"Then she will turn into a little squirrel, or a little lion..." Loren was immersed in his own fantasy and had no idea that danger was approaching.

"is it?"

Hermione's sarcastic and threatening voice sounded above their heads, and the next moment, the light of the setting sun was blocked by a long-haired figure.

Harry and Ron sat up suddenly, and pointed at Loren on the far right, saying in unison: "It has nothing to do with us. He said that."

Loren was confused.

Hermione grunted twice, pulled Loren up from the ground, and slapped the grass and dirt stuck on the back of his robe with great force. However, the force was completely absorbed by the cloth, and Loren did not feel any pain.

The two stood close together, and Loren's nose moved. He could easily smell the scent of the little witch. In addition to the scent of a slightly sweaty girl, there was also a faint scent of distilled essence.

Although she simply covered it up, Loren still smelled it. He quietly moved closer to Hermione, wanting to see if she had any newly healed wounds or other clues...

Harry got up and went to padlock the greenhouse. Professor Sprout gave him a key because of his skillful work.