Hermione, join me as Minister of Magic!

Although a building of more than 30 meters is nothing to Muggles nowadays, it was the first time they had seen a hotel with such a unique shape.

Thick and long pea vines spiral around Yuzhanshangtian, forming a dark green "trunk", and the pea pods hanging from the tower to the trunk are also half-opened, revealing the air bubbles in the middle. Room.

If they hadn't seen it with their own eyes, these people would never believe that there are houses with this shape in the world.

- After seeing this, William, who was accompanying him, hurriedly unified the caliber beforehand, and explained to these social elites:

"As you can see, Hogsmeade is an art village. The buildings in the village are designed by artists and realized by skilled construction engineers, so you will see many strange buildings here these days. , such as this 'Jack the Pea', was made by the famous artist Ms. Sprout..."

"Pfft-"

— Horace, who was listening to William's introduction of the hotel with great interest, couldn't help laughing when he heard it.

Horace is an ordinary villager in Hogsmeade. Apart from growing some vegetables and flowers, and reselling some contraband, his only job is to stare at the snow-capped mountains and make accidents for students or strange Muggle climbers. .As for his wife, she is a salesperson on the Hogwarts train and only works two days a year.

Such people are actually very common in rural areas during the feudal period, because life is not worrying,

With no worries about food and clothing and nothing to do, some of them only work as short-term labor for the landlord or manor owner during the busy farming season, some help carpenters and blacksmiths with some chores, and some become buskers. Well, they can't even find a job

These people are often a problem for law and order, because as long as they are not managed well, these people will start gambling, take narcotics and even do some dirty work of robbing outsiders.

These people are usually referred to by the rural people as "dirty people", a special product of the old era, and the reason is nothing more than that the countryside in a low-productivity environment cannot arrange jobs for the redundant population.

Although the wizarding world is already in modern times, in the wizarding settlements, the life of these wizards is no different from that of the rural areas in the old days, and the only relatively modern London can't arrange work for so many wizards. Mungo's Hospital and businesses in Diagon Alley absorbed almost all the wizarding jobs in big cities.

Because the Horaces were so idle, Lockhart hired them in the name of the Ministry of Magic to take care of the hotel and the mountains. log cabin.

It was also because he was a wizard through and through that he couldn't help laughing when William called Professor Sprout an "artist" seriously.

William quickly gave him a warning look, telling him to restrain himself.

Although he himself doesn't know whether his "artist" rhetoric can hide these "Muggles", but judging from the expressions of these social elites, they seem to have no objection.

——That's right, if I hadn't come into contact with wizard civilization in advance, I'm afraid I would be deceived too.William said heartily.

People have a tendency to use known things to explain unknown and new things, so as long as you give them an excuse, they will choose to believe

"But why does the sniffing company subsidize artists to build such houses?

"Someone asked curiously.

This kind of thing has always been a lot of words and mistakes, so as an accompanying person, William answered his question in one sentence:

"Because the directors of the company like it, half of Hogsmeade's real estate and real estate are in the hands of the directors of the company," he said.

Judging from the expressions of these visitors, William knew that his words had successfully established the impression of "company directors" in the minds of these people.

--Wealthy, rich and self-willed.

According to the "company background" compiled by Lockhart, the composition of the board of directors of the Sniff Drilling Company is mainly descendants of those land nobles. These descendants do not want to rely on their family's old land, so they jointly established a company.

So although the visitors were a little surprised, this set of rhetoric was very consistent with their inherent impression of those land nobles.

Only those families that have been passed down for countless generations will support any art, and only they have the financial resources, and only they have the leisure time.

And the next scene deepened their impression:

At the reception inside the hotel door, a young man with a long red ponytail and fang earrings exchanged coins for them.

"This is an employee of the bank, William Arthur Weasley, who will convert pounds into gold coins for you," William explained.

And the young man greeted the visitors generously.

"Hi everyone, my name is William Weasley, but everyone calls me Bill, and you can also call me Bill." The young man said with a smile.

The visitors couldn't help but have a deeper understanding of the phrase "Hogsmeade is an art village" when they saw Bill Wesley's exotic clothes.

Bill had long been used to the way outsiders looked at him, and he felt that since his outfit was considered unusual among wizards, it was normal for Muggles not to get used to it.

But unexpectedly, these Muggle elites quickly accepted his attire, which also made Bill look at Muggles with admiration.

Of course, Bill didn't know how much the society tolerated "different" after the Muggles experienced the hippie culture of the 70s.

Bill didn't dwell on this matter for too long, he quickly took out several large leather bags from the safe behind the counter, and dumped all the metal coins inside on the counter.

"I don't know if anyone has introduced it to you before. We only use these three currencies here. The name of this gold coin is Galleon, the silver bar is Sickle, and the copper plate is Nat.

"We all know." The Muggles said one after another.

"That's good, then you should know the exchange rate here." Bill said with a smile, "Considering the price level here, I suggest that you exchange at least 30 Galleons, which is 240 pounds. We'll take care of converting them back into pounds when we're done."

Because Gringotts are mostly goblins7 and they are not suitable to appear in front of Muggles: so the people who are responsible for exchanging money for Muggles can only be human employees in Gringotts, and because there is no prejudice against Muggles in wizarding families There were too few people, so the goblins finally had to choose Bill, the boss of the Weasley family, to exchange money for them.

After hearing Bill's words, these social elites smiled knowingly and became playful.

As the saying goes, you have to do a full set of plays. Since everyone comes to this "Medieval Style Art Village" for vacation, the coins used should of course be ancient gold and silver coins. The service of this resort can be described as very considerate.

"You're doing it as if it's real!" they commented.

Bill grinned noncommittally.

As social elites, although these Muggles believed that the people from the Sniffing Drilling Company would not cheat them, they still stared at the coins carefully for a while.

"Excuse me, what is the gold content of this "Galleon" gold coin? asked one of the financial practitioners named Gunn.

Bill had already prepared: "Like the early gold coins of the Roman Empire, 95% to 96%

Mr. Gann weighed the gold coin in his hand, felt its weight, and at the same time his thoughts were anxious: "Then how much Galleon is allowed to be exchanged for one person?"

"An invitation can be exchanged for 100 galleons. After all, you only need to stay here for seven days, so it shouldn't take much," Bill replied.

"If it's not used up, are we allowed to take it away?" Gann asked again.

Bill looked at him, looking a little confused: "You can take it away...but you should not be allowed to use these gold coins, so we provide the service of exchanging them."

Mr. Gann didn't say much after listening, but simply took out his wallet: "Can you use credit cards here?"

"What is a 'credit card'? Bill was even more confused, "Subtitles... cards)?"Can you buy things with paper? "

Mr. Gunn was amused by Bill—the actors in this resort were so dedicated that he found it funny and absurd.

Gann was also happy to play with them: "That is to say, you can only use banknotes issued by Her Majesty the Queen."

"Dollars, francs, marks, and doubloons are accepted."

"Okay...then pay in cash, 800 pounds, and I'll exchange it for 100 Galleons." Gann took out 8 Scottish hundred pound notes.

While the maximum denomination of banknotes in circulation in England is only 50, there is one in Scotland.

There were extra £100 notes, so after hearing he was holidaying in the Scottish Highlands, Mr Gunn pulled some out.

Bill didn't think too much, and he quickly exchanged 100 Galleons for Mr. Gann according to Gringotts' latest exchange rate.

In fact, he had a slight complaint against the goblins at Gringotts—originally, the exchange rate between galleons and British pounds was 1:7, but the goblins changed it to 18 on the spur of the moment, which is really ugly.

But these Muggles didn't seem to care about this. Except for Mr. Gann, the rest of the guests also followed Mr. Gann and chose the upper limit of 100 Galleons for exchange.

Muggles are a weird bunch, happy to be blackmailed, Bill thought.

Chapter 250 Run-in Contact

While Bill felt that Gringotts was blackmailing, the VC elite who had come to Hogsmeade thought otherwise.

9成半的含金量，约1/8盎司重的金币，而1994年时黄金的价格大约是380美元1盎司，也就是说，100加隆在麻瓜那边的价值相当于3000镑。

Exchange 800 pounds for 3000 pounds-it must be a fool who doesn't change the full amount.

It can be said that all Muggles think that this is the "tacted benefit" that the Sniff Drilling Company is giving them. After all, it would be too ugly to directly collect money, and it does not conform to the "noble style" of these land aristocrats.

And their reactions were all within Lockhart's expectations.

Because the amount of gold in the wizarding world is abundant, but the economic aggregate is not large, the purchasing power of gold is far lower than that of Muggles, and this gap can only be balanced through trade. get the most benefit

Just like the age of great voyages, Western Europeans only needed to use gold to buy oriental spices, silk and tea, and then transport them back to Europe to get 40 times the profit. It can be popular, as long as it is fast, even if 1/3 of the ships sink on the road, they can still make a lot of money.

A closer look at the reason is that after the gold mines in South America and the silver mines in Central Europe and Spain were discovered, there was a huge gap in the purchasing power of gold and silver between the East and the West.

If this gap can be used well, then the wizarding world can become the next sea coachman, the empire on which the sun never sets, and if it is not used well, it can only be reduced to Spain.

The Muggle guests who were invited didn't know what Lockhart was planning. They were immersed in the shock of "Jack Pea" and didn't think about it at all.

surplus.

Because it was already night when the Hogwarts Express arrived, most of the passengers chose to go to the hotel to rest and prepare to visit the village the next day.

They took the "bean pod sightseeing elevator" in fear and came to the room where the bean vines grew.

Although there are no electric lights, they all have a glass bottle floating on their roofs with blue magic fire burning inside.

According to Horace, the hotel waiter, they can all be voice-activated, and these "lights" will automatically light up or go out just by shouting from the guests.

In addition, the hot water in the hotel is sprayed from the top of the bean vines hanging in the room, and the shower curtain is the waterproof paper inner skin in the pods, so tourists can take a shower in it generously.

Probably because they have seen too many shocking things, so in order to avoid embarrassment, these Muggle tourists pretended to be well-informed, just thinking that these are some high-tech regardless of cost

"It's really strange, why have we never heard of such an interesting hotel before?" Mrs. Gunn asked curiously.

Horace immediately answered her: "Because this hotel was only built this year, and it is going to be used to accommodate the participating team members."

"Competition? What competition?"

Horace hesitated for a while, but still didn't tell them the whole truth: "Several students from foreign schools are coming to compete with us... If the weather is fine tomorrow, you can see our school's castle from here."

"Your school? Castle?" Mrs. Gunn was dumbfounded.

"Yes, but only a very small number of people can go to our school, and most people have never even heard of it. Although it is summer vacation, please don't approach it when you are walking, there are security guards there." Huo Russ decided to put the ugly words on

front.

Gunn and his wife sighed again and again, looking very disappointed.

Although they didn’t ask, they felt that they could guess what kind of place it would be—if it weren’t for the private schools that provide specialized education for the children of nobles and rich people, how many schools would have their own “castle”? ?

Ordinary people have never even heard of such an aristocratic school.

As the "elite class" of the middle class, Gann can be said to be the most anxious group of people in the entire society.

Because they can vaguely see the so-called "threshold of high society", but they still can't pass it, and if they relax, they may even be in danger of slipping, so they have to do their best to maintain their current status.

This kind of talent is the class that respects 996 the most. They regard "work endlessly and struggle endlessly" as their life creed, in order to wait for an opportunity and luck so that they can continue to climb up.

Therefore, for the "directors of the Sniff Drilling Company" behind Lockhart, Gann and the others looked at this group with envy and longing, and were very eager to join them.

If he can do things for these nobles, maybe he can join in at some point.

Could this be the opportunity I've been waiting for?Gann thought.

Lockhart's original intention of inviting these people to Hogsmeade was not the same. What he wanted was to explore the possibility of trade between the Muggle world and the wizarding world, and at the same time create a wider network of relationships for his brother-in-law.

But after he showed the company's "strength" to these Muggles, what kind of thoughts these Muggles would have was out of his control.

After a night of rest, the Muggle tourists woke up one after another, and did not

They looked out of the window at the same time.

Sure enough, when the morning fog on the highland cleared, Hogwarts Castle appeared far away in everyone's field of vision.

Fortunately, it was the summer vacation, and there were no people there, and there were no flying students on the Quidditch pitch, so there was no need for the Hogwarts professors to cast the invisibility spell.

These elites in the financial world were amazed at the grandeur of Hogwarts, but at the same time they couldn't help but feel a little sorry—it seems that there is still a gap between them and the upper class, otherwise they would never have even heard of this school before. .

But when they finished washing, took the "elevator" to the ground, and went down to the three broomsticks for breakfast under the guidance of the waiter, they discovered an unpleasant thing.

Because the guests in the Three Broomsticks are all looking at them curiously, as if they are some exotic animals.

The financial elites are naturally very unhappy. Although they can tell that those who are watching them are not malicious, it is this attitude of looking at them that hurts them even more.

We are not monkeys!Gunn thought angrily.

Even a delicious breakfast of tea, toast, fried eggs and bacon became a bit unpalatable because of the discomfort.

—William, who was accompanying him, saw that the situation was wrong, and quickly explained for the villagers.

"Hogsmeade is a small village. Outsiders rarely came here before. They were just curious and had no other intentions," he said.

Horace also hurried over, and then winked at the villagers, telling them to restrain themselves.

The task Lockhart entrusted to him was not to offend the guests. If he couldn't even do this little thing well, the Flint family would probably fire him.

"Morning, gentlemen! Did you rest well last night? Is there anything we can do to improve the service?" He tried to change the subject.

In normal times, such hospitality would have been enough to shut up these financial elites, but after enjoying the onlooker treatment just now, they deliberately wanted to make things difficult for the waiters.