Hogwarts and the Holy Grail War

Chapter 19: Night Shift Restricted Book Area

Ethan took a deep breath, opened the door leading to the main hall a crack, and squeezed in quickly.

The lights were still on in the main hall. Two senior students were walking back and forth in the corridor in front of the stairs. In the distance, another senior student was standing in front of the door of the library.

-

"When you get to the main hall, you'll have to face patrolling prefects," said Fred. "They're no easier to fool than Filch. Things like the Disillusionment Charm will be noticed if they get close, so it's best to just take a detour and avoid them."

"It's possible that we just happened to meet the professor," George said, looking serious as if he had recalled some bad memories. "They are very sensitive to traces of magic. Don't try to lure them away with magic."

"It can be seen that you two are people with stories." Ethan had a playful expression on his face.

-

Ethan clung to the wall, crouched and slowly moved to the corner of the stairs in the main hall. Then he stood up and walked down the stairs to the platform at the turning point, quickly walked to the stairs at the other end and climbed up, thus avoiding the Ravenclaw prefect who was patrolling the stairs.

[Great, we're almost at the door. Now all that's left is...]

Ethan leaned in the shadows at the corner, looking at Percy who was standing in front of the library not far away.

-

"Unless you meet Percy, of course." Fred mocked his brother mercilessly. "He is a blockhead, his mind is stagnant, and he can be fooled by making some noise."

"Whatever?" Ethan couldn't believe it. "He's the prefect. Is this really okay?"

"Yeah, whatever," George said with a disdainful smile, "This poor kid has become stupid from studying. He's easier to fool than Filch."

-

Ethan looked at the two suits of armor standing against the wall not far away, his brows furrowed and a plan came to mind.

He slowly moved to the side of the armor, leaning against the wall, and kicked one of the armors.

"Ah!"

The armor screamed in pain, attracting the attention of Percy who was sitting diagonally opposite.

Ethan took this opportunity to move away, and when the Ravenclaw prefect beside the stairs turned his eyes to the stairs, he quickly ran across the corridor.

"what happened to you?"

Another suit of armor nearby said with concern.

"Aha, I get it. It's you who did it! And you're still pretending to be innocent. I don't need your fake concern!" said the armor that was kicked, and kicked off the arm of the other armor.

"Nonsense, are you here to cause trouble?" The one-armed man in armor was very angry and picked up his mace to smash him into pieces.

"Hey, what are you doing? Be quiet." Percy walked across the corridor and said dissatisfiedly to the two suits of armor fighting each other.

【good chance! 】

Ethan leaned against the wall and moved to the door of the library as quickly as possible. He looked at Percy's back as he scolded Armor and shook his head helplessly.

[Poor child, you should be more careful. ]

Ethan turned around and ignored the noise behind him. He slowly opened the wooden door leading to the library, took a deep breath, turned sideways and squeezed in, then gently closed the door.

Gently and quietly, Ethan walked down the stairs and slowly into the library.

-

"After entering the library, you need to find the key to the iron door that locks the restricted area." Fred took them to another place and came to a railing. "The key is in Madam Pince's drawer."

"The lock can't be opened with an Arachnophobia spell. There's an Anti-Arachnophobia spell on the lock," George leaned on the railing and looked into the distance. "Once you use the Unlocking Charm on it, it will send out a piercing alarm that the prefects patrolling in the main hall can hear."

-

[I remember Madam Pince's workstation was at...]

Ethan looked to the left and saw that Madam Pince's workstation was just to the left of the library entrance.

It didn't matter that he took a look, Ethan could see Madam Pince's face with glasses. She was tidying something and mumbling something.

"Hufflepuff again! Can't they just fill out the registration form properly? What the hell is this?" Madam Pince complained, not stopping writing. "I'm the one who cleans up the mess, right? Really, there are always these stupid mistakes at the beginning of every school year..."

Ethan quickly squatted down, hunched over, and slipped to the bookshelf inside from under Madam Pince's nose.

-

"Of course, Madam Pince may stay there to work overtime," Fred said, "In that case, you have to figure out a solution on your own."

"It's going to be hard to distract her, to be honest," George said. "You'd better find a helper to go with you."

"Forget it. It's not convenient to do this with others." Ethan leaned against the railing, very confident. "Don't worry about unlocking the door. The mountain man has a clever plan."

-

Ethan walked to the outer corridor against the wall, walked around the library and came to the lock of the restricted area. He carefully looked at the iron door of the restricted area and came to a conclusion.

[Yes, it is a pin-tumbler lock.]

That's easy.

Ethan pulled out two strands of hair, put them in his palm, and cast a Transfiguration spell on the hair with his wand.

[『Dramatic Change in Appearance』]

The hair turned into two thick iron wires. Ethan bent one end of the wire into a small bend and inserted it into the keyhole.

Give the magic of Western wizards a little oriental touch.

Ethan fiddled with the lock picking tool slowly, holding his breath and listening carefully to the sound inside the lock. Finally, after a slight "click", the lock of the iron door opened.

【It's easy. 】

Ethan slowly opened the iron door to prevent it from making any creaking noises that would attract Madam Pince's attention. He quietly entered the restricted area and then closed the iron door just as slowly.

There were indeed traces of ancient magic in the restricted area. The white spots of light gathered into a thin line on the ground, guiding Ethan to a downward staircase.

-

"By the way, there is a book on a table in the restricted area." Fred remembered something, "Don't touch it, the book is under a temptation spell."

"Once you open it, you will be confused. We have been fooled twice." George smiled bitterly, "So no matter whether it is a person or a book, you can't judge it by its appearance."

-

[No matter how you look at it, this is too deliberate. How did the Weasley brothers fall for it? ]

Ethan looked at the beautifully decorated book on the table next to the stairs, resisted the urge to pick it up and keep it for himself, and walked up the stairs to the basement.

-

"There are two ghosts patrolling the corridor on the first basement floor. They are the last guards." Fred stood up from the railing and stretched lazily. "But they are dumber than Percy. Just make some noise to distract them."

"Remember not to get too close. They can still see the Disillusionment Charm." George finally reminded, "Good luck."

Chapter 20: As long as you show your health bar, I will kick you even if you are a dog

The underground floor of the library is in the shape of a "sun", consisting of two U-shaped corridors put together. Two ghost administrators are floating in the air, monitoring every move in the corridor.

Ethan cast a short flying spell on the bookshelf in the left front corner, and two books flew out of the bookshelf and fell to the ground. As expected, the ghost was attracted and flew to where the books fell.

Ethan crouched and took another path in the circular corridor to avoid the ghost's sight. Then he used the same method to lure away another ghost guarding the stairs and walked up the stairs to the second underground floor.

【Okay, it's safe now. 】

Ethan let out a long breath, straightened up, and stretched. The second underground floor of the restricted book area looked much more dilapidated. Old wooden tables filled the entire room, thick books were randomly stacked on the tables, and the corners were filled with armor boxes, celestial globes and other sundries, all of which were covered with thick dust.

"Is this the restricted books area or the miscellaneous items area? Is there no one cleaning it? Ahem…"

Ethan was choked by the dust floating in the air and couldn't stop coughing.

He finally recovered, took a deep breath, covered his mouth and nose with his robe, and moved through the narrow gap between the tables.

"It's just bad luck that I can't use a cleansing or cleaning spell to make these things disappear."

Ethan muttered as he crawled under a dusty table piled with books. In order to avoid being discovered, he had to keep the items in the house as intact as possible, and he couldn't even flip over the table that was blocking his way.

It's very annoying.

Fortunately, there are no ghosts guarding the second underground floor, so there is no need to avoid their sight, otherwise it would be more troublesome.

"Finally, it's here."

Ethan struggled to crawl out from under the last table, and slowly stood up while panting. His forehead was covered with beads of sweat. He held his legs and looked at the metal door in front of him that was blocked by fragments of armor.

On the ground, thin silver-white lines formed by traces of ancient magic gathered here from all directions and flowed behind the door. No matter what was marked on the map, it should be behind this door.

There was not a lot of dust on the armor fragments in front of the door, so they must have fallen off recently. There was also a helmet of the same style hanging on the wall above the door, and it looked like the armor was originally hung there in one piece.

But why hang a piece of armor on the door? Is it so that when someone opens the door, the armor will fall down and blow his head off?

[It should be the Weasley twins who did it. 】

Ethan kicked the armor fragments and immediately thought of the most likely suspect.

After all, apart from the twins, no one else could go that far into the restricted books area.

And they are repeat offenders. God knows how much trouble they have caused in the restricted books area.

"Recover as before."

As Ethan waved his wand, the armor fragments flew up automatically and pieced together into complete parts bit by bit in the air. Finally, all the parts were combined and pieced together with the hanging helmet.

It looks like it is automatically dressed, which is very cool.

"Armor protection."

Ethan cast an armor spell over his head to prevent the armor from falling off, then stepped forward and opened the metal door.

Behind the door was a small square room with a table on it and a door on the side leading to a staircase leading downwards.

Ta-ta-ta-ta—

Ethan walked down the spiral stone staircase, with several spots of light surrounding him as illumination. He held the magic wand in his hand and pointed it forward in case anything strange suddenly popped out.

After all, it is common knowledge in the magic world that such old and dilapidated restricted areas may contain monsters.

The staircase went down two circles and then reached the bottom. In front of him was a cylindrical dome-shaped stone cave. Ethan first stood on the staircase, controlling the light spot to circle around the room in front of him. After making sure that there were no monsters hiding, he stepped down the stairs.

"Looking at the thickness of the dust, this room must have been here for a long time." Ethan stepped on the dusty stone floor, leaving footprints one by one. "And there are no footprints. It seems that Fred and the others have never been here."

In the center of the room was an empty metal door frame with a pointed top, exactly the same shape as the portal door frame encountered in Gringotts Vault No. 12.

The thin line of ancient magic trace that had guided Ethan all the way here from the Restricted Book Area flowed all the way to the ground behind the door frame and gathered into a vortex, the same as the one encountered in the mysterious hall before.

"Since they are the same thing, the way to open them should be the same."

Ethan walked through the door frame and stood on the vortex, waving his wand from bottom to top.

hum-

There was a slight sound behind him. Ethan turned around and saw a light blue curtain of light with ripples slowly emerging above the empty door frame. From the curtain of light, he could see a long corridor on the opposite side. The architectural style was similar to that of the Meditation Bowl Rotunda. As expected, it should have been built by Percival and his team.

Ethan held up his wand and slowly walked through the light curtain and came into the corridor. The entire corridor was illuminated by a soft mysterious light source. At the end of the road was a metal door with the familiar magic symbol engraved on it.

“Nox.”

Ethan turned off the fluorescent light surrounding him, raised his wand cautiously, and slowly walked towards the door.

After a short distance without encountering any enemy attacks, Ethan arrived in front of the gate and stretched out his hand to push it open. The magic symbol in the center of the gate suddenly emitted a white light, and the light gathered into a line of words in front of Ethan.

"The Pavilion of Knowledge, those who are incompetent are not allowed to enter."

"Oh no, it looks like there's a boss behind the door that needs to be fought."

Ethan looked at the game prompts that gave him an overly strong sense of déjà vu, sneered, and didn't take it seriously.

No matter what kind of enemy you encounter, as long as your health bar is lit, I can kill you by scraping you.

Don’t ask, if you ask, it’s the confidence that I gained from the many spells I learned in cram school.

I am very strong now.jpg

The light gradually dimmed, and the door creaked heavily and opened automatically to both sides.

Behind the door was a spacious square hall. On the wall facing Ethan was another similar metal door. Next to the door was a statue in armor holding a long sword, kneeling on one knee on the ground.