Hogwarts 1991

Chapter 449 Horace Slughorn ([-])

"Good evening! Horace!" Dumbledore greeted lightly.

"Well, hello!" Horace Slughorn was looking up and down at the McGuffin with his big round eyes.

He first looked at McGuffin's forehead, as if expecting to see something.

McGuffin understood at once what the old man's action meant.

Although Dumbledore had already told him his identity in advance, the fat old man probably wanted to see if he was Harry.

Obviously he also knew Dumbledore's tricks.

After Horace finished scanning the McGuffin, he focused his gaze on Snape, and responded to Dumbledore in a low voice, "Albus, hello!"

It sounded like he hated seeing his old colleague.

His eyes were still on Snape.

"Professor Horace! Hello!"

Although Snape was very rude to the professor, when he actually faced him, he maintained a rare courtesy.

"Ah, Severus... long time no see!"

Horace deliberately didn't look at Dumbledore, and focused his attention on Snape. Like a chubby groundhog, he swayed over and patted Snape's shoulder with his toes, wanting to show the intimacy between himself and Snape.

"Well done, I heard that you saved Harry Potter and other young wizards in that terrible attack not long ago, and you were awarded the Order of Merlin for that reason. Well done! I am proud to have a student like you!"

He grinned triumphantly.

Snape had an ugly grin on his face.

"Come on, come in...Dumbledore, you're welcome! Midnight came suddenly... If you hadn't said hello in advance, I might have notified the Auror directly, and asked my students to come over to see who would 'disturb' the peaceful life of this retired old man...The unlucky things that have happened in the wizarding world in the past two years have made me vigilant!" Horace said.

——Dumbledore's opinion of Horace is really accurate.

"Who is it? Kingsley?" Dumbledore asked curiously.

Horace smugly showed off, "More than one, you know, Albus... More than one... My students respect me as a former teacher!"

"It's like this house! This is what a student who went to the United States for development two years ago asked me to live temporarily. He told me... I can live here as long as I want... Of course, it's good here, but there are too many Muggles around, and the house is a bit too big, which attracts Muggles' attention too much... This is especially bad."

Horace was rambling, and while showing off his connections, he led a few people inside.

The front hall of the house is spacious and tall, and the decoration is also exaggerated.

At first glance, McGuffin almost thought he had entered the auditorium of a big hotel or the foyer of a theater.

...the magnificent gate, the Romanesque specialization style, the Japanese waterwheel in the courtyard...

Although it looks very 'gorgeous'... But if you look closely, you can feel a very inconsistent and unsuitable feeling,
From the inside to the outside exudes a strong taste of 'upstart'.

Although the owner of the house has done a lot of hard work among wizards, he is trying his best to pretend it is a normal residence for Muggles.

Can--

McGuffin was a little dumbfounded as soon as he entered the door.

In front of them is a fountain pool.

The same splendor, the same ancient Roman style, but also very huge...

Seeing them coming in, the mermaid sculpture in the fountain came alive, she turned around, and shyly covered her chest with her arms, and then the two dolphins beside her swam, swung their tails and spit out two streams of water, fell into the pool, and splashed.

This--

Is this what rich wizards enjoy?
I don't understand, who would build a pool fountain in their own home, it's purely out of their minds!
And what is the mermaid on the top of the pool, is it 'Xuanwu' or 'Baxia' (probably a giant turtle-like creature, it is difficult for McGuffin to see what it is)...

This combination of 'something'...

A mythical oriental beast with a mermaid on its back.

This is the first time seeing McGuffin!

What an eye opener!

The decoration of the surrounding walls is also in the same style,...all kinds of gorgeous reliefs, golden wallpaper...It is so bright under the light that it is so dazzling that people can't open their eyes.

The left and right sides of the front hall lead to other rooms, as if one is the kitchen and the other is the living room.

After the fountain, right in front of them, there is an extremely wide staircase, covered with a red carpet, that forks to the second floor.

On the platform in the middle of the stairs, a huge portrait hangs on the wall above.

Almost as old as Hagrid.

Horace was leading them there.

The wizard in the portrait is a middle-aged man wearing a golden wizard robe, holding a sword and confronting a dragon trying to breathe fire in the distance...

But the most conspicuous thing is not this... but the wizard's beautiful hair... The long golden hair is fluttering in the wind in the painting, very smooth, just like the lighted commercials on TV, it looks very unnatural.

And the dressing style is in line with the decoration style, McGuffin finally knows why this house is like this.

Snapped!
Horace turned around from the front, snapped his fingers, and the golden door behind him closed automatically.

He happened to see the MacGuffin stop and study the portrait carefully.

Horace said, "This is the owner of this house... My student, this guy is a strange fellow, always willing to observe Muggles, live among Muggles... He even made a small fortune from Muggles..."

It's a small fortune, but seeing Horace's Versailles tone and the decoration style of this house, it's not hard to imagine that the amount of this small fortune should be huge.

"Of course, this kind of interest in Muggles and that small fortune got him into a lot of trouble with the Ministry of Magic's legal issues... It was said that he used magic to take improper means in Muggle society...to grab wealth...After that, I managed to clear some old guys from the Ministry of Magic's Law Department...and saved him from prison!"

Seeing the startled look in McGuffin's eyes, Horace seemed to have misunderstood.

He pointed to the portrait and said, "Don't worry, it's fine. This house will only show its magical side when facing wizards... For example, this portrait will become like this when Muggles come over..."

Horace took out his wand and waved it, and the middle-aged wizard with flowing hair immediately turned into a dignified and elegant portrait of a famous Muggle.

——[Mondalisa's smile]

——Still a full-body portrait!

Gan!
McGuffin shuddered.

This change!
In this way, Horace led several people into the corridor on the second floor, turned right and entered a study room with a piano.

There are all kinds of books here, most of which are actually written by Muggles, and many of the titles on the spines are in Chinese and Japanese.

It seems that for some reason the owner of this house is particularly fond of the orient, and always collects some nondescript things with oriental elements.

And the owner of this house seems to be very deceitful...

Because on the bookshelf, McGuffin not only saw the (Chinese version) Xinhua Dictionary, Journey to the West and other four major classics... There is even a booklet of "Jin Ping Mei" published by 'BJ Yanshan Publishing House' and "Sow Production and Nursing" published by 'Jilin Photography Publishing House'... just placed in the most conspicuous place like that.

McGuffin looked at these books with the corners of his eyes twitching.

"Okay, sit down! You should drink some tea... It must have been hard work to come all the way here in the weather just now!"

Horace invited the men to sit down. (Dumbledore and he wave their wands, bringing chairs out of nowhere)

After that, he struggled to move his chubby body, and walked towards the corner of the room next to the bookshelf, where there was a fireplace made of pebbles.

That fireplace doesn't fit in with the style of the place...it looks like it was transplanted here out of thin air.

Horace Slughorn bent over the fireplace with great difficulty, fussing about something, but when he retreated to the puffy armchair it was already ablaze.

And a copper pot and some exquisite porcelain tea sets... floated from everywhere later.

At some point, McGuffin brought a cup of steaming amber tea in his hand.

The study room is also filled with the fragrance of tea leaves and the smoky smell of fruity wood from the wood burning in the fire.

Horace sat down on the armchair, and the armchair collapsed under his heavy body, making a creaking sound.

He took a sip of the tea, made a cheerful sound, patted his bulging belly, and asked Dumbledore, "Albus, what's your business, come to me at this time! It can't be that you are here to catch up with me, right? He also brought the little wizard and Severus with him!"

"Well, we do have something to do, but it's not in a hurry... The important thing is that we haven't seen each other for a long time, how is it, Horace, how are you these days?" Dumbledore asked.

"It's not very good... I can't breathe, asthma, rheumatism, and my legs and feet often walk very hard... Alas! It's expected..."

While Horace and Dumbledore were talking about old times, McGuffin began to look at the furnishings of the room.

It can be seen that there are many things in this room that are incompatible with this place...

Newspapers, magic books, automatic quills, solar system models for stargazers, constellation maps...fireplaces, pianos, various photo frames, photos...and that grandfather clock...

And then, exactly one o'clock in the middle of the night, the old grandfather clock began to strike the time.

The basilisk model of Xiaoqiao came to life from the pendulum, crawled slowly, and then crawled out from a hole at the top of the dial. It stretched out its body like a stick, straight in the air, and its two dim yellow eyeballs shone slightly... It opened its mouth and showed its fangs, and made two piercing cock crows...

Forehead!Very bad taste.

McGuffin looked away unnaturally, which reminded him of some unpleasant things.

There are some shining silver photo frames placed in various places on the bookshelf. In the photos, there are many students wearing wizard robes, they are jumping and making various happy expressions and movements... Of course, more group photos are various unsmiling senior officials of the Ministry of Magic standing with the fat old man.

Next to the bookshelf, there is a large writing desk near the window, and a stack of newspapers is placed in the corner...

There are all kinds of newspapers from all over the world... "North American Wizard Weekly", "Gringotts Financial Daily", "Daily Prophet"...

A lot of it was about the night of the Hogwarts attack, and Fudge's recent reforms to werewolf rights these days, as well as some reinterpretation of the legal provisions on Muggle protection...

It also circled the position changes of some officials of the Ministry of Magic and the International Union of Magic in red pen-it seemed that Horace was extremely worried about this.

"Come on, let's get to know each other again! I think you should know who this is." McGuffin's sneaky look around was interrupted by Dumbledore.

"He's MacGuffin Albert."

"McGuffin, this is my old friend and colleague, Horace Slughorn...an accomplished potionist, magic educator...and trained many great potionists."

Dumbledore raised his hand and introduced.

"You're welcome, you're too polite, Dumbledore!" Horace smiled, trying to divert his curious gaze away from McGuffin.

McGuffin knew that this bald, fat wizard must have learned a lot of exaggerated rumors about him from the pile of third-rate newspapers, so he had this expression.

"Okay, let's talk business!"

Dumbledore looked straight, and said, "I want to officially hire you as the professor of potions at Hogwarts!"

"Albus...everyone knows that the Dark Lord put a curse on that class, I'm not going to kill myself as a dark magician..."

Horace stroked his walrus-like beard and looked at Dumbledore with the expression that you finally showed your fox tail, and then he naturally refused, but he realized that he had made a mistake in the middle of speaking.

"Potions? That's not Severus, you!"

He looked at Snape immediately after reacting.

Snape nodded, "Well, I've always wanted to be a Defense Against the Dark Arts professor...Professor Dumbledore finally agreed this year."

--Are you crazy?
——How could anyone want this unknown position.

The expression on Horace's face no doubt suggested this.

He opened his mouth and froze for a moment.

"This……"

Dumbledore continued, "I know you have the right to live your own quiet life, and I know you are happy to enjoy this material life!"

The words got to Horace's heart, he lost his hostility a little, nodded slightly, then immediately raised his face and looked at Dumbledore warily.

"But……"

Dumbledore stood up, and he walked to the desk at once, pointing to the newspapers on it, the oriental elements in the courtyard, and the Chinese books on the bookshelves.

"But... you also noticed something was wrong, right? Horace? Otherwise, you wouldn't have asked J.L to get such a Muggle house with an oriental atmosphere... You even got so many Muggle books from East Asia... You have always been very keen on the dark direction of the magic world, and you have a kind of ingenuity that is different from ordinary people in this kind of thing."

Horace immediately widened his bulging eyes. He tried to stand up from the chair as well, but he was too fat and his legs were too short. He couldn't reach the ground when he was sitting, but now he suddenly wanted to get up... It took a lot of effort, and he pulled his big butt out of the armchair after two attempts.

Then stand in front of Dumbledore, face to face with him... stare at each other.

"What the hell do you know? Albus!"

Horace asked word for word.

(End of this chapter)