Hogwarts: Bourne Returns from Warhammer

Kucha…Kucha…Kucha…

The rain was getting heavier as the train continued north; the windowpanes were now a thick, sticky gray that deepened until the lights in the corridors and luggage racks came on.

The train was shaking, raindrops were hitting the windows, and the wind was howling, but Professor Lupin in the compartment was still sleeping, looking very tired.

Harry met Ron, Hermione and the others on the Hogwarts Express, but because most of the compartments were full, they could only enter this compartment.

Perhaps because someone was not on the train, nothing unexpected happened and the Hogwarts Express ran very smoothly.

Only after crossing a railway bridge and then a large forest did the train slowly slow down, and the little wizards could hear the hissing sound of the engine exhausting gas.

"We might be there," said Ron, leaning forward to look at Professor Lupin, who was leaning against the now darkened window. As he finished speaking, the car began to slow down.

"We can't be there yet," Hermione pointed out the window, where there was a vast field, "unless the station in Hogsmeade has been demolished, or else the platform here has been enchanted so that we can't see it."

But the train was really about to stop.

The sound of the steam turbine became quieter, and the sound of wind and rain outside the window became louder. Harry was closest to the door, so he stood up to check the corridor. People in the carriages along the corridor were leaning out to look around.

The train shuddered and stopped, and there were distant thumps and bangs as luggage fell from racks. Then, all the lights went out suddenly, plunging them into complete darkness.

"Ouch," Hermione whimpered, "Ron, that's my foot."

Harry wanted to laugh a little. He turned around and saw the vague black outline of Ron.

Ron had wiped a clean spot on the window and was looking out.

"There's something moving over there," said Ron. "I guess people are walking out."

Just then, the door of the carriage suddenly opened and someone fell painfully into Harry's legs.

"I'm sorry! Do you know what happened? Oops! I'm sorry-"

"It's okay, Neville." Harry said, reaching out his hand, feeling for Neville's coat in the dark and pulling him up. "Harry? Is that you? What happened?" "I don't know -"

There was a loud neigh and a cry of pain as Neville sat on Crookshanks by mistake.

"Quiet!"

Suddenly a hoarse voice was heard. It turned out to be Professor Lupin who woke up.

The man simply glanced at Crookshanks, and the large ginger cat went quiet.

There was a slight crackling sound in the carriage and a flickering light appeared.

Professor Lupin held up his wand and silently cast a lighting spell, illuminating his tired and gray face, but his eyes were alert and cautious.

"Stay where you are," he said, still in that hoarse voice. He stood up slowly, his hands full of fire stretched out in front of him. But before he reached the door of the carriage, the door slowly opened.

Standing in the doorway, illuminated by the flickering light of Lupin's hand, was a cloaked monster that reached as high as the ceiling.

Its face was completely hidden by the hood. Harry's eyes dropped downward, and what he saw made his stomach clench: a hand stretched out from the cloak. The hand shone faintly, gray, thin, and scabby, like something that had died and rotted in water. The hand was visible for a fraction of a second. As if the creature beneath the cloak sensed Harry and the others' gaze, the hand suddenly withdrew into the folds of the black cloak.

Then the thing beneath the hood, whatever it was, drew a breath, a long, slow, trembling breath, as if it were trying to draw something other than air from the surrounding area.

“Get Out!”

Professor Lupin's voice sounded again, and the tip of his wand was no longer emitting an incandescent light, but a silver light.

He stood up, holding his wand like a knife, and poked it in front of the Dementor, forcing it to retreat.

Because it felt the power of "Expedience", the Dementor felt waves of unbearable burning pain, so it kept retreating, and finally left the box and turned around and ran away.

"What is that? I feel like... I feel like all my happiness is about to disappear." Harry collapsed on the ground and asked weakly.

Ron and Neville quickly helped Harry up and put him on the chair. Hermione held her wand and looked at Professor Lupin's back with a thankful look on her face. Just now, the little witch was almost ready to deal with the Dementor by herself.

After all, this Professor Lupin was most likely their Defense Against the Dark Arts professor this year. And given the level of the Defense Against the Dark Arts professor at Hogwarts, these young wizards who had already taken the course for two years basically had no hope for him.

"This Professor Lupin is very different," the little witch thought secretly in her heart, "He is definitely not a fool. The creature that just appeared should be a Dementor, but he was able to force it to flee with an unknown spell, not to mention that the illumination spell he used was cast silently."

Professor Lupin, who had driven the Dementors away, also turned around at this time. He quickly took out a plate of leftover chocolate from his pocket and handed it to Neville, who was closest to him: "Feed Harry some chocolate first, and then each of you share a little. Sweets are very useful to you in this situation."

"Thank…thank you, professor."

Neville was so nervous that he stuttered. The sudden appearance of the Dementor had a great impact not only on Harry, but also on Neville, who also had some bad memories. He was also very panicked, but he did not collapse like Harry - this little fat lion who usually looked very timid might actually have the basic qualities of a Gryffindor.

"No need to thank me, but you still have to stay here and don't run around. I'll go take a look ahead. After all, it's not normal for 'that kind of thing' to appear on the train to Hogwarts. I suspect something bad has happened."

After saying that, Lupin patted Neville on the shoulder and walked out of the box.

Harry felt much better after he had been fed most of the remaining chocolate bar, Neville and Ron having given the last bar to Hermione, and they had only shared a few crumbs to taste the sweetness on their tongues.

"...This professor should be our Defense Against the Dark Arts professor this year. He looks nice and reliable." Ron said as he licked the chocolate crumbs off his fingers.

Rarely, the little witch Hermione did not refute Ron's statement this time, but nodded in agreement.

"What was that just now? I felt like I was about to faint." Harry climbed up from his chair and sat back down so that the other three could sit down in the box.

"They are creatures called Dementors. They are born to feed on human happiness. They also exude a magical aura that is enough to cause depression and bring back bad memories for humans.

But, these dark magic creatures should be guarded in Azkaban prison by the Ministry of Magic, right? For no reason, they shouldn't be on our Hogwarts Express, right? "

The little witch Hermione frowned.

"You may be wrong," Neville, who was usually the last person to refute others, suddenly refuted Hermione, "Because even if there is a reason, those Dementors should not be here...

My grandmother said that although Dementors are nominally employees of the Ministry of Magic, these evil creatures should not be allowed to exist in the world at all.

Just as the German Ministry of Magic exterminated the evil spirits that liked to trap and eat children, the British Ministry of Magic should have exterminated them all.

They just can’t do it.”

Compared to Hermione who had only read about Dementors in books, or Harry who saw what Dementors were for the first time today, Neville and Ron, two young wizards from pure-blood wizard families, had naturally heard some bad rumors about Dementors from their elders.

So Ron nodded and agreed, "Neville is probably right, and I believe that Headmaster Dumbledore will never allow Dementors to enter Hogwarts Castle, no matter what the reason is."

While these little wizards were discussing the topic of Dementors, Professor Lupin was running around in the various carriages of the train.

It turned out that there was more than one Dementor on the Hogwarts Express, and some senior wizards even had conflicts with them, but their spells seemed ineffective against these dark magic creatures.

Lupin solved the problems almost one carriage at a time, and drove away three or four Dementors in a row with the Patronus Charm.

Finally, he saw other people also using the Patronus Charm. There were two wizards, a man and a woman, wearing Auror badges, also driving away the Dementors.

However, the Patronus they summoned did not seem to have a strong spell - it looked like a bunch of silver smoke that was about to dissipate - and it was not even as solid as Lupin's Patronus.

But no matter what, a wizard who can use the Patronus Charm is basically certain not to be a bad person.

This is the consensus of the wizarding world. (Among the so-called "Death Eaters", only Snape can use the Patronus Charm.)

Therefore, when Lupin saw the two Aurors and the two Aurors saw Lupin, they began to cooperate tacitly without communicating with each other.

Together, they drove the Dementors in the carriage to a connection point, and then "pushed" them out through the door.

Because there were too many young wizards hanging in the train, even if they were driven out, the Dementors were unwilling to fly away. They wandered around the train, as if hesitating whether to enter the train again.

"Thank you, you can call me Tonks, and this is my partner Dawlish."

Tonks panted, reached out and shook hands with Lupin, then leaned against the wall of the Hogwarts Express.

Dawlish was just barely standing.

They were both exhausted, and their mentor, Kingsley Shacklebolt, was on his own, chasing after several Dementors that were flying towards a nearby Muggle village.

"My name is Lupin." After shaking hands with Tonks and Dawlish out of politeness, Lupin immediately got to the point and said, "You are all Aurors, right? Why are there Dementors here? Shouldn't they be in the North Sea, on the island where Azkaban prison is located?"

After hearing this question, the two young Aurors, Tonks and Dawlish, showed embarrassed expressions on their faces. Tonks's hair changed from its previous silver-white color to the color of a seven-spotted ladybug.

Finally, it was the slightly more "thick-skinned" Dawlish who answered Lupin: "You should be a professor at Hogwarts. I want to say that this is an accident. Do you believe it?"

-

"Accident, you call this an accident?" Karkaroff was furious.

"Alfonso, do you know how tight the annual budget of Durmstrang is?

We don't have a generous school director like Beauxbatons who can make gold out of mercury!

Every damaged plank on this magic ship, we have to spend money to repair it ourselves, but look at the deck of the ship "Morden" now, which planks do not need to be repaired? "

While speaking, Karkaroff was holding a William Sheckat computer clock in his arms, twisting the knob on it continuously. Finally, after waiting for a while, he heard a series of "ding-dong ding-dong" sounds.

"It will cost a total of 360 Markgrunds to repair these things, and I will have to pay those damn goblin craftsmen dozens of Silks for the transportation of the materials! Tell me, should I ask that little wizard for money?"

(McGrond is the gold Galleon used in Northern Europe and Germany, while Silk is the silver Sickle.)

Faced with Karkaroff's tough attitude, Professor Alfonso Ripa had to make concessions, after all, he was the headmaster of Durmstrang.

Alfonso Lipa held out his hands, clenched his fists slightly, and said, shaking his wrists: "You are the principal, so of course you have the final say."

Of course, he didn't intend to say it himself. Since Karkaroff said to ask Bourne for compensation, then let him go and ask for it himself.

After all, he only gets a few hundred magronds a month from Durmstrang, so why would he risk his life?

Although Karkaroff refused to believe what he said, that the little wizard turned into a three-meter-tall half-giant, and then used "extremely terrifying combat magic" on the deck to defeat a dozen Dementors and scared away an equal number or more of those dark magic creatures, Alfonso Lipa saw it with his own eyes!

Moreover, he felt that if he had not become presbyopic in advance, he seemed to have seen the little wizard biting a Dementor's claw raw.

"Of course we have to ask that little wizard to pay us back," Karkaroff reset the clock to zero and locked the reset button with a click. "I wonder if those people on the board of directors have had their brains transplanted from trolls. They insist on hosting the 'Potions Championship'. How can we run Durmstrang well with those bugs?"

It turned out that the reason why Karkaroff was so angry was that he felt that the large areas of burn marks on the "Malden" were most likely caused by Bourne's experimentation with potions while on the ship.

The reason why Alfonso Ripa and the several Durmstrang senior students who worked and studied said that they encountered Dementors was because they were shirking their responsibilities.

Family members know their own business. He knew that before leaving Durmstrang, Alfonso Ripa went to the library and borrowed a book called "The Energetic Argonian Maid", and that all the students who worked and studied, represented by Antonov, were addicted to alcohol.

"These guys must have been careless, so they allowed the little wizard to cause such damage. Now they are putting the blame on the illusory Dementors - do you really think I have never seen that kind of monster? And we encountered dozens of them. If that were the case, could the Malden still be brought back?"

Karkaroff thought viciously.

He wanted to punish Alfonso Ripa like a real headmaster (Dumbledore: Just tell me my name). However, because he had a big stain before becoming the headmaster, it was not easy to offend the professors of Durmstrang.

In addition to his dissatisfaction with Alfonso Ripa, he was also very dissatisfied with the Potions Championship hosted by Durmstrang, because the school directors only talked about it, but he, the headmaster, had to run around for it.

None of the young wizards who came to participate in the competition were worry-free. They were brewing potions every day, which wasted a lot of Durmstrang's potion reserves and destroyed a lot of equipment.

That’s all money!

You know, the pension that Karkaroff prepared for himself was also taken out bit by bit from the school board's appropriation every year.

And this year, a large portion of the school board's appropriation will be used to subsidize that damn Potions Championship - and it's all his money!