Ravenclaw's Sapphire

The news of Dumbledore's resignation naturally couldn't be hidden from the people in Hogwarts. When Professor McGonagall walked into the auditorium with a sullen face early the next morning and announced the news in front of all the students, the entire castle was almost alone. Fear and confusion remained.Fortunately, some arrangements were made before Dumbledore left. Professor McGonagall was in charge of stabilizing the order. Anyone who dared to violate the rules would be reprimanded angrily as long as this lady found out. After the boy made a mistake or two, under the double warning of the reduced score hourglass and hard confinement labor, no one dared to provoke Professor McGonagall's tight nerves.

Snape was the head of the patrol, trying to stick his big nose into every hole every day to probe for secrets that should or shouldn't be there.Letting Snape have powers made many people unhappy, especially the Gryffindor students, because they didn't know when the big bat would suddenly come out of the corner and give them a warning casually, regardless of their Whether he really made a mistake, he would definitely deduct Gryffindor points.

"Look, there's a cat, a half-blood, a pure-blood, and a Muggle being attacked right now! The monsters in the Chamber of Secrets are out of control and everyone has to fear for their lives now. Now that we all know Sarah Chuck Slytherin was responsible for creating the Chamber of Secrets, and Slytherin should be responsible for it. I would rather they stand up and apologize to everyone, and then join the search for the culprit, than let their selfish court Every day, the principal thinks about how to deduct points from other houses, and our house finally got some points, and now it is almost gone!" Lee Jordan from Gryffindor House said, and got the approval of many people, and then they Snape, who was on patrol, was caught by patrol for holding a private meeting and deducted twenty points ("Another excuse!" George Weasley said angrily).

Students were escorted to class by their teachers, and some late lessons, or those deemed unnecessary by the teachers - such as Lockhart's Defense Against the Dark Arts - were canceled, and the amount of homework was reduced accordingly. The sharp reduction is the only thing that comforts the students.

Harry and Ron gathered among a group of Gryffindors. Their classes for today were all over, and the team hurried to the lounge, escorted by Flitwick.No one is in the mood to make a laugh, they are depressed, and they just whisper a word or two to the friends around them occasionally.

When they turned a corner, Harry felt his sleeve being grabbed, but he should have been on the far left of the line!He broke out in a cold sweat and almost pulled out his wand—fortunately, he subconsciously turned his head to take a look.

Zoe stood quietly in the shadows, alone, with no one around her, which was out of order, but Harry immediately realized that she must have sneaked out of the line.Zooey didn't speak to him, but just stuffed a note into his hand, glanced at him, and quickly disappeared to the other side of the corridor.

No one noticed the previous scene, and Harry didn't say anything.He turned back to talking to Ron, chatting about ordinary topics, since Hermione's attack, they didn't even find Quidditch very interesting between them.They were all worried about their friends in their hearts, and now it seemed that Zooey was going to do something.Harry clenched his fists, the corners of the note pierced his palm with a dull pain, and his consciousness was more lucid than ever.

******

Harry called Ron to a corner of the lounge. He asked Ron to bring his magic chess set. The two of them sat at the table and pretended to be playing chess. He whispered to Ron that Zoe gave him something before At the same time, he unfolded the note carefully.

"At eight o'clock in the evening, in front of the stone monster in the corridor on the third floor, the password is iced lemon juice." As soon as they finished reading the words written on the note, a small cluster of flames suddenly swallowed the entire note until it was burned to ashes.The boys had to scramble to cover the fire, using their robes to shield them from prying eyes.

"She's such a lunatic. I think she must have set up a mechanism on the note. As long as the note on it is read, the note will spontaneously ignite. Then we can't hand the note to the professor." Ron complained, "She actually thought we would inform the professors? We are not Malfoy! She doesn't believe us at all, we want to cooperate with such people!"

"I understand that she must also be careful. If the note accidentally falls into the hands of people with malicious intentions, it will be dangerous." Harry's chariot rushed forward, knocking out the guards on Ron's board. The garrison flew, and the Praetorian groaned and fell on the board, and Ron had to take it out carefully.

"Harry, you should think that if we held the note in our hands instead of spreading it on the table, the note would burn your hand. This is a despicable method!" Ron was still very dissatisfied , "Are you sure we have an appointment tonight?"

"Of course. Why not?"

"Think about Malfoy, he didn't show up for the appointment last year, it was still a sacred duel invitation. We waited there for so long, and finally the menacing Filch came. What if this time is also a trap? Malfoy My father just canceled Dumbledore's position! Malfoy and Siegel are family friends, and they are both weird, Malfoy is arrogant, and Siegel is withdrawn!"

Harry thought about it carefully, and he really couldn't ignore the possibility that this was a trap, "We still have to go to the appointment, we don't know anything now, we need information, and Siegel will also need our assistance. She is unlikely to Playing with us on this matter, Professor Sprout's mandrake is about to be cultivated, and Hermione and others will wake up soon. As long as she doesn't want to break up with Hermione, she won't do so. "

"Well, you're right." Ron agreed, absent-mindedly eating Harry's bishop with his knight, and staring blankly at the way the knight swaggered across the board after defeating the bishop.

"We need to bring your invisibility cloak. It's forbidden to go out after six o'clock. The professors have been stepping up patrols. I don't want to bump into anyone on the way, let alone Snape always wants to detain Gryffindor More points to pull us down from No.1." Ron suddenly remembered something, "Do you know what magical powers that stone monster on the third floor has? It still needs a password."

"I don't know, but I passed by, and the stone monster was standing in front of a wall, but I didn't dare to look carefully. Lockhart's office is also on that floor, so I don't want to bump into him." Harry was depressed. say.

"Yeah, he's annoying, he's nothing but a face, I don't know why Hogwarts chose him to be our teacher." Ron imitated Lockhart, "'Potter, let's Let's take a picture together!', God, it's disgusting."

"I think most people have seen him for what he really is." Harry looked around nervously, and Lockhart's request for a photo with him reminded him of a troubled follower, "Don't play this here, Ron! "

"Harry!" Hearing this sharp male voice, Harry groaned in pain, and Colin Creevey rushed out from nowhere, holding his camera tightly in his hand, with excitement on his face look.

"Harry, here comes your little fan," teased Ron ("Hey, come on!").Colin is a freshman in Gryffindor, a wizard from a Muggle family. He has been following Harry since he entered school, as if Harry is a superstar.His attitude was warm and sincere, but besides being happy, Harry was more helpless and bored.

"We're going to hold him back, Ron, don't watch my jokes," Harry warned him. "If Colin catches us, we won't be able to find Siegel."

******

Hogwarts at night is a bit gloomy, the torches are burning, finally giving a light to the road ahead, because of the ban on going out, the usually bustling castle is not lively, at most, the professors can be heard from a distance The clicking sound of shoes on the ground, or a long shadow cast from the other side of the corridor.

It took a lot of effort for the two of them to get rid of Colin, the little fan was like a sticky brown sugar, and Harry felt that the longing light in Colin's eyes when he looked at him was about to drown him.To be honest, he is really troubled, no matter what reputation he has in the wizarding world, it obviously doesn't belong to him, he doesn't even know why he was able to destroy Voldemort, but people don't care about it at all, they just keep expecting on top of him.

"Hey, move less, Harry, you're about to squeeze me out." Harry came back to his senses, and quickly stopped his movements.He and Ron huddled under the invisibility cloak, but fortunately they were both of the thin type. You must know that they had hidden together with Hermione before.

They dodge the patrols along the way, careful not to reveal themselves, which is difficult, because they always feel that those piercing eyes will sweep over their hiding places from time to time, even if it may be only an illusion.They'd set off half an hour earlier, pretending they were too tired to go back to bed, but now Harry thought they might be late, because they spent so much time quietly waiting for professors to pass by.

They dodged into the third floor, thank goodness the patrol hadn't passed by yet, but the boys were careful not to take off their invisibility cloaks, and they found the stone monster that the note said looked like a gargoyle with its eyes closed snore.

"Hmm... iced lemonade?" Harry said softly.

The gargoyle didn't blink, snorted and jumped aside, revealing a hole.After the boys had passed through the hole, the gargoyle jumped back into place.The boys had no time to be amazed by what they saw. The stone slabs on the wall turned into a spiral staircase standing in front of them, as if inviting them to move on.

They felt that they had climbed for a long time, and finally came to the end. When they pushed open the closed door in front of them, they heard a cold greeting.

"You are late."