【Zhou Jia】self-punisher.

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"Professor, don't we have this course today? The senior class schedule does..."

"Postponed." Rama held his glasses with his fingertips, pursed his lips and looked at the disappointed students, "This is a suggestion from the Ministry of Magic. We should try to reduce the proportion of this class in teaching."

He watched the children who came with them talk and walk forward, and sighed wearily.The successive abnormalities since last year have exhausted all the energy of the current Minister of Magic, making him irritable and irritable, like a frightened bird with half bald.It all started with the sudden appearance of a giant monster... In his hard-working mind, he vaguely remembered the situation at that time, and the boy who recounted the whole process with a calmness beyond his years.

"This child has perfectly inherited your mantle." He looked up at the upper half of the portrait that was not exposed to the sun all year round, and murmured to himself.Transfiguration class... It reminded him of the man who had been in the limelight in this class.The ability to easily convert everything is as dazzling as if it is directly replacing the original elements of matter. "Hey, Axe, is this the stupid pet you dropped?" The vicious man who had been taunting him for a long time would turn the quill he dropped into a toad and jump on him, making Slater Lin was deducted a lot of points.

When I saw Arjuna turn the spider into a metal bookmark for the first time, one can imagine how complicated the inner emotions of Chisha Rama were.He severely stopped Arjuna's behavior and asked him where he learned the skills. "It's just a little preview, Professor." The boy's dark pupils overlapped with the man in his memory, making his heart throb like a spasm.He even forgot to deduct the points, just taught a few words indiscriminately and hurried away.So he couldn't help but be relieved when the Ministry of Magic suggested postponing the teaching grade for the subject.

"So you're here." Merlin poked his head out from behind the door, and the robe he was wearing at first looked even more unpleasant, and there was even an unknown pink rose pinned behind his ear. "They are all looking for you. Aren't you going to dance?"

It was only then that Shirama remembered why he had been so noisy all morning.It was rare for this otherwise lifeless school to usher in a regular celebration, perhaps the only one this season.But Merlin was obviously lying, no one in this school would expect him to appear on the dance floor.But he refused to comment on this, and just said a few perfunctory words casually, "I will come as soon as I deal with the matter at hand."

He persisted until half an hour later, and pushed open the door of the auditorium as the banquet was about to end.The warm spring breeze makes people feel restless, and the faint sound of the accordion is more exciting than before.Decorated like Christmas, he almost thought he had gone through the wrong door.

"Hey, professor, would you like some grape juice?" The little herbal medicine teacher handed over the half-spilled wine, his face was the same color as the drink.As far as the eye can see, there are students chatting in twos and threes. There are not many couples who are willing to dance openly on this occasion. When the figure came out, Rama the Axe decided to swallow back what he had just said.

"It's really right." Merlin sighed sincerely, not caring at all about the colorful expression of Shashi Rama.Although it seemed like a disaster, Karna, who was obviously not good at dancing, kept stepping on Arjuna's shoes, but the latter was always able to cover up successive mistakes without any trace.Rather than dancing, it looked more like Arjuna was strolling with his arm around his waist, and the two of them were talking in a low voice from time to time.

"Oh, what a surprise." Rama Axe looked away unnaturally, he always felt tricky and awkward about such trivial matters.He pretended to be looking at a ribbon of stars hanging from the ceiling, trying to focus on a moth crawling on the ribbon.The 10 minutes until the end of the ball had never been so long, and in the last few minutes he even counted the beat, silently praying that the headmaster would get up in time to announce the end of the banquet.

Five, four, three...

At the same time as the bell was ringing slowly, the flashing ribbon he had been staring at suddenly went dark for a moment, and then the entire venue was plunged into darkness like thick ink.The reverberating sound of the pendulum shook the huge auditorium, and the solemn and heavy voice overwhelmed the panicked discussions of the students who were at a loss.

At the first moment when the accident happened, Chisha Rama didn't realize that it was an accident.He hadn't been to a party like this for a long time, and wasn't sure if it was the latest trend among young people.But the fire that came immediately made him wake up.Before the auditorium was illuminated, he heard a sharp sound. "Quickly evacuate the students!"

Judging who said this sentence is not the point. The panic that broke out in the anxiety spread like a plague, and the girls screamed one after another.As soon as he raised his wand and ignited a cluster of flames, he felt an indescribable cold crawling from his fingertips to every inch of his skin.The temperature in the room instantly dropped to sub-zero temperatures, and the sudden cold wind even carried what looked like ice shards.

"Children, it's time to go back and rest." He heard Merlin's amplified voice, and his tone was as relaxed and cheerful as coaxing children to sleep.The gathered students followed Merlin out of the auditorium like frightened fledglings. As the number of students decreased, the cold and stern atmosphere in the room became more and more obvious.He watched helplessly as ice slag climbed up from the outermost layer of white wrought iron, freezing the dome into a thick layer of ice shell.The floor-to-ceiling windows seemed to be broken by something, creating a gap big enough for a truck to pass through. The room, which was still bright and colorful just now, was in a mess as if blown by a tornado, and the tables and chairs were turned into piles of wooden debris. .

"hiss……"

The cold wind circling around his ears whistled lowly, like a giant snake circling around his body.Before he could say the spell, a gust of wind came through the air, cutting off the condensed black mist in an instant.The mist that was gurgling forward like a liquid made a strange piercing laugh, and rushed out of the hole in the wall to the sky.

This is impossible - Hogwarts's numerous defenses are impossible to break through without anyone noticing the clues, and they don't even have the slightest intention of hiding their whereabouts, showing off in front of all the veteran magicians Blatantly provocative.

He walked forward slowly, with his back turned to the headmaster, who seemed to be getting older.He carefully considered his speech, and could hear his own voice echoing in the still cold room, and the soles of his shoes made a slight rustling sound when they stepped on the remains of tables and chairs that had turned into dead wood. "Maybe it was just an accident...Fortunately, no students were hurt..."

"No... the disaster has come." He saw the headmaster's back bowed a little more, and with the help of the rekindled lamp, he could see the dark blood stain standing on the gray beard.This made Axe Ramo speechless for a moment—under the arms that hung limply, the body of the thin elf, who had lost his life, was exposed.

This was the first murder ever committed at Hogwarts.

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"Professor, is someone sneaking in?"

Karna walked at the end of the crowd, and the surrounding students hurried forward like a shapeless tide.Merlin glanced at him, then cast a mysterious glance at Arjuna behind him, and patted him on the shoulder noncommittally.

"This is not something you students should worry about." Merlin rarely replied seriously in the tone of an elder, "Just go back and rest obediently, and leave the rest to the adults."

Seeing Merlin's figure and the team getting further and further away, Karna stopped in his tracks.He looked sideways at Arjuna who had been silent all the time, and the calm gaze that knew everything made Arjuna instinctively turn his face away.

"You are hurt."

Karna grabbed his wrist, and peeled off his right hand hidden inside the torn fabric that hung down in layers.The bloody skin seemed to be cut across by countless sharp blades in an instant, engraving countless scars of different shades.But in the more than ten minutes from the moment he was injured to now, he didn't show any signs at all, and he didn't even groan once.The boy who was used to forbearance let him hold it, and he clearly felt the strange temperature coming from his fingertips.

"It's nothing." Arjuna withdrew his hand, "It's just a skin injury."

He sensed the opponent's real target at the moment when the abnormal fluctuation appeared, and set up a protective spell in the shortest possible time to resist the sharpest blow.The powerful force caused his tiger's jaw to be torn immediately, and the entire right hand holding the wand was not spared - but there was no need to tell Karna about this.He changed the subject lightly, "Do you smell blood?"

"Maybe." Karna checked his injury, "You can't go back to the dormitory like this, you need to find a place to bandage...someone is coming."

A flashlight swept over where they were just now, and Karna gently opened the crack of the door and glanced outside, only after confirming that the night watchman had left did he heave a sigh of relief.When he turned around, Arjuna was no longer there. He looked around and found that he was standing in the deepest part of this strange room, as if he was looking at something.

Karna extinguished the light on the tip of his wand, and walked in his direction by the moonlight outside the window.The farther you go, the brighter the light becomes - when you get closer, you realize that what you are looking at is a mirror.The full-length mirror engraved with strange runes from top to bottom is no different from ordinary mirrors, but it exudes a particularly soft light. The light seems to come from itself, not the refracted moonlight.

The only thing that can be read is a line of small characters etched on the top of it.

Erisedstraehruoytubecafruoytonwohsi.

-TBC-