days at Hogwarts

Chapter 398 A chance encounter with Miss Beetle

There was still a week before the International Federation of Wizards was held, and in the next few days, Loren and the others wandered around this international metropolis casually.

To be honest, the impression of public transportation in New York is not good. If the dense lines and always crowded carriages in the subway stations are bearable, the damp and old platforms and the sleepy homeless people lying on the steps The strong and irritating smell of urine from Hanhe penetrated Wendel's psychological defense, and he rented a five-seater car through the hotel manager the next day.

Grandpa Bates held his breath and said in a muffled voice: "Even the sheepfold in my pasture is cleaner than here."

The high-rise buildings in Manhattan live up to the name of the steel jungle. Most of the pedestrians on the road are walking in a hurry and wearing suits and ties.

But Manhattan is probably the place where they have seen the most homeless people. The homeless people with blurred eyes are sitting in a dirty corner dragging large and small boxes with a cup in front of them, waiting for charity from passers-by on the road.

Although it is only separated from Manhattan by a river, Roosevelt Island shows a completely opposite state. It does not have the skyscrapers, feasting, dirty streets and pigeons that are too fat to fly on the Isle of Man. Instead, there are only apartment buildings in the architectural style of the last century, simple shops, and wild geese that are a little afraid of people.

Loren also saw several wizards in the crowd. They looked leisurely and seemed to be traveling.

There were two days before the International Confederation of Wizards. On this day, they saw Van Gogh's "Starry Night", Monet's "Water Lilies", and some other oil paintings they had only seen in books and on TV at the Museum of Modern Art in New York.

Wendell and Monica stood in front of the oil painting for a long time. Even Bates was admiring the oil painting, nodding and pondering from time to time. The vicissitudes of his face and the deep expression seemed to tell a story.

Hermione walked with Loren and talked to him about the birth, connotation, and role of these oil paintings in art history...

Recalling the agreement reached with Dumbledore and the news she had learned since the holidays, Rita gradually calmed down and raised her chin towards the two of them and hummed softly:

"Don't try to blackmail me with the Animagus thing again. My friend at the publishing house told me that your Professor McGonagall has registered Animagus for several students. I have also completed it at MACUSA." Animagus registration...and I have fulfilled my agreement with Dumbledore."

"Vincent Van Gogh used exaggerated techniques to vividly depict the starry sky full of movement and change..."

"Speaking of which, I think the oil paintings in Hogwarts Castle are more interesting, especially Silly Barnabas——"

"No, you don't understand..." Loren said meaningfully, "A person's identity lies in his location, and so does a work of art. Since this painting has been framed and hung on the wall of the art gallery, this means , it is a work of art just like Starry Night and Water Lilies.”

Rita looked a little nervous. She was very impressed by the two little wizards, especially the boy with black hair and eyes on the right.

A year ago, she sneaked into Hogwarts to find out the inside story of some secret room incidents. She was discovered on the spot by Loren Morgan. She was put into a glass bottle once they met, and then was sent to Professor McGonagall. Professor Pu's interrogation revealed some secrets that could ruin her reputation and ruin her family.

Hermione was silent for a moment and couldn't help but remind: "But this is just a diagram of the escape route."

In the following months, she was detained in the school as an assistant teacher in the Animagus teaching class. It was not until the holidays that she reached an agreement with Dumbledore. She would come here to find out some information for him in exchange for Hogwarts keeping secrets for her.

……

The little witch was like an emotionless memorization machine, reciting information from nowhere.

"The entire picture is swallowed up by a turbulent, turbulent blue-green torrent. The rotating, restless, and curling nebulae make the night sky extremely active. The scene that is divorced from reality reflects Van Gogh's restless emotions and crazy world of illusion..."

Loren suddenly raised his index finger. He stopped in front of a framed abstract oil painting and pretended to listen quietly: "Don't talk, just quietly appreciate the touch brought by the artwork."

Loren's voice paused, and his eyes locked on a blond reporter in the crowd who was taking pictures.

He found a booth facing the street in the coffee shop next to the art museum. Under the guidance of the waiter, Loren ordered a mocha for himself and a macchiato for Hermione. Finally, he glanced at Rita and ordered some for her. Got a glass of iced Americano.

"Isn't that what you were talking about just now..." Loren suddenly relaxed, stretched and walked forward, "I admit that those oil paintings are very beautiful and have unique beauty, but forget about those long paragraphs of interpretation. …”

Loren said gently: "We have no intention of blackmailing you, Ms. Skeeter. Meeting here is just a coincidence. We are just curious about why you appear here. You know, after all, this is a Muggle art museum."

Hermione followed his gaze and exclaimed in surprise: "Miss Rita Skeeter?"

Loren and Hermione looked at the reporter. Compared to last year when she was a teaching assistant in the teaching class, Miss Beetle seemed to be a little fatter. Her long blonde hair was made into delicate curls. She was very stiff and looked weird. , wearing narrow glasses and eye-catching bright red nails.

"Nonsense." Hermione rolled her eyes.

"Loren Morgan, Hermione Granger?"

"Shh..."

As far as he knew, Rita was a pure-blood and had expressed her dislike of Muggles in many articles in the past.

"I'm doing a feature for the New York Times..."

Rita pretended to admire her red nails casually, but her high-pitched tone showed a bit of pride.

"Sorry to interrupt, Ms. Skeeter, this should be a Muggle newspaper, right?" Loren asked curiously.

While he was talking, the waiter in the coffee shop had already brought the drinks and desserts from their shop.

Rita glanced at the iced American in front of her, then naturally picked up the coffee and took a sip. Her expression was calm, as if she had long been used to the taste: "In the wizard's words here, it's No-Maj."

Rita put down the iced Americano: "Oh, the New York Times is indeed a non-wizard newspaper. Millions of people read it every day. Their editor thinks that my perspective is very novel, and the remuneration is generous enough..."

Loren and Hermione drank coffee in silence, feeling a little complicated. An arrogant pure-blood wizard seemed to have integrated into Muggle society and seemed to enjoy it all.

Miss Skeeter, who did not hear the praise or exclamation, waited for a few seconds, then silently put away her nails, picked up the iced American and took another sip. Rita frowned slightly and cleared her throat: "Is there anything else? If nothing else, I will Leave first."

Loren and Hermione wanted to hear the information Dumbledore asked her to inquire, but they were just ordinary students and couldn't ask questions, so they could only shake their heads.

Rita laughed happily: "For the sake of Hogwarts, I'll give you a piece of advice. Leave New York as soon as possible. Don't even think about attending the International Wizarding Conference."

"What do you mean?" Loren and Hermione looked at her doubtfully.

"I don't know the details..."

Rita shrugged: "But last winter many werewolves froze to death in Brooklyn, and many homeless people froze to death in Central Park. To be honest, werewolves and homeless people froze to death every year. But the strange thing is that their bodies were all frozen to death. disappeared."

"The body...is missing..." Loren and Hermione repeated quietly.

"Yes, the bodies waiting to be cremated at the funeral home and the bodies buried in the cemetery are missing."

Rita continued, "The No-Maj government suspects that someone is selling organs, or that some institution is using homeless people for human experiments, and the corpses have been disposed of. The werewolf leader suspects that someone is selling werewolf corpses as magic materials... But with the gold medal reporter's Intuitively, the two things may be related.”

Loren had a thoughtful look on his face, werewolves and muggles that reminded him of Grandpa Bates.

"In addition, the Magical Congress of the United States of America has recorded many sightings. Some people have seen the corpse of a werewolf in the underground pipes in Brooklyn. They also purchased a batch of the venom of the Winged Demon..."

Rita stared at the two of them and said seriously: "New York is going to be uneasy!"

Both Loren and Hermione were shocked by the news. The venom of the witches has the effect of clearing short-term memory. MACUSA purchased the venom of the witches, which means that officials believe that a large-scale magic exposure incident may occur in New York.

Today is not the era in the history books where cars and horses were slow and letters were far away. Electromagnetic waves have closely connected the whole world. There are countless cameras and tape recorders in the city, as well as dozens of news media that can broadcast live around the world. Such a large-scale magic exposure incident in an international metropolis with nearly 10 million people can almost be regarded as the magic world being exposed to ordinary people.

If magical remedies are adopted, Aurors in the Ministry of Magic all over the world will have to switch to memory cancellers, and the Oblivion Curse will become a must-learn spell for wizards.

Rita ignored what the two little wizards were thinking, picked up the Louis Vuitton limited-edition handbag and stood up: "I'm leaving after taking today's information. I suggest again, either leave this city as soon as possible, or go find Dumbledore." The principal seeks asylum.”

"Well, see you at Hogwarts next year!"

After saying that, Rita Shiran walked to the front desk of the coffee shop and swiped her card to pay, neatly and skillfully.

He looked like a Muggle expert.

……

"Loren, is there going to be a disaster in New York?"

Hermione asked worriedly.

Loren watched the reporter disappear into the crowded streets and shook his head: "Almost all the Ministry of Magic around the world will attend the joint conference. There will be a large number of Aurors accompanying them, and Dumbledore will be in charge. I don't think there will be any trouble. An irreversible mess..."

Hermione breathed a sigh of relief, but her heart started to pound again because of his next words.

"But I'm worried about potential confrontations affecting ordinary people."

"..."

July 1994, outside the Museum of Modern Art in New York.

Cars and horses are like dragons, and people are coming and going.

……

Returning to the hotel that night, Hermione couldn't wait to enter the Book of Fantasy. After consulting with Flamel, she began to search for major magical events that had occurred in New York in the past century in the bookshelves classified by history.

In the bright library, the girl reads quietly on the desk.

Separated by a bookshelf, Loren simulated two corpses in mid-air.

The appearance of the two corpses is that of middle-aged men. The corpse floating on the upper floor simulates an ordinary person who has frozen to death. The facial expression is half-smiling, the skin on the whole body is pale or pink, and the exposed limbs are like chicken skin, and the parts of the limbs that are not covered by clothes are The swelling is bluish-purple and has a clear boundary with the area covered by clothes.

The lower level is the corpse of a werewolf after death. The alien magic power in the body begins to dissipate due to the loss of life and soul. The werewolf characteristics will fade within a few minutes. The duration of the transformation will be extended on a full moon night, but it will eventually return. Looks like a normal person.

The dry and standing hairs are constantly growing and retracting under the skin, the sharp teeth are growing and retracting into the gums, and the werewolf corpse is constantly repeating the process of returning to its original shape after death.

According to Rita, there have been many sightings of werewolf corpses recently, and it is obvious that someone has preserved the characteristics of werewolf corpses.

"By what means..."

Loren's eyes wandered to the werewolf's corpse, and he waved his hands to turn the corpse from time to time, with a glimmer of thought flashing in his eyes.

Combining the knowledge of anatomy and alchemy that I have learned, if the alien magic power can form a channel for circulation in the corpse, just like the magic circle engraved with magic text, it can delay the process of magic dissipation.

Loren waved his wand, and a dim light circulated under the skin of the werewolf corpse, extending along the aorta of the limbs, eventually forming a magic text array connected from end to end.

With a gentle tap on the heart, weak magic power was pumped into the magic array, and the body stabilized in the werewolf form.

It's just that Loren still sensed the slow passage of magic power. Judging from the speed of passage, the corpse's werewolf form could only last for half a month. However, more than half a year has passed since last winter. Why can those werewolf corpses in the sewer pipes maintain their form? So long?

……

On the other side, Hermione easily found the records for December 1926.

Fantastic animal expert Newt Scamander traveled around the world under the commission of Obscurus Books to write the first edition of "Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them". He arrived in New York in 1926. Due to a series of coincidences, he lost his suitcase and lost several magical animals. Lost, so he embarked on a journey to find magical animals with the female Auror of the United States Ministry of Magic.

It happened that the first generation of Dark Lord Gellert Grindelwald was dealing with the United States Ministry of Magic and the Purifiers, using them to find the Obscurus with terrifying power. With the help of Gertler Grindelwald, half of New York was destroyed by the violent magic of Obscurus.

In the end, the United States Ministry of Magic united to defeat Grindelwald, but this also exposed the wizarding world to the residents of New York. In the end, Newt Scamander mixed the venom of the Winged Demon into the heavy rain, eliminating the exposure crisis.

Nico Flamel was a witness to history and a good friend of Newt Scamander. His notes contained more detailed descriptions of events, and Hermione keenly noticed an unfamiliar term among them.

"The Purifier?" Hermione whispered, "What is that?"

(End of this chapter)