days at Hogwarts

Chapter 544: Smart Giant Gale

"Let me tell you..."

As if he had made up his mind, Gale supported himself with his hands and dragged his broken leg forward a few steps. The expression on his face was very strange. He tried hard to appear relaxed, but perhaps because he had spent too much energy grinning just now, the muscles and skin on his face were too heavy and he couldn't do it.

Gale forced a smile, and his deep voice echoed in the cave: "This story starts from the year I came out of my mother's belly..."

"For a giantess, the most important thing in life is to give birth to a tall, strong-boned child. This means that he will grow up to be an excellent warrior, capable of hunting, digging caves, and defending against foreign enemies. If a giant is skinny and short, it is a waste of food and breast milk. They are weak and incompetent, unable to defeat the beasts in the mountains, unable to obtain enough food to survive, and can only rely on charity from others...

So the first thing a pregnant giantess does after giving birth is to check his body. If he is not strong enough, it is best to throw him to death immediately. A newborn baby is more delicious than a three-month-old lamb..."

He muttered to himself, and his tongue unconsciously licked the remaining bone spirit between his teeth. The bitter taste spread on the tip of his tongue, and the aftertaste was long.

On the other side of the cave, Loren and Hermione felt a chill in their hearts and looked up at the giant with a broken leg sitting cross-legged on the ground. They then noticed that Gale's body shape was about the same as his sister Mir. Compared with other male giants in the tribe, Gale looked particularly short and thin.

"You may wonder why I didn't die from the fall with my body size?" Gail lowered his head and looked at his arm, and out of the corner of his eye he caught a glimpse of the broken leg lying on the ground, dragging itself weakly.

His slender arms had no excess muscles, his sickly pale skin was loose and inelastic, and his blue blood vessels lurked beneath the skin, which was completely different from the bulging blood vessels of other giants. Sometimes he even felt that if he fought with Mil, he would be the one getting beaten.

Fortunately, he has been well taken care of over the years.

"In fact, it's not just me who is skinny, but also Mir who is a woman. Our father once wanted to kill us, but we caught up with the good time, and because we have a good mother...

Before the giant tribe was driven to the mountains, most of the giants were slaves of the Dark Lord. The lives of slaves belonged to their masters, and even the slaves' parents could not deal with them without permission. I survived by relying on the protection of the Dark Lord. At that time, our food was provided by the Dark Lord, and I was also able to get enough bran to survive..."

Although most of the food was always snatched away by his lazy, greedy and stupid father, the remaining food was just enough to barely sustain his survival.

The thing that impressed him most about his childhood was hunger, which tortured him all the time. The second thing was pain. Not having enough food meant not having enough physical strength, which in a giant tribe also meant that he was more likely to be bullied by others.

Gale lowered his right hand and pressed his palm on the broken leg. He applied a little force, and waves of dull pain traveled from the broken bone along the nerves into his head, making some long-lost memories clearer:

“The peaceful and happy life didn’t last long. Giant slaves were not suitable for doing housework or taking care of wizards. They played a role in other areas, such as carrying heavy objects and serving as cannon fodder. Whenever there was a conflict or a battle, my parents had to rush to the front of the battlefield with other giants, using their thick skin to resist the flying flames, shapeless blades, or the green light that would kill them at the first touch.

As for those of us who are not yet adults, or not big enough to be qualified as human shields, we stand on the high ground far behind and watch..."

"Cruel Death Eaters..." Hermione said softly, feeling somewhat moved.

Loren observed the giant Gale without blinking. He originally thought that the reason why the three giant siblings were different might be due to family reasons, perhaps because their parents were wise and gave them a good education, but now it seems that it was more because they were influenced by the thin giant Gale.

He really doesn't look like a giant. His language is fluent, his logic is clear, and his statements are distinct.

he is very smart.

"In short, after observing their suicide charges again and again, I gradually discovered one thing, that is - as long as you run slower, you can survive the war. Later, I told my parents about this discovery..." Gale spoke in a low voice, and others had to concentrate and listen carefully to hear what he said clearly, "They couldn't wait to try my discovery, and then... the father who hated me died."

"died?"

Gale nodded gently. "Later, I learned that the scale on the battlefield needs to be carefully controlled. People in front of you keep falling down due to spells. You can't let yourself run too fast and expose yourself to the attack of spells. There are Death Eaters supervising the battle behind you. You can't let yourself fall behind, otherwise you will be executed as a cowardly traitor. So you must always run slower than other giants, and always run faster than another part of the giants... My father was greedy and stupid. He stopped directly on the battlefield and was directly executed by the Death Eater covered in a hood..."

Only a female giant was left with three underage siblings to depend on. However, because of that special turbulent era, the four of them lived a relatively easy life. The Death Eaters provided sufficient food, the three siblings did not have to go to the battlefield, and their mother could rely on Gale's wisdom to save her life. They lived smoothly until the fall of the Dark Lord and the giant tribe was driven away...

Gale's voice suddenly became a little hoarse when he said this: "Because I am thin, I don't like to play the games that the giant children like to play. I prefer to listen to the conversations of the wizards who are in charge of us. Little by little, I learned your language..."

"She also taught me..." Mir took over the conversation and continued, "My mother survived the brutal war, but she couldn't survive the long-distance migration. After settling down in the cold and barren mountains, she suddenly fell ill and died soon after. From then on, the three of us siblings relied on the strong body of our eldest brother and the wisdom of our second brother to barely survive, until a week ago, when outsiders broke the peaceful life here, and we almost saw the god of death wandering at the entrance of the cave..."

"Oh?"

Loren looked up at her eyes calmly and asked slowly, "Do you hate us then? We are Dumbledore's students. More than a decade ago, it was he who defeated the You-Know-Who and destroyed your beautiful life, forcing you to migrate a long distance. More than a decade later, it was he who sent Hagrid here, causing you to be injured and on the verge of death..."

"What are you talking about!" Hermione whispered, tugging at his sleeve.

"Being a slave under the Dark Lord is not a good life. We could be dragged onto the battlefield as human shields to die at any time. It was not Dumbledore who made us migrate so far. It was he who protested to the Ministry of Magic and gave us a chance to live. It was not Hagrid who implicated us..."

Mir stared at Loren. His eyes were more than ten times bigger than his, and at this moment, he was expressing his sincere gratitude. "In the end, it was you who saved us from despair."

"You are very smart, even smarter than many wizards."

Loren glanced at her slightly swollen and unnaturally moving shoulders, and released a milky white healing spell from the tip of his staff: "It will be much easier to cooperate with smart people, so I plan to make a deal with you."

"trade?"

"..."...

12 Grimmauld Place, Blake's old house.

The big clean-up operation to renovate the dilapidated house is still going on. Fortunately, most of the rooms have been cleaned out, and only some old things of the Black family need to be cleared out.

Sirius led a few young wizards who stayed behind and turned over the piles of old things with little interest. The valuable antiques were placed separately aside, and the alchemical items that could still be used were counted and labeled. As for the remaining items that symbolized the glory of the Black family, they were not easy to resell, so Sirius decided to treat them as waste.

"This is a posthumous work by a painter with a long name from the Middle Ages. It is said to be worth some money. Let Mundungus sell it as operational funds for the Order of the Phoenix..." Sirius casually threw the painting into the box next to him.

"!"

George and Fred subconsciously glanced at the painting, their eyes sparkling, and they couldn't help but wonder in their hearts whether opening a shop could be considered an action of the Order of the Phoenix, and whether this painting could be used as their start-up capital...

"Huh? This is a two-way mirror, Harry, come here!"

Harry, whose cheeks were stained like a cat by the dust, walked over and looked at the simple-looking small mirror. He asked in confusion, "Two-sided mirror, what's the use?"

"This mirror is for you. The other end of it is connected to the mirrors in this house, just like a Muggle telephone. No matter where you are, as long as you wipe the mirror and call my name, I can talk to you."

"So amazing!?"

Ron, who was standing next to him, came over immediately and clamored for him to demonstrate it again. There was a lot of chattering until Molly's roar came from the basement kitchen, and then they started working again.

Sirius looked at the pile of miscellaneous items in front of him, noticed a tapestry at the bottom, his expression froze, and he fell silent.

"This is……"

Harry and Ron worked together to pull the tapestry out from underneath. Looking at the old yet still luxurious tapestry, they didn't know which box to put it in.

The tapestry looked very old and dull, as if it had been gnawed in several places by foxes, but the gold thread still gleamed, and they could clearly see a long family tree that stretched back to the Middle Ages.

There are two lines of large characters embroidered on the top of the tapestry:

[Most Ancient and Noble House of Black]
[Forever Pure]
Ron looked at the bottom row of the family tree and noticed a strange gap: "Sirius isn't on it!"

Harry vaguely heard his godfather mention this story, but he didn't know the details. He hesitated and looked at Sirius.

"It was there." Sirius had an indifferent expression on his face, as if he didn't care about the matter. He pointed to a small round burnt hole on the tapestry, which looked like a trace of cigarette burns. "After I ran away from home, my dear old mother destroyed me. Kreacher likes to whisper this story."

"Running away from home?" George and Fred understood immediately.

"I was about 16, and I was fed up with this house and the people in it."

"Where have you been?"

"At James's house, Harry's grandparents are very considerate. They almost treat me as their second son. Just like Harry always wants to stay at the Burrow during the summer vacation, no one requires me to stay here for a month every year. My uncle Alphard even supports me... During the school holidays, I temporarily lived in the Potter family until I was seventeen. My uncle Alphard passed away and left me a considerable amount of gold. After graduation, I lived on my own and took care of myself... Fortunately, Mr. and Mrs. Potter always welcome me to their house for dinner every Saturday."

Sirius had a smile on his face and used his hands to tidy up his messy long hair, but the people present could feel that he was not happy: "Believe me, I have persisted for 17 years, which is already amazing."

He stretched out his finger and ran his fingers over the names at the bottom of the family tree one by one: "My parents were crazy about pure-bloods. They believed that being a member of the Black family was born noble... My foolish brother, Regulus, was too weak and actually believed what they said..."

At the door where no one noticed, an old house-elf appeared at some point and stood there, listening to his story with tears in his eyes.

"He is younger than me. People constantly remind me that his son is much better than me. In fact, it is true. He joined the Slug Club soon after entering school. His grades in every subject are better than mine. Even I know that he will have a bright future and will make the Black family name shine brightly."

Sirius paused and smiled bitterly. He could escape from the Black family with peace of mind because he knew that Regulus would carry the Black family's expectations. "But he was such a stupid idiot. He joined the ranks of the Death Eaters and died in an unclear way in the end."

"what does that mean?"

"He died before Voldemort fell. The cause of death is unknown. He did not die in the battle with the Aurors. He was not important enough for Voldemort to kill him personally, so I suspect that the Death Eaters killed him. He was probably terrified by those persecutions and wanted to quit..." Sirius sneered, "For the Dark Lord, it's either life or death. This stupid idiot doesn't understand this truth -"

"Don't slander him!"

An old and shrill voice cried out, Kreacher rushed over and snatched the tapestry from their hands, his ugly cheeks covered with snot and tears: "Master Regulus is not an idiot! He defeated the Dark Lord!"

(End of this chapter)