Hogwarts: Bourne Returns from Warhammer

Chapter 40 Swamp Digging
If you eat too much instant noodles, you will always find that there is no ingredient package after opening it; if you shop online too much, you will always encounter the dilemma of going out to pick up express delivery and forget to take the key; if you fall in love too much, you will always meet a bad guy or a bad girl. …

What is going to come will come.

On Wednesday morning, the first-year Gryffindor wizards had their first Defense Against the Dark Arts lesson in their lives.

This is the course that all the little wizards are most looking forward to. Even Ron, who habitually wants to "faint" when he sees a book, actually previewed the textbook in advance.

"The first chapter of "Dark Arts: A Guide to Self-Defense" is about the 'Snot Curse'. The effect of that little evil spell is really interesting. I can't wait to learn it, and then find an opportunity to use it between that stinky fart and Try it on his little follower."

On the way to class, Ron kept chattering about his plan to his roommates.

Maybe it's due to inertia, or maybe it's just a natural incompatibility. Ever since they met Malfoy and the others on the train, the relationship between the Harrow duo and each other has been avalanche. They hate each other - no one hates them the most. Only more annoying.

Bourne did not join in the quarrel among the children. He was thinking about his own business as he walked.

In order to take this Defense Against the Dark Arts course, he had made some preparations, and even carried the red iron tool box - he was afraid that when "school violence" really happened, he would not have the tools at hand.

However, when the little wizards walked into the Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom with great interest, they almost thought they had gone to the wrong place.

Obviously the classroom was on the third floor of the castle, and it was a sunny morning. The classroom that should have been bright and bright turned out to be as dark as a basement.

Not only were the curtains drawn, but there were actually wooden boards nailed to the windows, and large pieces of wall covering were peeling off the surrounding walls.

The tables and chairs used by the little wizard were all in tatters, and it was doubtful whether they would fall apart immediately after sitting on them.

In such a large classroom, only a few candles were lit for lighting. It is hard not to wonder whether Professor Quirrell, who decorated the classroom, opened an optical shop as a side job to support his family.

Even more unbearable is the smell in the classroom. The strong smell of garlic hit the little wizard's young nose like a fist, and it was also very spicy to the eyes.

Having found their seats, in addition to students like Bourne who came to class with a clear purpose, and Miss Know-It-All, who has already become famous in Gryffindor (and even the entire first grade) in two days - she is immersed in previewing Even if they had already previewed the textbook - most of the other little wizards covered their noses with their hands and started chattering in low voices.

Ron rubbed his index finger on the table, then extended his dirty finger to Harry for a look.

"My confidence in this class is a little low," he said. "Both George and Fred said that the Defense Against the Dark Arts class at Hogwarts has never been very good, and they actually told the truth this time."

"Maybe there's a chance," Harry could only comfort him. However, while he was talking, his hand touching the bottom of the chair seemed to come across something sticky. This caused him to waste a brand new piece of parchment.

Neville, who was sitting next to them, kept his head down, rummaging around in his small school bag. In the end, this honest kid could only admit with a sad face: "I seem to have left my textbook in the dormitory."

Seamus Finnegan advised him to be more open-minded. Anyway, given the current state of the Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom, Professor Quirrell's skills are probably not very good either. It doesn't matter whether there are books or not in class.

"Look, I didn't bring any books with me." Seamus showed Neville the contents of his schoolbag. They were still filled with the textbooks used in Monday's class. He had been too lazy to change them for the past few days.

"But the next class is Potions, and you don't seem to have brought any Potions textbooks." Neville reminded Seamus in a low voice: "Professor Snape is the Head of Slytherin. I heard from the seniors, He will always find various reasons to deduct points from other colleges. Be careful..."

If the little lions' chats were somewhat related to this course, then the little badgers who were in class with them mostly focused on discussing Professor Quirrell, the teacher of the Defense Against the Dark Arts class.

Their topic was sparked by a young wizard named Zacharius Smith, who was a descendant of a pure-blood family.

Although there is no Smith family in the list of the "Holy Twenty-Eight", after being assigned to Hufflepuff, he claimed that his family has a blood connection with the founder of the college - the Hufflepuff version of Malfoy belongs to yes.

However, the little badger was still innocent, so many freshmen truly believed what Zacharis said.

"I'm telling you," because he was so enthusiastic about it, Zacharias actually sat down on the desk, put his feet on the chair, and said condescendingly to Justin and MacMillan: "Everyone at Hogwarts A professor receives a special allocation from the school board before the start of each school year to purchase teaching aids and improve teaching facilities. This year will be no exception.

The classroom we are using now is so crude. In all likelihood, Professor Quirrell must have used the funds to do other things. "

Justin showed his talent for admiration and continued: "This is Hogwarts, the best magic school in the UK and even the world. How dare he do this?"

Zacharias was very satisfied with the little brother's foreshadowing. He showed an expression of wisdom and excitedly expressed his inference.

"There is only one truth! That Professor Quirrell was able to become the professor of Defense Against the Dark Arts must be because there is someone behind him!"

Bang...

The reason for the dubbing was not because the wise kid spoke loudly, but simply because something actually hit the floor.

Hearing the words "There is someone behind him" seemed to trigger a stress response. Professor Quirrell, who was walking out of the corridor connecting his office and the Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom with something in his arms, was suddenly startled and immediately reached for it. Get the wand on your belt.

The teaching aid he held in his hand, a round goldfish bowl, naturally fell to the ground and smashed to pieces. Many round "rotten wood" pieces contained in the fish tank all rolled towards the classroom and near the little wizards.

"What is this?"

Hannah Abbott, who was wearing two pigtails, looked down curiously and couldn't help but stretched out her wand to poke at the piece of "rotten wood" that stopped after hitting her shoes.

This is true for Hufflepuff's little badger, not to mention the curious Gryffindor little lion. They don't even use wands but directly reach out to grab it.

However, none of these freshmen seemed to have considered what classroom they were in or what class they were about to take——

Hannah poked the piece of "rotten wood" with her wand, and it was like turning on a switch, and it immediately took off its disguise.

It stretched out its camouflaged claws with fins on them; one end of the "rotten wood" was twisted, which is its head. If you look closely, you can see a triangular crack-shaped mouth, which is full of sharp edges. the teeth of.

"Don't, don't, don't move..." Quirrell wanted to say something, but the long time of pretending had some impact on him, and now he still stutters even if he wants to speak normally.

So he reminded him a step too late.

The nimble little wizards woke up almost all the dormant "rotten wood" - that is, the swamp digs. "Ah!" Hannah screamed.

The swamp digger, who was awakened by her poke with the wand, opened his triangular mouth and pounced on her ankle, frightening the little witch so much that she fell off her seat and didn't even bother to pick up the wand after she dropped it.

Some other little wizards didn't even perform as well as she did. For example, Zacharias, who had just gained wisdom, reached for the swamp digger, so he had no time to dodge and was bitten by the little thing on his finger. He immediately burst into tears.

Compared with the little badgers who usually cry out in pain or cry after being attacked, the little lions behave like Gryffindors. Although they can't deal with the swamp digger's spell or other techniques, they can at least fight back.

For example, Harry and Ron worked together to overturn a desk and crush several swamp diggers that rushed towards them.

For another example, Neville and Seamus stood back-to-back, picked up their small schoolbags and swung the swamp diggers at them.

When he saw that Hannah was about to be bitten not far away, Neville, a very shy little boy who sometimes acted clumsy, immediately took out a thick potions textbook from his school bag and said "Yeah". He held it up with both hands and swatted at the swamp digger that had attacked Hannah.

These are still relatively ordinary little lions. Some of the smarter ones, such as the little beaver girl sitting in the first row, even showed what a wizard should really be like - she took out her wand to deal with the swamp dig. son.

Generally speaking, the first-year wizards who have just entered the school are all at the same level, and they all know a few spells.

However, this convention is not suitable for academic masters, especially those who are the "book king" type.

"Yingadim~Leviosa!"

Hermione successfully cast the Levitation Charm, a spell that had not been taught in Charms class, and the effect of this spell was to successfully make the swamp digger that rushed towards her float into the air, waving its claws in vain, and started Useless effort.

After witnessing Hermione's actions, even Quirrell, who was possessed by Voldemort, had to admit the excellence of this little witch. So, he stammered: "G-G, Gryffindor, two points."

Then, just when Quirrell was about to tell the little wizards to stop moving so that he could clean up the mess for them, a voice suddenly sounded in his mind: "Don't worry, let me see again, the courtyard I used to have What is special about the children of the elder family?

Do you still remember, on the morning of the first day of school, we happened to meet this little wizard when we came back from the Forbidden Forest - it was a bit too coincidental - to test his quality and see if there would be any surprises. . "

"Yes, yes, yes, my master." Quirrell answered Voldemort in his mind.

However, his flattering reply was just another sentence of "idiot" and: "This is an exchange of ideas. Are you a stammerer?"

Quirrell would definitely not dare to talk back to Voldemort, but he dared to do something evil - of course, the target of the evil plot was the young wizard - his mind had been completely distorted by black magic, coupled with the tragic experiences of the past two days , which made Quirrell develop a somewhat anti-social character. If you don’t explode in silence, you will become perverted in silence.

"In that case..."

Quirrell thought, silently raising his wand and pretending to cast a spell to deal with the swamp digger, but in fact he cast a spell that he had practiced to cast silently and without a wand because he had been using it all the time recently... a confusion spell. .

In order to paralyze his prey, Bourne, who pretended to be just like his roommates and just used simple physical means to reason with the swamp diggers, suddenly felt a sense of malice. Thinking on his heels, he could guess which old man was causing trouble.

At the same time, the swamp diggers who were running rampant in the Defense Against Dark Arts classroom seemed to have received some signal. There were many swamp diggers who actually gave up attacking the little badgers that were closer to them. Instead, they turned around and pounced on the little wizard of Gryffindor.

Moreover, these swamp digs actually used the art of war. The plank road is built openly and the warehouse is secretly built. It seems that they attack all the lion cubs randomly, but in fact most of them are heading towards Bourne.

Although they are inconspicuous in size, they are magical animals that can be rated as "3X" dangerous level. Swamp diggers are actually very dangerous to humans.

Moreover, the reason why Quirrell chose it as a teaching aid for the Defense Against the Dark Arts class is that in addition to being a magical animal, swamp diggers can actually be classified as "dark magical creatures".

Generally speaking, so-called "dark magic creatures" must have two characteristics at the same time:
First, they are not naturally born magical creatures, but creatures created intentionally or unintentionally by wizards (or other magical creatures).

Second, they are dangerous to a certain extent, and most of them tend to feed on humans or humanoid creatures.

Of course, the severity of this tendency is different for different black magic creatures.

For example, dementors are typical, extremely evil black magic creatures. The happy emotions of living people are the dementors' favorite and currently the only known food source.

Although there are records of swamp diggers attacking humans, their daily food sources are mainly insects, reptiles and small mammals. Occasionally they can find a mandrake - a magical plant with human-shaped roots - which can basically satisfy their hunger. .

At this time, the reason why those swamp diggers "locked" Bourne was because, under the influence of Quirrell's confusion spell, they mistook the little wizard for a mature mandrake!

They are eager to enjoy this delicious meal.

The triangular mouths of these swamp diggers kept rustling, making a "click-click" friction sound, and then jumped up from the ground like facehuggers and pounced on Bourne's white and tender face full of collagen.

"Bourne, be careful!"

The little wizards who were familiar with Bourne screamed in alarm, and they quickly threw all the things they could pick up at the jumping swamp digger, trying to stop them.

Hermione turned to Quirrell and shouted: "Professor!"

However, at this time, Quirrell pretended to have a constipated expression, sweat was pouring out of his face, and his mouth kept opening and closing, but he couldn't recite a complete spell.

Seeing that asking Professor Quirrell to help was a wishful thinking, Hermione decided to do it herself, and she successfully used the levitation spell again. However, there were so many people rushing towards the Dig in Bourne Swamp that the little witch's floating spell couldn't stop them all.

Just when the little wizards turned pale with fear and even wanted to close their eyes because they couldn't bear to watch the next scene, Bourne simply threw away the broken leg of the chair that he had used as a stick and took out his own wand.

"I was underestimated..."

The little wizard muttered in his mind.

(End of this chapter)