Chapter 274: Sirius Black Breaks Into Gryffindor
"But studying isn't just about classes. What about homework and organizing notes? Don't those count?" He pointed to the stack of parchment covered in writing, the edges of which were already wrinkled from the ink. "With the amount of time you have, you can't possibly finish all of this with good quality, unless you know time magic oh, you do, but you're not using it properly."
Hermione's eyes widened slightly. Dylan's words gave her some insight. She had to admit, she had never thought of it that way. She had always felt that the Time-Turner was only for traveling between different classes but had forgotten that the mountain of homework was also eating up her time.
"Even 'Miss Know-It-All' has a furrowed brow," Dylan said teasingly, his eyes on her frowning face. "That means even you need a little more time."
'Miss Know-It-All.' Hermione used to hate that name. The first time Professor Snape had said it with a cold tone, she had secretly cried in the bathroom for a long time, thinking it was a mockery of all her hard work. But coming from Dylan's mouth, it carried a knowing intimacy, as if he were saying, "I know how smart you are." She couldn't help but let out a giggle, and the tiredness in her eyes seemed to fade a little.
"But just using the Time-Turner for homework isn't enough." Dylan raised his hand and waved at a table in the distance. A glass of butterbeer floated over and landed steadily in his hand. The amber liquid formed a fine arc on the glass. "You also need to set aside time to rest. Otherwise, you're just spreading out the time you spend staying up late. You'll still be tired, and you might even spend more time than you originally would because you're always rushing."
Hermione bit her lower lip, her fingers gently stroking the chain of the Time-Turner. Dylan's words were like a key, unlocking the tense string she had been holding on to. She remembered only sleeping three or four hours a day, relying on stimulating potions to get through. She stayed in the library until it closed, even wolfing down her food. If she kept this up, she wouldn't even last until the final exams, let alone get twelve OWLs.
"Seriously," Dylan took a sip of beer, his expression becoming more serious. "The classes you don't like, why don't you drop them?" He watched Hermione's face tense up instantly and continued, "The Time-Turner folds your time, but it's still essentially consuming your life. It's not worth wasting time on subjects you're not passionate about or don't like."
These words carried more weight than Harry's "Divination is all nonsense." Harry disliked Divination because he wasn't good at it. Dylan, on the other hand, was analyzing it from the perspective of "how to use time efficiently." Hermione looked down at the notes filled with question marks in Unfogging the Future and for the first time, she wavered.
"Of course, this is just a suggestion." Dylan stood up and stretched. The fire from the fireplace cast a long shadow behind him. "In the end, it's your life to decide. As long as you don't regret the path you take, that's all that matters." He picked up the empty glass and smiled at Hermione. "It's getting late. Goodnight."
Watching Dylan walk through the noisy crowd toward the boys' dormitory stairs, Hermione looked down at her homework and touched the Time-Turner around her neck. After a moment of silence, a smile slowly appeared on her lips. She closed Unfogging the Future and pushed it to the side. Then she picked up her quill and wrote a new schedule on the top of the parchment. This time, she decided to use the Time-Turner to steal an hour of sleep for herself first.
When Dylan returned to the dorm, Dean and Seamus were still excitedly talking about the Quidditch match. They hadn't even pulled the curtains around their beds. They probably planned on going out again soon. Dylan couldn't be bothered with them. He took off his robes, cast a Scourgify on himself, and then cast a Silencing Charm around his bed. He then got into his four-poster bed and pulled the curtains shut. If they didn't go to sleep soon, Professor McGonagall would come and make them. He didn't need to worry about it.
He closed his eyes, and a few minutes later, he rolled over and quickly fell into a deep sleep. He didn't know how long he had been sleeping. Suddenly, a violent shaking pulled him back. Dylan's eyes shot open. Before he could see his surroundings, he instinctively reached for his wand under his pillow, his fingers already gripping the shaft.
"Hey, hey, hey! Dylan! Calm down! No spells, it's us!" Harry's voice came from his left, sounding panicked. Then, a pair of arms held his left arm tightly. Ron's hurried breathing came from his right. "Don't do it, Dylan! Calm down! Look Professor McGonagall is here too!"
Dylan could now see that the curtains had been pulled back halfway. Harry and Ron were holding on to him from the left and right, their faces full of tension. At the dorm entrance, Professor McGonagall was standing there with a serious expression, her wand in hand. The embers in the fireplace were still flickering, making her glasses glint.
Dylan finally broke free from the confusion, and the double vision in his eyes slowly dissipated. The dorm was in chaos. The curtains of all four four-poster beds were askew. And Professor McGonagall, who was standing at the dorm entrance, though her face was serious, didn't look intimidating at all. Her silvery-gray hair was held in a dark hairnet, with a few unruly strands hanging by her temples. The black and white checkered pajamas she was wearing were especially noticeable in the dim moonlight.
It was a gift Dylan had given her earlier. He had specifically asked a tailor in Diagon Alley to embroider a dozen black cats in the white squares. Some were arching their backs like a ball of fur, while others were stretching out their claws, playing with a ball of yarn. There was even one squatting on a moon, licking its paw. At this moment, the cat patterns were swaying gently with Professor McGonagall's slightly heaving chest, which softened her serious expression a little.
"Dylan, get up now. Your classmates will tell you what happened." Professor McGonagall's voice was a little hoarse, probably from being woken up from her sleep. She spoke quickly, and the hem of her wide pajamas swept past the doorframe. As she turned, a thread on the edge of her hairnet trembled, making Dylan blink repeatedly. He had never seen such a cute Professor McGonagall.
But soon, Professor McGonagall disappeared down the corridor. Dylan looked down at his pajamas. He quickly changed into his school uniform, buttoning his shirt meticulously and even carefully rolling up his sleeves to the middle of his forearm. He followed the crowd to the common room.
The fire in the fireplace was now just a pile of dark red embers, occasionally bursting with a few sparks. A few armchairs were crookedly squeezed together. A pumpkin juice jar in the corner had fallen to the ground, and the deep orange liquid had soaked into a large stain on the carpet.
"So, what happened?" Dylan found a decent chair and sat down. As soon as he sat down, he saw Neville huddled in the corner of the sofa, his shoulders shaking. Tears streamed down his face and dripped onto his tightly clenched pants, creating small, dark wet spots.
At this point, he finally got his bearings. It looked like Black had broken in. He had seen a similar scene in his divination last week, but he hadn't expected it to happen tonight. Divination was always a hassle. The scenes in the crystal ball were strictly synchronized with reality. If he wanted to see the details of the next day, he would have to spend an entire day in a state of divination. So Dylan usually only looked at key moments, such as who would break into the castle and who would be in danger in the Forbidden Forest. As for the specific time, whether it was 3 a.m. on a Sunday or midnight on a Thursday, he never remembered.
"Don't even mention it! Because of him, we almost all died!" A boy with glasses suddenly stood up from his chair, two buttons on his pajamas popping open. He pointed at Neville's nose, his voice so full of anger it was as if he was about to set himself on fire. "He wrote the entire week's passwords on a piece of parchment and left it lying around! If it weren't for him, how would Black have been able to get into the Gryffindor Tower?"
Neville's crying suddenly got louder, but not too loud, which made it sound even more restrained. His face was covered in tears and snot, and others frowned in disgust. Neville sobbed and tried to pick up the wand that had fallen at his feet, but his hands were shaking so much that he couldn't grab it after three tries.
Dylan seemed to not hear the boy's angry shouts. He just bent down, picked up Neville's wand, and gently placed it in his hand. "Next time, just remember the password or put it in a Remembrall and carry it with you." His voice was steady, like a stone thrown into a lake, instantly calming the surrounding noise. "That would be safer than writing it on paper."
"I... I understand." Neville nodded frantically and quickly took out his Remembrall. But tears kept hitting the Remembrall, making small splashes. The transparent glass ball felt slightly hot in his palm. The white mist inside was rolling restlessly. It was a sign that Neville had forgotten something important again.
Dylan opened his mouth, not knowing what to say for a long time. When the others saw this, they were both angry and amused, and for a moment, they were speechless, just like Dylan. The boy with the glasses finally let out a helpless huff and turned his head away.
Dylan lowered his eyes, his mind working quickly. Neville's forgetfulness seemed to be ingrained in his bones. He had seen a picture of Neville's mother. The once radiant witch could now only laugh like an idiot while hugging a teddy bear in St. Mungo's Hospital. The Death Eaters' Cruciatus Curse had not only ruined the couple but also created a shadow in the infant Neville's heart.
It made him always act like a frightened rabbit. When Dylan first met him, Neville would have to silently say his own name three times before he dared to say it out loud when he greeted someone. But after a few years under Dylan's influence, Neville had become much more lively and bold, even if he didn't become a great debater like Dean.
Maybe I can add a new spell to the Remembrall? Dylan thought. If he combined the Remembrall's ability with the syllables of the password and wove them into a dream so Neville could clearly remember them every time he woke up, would it be better? Dylan's Extreme Dream Weaving could help a person change their memory without pain. Even if it couldn't completely turn Neville into a new person, it could at least be used as an aid.
At this moment, the common room slowly became quiet, with only the occasional soft cracking of the embers in the fireplace. Dylan simply took the Remembrall from Neville's hand, his fingertips touching the cold glass surface, and began to chant a spell silently. Pale golden light threads slipped out from between his fingers, piercing the Remembrall like fine needles. The white mist inside immediately became much more docile. He had previously improved Neville's Remembrall, but now with Extreme Dream Weaving, he could try to improve it again.
Neville sat beside him. Harry and Ron were huddled together, not far from Dylan. They were speaking in low voices, their whispers reaching Dylan's sensitive ears like two little mice rustling nearby.
"Are you sure he had a knife in his hand?" Harry's voice was full of disbelief. He subconsciously touched his scar, which hadn't ached last night. "He had a chance to…"
"I saw it clearly!" Ron was so anxious he almost bit his tongue. He glanced at Dylan and quickly covered his mouth with his hand. "The knife was even gleaming! If I hadn't rolled under the bed in fear, I would probably be " He didn't finish the sentence. He just shivered, and his grip on Harry's arm tightened. "Why do you think Black didn't go for Dylan's curtains but came for me instead?" Ron's voice was even lower. "If he had woken up Dylan, I think Dylan would have been able to stop him just like he was about to use a spell on us just now!"
Dylan's fingers, which were holding the Remembrall, paused. He, of course, knew why Black didn't come for him. Who do you think was the one raising that rat? But there was no need to tell Ron, who was still in shock.
"Hmm… maybe," Harry said in response. He subconsciously picked at the wood grain on the armchair. The carvings on it were worn smooth by countless people who had sat there, just like the thoughts that were swirling in his mind. When Sirius Black broke into the dorm, the silver knife was aimed at Ron's bed, but it stopped abruptly when he saw the person in the bed.
The shock and pain in his eyes were not what a murderer's eyes should have. And the look Black gave him on his pillow before he ran away was cold but wrapped in an indescribable and complex emotion, as if he was confirming something. But if Black was really innocent, why didn't he come forward and explain? The Ministry of Magic wouldn't just throw an innocent person into Azkaban without even a trial, would they?
Harry remembered Hagrid saying that when Black was arrested, he was laughing like a madman, shouting, "He was protecting Lily and James's son." At the time, everyone thought he was crazy. But now, he wondered if there was another meaning behind that laugh?
The next morning, the atmosphere in the Gryffindor common room was even more subdued than the night before. Professor McGonagall, who had been searching all night, appeared. Her eyes were like a pair of searchlights, sweeping over the crowd and finally settling on Neville.
(End of Chapter)
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