"Where should I Start?"
The two of them remained silent for a long time, until an inopportune cloud obscured the moon. Helena finally spo
"Where should I Start?"
The two of them remained silent for a long time, until an inopportune cloud obscured the moon. Helena finally spoke.
Despite the brief silence, she had begun to realize she had misjudged the young man before her—but not necessarily, after all, Tom had deceived her in the same way before. He
had first accepted her pain and helplessness with patience and openness, then struck her in the moment of her greatest trust.
"There was once a young wizard as brilliant as you, a Slytherin named Tom Riddle."
Her eyes were profound, as if transporting her back to a distant moment.
"After becoming a ghost, I rarely interacted with others. Tom was almost the first person to approach me. His intelligence and patience delighted and benefited me greatly.
Despite his exceptional talents, he never rushed to assert his superiority, always patiently listening to me and offering advice. Gradually, I began to believe he was a trustworthy person."
Helena recounted her past with Voldemort, her eyes filled with sorrow, and Damon shook his head.
What does what that scumbag Tom did have to do with me? You were betrayed, and yet you're wary of me?
"Finally, he got the whereabouts of what he wanted from me."
"What was it?
"
Helena didn't answer.
She was beginning to feel that her mother's crown might not be such a good thing. It had cost her her life, her mother had fallen gravely ill after she had stolen it, and the Bloody Baron had killed her because of it all.
Now that the crown was gone, it was time to stop spreading its secrets.
Especially not to this young man, so talented he was dangerous.
"Let's stop here for today. I hope you won't be as evil as Tom. You know what happened to him."
Helena said goodbye to Damon with basic courtesy and quickly floated away.
Damon had just stood up to leave when a blood-soaked ghost appeared before him. "What did you talk about with her? She doesn't look happy." "
Ghost, the Bloody Baron.
Helena's murderer.
" "What does this have to do with you?"
Damon glanced at him, unwilling to answer.
The Bloody Baron watched Damon's retreating form with a fierce glare. He refrained from attacking, believing he was no match for the young man. Besides, he wanted to remain alive to atone for Helena's sins.
After that night, the subtle sense of surveillance from Damon finally dissipated.
Helena didn't completely trust Damon, but her vigilance had become more direct. She now appeared directly in Damon's sight, openly monitoring him.
The two of them would occasionally sit together to watch the moon, but it was rare, usually on Friday nights, and Helena's stays were always short. She ostensibly said she didn't want Damon to violate the nighttime rules, but the details were unknown.
After all, the restriction was meaningless to Damon, and Helena knew it.
October was approaching, and because Damon praised the Half-Blood Prince with such fervor, the young wizards noticed that Professor Snape had been in a better mood recently, despite still deducting points from Gryffindor.
Dumbledore, through Fawkes, provided Damon with a room where he could Apparate—his office.
From now on, Damon could Apparate from his office, and also use it to return.
Although it was somewhat inconvenient, Damon had no choice but to accept it.
After completing his disguise in Dumbledore's room, Damon, or rather, Caliban Mortos, headed to the Ministry of Magic at noon on the first day of October, after his usual morning classes.
His three-year Auror training was about to begin, though he hadn't planned on taking that long.
"Pop."
With the sound of soft firecrackers, Damon appeared beside a shabby red telephone booth—several panes of glass missing, its back nestled against a grimy wall covered in graffiti.
It hardly looked like the entrance to the Ministry of Magic.
Despite having only been there once, Damon walked in with impeccable ease. The phone hung askew from the wall, but he didn't mind, simply picking it up and dialing.
62442
As the dial whirred back to its original position, a cold, woman's voice echoed from the booth. It was loud and clear, as if an invisible woman were standing beside him.
"Welcome to the Ministry of Magic. Please state your name and business."
"Caliban Mortos, Auror Training."
"Thank you," the woman's voice said coldly. "Guest, please take your badge and
pin it to your coat." With a ding, ...
He pinned the badge to the front of his T-shirt when the woman's voice spoke again.
"You will need to go through the security desk and register your wand. The security desk is at the end of the main hall."
The floor of the phone booth suddenly trembled, and Damon slowly sank into the ground. He watched the sidewalk outside the phone booth's glass window rise higher and higher until darkness fell overhead. He could hear the monotonous, grating sound of the phone booth sinking into the ground.
After about a minute, a thin golden light shone on his feet, then gradually widened, spreading across his body, and finally shone directly into his face.
Damon casually snapped his fingers, and the light in front of him was refracted.
"The Ministry of Magic hopes you have a pleasant day," the woman's voice said.
The door of the phone booth flew open, and Damon stepped into a magnificent hall with a polished dark wood floor and a peacock blue ceiling inlaid with gleaming golden symbols that moved and changed constantly, like a huge, high-rise bulletin board.
Damon passed the fountain in the center of the hallway, striding forward until he finally stopped at a sign reading "Security Check."
A wizard, dressed in a peacock-blue robe and unshaven, was still slacking off, reading the Daily Prophet.
He wasn't in a hurry when Damon arrived, slowly putting down his newspaper and saying listlessly,
"Come here."
He raised a long golden rod, as thin and flexible as a car antenna, and swept it across Damon's chest and back, like a security check in his past life.
"Wand."
Damon handed it over, and the wizard tossed it onto a strange-looking brass machine that resembled a single-pan scale.
The machine began to vibrate slightly, and a narrow strip of parchment quickly emerged from a slit at the bottom. The wizard tore the paper off and read the words on it.
"13 inches, the wand core is the heart nerve of a fire dragon, and it took a year, right?"
"Yes."
"I'll keep this," he said, poking the parchment slip on a small brass nail. "You take this back."
He returned the wand to Damon.
After this primitive and somewhat nostalgic inspection, Damon set off for the Auror headquarters on the second floor underground.
I'm afraid even he didn't expect that because he skipped the morning training, the only four members were talking about him, wondering where he got such connections to be so bold.
At the same time, they prayed in their hearts that such a person would never join their team in the future.
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(End of this chapter)