Fafnir's gaze naturally followed the silk scarf, his head turning in sync with its swaying.
Suddenly, the scarf split into two. Before Fafnir could decide which one to follow, one of them morphed into an injector filled with a pale green liquid.
The needle glinted coldly in the air, and as realization dawned on Fafnir, he let out a short, sharp screech.
A traitor among us! Treason!
"Easy there. Don't move. It won't hurt a bit," Louis coaxed him like a shady uncle trying to trick a kid into getting a shot. His hand moved with precision—swift and merciless—as the needle pierced the vein beneath Fafnir's wing in one smooth motion.
The pale green genetic enhancement serum was injected into his body, and the effect was instant—Fafnir passed out with a squawk.
> You have deceived your owl (magical creature)
> Trick Points gained: 80
> Current Points: 14,520
> Total magical creatures fooled: 2/3
Checking his heartbeat to confirm it was just unconsciousness and not... something worse, Louis then casually cleaned up a few loose feathers Fafnir had flailed off, tossing them aside before slumping onto the nearby couch. He pulled out a finely-crafted heather pipe.
"Let's see if this thing can help me figure out how to unlock the next tier of the lottery," he muttered. With a snap of his fingers, a dragon rune flame flickered into existence and lit the tobacco.
The tobacco went out.
Louis stared blankly.
He'd never smoked before—let alone used a pipe. Great.
"How the hell do you light this thing properly?" Louis scratched his head, trying to recall what he'd seen in old TV dramas. He leaned in, puffed hard while relighting—
Thick smoke rushed into his lungs.
He coughed violently, nearly hacking out an entire lung.
At the same time, his brain went razor-sharp—crystal clear. The burning sensation in his chest contrasted sharply with the sudden mental clarity, and a storm of inspiration exploded through his thoughts. Clues and theories connected in bursts of brilliance.
It worked.
Still coughing, Louis quickly stashed the pipe away and gathered his thoughts, focusing on Hogwarts and trying to determine the method to unlock the next-tier lottery.
He mentally flipped through everything he remembered from the Harry Potter films and books. Key characters surfaced one after another.
Clues threaded together like strands of silk, forming a cohesive web in his mind—and eventually, a few likely answers crystallized.
Five minutes passed.
Louis exhaled deeply on the couch.
[Sherlock Holmes' Pipe] was indeed powerful. Though incomplete clues meant he couldn't form a definitive answer, it had revealed the strongest possibilities:
---
Possibility One — The Most Difficult One:
Pull off a deception that directly affects either Dumbledore or his phoenix, all while under their watch.
Dumbledore was a near-two-century-old legendary wizard with immense experience. Even if his eyes had dulled with age, the phoenix—possessing high intelligence and exceptional perception—could compensate.
Fooling both was no easy feat.
Still, not entirely impossible. After all, Voldemort was lurking in the school. If Louis wanted, he could engineer an elaborate illusion involving the Dark Lord's early reveal—a grand "vanishing act" under Dumbledore's nose.
But doing that would require Louis to act directly—or at least through his persona, Dio Brando. That would expose him, making it harder to keep deceiving Voldemort and farming Trick Points in the long run.
---
Possibility Two — Related to Voldemort:
Not Voldemort himself, but his Horcruxes.
They're arguably the most vital magical items in the entire story, anchoring Voldemort's immortality.
If Louis could find and collect Horcruxes, his system might react in a major way.
---
Possibility Three — Exploring Hogwarts:
Some overlap with the previous method, but focused on the school itself.
Hogwarts is a castle filled with ancient magic and hidden secrets—used as a fortress during times of wizard persecution. It holds mysteries like the Chamber of Secrets and the Room of Requirement.
Even Dumbledore knew little about either place. He had stumbled into the Room of Requirement once but didn't truly understand it.
Exploring those areas might trigger the system—and conveniently, one of the Horcruxes just happened to be hidden inside the Room of Requirement.
---
Possibility Four — Collecting the Deathly Hallows:
Though Louis dismissed this idea as soon as it surfaced.
The three Hallows: the Elder Wand, Resurrection Stone, and Invisibility Cloak.
All mythical and legendary items that actually exist.
- The Elder Wand boosts its user's power and is currently in Dumbledore's possession.
- The Resurrection Stone is embedded in one of Voldemort's Horcruxes, stored in the ancestral home of the Gaunt family.
- The Invisibility Cloak belongs to Harry and will be given (or returned) to him by Dumbledore during Christmas.
Gathering all three in the short term was impossible. Louis discarded the idea immediately.
---
That was as much as the pipe's enhancement could reveal.
"Setting aside the first one for now, the second and third options are worth attempting. As for the fourth… sure, I could force it, but it'd be a one-time jackpot—and ruin any future chances of farming more Trick Points," Louis thought aloud.
He had a plan.
Above all, he had to avoid acting under his true identity. If he absolutely had to make a move, it would be Dio Brando who stepped into the spotlight.
Louis had to be careful because the wizarding world was small.
The beings that could give him massive Trick Points were rare. If his true nature got exposed, he'd lose his ability to farm those points.
After all, no one trusts a powerful and clearly malicious man—and deception requires trust first.
He pulled out the pipe again. The embers were still warm. He gently blew on the bowl, reigniting the tobacco.
There was still more to think about.
Smoking this thing was painful as hell—but the results were deliciously effective.
Staring at the pipe, Louis clenched his jaw—and took another puff.
*