Next to Professor McGonagall, Jordan shouted through the golden megaphone, "The players are in position, and Madam Hooch is now entering the pitch. The match is about to begin!"
Madam Hooch walked to the center of the pitch. Her eagle-like eyes looked up at the players from both teams, and she said sternly, "I want a fair match from both sides!"
She then kicked open the wooden box containing the Quidditch balls. The Bludgers and the Golden Snitch flew into the air, and at the same time, Madam Hooch threw the Quaffle high up.
The match officially began.
"The match has begun! The Quaffle is first grabbed by Gryffindor's Angelina, and she makes a beautiful pass! Oh no! It's been intercepted by Slytherin! Slytherin's captain makes a very nice shot, will it be a goal? Oh my goodness! A beautiful save by Gryffindor's Keeper, Wood! He successfully defends the ten points! But beside him, Katie was accidentally hit in the head by a Bludger! Ouch! That looks painful! Now Slytherin has the Quaffle, and their Chasers are trying to break through Gryffindor's defense, but they're hit by a Bludger from one of the Gryffindor Weasleys! Gryffindor's Angelina gets the ball and is on the attack! She's flying, she dodges a Bludger! The Slytherin Keeper lunges! He missed! It's a goal! Gryffindor scores first!!!"
"Brilliant! Go, Gryffindor!"
Jordan cheered passionately, and the little lions behind him also let out excited screams and cheers. In the stands, Victor looked at all this with a speechless expression. The Quidditch match was indeed passionate, but the rules seemed a little too simple and brutal. It looked less like a ball game and more like a brawl with balls. Also, that little lion named Jordan seemed a bit biased in his commentary!
However, unlike Victor, Rick, who was a hockey player, was extremely excited. Perhaps it was because ice hockey and Quidditch had many similarities in their playing styles and rules. But for some reason, he was constantly cheering for the Gryffindor lions.
Back on the pitch…
With Jordan's passionate commentary, the match became more and more intense.
"Now let's turn our attention to Harry Potter. As the youngest Seeker at Hogwarts in this century, how will he perform? Wait! Is that the Golden Snitch? Harry Potter sees the Golden Snitch, and he's chasing it! But the Slytherin Seeker is right behind him! The two of them are squeezing together! Oh, damn it! The Slytherin Seeker fouls! He bumps into Harry, and the Golden Snitch disappears again! Hmm, something's wrong! There seems to be a problem with Harry's broom, but he's riding a Nimbus 2000! The broom seems to be trying to throw its owner off! What's going on?!"
The stands were in an uproar. No one knew why Harry had suddenly lost control. At this moment, in the Gryffindor stands, Hermione, who was watching the match intently, looked through her binoculars and suddenly saw Snape on the other side of the pitch. His eyes were fixed on Harry in the sky, and he was muttering something.
"Oh my goodness! Why?!" Hermione put down her binoculars and said in shock, "Why is Snape casting a spell on Harry?!"
"What did you say?" Ron, who was next to her, heard that Hermione might know the reason and asked quickly.
"It's Snape. Snape is jinxing Harry's broom!" Hermione said, handing the binoculars to Ron.
"What… what should we do?!" Ron anxiously put down the binoculars. He had clearly seen what Snape was doing.
"Watch this!"
Hermione, having confirmed the "truth" of Harry's loss of control, secretly went around to the Slytherin stands. Using the wooden stairs as cover, she cast a "Incendio" and set fire to Snape's robes.
Snape, who was continuously muttering the counter-curse, suddenly felt his feet getting hotter and hotter, but he couldn't attend to it because all he wanted to do at that moment was to protect his loved one's child from harm.
But after a while, a professor finally noticed the flames on Snape's robes. With the professor's reminder, Snape quickly stood up to put out the fire. His movement also interrupted Quirrell's curse, and Harry's broom stabilized and returned to the pitch.
Victor had seen all of this from a distance.
In the end, the match between Gryffindor and Slytherin ended with Harry catching the Golden Snitch first.
Seeing that the match was over, Victor patted Aliya, who was sleeping on his shoulder, and said, "Aliya, wake up! It's over!"
To be honest, Victor was impressed that she could fall asleep in such a noisy environment.
"Huh?! Is it over?!" Aliya slowly woke up and rubbed her eyes. "Did you win?"
"Gryffindor won!" Victor said with a wry smile. "I should have known you don't like watching Quidditch, and I wouldn't have brought you here!"
"It's okay, I just couldn't get into it," Aliya yawned and shook her head. "It seemed interesting at first, but with such a big pitch, all I could see were a dozen little dots flying around in the sky. Then, for some reason, I just got more and more sleepy."
"You should have told me earlier! I could've Transfigured you a pair of binoculars!" Victor sighed helplessly. "Oh well, since the match is over, I'll send you home! Oh! But where's Rick?"
"Huh?!"
Later that evening, after finding Rick, who had been abducted by the Weasley twins, Victor sent the Swinton siblings home and even stayed for dinner. After dinner, he used spatial magic to return to Hogwarts.
As usual, he went to the top of the astronomy tower to practice his magic. He didn't know how much time had passed.
The night had deepened, and the moon and stars were bright.
Just as Victor was meticulously unraveling the magical structure of the Avada Kedavra curse, a familiar voice suddenly interrupted him.
"Victor, are you up there?!"
"Huh?!" A question mark appeared above Victor's head. The purplish-red glow in his pupils instantly faded, and the broken green magic circle in his hand disappeared. He sat on the platform he had created on top of the tower and looked in the direction of the voice. He saw Hermione leaning on the window of the Astronomy classroom, looking up at him.
"Hermione, you're out of bed after hours?!" Victor exclaimed. The young witch was a good girl, and she would never do something that clearly violated school rules and would cost her House points unless it was absolutely necessary.
"It's not past curfew yet!" Hermione said primly. "And let me up there! I need to talk to you about something important!"
"Alright, alright!" Victor thought, and the young witch was involuntarily lifted into the air. After landing on the platform, before Victor could even ask what was going on, Hermione started excitedly talking about the Quidditch match that afternoon. She even inexplicably linked it to the troll invasion on Halloween, which made Victor very confused.
"Stop!" Victor interrupted Hermione directly. "I think I get what you're saying! But from everything you've told me, it's all based on the assumptions you, Harry, and Ron made based on your impressions of Snape! You say that Snape wanted to kill Harry on the Quidditch pitch today, so I ask you, why would Snape do that? What was his motive for killing Harry? Second, what proof do you have that Snape let the troll into the school?"
"Didn't I just tell you? I saw Snape staring at Harry and muttering a curse! It wasn't until I used a spell to burn his robes that Harry's broom went back to normal," Hermione explained.
"But your explanation doesn't answer my question," Victor said. "Which is, why does Snape want to harm Harry?"
"I don't know!" Hermione said angrily. She hated the feeling that Victor didn't trust her. "But Snape is always picking on Harry, so he must have a reason!"
"And the troll? You can't just assume he had something to do with the troll because he was limping after Halloween, can you?!"
"Well, once during a break, Harry, Ron, and I accidentally went into a room on the third-floor corridor. There was a three-headed dog there, and it was guarding something…"
"There's just the two of us here; you don't have to whisper!" Victor suddenly interrupted Hermione. He couldn't help but complain when he saw the young witch acting so secretive when she was talking.
"Just let me finish!" Hermione glared at Victor, blushing. "According to Harry, the three-headed dog is most likely guarding a top-secret item that Hagrid brought back from Gringotts. Snape let the troll into the school during the Halloween feast to create a distraction and get past the three-headed dog to get it. Don't you remember he was the last one to arrive in the dungeon that day?"
"Professor Quirrell was also the last one to arrive that day," Victor asked, his eyes narrowed. "And what does any of this have to do with Snape wanting to kill Harry?"
"Of course…" Hermione was about to say "of course it does" but she suddenly realized that, just as Victor said, the two events didn't seem to have any connection at all. And the story about Snape trying to get past the three-headed dog was something Harry had told her.
"Anyway, anyway, I saw it today!" Hermione couldn't find a good reason and just gave up. "I don't know what the reason is, but the fact that Snape was casting a curse on Harry today is the truth!"
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