At the same time, as Victor was marveling at seeing a legend in real life, not far away at the Gryffindor table, Hermione was aggressively stabbing the lamb chops on her plate with her fork, glaring with an intense look of resentment at Victor and Penelope.
"What's wrong with her?" Ron, who was playing Wizard's Chess with Harry, asked curiously, looking at the resentment that was almost solidifying on Hermione's face.
"I'm not sure, but I'd bet it has something to do with Victor," Harry replied, shrugging.
"How so?"
"It's just a guess, but it seems like Hermione and Victor have been on bad terms for over a month now," Harry said in a low voice. "I don't know what happened, but I've definitely seen them talk to each other a lot less recently. And I've noticed…" he paused here and glanced at Hermione. "I've noticed that it's not that Victor is ignoring her; it's that Hermione turns away every time she sees him."
"Then why is she acting like this now?" Ron was puzzled. He thought it was Hermione's own problem.
"I think it's because she still hasn't received a Christmas present from Victor. Look, it's Christmas Eve already. If he wanted to send her one, she would have received it by now," Harry guessed. "You know how Hermione is. She's probably been waiting for Victor to be the one to talk to her…"
After speaking, they both secretly turned their heads to look at Hermione, but Hermione, who had sensed their gaze, shot them a glare, and they were so scared they immediately pretended to continue their game of chess.
Because Hermione's resentment was so deep, Harry and Ron didn't dare to discuss her and Victor anymore for fear of getting caught in the crossfire. So, the two started talking about everyday things while playing chess.
"Ron, are you guys not going home for Christmas?" Harry moved his rook forward two spaces on the chessboard and asked. "I saw Fred and Percy are still at school."
"We're going back after Christmas, and then we're going to Romania to visit my brother. He breeds dragons there!" Ron took the opportunity to capture one of Harry's pawns. "Actually, we usually go back today, but Fred and George both failed their Transfiguration exams this term, so Professor McGonagall is making them stay to retake them. And Percy said he has to prepare for his O.W.L.s."
"So, since they're not going back, I don't want to go home early either!"
"But the main reason is that my silly owl broke its wing a while ago, and my mum spent a lot of money taking it to St Mungo's. So instead of going home for Christmas, I might as well stay at Hogwarts for a more extravagant feast," Ron said, putting the pieces of Harry's captured pawn aside.
Seeing that his position on the chessboard was unfavorable, Harry quickly moved a piece to defend. At the same time, he asked, "You said Percy is preparing for his O.W.L.s. What is that?"
"It's actually a kind of wizarding level exam…" Ron began to explain.
An O.W.L., or Ordinary Wizarding Level, is a subject-specific exam that fifth-year students at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry must take, administered by the Wizarding Examinations Authority. The scores a student gets on a specific O.W.L. exam will determine whether or not he or she can continue to study that subject the following year.
Besides referring to the exam that fifth-year students take, "O.W.L." sometimes also refers to the difficulty of a course—that is, the O.W.L. level.
"Percy told me all this. He talks about it all the time, so I feel like the letters O.W.L. are about to be carved into my brain!" Ron said with a sigh of disgust.
However, Harry was a bit confused, but he probably understood that the O.W.L. exam was to test a wizard's overall ability or to determine what kind of job they were qualified for.
"Hey, Harry! Why aren't you going home for Christmas?" Ron suddenly realized that his friend was also not going home for the holiday, so he asked curiously.
The reason Ron asked was that Harry had barely mentioned his past life, only occasionally mentioning some things about his aunt's house.
When Harry heard Ron's question, a complicated expression appeared on his face. A flash of resentment crossed his eyes, and he said, "If I could, I would never want to go back…"
For him, the small cupboard on Privet Drive wasn't a home at all; it was a hellhole compared to the comfortable dormitories at Hogwarts! So he didn't want to go back!
"Huh?!" Ron saw Harry's grim expression and wisely decided not to press the matter further. But at the same time, he checkmated Harry's king on the chessboard…
After dinner, Victor, of course, did not accept the generous "sponsorship" from the rich Penelope. He was just being overly dramatic about his money problems earlier. After all, if he wanted to make money, there was a huge vault right next to Hogwarts!
Before he left, Victor first went to the Room of Requirement and grabbed two super large oak barrels. After cleaning them, he took them and flew toward the Forbidden Forest.
The Dark Forest, also known as the Forbidden Forest, is located on the edge of the Hogwarts grounds. As its name suggests, Hogwarts students are generally not allowed to enter it. However, in special circumstances, such as detention or Care of Magical Creatures class, students may be specially approved to enter the Forbidden Forest, but only the outer areas.
For centuries, because the Forbidden Forest contained many mysterious magical creatures and potion ingredients, many students have wanted to explore it. But most of the students who trespassed deep into the Forbidden Forest died, and some even had their bodies disappear.
Victor had once heard that last year's Defense Against the Dark Arts professor had gone missing in the Forbidden Forest. Before he came to Hogwarts, he had apparently spent some time in Azkaban. At the time, Dumbledore had mobilized all the professors and staff to search for this professor in the Forbidden Forest, but in the end, all they found was a bloody strip of cloth.
The Forbidden Forest was huge, but with Victor's speed, he landed in less than a minute. Standing on the soft, thick moss of the Forbidden Forest, he looked around. It was pitch black, and nothing could be seen. Toxic miasma permeated the air.
Victor raised his hand slightly, and a yellow magic circle appeared in his palm. Several light spheres flew out of the magic circle and surrounded Victor, illuminating the path ahead.
The light spheres were incredibly dazzling in the dark Forbidden Forest. Victor was like a giant lightbulb. He did this to attract some nocturnal magical creatures, but after waiting for a while, he found that nothing was approaching him except for some light-seeking insects.
"That's strange. I was told there were a lot of magical creatures in the Forbidden Forest. Why can't I see any?!" Victor was confused, so he started to venture deeper into the Forbidden Forest.
After walking for a few minutes, he suddenly saw a very conspicuous nest made of rotten leaves not far away. He got closer and saw more than a dozen small, spherical, and fluffy magical creatures looking up at him from the nest.
"Wow, how cute! They're Puffskeins!!!" Victor's heart overflowed with love when he saw such adorable creatures. But he was also very curious as to why these Puffskeins were here.
Puffskeins are gentle and harmless creatures. They are indifferent even when hugged or tossed around. They are scavengers and will occasionally stick out a very long, thin pink tongue, which they will flick out to find food.
In a wizard's home, Puffskeins will eat leftover food and spiders, but they are particularly fond of sticking their tongues into a sleeping wizard's nose to eat their dry boogers. Therefore, their docile nature makes them very popular pets among generations of wizard children.
So how could an animal like this survive deep in the dangerous Forbidden Forest without being eaten by other animals?
Although Victor didn't know how these Puffskeins had survived, he didn't think about it too much. He took out a cloth bag and put all the Puffskeins inside. These little cuties could sell for an average of two Galleons each in Diagon Alley. So Victor figured that if he took this nest of Puffskeins back to Hogwarts, he could definitely sell them for one Galleon each instantly. After all, these cute creatures were fatally attractive to the young witches!
So, after putting the bag of Puffskeins into his pocket dimension, Victor continued to venture deeper into the Forbidden Forest.
After leaving the Puffskein's nest of rotten leaves, Victor hadn't walked far when he discovered another magical creature. He saw a pair of eyes reflecting a white light under the illumination of his light spheres from a tall fir tree not far away.
"Haha! It's a Fwooper!" Victor said happily.
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