"What happened here?" an old man asked the sheriff standing guard nearby.
This place was some distance from the residential area. He had seen a huge cloud of dust suddenly explode here and hurried over out of curiosity.
Even now, the dust still hung there like a filthy, heavy dark cloud, covering the grass that had once been green and making it impossible to see what was inside.
"No idea. We only just got here ourselves," the sheriff said helplessly, shaking his head.
What had just happened was far too bizarre. If he and his partner had not happened to be patrolling here, he would not have wanted this assignment at all.
"Then why are you just standing here?" the old man pressed.
That left the sheriff at a loss for words. His partner, a rookie policeman who had only joined the force not long ago, was already looking at him eagerly.
"What was that just now? A gorilla?"
"Don't be so curious, kid." The sheriff smacked the rookie on the head irritably. "That's the secret to how I became sheriff!"
"But I heard you've only ever made it as far as sheriff after all these years..." the rookie muttered.
"What did you say?"
"That...!" The old man suddenly pointed behind them into the dust, his upturned face full of terror. "What is that?!"
Relying on years of police experience, the sheriff heard the rushing sound behind him and, without even turning around, grabbed the arm of the man beside him and hurled him away.
Thud...
The rookie did not even realize what had happened before he was flung straight into the old man. Fortunately, he was flexible enough to twist in midair, keeping the frail old man on top.
But that also let him see exactly what was happening.
An ugly Giant as tall as a two-story building raised his enormous right hand high, then...
Brought it down.
Boom!
The Giant's palm smashed down with the force of a mountain crushing from above. The hand and the dust instantly engulfed the spot where the sheriff had been standing, and the shockwave from the impact sent the two men on the ground tumbling head over heels.
"Sheriff..."
Boundless fear overwhelmed both the policeman and the old man. They could only stare at the scene in stunned silence.
But the Giant's dull face showed a strange expression.
It rubbed the palm still covering the ground in confusion, as though the feel of it was somehow different from usual.
The Giant quickly lifted its hand, still half-kneeling, and looked at the place it had just struck.
The sheriff was lying face-down on the ground, a layer of golden light shimmering across his back. It was that layer of light that had kept him from being crushed flat, leaving him with only the pain of hitting the ground face-first.
"Ow."
The sheriff cried out in pain and, as if sensing something, rolled over into a more comfortable position.
"Ha! So I wasn't seeing things. It really was you, you big idiot, causing all this!"
For some reason, that layer of light between him and the Giant filled him with an overwhelming sense of safety.
It made him feel safer than the pistol at his waist.
Right, he still had his pistol.
Only then did the sheriff realize it. He hurriedly pulled it out, gripping it in a slightly trembling hand.
It didn't matter. The Giant was so huge that no matter how much he shook, he would still hit it.
Bang bang bang...!
Even though he had no real hopes for how much damage his pistol could do, he still pulled the trigger in a frenzy.
Feeling the sudden sting of pain, the Giant waved its huge hand in irritation, as if trying to pluck off that little thing making all the banging noises.
One shot, two shots... right up until the last bullet, the sheriff squeezed his eyes shut nervously.
Bang!
Boom!
Suddenly, a violent tremor like an earthquake surged up from the ground ahead, knocking the empty pistol from the sheriff's hand.
When he opened his eyes in confusion, he found a handsome man standing above him, looking down with a teasing smile.
"This is the first time I've ever heard that Muggle policemen like fighting while lying on the grass."
But another man beside him, one with a much gentler appearance, bent down and offered him a hand.
"Hello, Sheriff. My name is Evans. I'm with the British Government's Joint Operations Office, ah, Military and Police Affairs Commissioner."
After witnessing the astonishing methods of the wizard beside him, and after the discomfort of being taken along in Apparition for the first time, Evans's complexion was not looking too good.
Still, the sheriff let out a long breath of relief and happily took Evans's hand to stand up.
He would rather face ten thousand people mocking him than see that ugly Giant again.
Only after he got to his feet did he realize that several more people had appeared out of nowhere. One man at the front was standing beside the Giant, curiously nudging it with his foot.
Meanwhile, a young girl nearby pointed curiously at the sheriff and the other two.
"Should I go Obliviate them? I only joined the Joint Office because I was working as an Obliviator!" Crystal asked eagerly.
Tver looked at the corpse before him and fell into thought.
"No need. Only these three saw what happened. Let Evans handle it. It'll be good practice for his ability to talk people into, or over, the truth."
"Huh?" Crystal blinked in confusion. This way of doing things went against everything she had learned in Obliviator Headquarters about the Statute of Secrecy.
But considering Tver's current status as a representative of the International Confederation of Wizards, she could not very well say anything.
Surely the International Confederation of Wizards would not take the lead in violating the Statute of Secrecy.
Still, for this operation they had only brought Evans as their one Muggle employee, while all the wizard staff had been mobilized. And yet after all this commotion, it had turned out to be just a single Giant.
As the Giant died, the dust hanging over the area gradually dispersed, revealing the original grassland, as well as the house that had been smashed into ruins by the Giant.
At that moment, Marvolio came over with keen interest and also gave the Giant's corpse a light kick.
With his extensive experience in killing, he immediately understood why Tver was confused.
"This was a living Giant?"
Having cast the Killing Curse himself, he knew perfectly well that this Giant was dead beyond doubt.
What he meant was that this Giant had not been turned into an Inferius as Tver had expected, but had instead been actively moving around in the dust, destroying things.
"Yes, so right now we have one piece of good news and one piece of bad news," Tver said helplessly.
"The good news is that, for some reason, the Giants haven't been turned into Inferius. At least, not all of them have been killed."
"But the bad news is that the Giants seem to have joined Voldemort's army. At least one of them has," Marvolio added precisely.
"But why would You-Know-Who let a Giant make such a huge commotion here?" Crystal asked in puzzlement.
"That's a question for Voldemort himself." Tver shrugged helplessly.