Hogwarts Raven's Claw

Chapter 288 Warriors

“Ding~Ding~Ding”

The hall fell silent as Dumbledore tapped the plate gently.

Everyone in the faculty seats was as nervous as the students below, except for Crouch, the head of the Cooperation Department, who looked a little uninterested, or even a little bored.

"Well, the Goblet of Fire is about to make a decision." Dumbledore stood up and walked to the Goblet of Fire. "Listen, after the names of the champions are announced, I want them to go to the top of the hall and then walk along the staff seats to the room over there. We will give them preliminary guidance there later."

After saying this, Dumbledore took out his wand and waved it vigorously.

All the candles were extinguished instantly, the Goblet of Fire became the only source of light, and the auditorium suddenly fell into a state of semi-light and semi-darkness.

Suddenly, the light in the Goblet of Fire began to bloom, and the blue-white flames that were emitting sparks were even dazzling.

"Right away!"

Franklin spoke in a low voice, and he even held his breath on purpose, as if he was afraid that his breathing too heavily would blow out the flame in the Goblet of Fire.

The flame in the Goblet of Fire suddenly turned red, and a tongue of fire suddenly shot up as sparks flew, followed by a half-burnt parchment flying out.

Dumbledore waved his hand gently, and the parchment flew obediently into his hand.

"The champion of Durmstrang." Dumbledore deliberately kept it a secret. Karkaroff was sweating anxiously. "It's Viktor Krum!"

"Phew! I knew it would be him!"

Karkaroff let out a long breath, clapped his hands and spoke excitedly to Snape beside him.

But Snape moved aside in disgust.

At this time, applause and cheers had swept the entire hall. Mike saw Krum stand up from the Slytherin table and listlessly walked to the next room according to Dumbledore's previous instructions.

"They don't seem surprised at all." Franklin said to Mike while clapping, "I don't understand, if they knew from the beginning that the Warriors would be Krum, then why did they come here, travel?"

Following Franklin's gaze, Mike saw the Durmstrang students with Slytherin looks.

They seemed to have anticipated this result and did not show any emotion of losing. After applauding, they continued to eat with their heads down.

"I think you might be right," Mike said.

At this time, the second piece of parchment also jumped out of the Goblet of Fire under the push of the flame.

"The champion of Beauxbatons," said Dumbledore, "is Fleur Delacour!"

There was another round of deafening applause and cheers. Amid the cheers, the elf-like girl Fleur stood up gracefully, shook her silver hair, and walked lightly between Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff.

Where she had been sitting originally, the unsuccessful Beauxbatons girls all hung their heads, looking unhappy, and some even burst into tears.

"Oh! That's the right reaction!"

Once again, Franklin expressed his opinion.

But this time no one had time to respond to him. Now everyone's attention was focused on the flames. Everyone knew that the next one would be the Hogwarts warrior's turn!

"boom!"

Along with the sound of flames erupting, another piece of parchment spewed out from the Goblet of Fire.

Dumbledore held the parchment in his hand, a smile appeared on his face, then he quickly tightened his expression and said in a serious tone:

"The champion of Hogwarts is Mike Townley!"

"I knew it! I knew you could do it!"

Penelope hugged Mike and spoke loudly, but Mike couldn't hear what she was saying because the cheers around him were deafening.

Every Ravenclaw student was jumping up and down, screaming and stamping their feet. Even Professor Flitwick, who was sitting in the staff seat, slammed the table and shouted "good", which scared Professor McGonagall next to him.

In contrast, the Hufflepuff table was dead silent, and all the students looked lost.

As the saying goes, the greater the hope, the greater the disappointment.

If they hadn't seen hope, they could still celebrate the winner as usual, but now...

"call!"

Cedric sighed deeply, stretched out his trembling hands, pushed away the classmate who was patting his back to comfort him, and stood up.

Applauded.

He clapped very hard, and the sound was particularly loud in the silence of Hufflepuff.

All the Hufflepuffs looked at him in surprise, but then, everyone seemed to understand what Cedric meant, and they all stood up and began to applaud Mike.

"Hey! Mike!"

Cedric suddenly yelled.

Mike, who was walking towards the next door, heard the noise here.

Turned his head.

"Don't embarrass me! You must win the Tri-Wizard Cup!"

Mike smiled and gave a thumbs up, pointing at Cedric!

"Oh, that's so touching! Cedric!"

Professor Pomona Sprout was wiping her tears with a handkerchief. As the head of Hufflepuff, she felt a little disappointed that Cedric failed to become a warrior. But seeing Cedric's performance at this moment, she couldn't help but shed tears.

Dumbledore was also applauding, he was proud that Hogwarts had two such outstanding students.

"See what I said, Cedric can never be a warrior!"

Ron said to Hermione smugly.

However, Hermione's eyes were already blurred with tears at this moment, and she had no intention of paying the slightest attention to Ron.

"Don't say that, Ron." Harry continued, "You can see that Harry and Cedric are good friends. They won't care no matter who becomes the champion."

After saying that, Harry lowered his head.

He didn't even register this time.

It's not that he doesn't want to, but Dumbledore won't let him.

This made him very depressed.

It's not that he wanted to be the Hogwarts Warrior either, he knew that with Mike and Cedric around, there was no way he would be chosen as the Warrior.

But Dumbledore's behavior still made him very depressed.

Ron immediately realized that his words had affected Harry. Just as he was about to comfort him, the light around him suddenly brightened again.

Ron turned around in a daze, and saw that another piece of parchment was spit out from the Goblet of Fire.

Dumbledore instinctively reached out to take the parchment and looked at it.

Then, as if he couldn't believe his eyes, he adjusted his reading glasses on his nose, and moved the parchment farther away so that he could see it more clearly.

Then he seemed to have finally accepted the fact, and with his mouth slightly opened, he looked at Harry who was sitting at the Gryffindor table in surprise and said:
"Harry Potter."

As soon as these words were spoken, the entire auditorium was in an uproar.

"Dumbledore! What's going on!"

"Yes, could you please explain to me why there are two warriors in Hogwarts!?"

Karkaroff and Maxim had gloomy faces and immediately stood up to accuse Dumbledore.

"Please be patient, we will talk about this later." Dumbledore pursed his lips, turned to Harry and said, "Harry, go next door first."

Harry still had a dazed look on his face, as if he hadn't heard anything.

On the contrary, Ron, who was standing next to him, was so excited that he immediately hugged Harry and shouted:
"Harry is a warrior! Harry is a warrior too!"

The surrounding Gryffindors finally reacted and began to cheer.

Harry was pushed out by the crowd.

He walked forward blankly, his cheeks burning.

When he came close to Dumbledore, he turned around and explained to Dumbledore anxiously:

"Professor Dumbledore, I did not..."

"Okay, go in first." Dumbledore interrupted him and pointed to the door not far away. "We will deal with this later."

Looking at Dumbledore's somewhat serious expression, Harry felt extremely aggrieved. Trying hard not to let his tears flow down, he turned around and walked to the next room.

At the same time, in the next room.

"Mike! I knew it would be you!"

Furong hugged Mike warmly and gave him a kiss on the cheek.

Mike felt Furong's cheeks were hot. He must have felt that after being chosen as a warrior, her mood at the moment was not as calm as she had shown before.

"Thank you." After greeting Fleur with a smile, Mike turned his gaze to Krum who was keeping his head down and not speaking. "Krum, it's nice to meet you. Your performance in the Quidditch World Cup was wonderful."

Krum, whose name was called, raised his head and looked at Mike with some surprise. He quickly stood up and said in halting English:
"Nestumite oil!"

"Honestly, I think you're a very talented Quidditch player." Mike continued, "Are you interested in cooperating with my Los Santos Group? You can be our spokesperson."

"Emm, three grams of oil! Three grams of oil!"

Krum had an awkward smile on his face, and Mike realized that he didn't understand what he had just said at all.

"Okay, ignore him." Fleur pulled Mike's arm, "Come on, tell me in detail, what happened after you were taken away by the Ministry of Magic that day?"

Mike gave Krum an apologetic look before being pulled away by Fleur.

Krum exhaled deeply, wiped the sweat from his forehead, and sat back in his seat.

Mike and Furong were chatting intermittently, but their eyes were always glancing towards the door.

Furong did not notice his absent-minded look. It was not that Furong had a low EQ, but that she was too nervous at the moment and was only concerned with talking incessantly to divert her stress.

With a creak, the door was pushed open again, and Harry, with a dazed look on his face, finally walked in.

"Oh, they asked us to come over, didn't they?"

Fleur smiled, she mistook Harry for a messenger.

However, Harry did not respond, but stared at Mike blankly, as if he was looking at his only life-saving straw.

Tears welled up in his eyes, but he forced himself to hold them back.

Harry wanted to explain everything to Mike in one breath, but his throat felt very sore. He opened his mouth for a long time before he uttered two words with a tearful tone.

“Mike…”

"Oh, Harry." Mike quickly broke free from Fleur's hand, came to Harry's side, and secretly handed him a handkerchief, "What's wrong with you?"

Blocked by Mike's tall figure, neither Krum nor Fleur could see Harry.

At this moment, Harry's tears finally fell.

He took the handkerchief handed to him by Mike and wiped it silently, while his other hand gestured in the air and he kept muttering:

"I didn't... didn't... really..."

At this time, the door was opened again, and Ludo Bagman walked in with steady steps.

Harry seemed to not want them to see him crying, so he wiped his face with a handkerchief.

"Gentlemen, and this lady. Although it is hard to believe, I will still introduce her to you." Ludo Bagman put his hand on Harry's shoulder with a smile on his face and spoke slowly, "This is the fourth champion of the Triwizard Tournament, Harry Potter."

When Ludo said Harry's name at the end, he emphasized the pronunciation, as if he was introducing a finale character.

Mike looked at Ludo deeply and said nothing.

Furong beside her was immediately furious. She shook her long hair and said with a sweet smile:

"That's a funny joke, Mr. Bagman."

"A joke?" Bagman repeated. "No, no, no, this is not a joke. The Goblet of Fire chose Harry. Hehehe!"

"This is obviously a mistake. Each school can only have one champion. Hogwarts already has Mike, how can there be another Harry?"

"At this point, ma'am, I advise you to accept the facts." Ludo said meaningfully, "The decision of the Goblet of Fire cannot be questioned by anyone."

At this moment, the door of the room was pushed open again, and Dumbledore and a large group of people walked in one after another.

"Professor Maxim!" Furong rushed to their headmaster's side, "They said this little boy is also going to participate in the competition!"

Hearing this, Harry clenched his fists suddenly and glared at Fleur with his red eyes, obviously angry at the three words "little boy".

Ms. Maxime, the tallest among the crowd, had her chest heaving violently. She suppressed her anger and said to Dumbledore:
"What the hell is going on, Dumbledore!"

"I would like to know that, too, Dumbledore." Karkaroff sneered. "Hogwarts has two champions? I don't remember anyone telling me that the organizers could have two champions!"

Dumbledore ignored the two men's questions. He slowly came to Harry, squatted down, looked directly into Harry's eyes and said:

"Harry, I remember I warned you not to put notes in the Goblet of Fire."

"I didn't!" Harry was anxious all of a sudden, tears appeared in his eyes again, "I swear I didn't, really!"

"You're lying!" Snape stood out from the crowd, "Don't think you can fool everyone! You have been breaking school rules since the first year, and you must have used some tricks this time!"

"I don't!"

Harry's eyes were fixed on Snape, as if he was about to rush towards him with blood.

However, he was held tightly by Mike beside him.

"Calm down, Harry!" Mike whispered, and then turned his gaze to Maxim and Karkaroff, "The decision of the Goblet of Fire cannot be questioned. At this point, you only have two choices, either participate or admit defeat and withdraw!"

(End of this chapter)