The Shopkeeper of All Worlds in the British Wizarding World

Chapter 360: Number 12, Grimmauld Place (Please subscribe, please bookmark, please vote)
After counseling Percy, Ryan went home with Hermione while eating raspberry jam ice cream. The next morning, the two threw their luggage into the space bag and left home for Sirius' ancestral home.

Grimmauld Place is located in a decaying neighborhood in London, so there are not many people coming and going. For safety reasons, Ryan and Hermione got off the bus one stop away from Grimmauld Place. Before that, the two used the Faceless Man's ability to make up as two ordinary middle school students with Eastern European looks.

Thanks to the rich variety of cosmetics in the modern world, they have unprecedented convenience in disguise, such as various foundations, colored contact lenses, etc., plus some strange potions similar to hair dye. With the help of these things, no one can recognize that the boy with brown hair, green eyes and Caucasian face is Ryan.

"Your look is really unique," said the blonde Hermione as she walked along the sidewalk. "Where did you learn that quick hair dye?"

"In a previous book," Ryan said, "Originally this was a failed potion because it could only last for half an hour. But I thought it could be used to quickly disguise myself. After trying it, I found that it was indeed more convenient than the potion used by the Faceless Men. Well, this should be the place."

"This place looks pretty shabby," Hermione said after looking around.

Her assessment was accurate. The houses around the square were all shabby. Some of the houses had broken windows that gleamed bleakly in the sunlight. Paint was peeling off many doors, and several of the front steps were filled with garbage. A pungent odor of rotting garbage emanated from the bulging garbage bags in the dilapidated gates.

The two began to recall the contents of Dumbledore's note. Just as they thought of No. 12 Grimmauld Place, a shabby door suddenly appeared between No. 11 and No. 13, followed by dirty walls and gloomy windows. It looked like an extra house suddenly expanded and squeezed out the things on both sides. Finally, a house that looked very old appeared there.

"Who?" When they walked up the broken stone steps and grabbed the silver door knocker in the shape of a coiled snake and knocked on the old door with peeling black paint and scratches all over it, a vigilant voice came from inside. Ryan recognized it as Sirius' voice.

"Ryan Liang and Hermione Granger." Ryan said standing at the door.

"Lian, tell me where you first met me?" Sirius asked vigilantly. It seemed that this place, as the headquarters of the Order of the Phoenix, had entered a state of war.

"In the common room at Hogwarts," Ryan replied. "I knocked you out while fighting."

"Correct, but you really don't need to explain that in such detail." Sirius opened the door, and two unfamiliar faces wearing ordinary middle school uniforms appeared in front of him.

"Don't worry, it's really us." Ryan said, taking out the blue contact lenses from his eyes.

"Come in!" Sirius made way for him. "It's good to be cautious. No wonder Moody praised you for being suitable to be an Auror. By the way, you two follow me and don't touch anything." Sirius led the way.

As Ryan entered the dark hallway, he smelled a damp, gray smell, and a sweet, rotten smell. The smell grew stronger as he followed Sirius into the house, giving the impression that the place was an abandoned, empty house. The hallway was long and in the style of a typical Victorian house. The peeling wallpaper and the frayed carpet gave a glimpse of the house's former glory. A spiderweb-like chandelier flickered overhead, and portraits hung crookedly on the walls, blackened by age. Ryan heard what sounded like some small animal scurrying behind the skirting. The chandelier and the candelabra on a rickety table next to it were both shaped like large snakes.

"You're here early. The Weasleys may not arrive until the afternoon." Sirius introduced them as he led them into the room. "Because all of us except me are Slytherins, this house is full of pure-blood style. I don't like it here. If Dumbledore didn't need a safe place, I would never come back here."

"By the way, is there anything we can do?" Ryan asked, looking at the dilapidated house. It looked very bad here, and there was not even a clean piece of ground.

"You just arrived, I thought you might need to rest first." Sirius said a little embarrassedly. After all, this was his house, and it was really embarrassing to expose it in such a messy state in front of the guests.

"It's okay. We're all well rested and ready to work." Hermione said in an energetic tone, "Okay, tell us what you need us to do."

"Well, this--" "Sirius, let the children clean up the kitchen and guest rooms first. Everyone will move in slowly, and you have to provide them with a place to cook and sleep." At this time, a middle-aged man with graying hair walked down from upstairs.

"Professor Lupin." Ryan and Hermione immediately recognized who this man was and greeted him.

"I'm sorry to ask you to start working right away, but there's nothing we can do about it." Lupin said gently. "No one has lived here for ten years, ever since Sirius' mother died. There's only a crazy and very old house-elf left in this house. We have to at least clean up the house to a level where it's habitable. Of course, I'll help you clean up the house, so you don't have to worry about getting hurt by the unknown."

"Okay, but you just said there are house-elves--" Ryan asked, because the house-elves he had seen before would clean up the places they served, and their magic was enough to allow them to complete most of the housework even when they were very old.

"Don't mention it." Sirius looked disgusted. "Kreacher can do things that will surprise you if he wants to. But he has been driven crazy by my mother and her portrait. Now he won't do any housework except cursing me madly and doing some weird things. All the housework these two days is mainly done by Lupin."

Ryan thought it was a good thing that Lupin moved in. As a real single man, Lupin had strong self-care ability and top-notch housework skills, which allowed Sirius to live a normal life these days.

"Okay, our first step is to clean up the kitchen. I cleaned up a small space for cooking two days ago, but that's far from enough. Everyone will come here one after another today, and we must clean up the entire kitchen as soon as possible to welcome the guests." Lupin went downstairs and started to arrange tasks. As an excellent student and class leader in the school, his organizational ability is much better than that of Sirius, the famous troublemaker.

"No problem." Ryan and Hermione first took the luggage out of the space bag and put it in the living room, then followed Lupin to the kitchen.

(End of this chapter)