Hogwarts: I am Snape

Chapter 29 Afternoon
In the afternoon, the warm sunlight slanted down the corridors of Hogwarts Castle.

Pandora walked briskly, leading Snape toward her laboratory.

Along the way, light spots filtered through the stained-glass windows, changing colors as they fell onto the stone brick floor.

She needed to make some preparations in the laboratory before going to see the unusual protective magic.

"Pandora, what kind of experiments have you been doing?"

"Recently, I've been researching a special topic: combining magic with plants. Sometimes, casting special spells on certain plants can produce surprisingly amazing effects."

"For example, if you cast 'Drowsy Whirlwind' on mistletoe, its corolla will release a captivating fragrance that will attract people to move closer without them noticing. After smelling it for a while, you will fall into a daze and have a warm dream."

"Last time I missed several days of classes like this, but luckily no one came looking for me, and when I went back it was as if nothing had happened."

"..."

After hearing this, Snape was at a loss for words.

A strange feeling welled up inside him; he found these things somewhat endearing, yet he also felt sorry for her.

“What is ‘Dumb Whirlwind’?” he asked softly.

“This is a spell I invented. I combined ‘Stupefy’ and ‘Tergeo’ to make ‘Stupe-Tergeo’.”

They chatted all the way up to the eighth floor of the castle without realizing it.

Snape looked up and saw the tapestry depicting the troll in a ballet tutu.

He couldn't help but raise an eyebrow: The ancient secret place of Hogwarts is so lively now?
“Wait for me a moment,” Pandora said to Snape after looking around.

She ran back and forth in the corridor, muttering to herself, "I want to do an experiment, I want to do an experiment..."

A moment later, Snape saw the smooth door on the white wall again.

He stepped forward first, opened the door, and stepped aside to let Pandora in.

It was a round circle, much smaller than the place where he had hidden things last time.

The room contained several large round tables, on which were placed glassware of various shapes and some papers. Near the window, there were also about a dozen kinds of colorful plants planted on the wall.

“Isn’t it amazing?” she said. “There’s a laboratory like this in the castle, and I’m the only one using it.”

“Yes, it’s amazing,” Snape agreed, not wanting to spoil her fun.

His eyes scanned the room, and he suddenly noticed that the papers on the table were several newspapers.

Why do you still have the Daily Prophet here?

“I use them to wrap up dragon droppings,” Pandora replied nonchalantly as she tidied the dishes on the table.

“That makes perfect sense,” Snape said, his lips twitching. “By the way, how did you find this place?”

“They wouldn’t let me do these things in the dorm, saying it was too dangerous,” Pandora said. “I wanted to find an empty classroom in the castle to do the experiments. But the professors didn’t really agree with me using those classrooms, so I had to keep changing locations. Once, Peeves even broke all the experimental materials I had collected.”

"Of course, things are fine once I get here, no one bothers me anymore."

She picked up a glittering crystal ball and said to Snape, "Look, this is a 'Resonance Crystal for Visibility.' Tap it with your wand and you'll see invisible things around you, like harassing flies or something."

“But be careful, using it for a long time will make your brain work slower and slower, like it’s going to freeze…” Pandora excitedly introduced her laboratory to Snape. Many things here were beyond Snape’s imagination. He really didn’t know how she made them.

"Alright, I need to prepare for the special explosion."

She laboriously lifted a plain-colored small bag from the ground, and took out several sets of bottles and jars and a brass balance from it. Amidst the swirling smoke, she began her preparations.

"Pandora, did you make this little bag yourself?"

Snape noticed the bag's unusually large capacity, which reminded him of the spatial artifact Hermione had prepared for the trio's nomadic life.

“What?” Pandora looked up, her hands still moving, and said, “Oh, you mean this? Yes, I made it with the Unseen Stretching Charm. Moving the lab would have been too painful without it.”

"Um, I was wondering if you could make something similar for me?"

Snape picked up a copy of the Daily Prophet from the table and, with a smirk, said it to her.

He suddenly felt that the room temperature seemed a bit high.

“Okay,” Pandora said quickly, almost without hesitation. “But this spell is very difficult to make. I tried many times before I could make this little bag. I don’t know when I will be able to make another one for you.”

“It’s alright, no rush,” Snape said cheerfully. “You can do it when you have time.”

Then, he leaned against the corner of the wall, unfolded the newspaper, and stopped disturbing Pandora's work.

This is a newspaper from April, and there's nothing noteworthy about it.

The newspaper was filled with news from the Ministry of Magic and gossip, and the entire paper did not touch on any magical theory, which shows that the author had no theoretical knowledge.

After reading it, Snape thought that the Daily Prophet was not a first-rate newspaper, but using it to wrap dragon dung was a good use of it.

Suddenly, in a small corner of the last page, he noticed the words "Muggle Prime Minister"—

The Minister of Magic and the New Muggle Prime Minister Successfully Meet:
"Recently, Minister for Magic Harold Mincan and the newly appointed Muggle Prime Minister James Harker held a friendly and in-depth meeting... The two sides exchanged views on a number of topics of common concern... During the meeting, both sides emphasized the importance of harmonious coexistence between wizards and Muggles... We believe that the current difficulties are temporary, and with the joint efforts of both sides, a new world full of harmony and prosperity will emerge..."

“Wait, James Harker…”

Snape picked up the newspaper he was about to put down again and stared intently at the common British name that was the same as Potter's, and the animated picture below it.

“James…Jim…Jim Hacker…”

"Holy crap!" He couldn't help but use force, tearing the newspaper in half with a "rip".

The new Muggle prime minister's face was still stiffly smiling on half of his face.

“What’s wrong, Severus?” Pandora asked.

“Nothing, nothing,” Snape folded the newspaper page and put it in his pocket. “What a wonderful world this is…”

“Yes, I think so too,” Pandora said without looking up as she continued mixing the colorful reagents.

Long afterward, Snape still clearly remembered that autumn afternoon in 1976, in the Room of Requirement, where Pandora was tinkering with her experimental apparatus, and he was flipping through the Daily Prophet beside her, feeling neither troubled nor even a shadow in his heart.

For many years afterward, he traveled tirelessly with little rest, and never again had such an afternoon.

(End of this chapter)