Hogwarts: This professor is too Muggle.

Chapter 193 The Golden Cup Incident
It was 1:30 PM, lunchtime had already passed.

Melvin did not go to the Great Hall for lunch. Instead, at the invitation of the fat monk, he stayed in the Hufflepuff lounge and had lunch with Hannah, Rolf, Ernie, and Justin, a few young wizards.

No need for house-elves to deliver food. Just turn right after leaving the common room, scratch the pear on the fruit painting, and the kitchen is right there. Help yourself to whatever you want to eat. Everything is freshly cooked. The cream of mushroom soup is steaming hot and still bubbling, and the fat on the grilled steak is still sizzling.

If you find the roast meat and cream soup too sweet, there's a greenhouse orchard right outside the window, almost the size of a third greenhouse, where you can always find seasonal, ripe fruits. Freshly picked, green, pesticide-free, refreshing and not greasy, you can even drink the dew on them.

To truly experience the unique charm of Hufflepuff, it's best to wait until Cedric and his friends win the Quidditch match, or after the final exams, when the prefects will take everyone out for a bonfire party.

Students with good cooking skills are in charge of grilling the meat, and they can get the ingredients from the kitchen next door. If they don't want to do it themselves, they can ask their house-elves.

Unfortunately, Hufflepuff students are generally not competitive, and they rarely win the Quidditch trophy or the House Cup, only able to look forward to the annual final exams. In some ways, they love studying even more than Ravenclaws.

Led by the fat monk and the students, Melvin explored almost the entire lounge, except for the girls' dormitory.

Leaving the common room and entering the underground greenhouse, walk along the lawn path deeper into the greenhouse. After about half a mile, you will see a small irrigation ditch, only knee-deep, which is diverted from Black Lake. It is mainly used to irrigate this greenhouse and is occasionally used by students to play. There is a wooden bust of Mrs. Hufflepuff by the ditch.

Melvin stopped here.

Unlike the wizard statues in the castle, this statue was exceptionally rough, with almost no visible facial details. The features of the eyebrows, eyes, nose, and mouth were all blurry, and it could only be vaguely discerned from the outline that it was a short, stout witch. There were no mottos or proverbs on the base either.

If the fat monk hadn't introduced him as Professor Sprout, Melvin wouldn't have thought anything was wrong.

Perhaps because it was Hufflepuff territory, Melvin was secretly thinking to himself when the Headmaster of Hufflepuff sensed him. The moment he had a thought of offending someone, Professor Sprout appeared behind him.

“Melvin!” Professor Sprout, dressed in a brown-green gardener’s suit and carrying a wicker basket, waved to him happily. “Would you like to come to our lounge?”

“This is my first time here, and the fat monk is my guide.” Melvin looked at the basket she was carrying, which contained a plant specimen with lanceolate leaves and a blurry human figure on the rootstock. “Is this a mandrake specimen?”

“That’s right, I’m using it to decorate the lounge,” Sprout explained enthusiastically. “It’s not fully made yet. Once it’s dried and absorbs the sun’s magic, it will come back to life and sing and dance again. But the weather has been bad lately, with constant rain, so I can only bring it here to dry.”

She pointed to the dome of the underground greenhouse. Like the magical dome of the auditorium, the ceiling here could also mimic the weather, but it was always sunny here.

Melvin felt that Hufflepuff was very different from the other houses. The heads of other houses always avoided appearing in the common room, generally considering it the students' space, but Hufflepuff had no such barriers at all.

"The mandrakes at school are almost ripe. There are still some left over from your last purchase. I transplanted them into the third greenhouse, and they seem to be showing signs of mating..."

Melvin listened quietly with a smile as Sprout rambled on about the interesting things about the plants in the greenhouse.

The little girl named Hannah, standing by the irrigation ditch, was holding freshly picked strawberries, still a pale greenish-white color. She wasn't shy at all when she saw the dean. She greeted the two professors, squatted down to rinse the unripe strawberries, and skipped away.

"Brother, Professor, are you familiar with Lady Hufflepuff's life story?"

"We only know what's recorded in the school's history."

"Do you know anything about the Golden Cup?"

"You mean the founder's relics?" "Yes, the sword and crown possess incredible magic. Aren't you curious about the unique magic of the golden cup left behind by Hufflepuff?"

Professor Sprout fiddled with the specimens, not surprised that Melvin wanted to know about them, and casually said with a smile, "The golden cup was originally used by house-elves to hold food, perhaps to make the food taste better?"

The fat monk nodded thoughtfully, seemingly agreeing with the guess.

Compared to the creations of the other three founders, the Golden Cup is like Hufflepuff House, accepting students that other houses are unwilling to accept. It doesn't have any particularly outstanding characteristics, but when you look closely, its gentle yet resolute power is hard to ignore.

Melvin stood beside the canal, sunlight streaming down through the clouds, the water reflecting shifting light and shadow. He turned to look at the indistinct statue, as if he could see a kind and powerful witch from a thousand years ago, smiling at them across the river of time.

A slight thought struck him; perhaps the Hufflepuff statue was giving him a hint, or perhaps he had simply found the right direction.

……

at dusk.

Hufflepuff's golden cup sat on the young professor's desk, its smooth surface reflecting the flickering candlelight.

The glass was filled with water, reflecting the young snake bowing its head and flicking its tongue, as well as the young professor at the table. Melvin stood steadily, his hands on the table, watching the snake's reflection in the glass.

Yulm turned to look at him, then looked up and let out a soft bark: "Woof?"

"When I visited the Hufflepuff lounge, something suddenly occurred to me. Under normal circumstances, the sword and the crown do not reveal any strange magic. I don't know much about the crown, but it is probably related to wisdom. The Gryffindor sword only recognizes true warriors."

Melvin explained softly, "So I was thinking that to unleash the true magic of the Golden Cup, it also needs to be recognized by it."

Unlike Gryffindor, Hufflepuff's overall qualities cannot be summarized by a single adjective. They are hardworking, loyal, fair, and inclusive, and have a close connection to the earth and food...

Melvin did not consider himself a wizard like Sprout, but he had the impression of an animal with similar qualities, and he happened to have the blessing of that animal within him.

With calm breathing, he placed his hands on the base of the golden cup, channeling the unique magic from the unicorn and slowly pouring it into the cup.

The golden cup overflowed with iridescent light, dazzling and radiant yet not at all blinding. The light blended into the clear water, transforming into a soft, milky white. The water turned into a liquid similar to milk, silky and delicate, but not as thick, its texture remaining largely unchanged.

Melvin could smell a scent similar to senna extract, and he guessed it was some kind of medicinal liquid. But before he could examine it closely, thin, black threads suddenly emerged from the bottom of the glass, swirling along the glass like serpents.

As the black color gradually spread, the milky white liquid began to bubble, eventually turning into a cup of grayish-tin-colored unidentified liquid, resembling fermented cheese and emitting a faint fishy odor.

Yulm turned his head away in disgust, distancing himself from the golden cup.

“Voldemort…” Melvin muttered, frowning.

(End of this chapter)