The Silent Bookstore Manager at Hogwarts

Of course, Ron and Hermione's thinking wasn't as agile as Harry's, but they did come up with some ideas. Some offensive spells were directly cast on the enemy pieces, but unsurprisingly, the statues were either completely unharmed or immediately restored to their original state. It seems that the person who designed the chessboard had considered that the players might influence the game through external forces, so they took special precautions.

"Harry, it's useless..." Ron complained. He watched as a stone statue that had just developed a crack repaired itself in the next second, as if only damage caused by one's own pieces could not be repaired.

"No, let's try a different approach. If we can't work out the rules by taking direct action... then how about letting the pieces do the work?"

Ron confused Harry. Wasn't Harry simply telling him to play chess normally and use his pieces to capture the opponent's pieces? Why was he making it sound so mystical?

"You see, for example..."

Harry brandished his wand, a fire igniting in his eyes—something Ron had never seen before… Then, the pawn at the very front of the chessboard was shattered by Harry's wand. Even Harry himself hadn't expected it to happen so smoothly, as if someone were helping him.

Hermione covered her mouth in shock when she saw her soldiers being destroyed by Harry. The three of them could only win with these pieces, but Harry suddenly weakened their fighting power as if he had gone mad.

Then, Harry scattered the bitter salt, and the stone soldier that Harry had shattered began to reassemble according to the rules. However, during this process, Harry's bitter salt merged into the soldier. Then, Harry raised his wand without uttering any spells, but the remaining two people felt the surging magic.

"What is that?"

Ron murmured, the reforged soldier was no longer the medieval infantryman wielding twin swords, he looked more like... Ron didn't know how to describe what he looked like.

"Isn't that an engineer?! Harry, how did you do that?!"

Hermione couldn't help but complain. In a game that looked like chess called Wizard's Chess, the appearance of a piece with clothing that looked like it came from modern warfare was just too outrageous. What's more, the chessboard seemed to actually acknowledge the piece's role.

"Hermione, we are wizards... Sometimes we can't be bound by common sense. Think about it again, isn't this piece still a piece on the chessboard?"

"That's true..."

Hermione felt like she had a lot of things stuck in her throat and could only swallow them down. She didn't even know how Harry managed to make the chessboard think that the piece was still a normal piece.

"That makes sense. Chess has a system of promoting pawns, so why can't Wizard Chess have a similar mechanism?"

Harry confidently began to persuade Hermione, making Hermione somewhat skeptical, but the idea of ​​a modern soldier mixed in with a group of medieval soldiers seemed too suspicious no matter how you looked at it.

However, Harry had no intention of explaining further. In fact, he was just trying it out. After all, if it didn't work, they could just stay put until Red arrived. Harry really didn't think Red would be stopped by Fluffy. Even Harry himself estimated that he could quickly subdue Fluffy with his minor injuries. How could Red, who always held back some strength during sparring, not be able to handle Fluffy?

So, the soldier dressed in modern soldier's uniform and carrying an entrenching tool was ordered forward by Ron. When the opposing soldier saw the entrenching tool enter its attack range, he had just drawn his twin swords when his head was chopped off with a single shovel. After eating the opposing soldier, the soldier even placed a landmine on the spot, prompting Hermione to complain that this was no longer a game of chess.

Of course, Ron was also deeply shocked by the mechanical monster chess pieces that Harry had modified. He had never fought such a rich battle in his life; it was as if he were fighting cavemen.

"Now I know why you don't play wizard chess with anyone else, Harry. Only Red can handle this kind of game, right?"

Ron grumbled. Many Gryffindors had tried to guess why Harry always just watched them play wizard chess. They thought Harry was either completely clueless and didn't want to embarrass himself, or he wasn't interested at all. But Ron now understood. Harry's wizard chess skills were far more terrifying than theirs. His games with Red using regular wizard chess had already demonstrated this, but no one had ever thought about it deeply.

Of course, Ron had his thoughts, but he still very happily smashed the enemy's king. To be honest, this was the most interesting game of Wizard Chess he had played recently. There was no strategy or thinking involved, only the thrill of overwhelming the opponent with mechanics and numbers.

So they went to the next room.

"What is this?"

The room was simply furnished with a wooden table and several bottles on it, each of which appeared to contain some liquid.

Ron knew almost nothing about potions, or rather, apart from barely managing to pass the final exams, he didn't understand most of what Snape taught in class. After all, Snape wasn't the kind of teacher who would take care of struggling students.

"Potion... If Red were here."

Harry sighed. His understanding of potions was only slightly better than Ron's; Hermione might know more. But Harry subconsciously felt that if Red were there, he could definitely solve the problem immediately, since Red's mastery of the Great Magic clearly had some connection to potion-making.

"It's alright... Leave this to me, let me take a look..."

Hermione glanced at the clues in the room. She vaguely felt that the handwriting was somewhat familiar, but at this point, she didn't have time to think about who had set up the test in the room. The only thing she could do was to find the potion that would allow them to pass through the black wall of fire.

"If all else fails, I have a few other methods I can try..."

"No, Harry, I've found the answer, but the problem is..." Hermione looked at the small vial in her hand with a troubled expression. The amount of this potion was probably only enough for one person to pass through the wall of fire and reach their destination, but that meant...

Harry showed no panic upon hearing the news; instead, he naturally took the medicine bottle from Hermione's hand.

"Wait for me to come back. If Red comes, just tell him what happened here."

After Harry finished speaking, he drank the potion and passed through the wall of fire.