Magical Studies at Hogwarts...

Chapter 206 People in Panic

"Hermione, are you... alright?"

As a friend, Harry felt it was necessary to check on Hermione, whose current state was clearly abnormal.

"It's nothing." Hermione shook her head, the emptiness in her eyes disappearing, replaced by a spark of life. Harry secretly breathed a sigh of relief. Just as he was about to say something more, Hermione slammed the newspaper on the table, pointing to the corner of page four, and said, "I think we should focus our attention on this..."

"What? I haven't seen it yet..." Harry leaned closer and read out each word carefully, "A Ministry of Magic employee died a violent death... Broderick Bodle is dead?"

"Broad? Who's that?" Ron asked.

“We saw him, in St. Mungo’s, remember?” Hermione whispered. “In the ward where Neville’s parents were, he was lying there staring at the ceiling. We also saw that plant on his bedside table; we thought it was a Christmas cactus, after all, nobody would have guessed it was Grimace…”

"Devil's Web... Damn it, we should have recognized him, we've seen him before... He didn't have to die," Ron said, somewhat annoyed.

"Without a doubt, this is a murder, a very clever murder," Hermione said.

As Harry listened to their conversation, he recalled the day he went to the Ministry of Magic for his trial, when he saw this person on the ninth floor of the elevator.

"I've met Baldr, with your father at the Ministry of Magic, the day I was tried..." Harry said slowly. Ron thought for a moment, then exclaimed in surprise, "I remember! My father mentioned him at home!"

"He's a taciturn man; he works for the Department of Mysteries!"

"The Department of Mysteries, where is that?" Harry asked.

Hermione rolled her eyes, propped up the newspaper to block their view, and whispered, "The Department of Mysteries is the most secretive place in the Ministry of Magic. The people who work there are the Silent Men, and everything they research is top secret!"

"Do you remember where Mr. Weasley was attacked?"

"I remember... it was the Department of Mysteries!" Harry suddenly remembered what they had overheard at St. Mungo's.

"That's right, obviously, this must have been done by... the mysterious man and his group. There's something he wants there... but what exactly does he want?" As she spoke, Hermione suddenly fell into deep thought, her hand unconsciously stroking the pendant on her chest, muttering something to herself.

Seeing this, Harry and Ron exchanged a glance, shrugged, and refocused their attention on the food in front of them. They were used to it; Hermione was like this when she was thinking this semester, and she'd be fine in a bit.

Before they had even taken a few bites, Hagrid walked in from outside, spoke a few words to Dumbledore at the professors' table, and then left. Seeing this, Harry and Ron quickly ran over and called to Hagrid. Upon closer inspection, they discovered that Hagrid's previous facial injury hadn't fully healed, and now he had several new wounds.

"Hello." Hagrid tried to smile, but the movement aggravated the wound on his face.

"Are you alright?" Harry stepped aside to make way for a few Hufflepuff students, his face full of worry.

"It's nothing, everything's fine." Hagrid's expression looked very unnatural. "I'm just very busy, you know... preparing lessons, teaching classes, and I've even been placed on probation..."

"To be kept on probation!"

"Yes," Hagrid sighed, "that's to be expected. The results of the last investigation weren't very good... Anyway, I have things to do. Goodbye, Harry, Ron..."

Watching Hagrid's departing figure, Harry felt that he must have had a lot to say, and it didn't seem like good news.

In the following days, everyone was talking about Ike's attack on Azkaban and rescue of more than a dozen Death Eaters, and all sorts of unreliable speculations emerged. Some said that Ike wanted to become the new Dark Lord, which was why he rescued the Death Eaters; others said they had seen those people in Hogsmeade; and some even speculated that they were hiding in the Shrieking Shack, just like Sirius Black had done.

Rumors spread like wildfire, causing widespread panic, especially among those raised in wizarding families. Their ancestors, even those two generations prior, had experienced that dark period, some even having relatives killed by the escaped Death Eaters. Such news couldn't be kept secret; within days, everyone knew who had experienced it.

This undoubtedly caused them great distress.

The young hawks were also suffering, especially Stuart and others in the same year as Ike. They became the center of attention, with large groups of people secretly glancing at them and whispering nonsense wherever they went. Some said they were Ike's spies at Hogwarts, while others called them lackeys; in short, nothing nice was said, and everything was extremely offensive.

Faced with such stares and comments, Stewart almost lost his temper several times, but Terry and the others stopped him each time.

"When I see him again, I'm going to give him a good beating!"

"Count me in, even if we combined still can't beat him..."

Thinking of this, Stewart and his companions couldn't help but feel downcast. Looking at those who were looking at them with strange eyes, they couldn't help but feel a pang of pity: these people had no idea how terrible it would be if it were really as the newspapers described...

Gradually, at some point, the topic of conversation changed. Someone collected the Daily Prophet from the past six months, studied it carefully, and concluded that the Ministry of Magic had been lying all along. This argument quickly gained widespread support and spread throughout the school.

So why would the Ministry of Magic lie? People quickly realized that what Harry and Dumbledore had been saying since last year was true—Voldemort was back!

Panic ensued, and people became even more anxious. Stuart and his friends, on the other hand, fared much better; almost no one looked at them strangely anymore.

Just when everyone thought things couldn't get any worse, they realized they had been too naive. After canceling numerous clubs, associations, and societies, vetting professors, and restricting Defense Against the Dark Arts to books, Umbridge further deprived them of their right to freely discuss matters. Although Education Decree No. 26 only prohibited professors from telling students information unrelated to their courses, in practice, even conversations among students were forbidden.

In just a few days, Umbridge indiscriminately arrested several students for whispering in the corridors, even those arguing about trivial matters like whether lamb or beef was tastier, and placed them in solitary confinement. A few days later, several more unfortunate students appeared, their arms covered in blood.

Harry and his friends escaped unscathed, and Umbridge doesn't seem to be paying much attention to him lately. She's been frequently seen in Magical Creatures Protection and Divination classes, seemingly weighing which student to expel to demonstrate her authority.

"A promising young wizard went astray due to poor upbringing, leading to this extremely damaging incident..." Fudge's words in the interview undoubtedly emboldened Umbridge, making her even more insane.

(End of this chapter)