A certain Hogwarts professor of runes.

He vaguely remembered that there were seven Horcruxes in total, most of which were relics of the four leaders of Hogwarts. This corresponded to Harry and his friends' seven years of school life. Could it be that one was destroyed each year?

He knew about Ravenclaw's crown, Slytherin's locket, and Hufflepuff's cup. Logically speaking, Gryffindor's sword should also be a Horcrux.

Which one was destroyed last year? The first book seems to be called "Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone," so the Philosopher's Stone is a Horcrux?

Felix made irresponsible guesses.

The information he had was actually useless. First, you couldn't prove what you said because he didn't know where the Dark Lord had put the Horcruxes. Second, it was too taboo. Felix's background was questionable, and suddenly telling Dumbledore about the Horcruxes... Goodness, you've started researching Horcruxes, haven't you?

Therefore, he'll just let things take their course and at most offer some side support.

This can be considered a perk for his assistant (tool) Hermione Granger.

That's right, the assistant position has already been reserved for her, for reasons... well, it's hard to explain.

Two of the three remaining candidates have already dropped out: the Weasley twins approached him yesterday and withdrew voluntarily. They've been busy with Quidditch training this week and expect to spend every weekend on it for the next year.

Felix understood from their tone that they were implying he should put that guy named Wood in solitary confinement for a whole school year so they would have time to do other things.

Would he agree to this? A professor openly abusing his power for personal gain—does he even have the right to live a respectable life?

The main problem is that we couldn't agree on the terms; they were asking for too much time!

Even Snape wouldn't lock a student up for an entire school year for no reason.

This left Felix speechless. He had originally intended to repay Professor McGonagall's favor, but things had turned out this way.

Are there any other promising students in other colleges...?

Fortunately, Miss Granger is very reliable. I can run into her at the library every day, and you can tell she's working very hard; she even has dark circles under her eyes.

The next day, at the library.

It was another ordinary day. Felix picked out a book called "Secrets of Fighting" from the restricted section and devoured it with great interest.

This book primarily records the secrets of various duels among wizards throughout history. It's placed in the restricted section because it contains many explicit images. In an era when magical laws were lax, black magic flourished due to its rapid learning, immense power, and bizarre nature. Therefore, duels at that time were bloody, cruel, and even quite bizarre.

For example, what he was seeing now was a hapless wizard whose head had irreversibly "pumped up," not just swelled to the size of a pumpkin, but had completely turned into a "vegetative state."

Even more miraculously, this loser lived on and died three years later.

The book also contains a lot of fighting instruction, which is quite explicit. Felix even sees how to incorporate curses into ordinary spells.

New trick learned!

Around noon, Felix walked out of the library to enjoy his lunch.

Hermione on the other side hesitated for a moment, then decisively followed.

"Professor! Professor Hep."

Felix stopped in his tracks. "Is there something you need, Miss Granger?" He didn't tell Hermione that she was already the only candidate for assistant, and that learning more wouldn't be a bad thing.

"Well, I read in a book that some gifted wizards can hear things that others can't. Is that true?" Hermione asked, calming her breathing.

Felix was taken aback. Cleveland? But he quickly dismissed the far-fetched idea.

"Could you be more specific? The conditions you've given are too broad."

Hermione considered it carefully, seemingly organizing her thoughts, "It's a little story about a young wizard and...his father, who were copying documents in a castle when the young wizard suddenly heard something strange, while his father! knew nothing about it."

Why does Hermione keep pausing on the word "father"?

The thought flashed through his mind, and after a moment of serious consideration, Felix replied, "Many of the stories are actually made up, so what you hear may not be true. However, we can discuss it for now."

Hermione nodded happily.

“The first possibility is that the young wizard is lying, trying to get his father’s attention, which is common in the Muggle world,” Felix said, stating what he considered the most likely answer.

Seeing Hermione about to speak, he shook his head. "The second possibility is that they are copying some dangerous magical materials. You know, some ancient magical manuscripts contain magic or have been specially treated by their previous owners. If unqualified people touch them rashly, it can easily cause dangerous consequences."

Seeing Hermione deep in thought, he added, "There are quite a few books like that in the restricted section of Hogwarts."

However, they are all locked with magical chains, strictly forbidding young wizards from peeking at them—unless you obtain the professor's autograph.

“The third possibility,” Felix raised his voice slightly, “is that the young wizard has awakened some talent, such as prophecy, perception, or suddenly mastered a language.”

"Could you elaborate, Professor?"

"Well, as you know, some young wizards have special talents, such as animal affinity or exceptional talent in wandless spellcasting, while the rarer one is the talent for prophecy. Professor Trelawney's elders seem to have this talent... Oh, Trelawney is the Divination professor, you might take her class next year."

"As for language talent, it is often related to their ancestors. If their ancestors mastered mermaid language, this talent may be passed on to the next generation, or suddenly appear in their bloodline hundreds of years later."

Felix gave a casual example: "For instance, the little wizard in your story might have had ancestors who spoke mouse language, and he just happened to overhear a talkative Mr. Mouse rambling on that day."

Even after Professor Hyp had disappeared from sight, Hermione remained in her thoughts. Could it be that Harry had an ancestor who was a strange wizard who could talk like a mouse?

She was a little confused.

Chapter 23 Parsleyan, Diligent Hermione

"This is impossible!"

When Hermione relayed Felix's words to Harry and Ron, Harry angrily retorted.

He had no desire to admit that he had an ancestor who could understand the language of mice!

Harry felt his first week of school was absolutely terrible. He got locked up for driving across England, was deliberately staged an accident by Lockhart, had a bizarre encounter with photography enthusiast Colin, and then there was the grueling Quidditch training…

He was put in solitary confinement yesterday and had to write back to Lockhart's fans, one after another, for a full four hours!

That wasn't the worst of it. In Lockhart's office, he heard intermittent sounds, "Kill you... Tear... Death..."

When he told the two of them about it this morning, they looked at him as if he had finally gone mad. Hermione then volunteered to ask Professor Hyp, and the answer she received left him somewhat devastated.

“That’s not necessarily true, buddy. I’ve heard similar rumors,” Ron whispered, pulling a fat rat from his pocket. The rat looked rather listless. “You can try talking to Scabbers!”

Ron held Scabbers in both hands and presented them to Harry, his eyes filled with anticipation.

Harry had to look down and meet the mouse's gaze. "Can you understand what I'm saying?"

Banban rolled her eyes and turned away from him.

“Harry, stop talking like a human! You were just talking like a human,” Ron said.

Harry: "..." I know what you mean, but could you be a little more polite?

He tried more than ten more times, but the mouse didn't react at all. "It doesn't work!" he breathed a huge sigh of relief.

Fortunately, things didn't go as badly as they could have.

Hermione, watching the farce unfold, reminded him, "Harry, Professor Hyp was just giving an example; there are other possibilities."

Ron, however, had a different opinion: "Besides rats, what else is in the castle? It can't be just bugs, can it?"

This thought was even more terrifying. Harry shuddered and quickly racked his brains, trying to think of a way to change the subject.

"It might be a snake!"

"snake?"

Ron and Hermione fell silent, exchanging strange glances.

"You mean, you can talk to snakes?" Ron swallowed hard.

Harry didn't notice this; he excitedly recounted his experience of visiting the zoo and talking to a snake there before enrolling in school.

"A giant python is telling you it has never been to Brazil?" Ron's voice was very weak.

"What's so special about that? I bet a lot of people can do it! It's what Professor Hyp mentioned, that... talent!"

Ron didn't speak, but Hermione whispered, "Harry, talking to snakes is Salazar Slytherin's signature. This ability is called Parseltongue, which is why the symbol of Slytherin House is a snake."

“But I’m not,” Harry said, somewhat bewildered. But then he suddenly remembered that during his first year of house sorting, the Sorting Hat had strongly advised him to choose Slytherin. With that thought, Harry shut his mouth tightly.

“It’s alright, buddy.” Ron patted him on the shoulder casually. “Pure-blood wizards often intermarry. Maybe you’re Slytherin’s great-great-great-great-grandson…”

Seeing that Harry showed no signs of relaxing, he added in a low voice, "Really, if you really want to go into detail, most pure-blood wizarding families can be traced back to each other. I'm even related to the Malfoys."

"You and Malfoy?" Harry was shocked.

Ron shrugged. "There are only so many pure-blood wizards, so it's normal for them to intermarry. If you ask me, true pure-bloods are long gone; they wouldn't have survived to this day."

Harry finally calmed down.

“Harry, it’s best not to tell anyone about this,” Hermione advised.

Harry nodded, but he would never admit that he didn't want to be related to Slytherin.

Hermione steered the conversation back on track, saying, "Since you speak Parsley, the sound you heard that day was very likely a snake, perhaps moving along a crack in the wall."

In the little witch's mind, a snake is at most as thick as a wrist.

"But I heard it saying things like death, killing, and tearing you apart."

“Maybe it was hunting at the time? You know, catching mice and small insects or something like that,” Ron guessed.

Without evidence, the trio had no choice but to give up.

It's nothing serious anyway!

"Hermione, how's your paper coming along?" Harry asked.

"Oops!"

Hermione yelled and quickly left, leaving the two of them standing there in a daze.

“Has Hermione gone mad from reading too much lately? This is the first time I’ve seen her like this,” Ron said.

Harry shrugged.

library.

Hermione occupied a large table by herself, which was covered with thick books. In front of her was a parchment, and she was writing furiously.

There are less than ten hours until the library closes; I might have to stay up all night tonight.

"Come on, Hermione!" she cheered herself on.

So far, she has only managed to read twelve books, even with all her might. She has only skimmed through them and can only remember less than 50% of the content. This is very different from her usual habits, as she hasn't memorized any of them.

For the sake of her thesis, she had to reluctantly give up her reading habits. However, she has decided that after submitting the thesis, she will review the reading list again and memorize all the content.

She flipped through the pages of the book with a rustling sound, jotting down relevant arguments and evidence with a quill pen, completely absorbed in her work. She didn't even notice Mrs. Pince walking past her several times.

She stayed until closing time, finally finishing reading all 16 books. Carrying the remaining four books and a thick parchment, she yawned and staggered back to the common room.