A certain Hogwarts professor of runes.

In other words, the number is uncertain, and it's also uncertain whether the number has been completed. Felix thought of a number, seven, but he didn't say it. It would be useless to say it; Dumbledore still had to explore and verify it himself.

However, he thought of something: "Ravenclaw's crown, Slytherin's locket, Hufflepuff's cup... Dumbledore, could Gryffindor's sword also be a Horcrux?"

Dumbledore shook his head. "I happen to know where the sword is. Voldemort didn't get it."

As Felix stepped out of the office, a light rain began to fall. He walked on the damp earth, still recalling the Hufflepuff Cup that Dumbledore had just transformed into.

Dumbledore's words were a bit harsh: "It's strange, but I feel like you and Voldemort really have some kind of connection. Maybe you'll run into other Horcruxes in the future. I'd better let you see what the Golden Cup looks like."

Felix couldn't help but think to himself, "You're the one who's destined to be with him. Is Dumbledore planning to give him the job of dealing with Voldemort?"

Chapter 307 Portrait

The next morning, a torrential downpour began, with lightning flashing across the dark sky from time to time.

Felix stood by the window, watching the heavy rain fall like layers of curtains, blurring the distant Forbidden Forest. His right hand held a palm-sized, colorless, transparent spherical vortex, within which a shrunken Dementor spun lightly.

After a while, he returned to the house. The vortex gradually dissipated, and his hand gleamed slightly with silver light as he grabbed the Dementor.

After fiddling with it for a while, I casually slipped it into the ring.

……

In class, the young wizards were visibly downcast due to the weather, especially when Felix asked them to hand in their assignments. Through the window, he saw a group of students lining up in the pouring rain to go to the greenhouse for their herbalism class. One unlucky student slipped into the mud but was immediately washed away by the rain.

“Alright, students,” Felix said, looking at the fourth-year students below, “I’ve put together the 227 ancient runes you need to master this school year into sentences, so your task from here on out is quite clear—”

"I need you to remember these seventeen sentences."

Felix said uncertainly, "It shouldn't be too difficult, at least it's easy for me. We'll start from the first sentence, it's all knowledge I've already learned..."

At noon, Felix heard many interesting stories while having lunch in the auditorium.

The Quidditch final is just around the corner, this Saturday, the day he and Sirius agreed to meet. The two favorites to win, Slytherin and Gryffindor, are fierce rivals. Besides Wood loudly praising the superior performance of Firebolt, a little girl can often be seen swaggering by on a large snake, attracting the attention of passing wizards.

However, just a few days later, several senior Ravenclaw students "accidentally" passed by the open space with a seven-foot-long eagle, attracting a crowd of onlookers.

The Hufflepuff wizards have kept a low profile, which may be related to their early exit from this year's trophy race – they suffered a crushing defeat to Ravenclaw in a crucial match.

However, this did not dampen the enthusiasm of the young badgers. After only two days of disappointment, their captain took the lead in supporting the Ravenclaw team and declared that they were in excellent form and were strong contenders for the championship.

Besides these, Harry's Patronus, Felix burning the Dementors, and Minister of Magic Fudge's disheveled departure from the school were the hottest topics. Any one of them would spark a discussion that would last for several minutes. Felix even saw a Hufflepuff student and his companion arguing about whether Fudge would resign, forgetting to eat and having to rush to Potions class with two pies.

'Severus has a very keen sense of smell. If he finds out…' Felix shook his head, secretly memorizing the student's appearance, preparing to see if he would be put in solitary confinement.

That afternoon, Dumbledore brought back Sirius Black's innocence certificate. "The warrant has been withdrawn, but I don't expect the Ministry of Magic to publicize its mistake so openly. Hodge's case has also been taken over by Wizengamor, and there's also Buckbeak's verdict."

Felix glanced at the conclusion at the bottom of the document: "Accidental injury, fine of five hundred Galleons." He smiled slightly. "The Ministry of Magic was very efficient this time; it had been dragging on for quite a while before."

Dumbledore blinked. "I told Fudge that you were Hagrid's lawyer... and he immediately let him go."

However, he immediately said in a deep voice, "Based on my understanding of Fudge, this is only a temporary compromise. I don't want you to underestimate him because of his poor behavior these past two days. His advantage is not in his strength."

Felix's joking expression vanished, and he nodded seriously. Ultimately, what happened yesterday was because he had demonstrated formidable strength and was in the right, leaving Fudge with no chance of gaining an advantage, which is why he quickly compromised.

But if you really think he was intimidated by your strength and then try to intimidate him with your power in every way, that's more likely to cause resentment and trouble.

If Fudge is really pushed to the limit, he might resort to a desperate, all-or-nothing tactic, sending out all the Aurors and strikers. Does he really want Felix to become a demon king and slaughter the wizarding world? Don't even think about it; Dumbledore would be the first to object.

So now that Fudge has shown goodwill, Felix has to appreciate it, even though he's not entirely comfortable with it.

If yesterday's events had any impact on him, it made him more eager to make some changes—not to change himself, but to change everything he saw. He was like a painter who saw a stain on his canvas and felt an urge to turn the stain into a more beautiful picture.

In the evening, there was an unfinished letter on the table, which began like this—

'Dear Andy, I have given serious consideration to your suggestion and believe that I should be more actively involved. I am preparing to start a company—'

The letter ended abruptly there; the ink had long since dried and even blurred due to the damp air outside, demonstrating how long Felix had been thinking.

"Let's wait and think it over..."

Felix crumpled the parchment into a ball, flicked it gently, and the parchment transformed into a firebird that flew out the window, turning into wisps of ashes.

“I think you should just do what you think of, since you can always delegate things to someone else,” a voice said.

Felix looked up at a portrait on the wall. The previously blank frame now contained the image of a young man with black hair and blue eyes, wearing a dragon skin cloak. It was Felix himself.

That was a portrait hanging at St. Mungo's Hospital for Magical Injuries. He complained, "The headmaster hung me next to a talkative medieval wizard who observes the flaws on everyone's face and tries to offer advice. I've punched him three times already, but unfortunately, his brain is filled with obsession—or rather, he has no brain at all..."

Felix looked at his own portrait and a strange sense of absurdity welled up inside him: "I think you're quite talkative now."

“You’ve been holding it in for too long…” The person in the portrait spread his hands at him. “Hey, listen to me, I’ve discovered something interesting.”

"What is it?"

“I could sneak into Dumbledore’s office. Remember the day I cured the Longbottoms? Dumbledore said he had received a notification from Dalys Delt, and I found her and begged and pleaded… She agreed to let me borrow her portrait, so I went to Dumbledore’s headmaster’s office and chatted with all the headmasters, and of course, Dumbledore himself.”

What did you talk about with Dumbledore?

"Don't worry, I'm tight-lipped, and you didn't tell me the most crucial secret either." The person in the portrait rolled his eyes, and Felix somewhat regretted making his portrait so lively.

"...He asked me if I liked sweets and suggested that you draw me a candy house. How interesting! How come you forgot to draw food? Even a bunch of grapes would have been fine..."

Felix: "...Shut up."

The portrait made a zipping-up motion, grinning as it prepared to leave. It seemed much more cheerful than Felix himself. "I still suggest you do what you want to do and stop overthinking." Then it disappeared.

Felix stared at the blank photo frame for a long time, then unfolded another piece of parchment, pondered how to write a job advertisement, rolled up the parchment, and casually stuffed it into his pocket, intending to send it to the Daily Prophet when he had time.

The next two days were uneventful until Saturday morning, when Felix got ready to enter number 12 Grimmauld Place through the fireplace.

Sirius had been waiting for a long time. He paced anxiously back and forth in the room, and his eyes lit up when he saw Felix.

"You've finally arrived!"

“Here is your certificate of innocence. Take it.” Felix handed him the official document from the Ministry of Magic.

Sirius took it, glanced at it, lost interest, and casually tossed it onto the sofa. "I'll call Kreacher, Kreacher!"

A house-elf suddenly appeared in front of the two.

"Is he going too?" Felix asked in surprise.

“He insisted—” Sirius shrugged.

Kreacher proudly puffed out his chest. "Nobody knows this place better than me."

Chapter 308 Voldemort's Mistake

The terrain by the sea rises abruptly, revealing a black cross-section under the erosion of the seawater, forming a straight cliff.

The waves crashed against the rocks, stirring up white foam and creating a huge roar.

"boom!"

Three people suddenly appeared on the bare rock, two adults and one child, one of whom was trembling and almost fell over.

“Apparating you is like dragging a mountain, Felix,” Sirius said breathlessly.

"Please forgive me, I may have too many magical items on me," Felix said awkwardly. There were more than a dozen Dementors hidden in his ring. These prisoners were crammed together in a small compartment without any magical separation, so Sirius was essentially Apparating a group of people with him.

Only then did they have time to observe their surroundings: a black, abrupt cliff, with the surging sea on one side and the winding mountains on the other. Felix peered into the distance and could vaguely see a village halfway up the mountain.

Besides, the surrounding area was barren and desolate, with no trees, grass, or beaches in sight except for the vast sea and rocks.

Sirius Black pointed to a rock in the sea, "The cave entrance is directly below the cliff, but we can't see it now. We can Apparate to that rock to get there..."

"Let's go."

With Felix leading them this time, they quickly jumped to the edge of a narrow crevice below the cliff, and took a few steps forward as the swirling seawater reached their feet.

Soon, the crack turned into a dark passage, with rock walls covered in sticky mud on both sides, only two or three feet away. Every now and then, they could crush a seashell or something similar underfoot, and the air was filled with a salty, rotten smell.

“These were brought in by the tide,” Sirius said, raising his glowing wand and kicking away a fish blocking their path, sending it crashing into a rock wall along with a small stone. “I cleared it away before, but it reappeared after only a few days.”

Felix carefully examined the rock wall. In the black and white perspective, powerful magic was superimposed on the dark rock wall, and he could smell the scent of a powerful curse.

It's clear that Voldemort was very skilled at curses and similar magic.

"I got stuck here. When I asked Kreacher, he didn't know either. He and Regulus didn't encounter this wall when they came here..." Sirius explained.

“Kreacher, I remember you’ve been here twice?” Felix asked softly, as he explored the magic on the rock wall.

“Yes, yes, Mr. Hyp,” Kreacher said, a look of fear on his face. “The first time, Master Regulus came to Kreacher and said that the Dark Lord needed a little elf… It was an honor. Master Regulus asked Kreacher to complete the task assigned by the Dark Lord, and then… go home.”

"Kreacher followed the Dark Lord here, but instead of encountering the rock walls, he came directly to a large black lake with a boat... On the island was a stone basin filled with potions, which the Dark Lord forced Kreacher to drink..."

"Kreacher recalled many terrifying things: the memory of being punished, the hallucination of being kicked out of the house... His insides felt like they were on fire... Kreacher begged the Dark Lord, but he just laughed and made me drink all the potion..."

Sirius remained silent. He had heard the story before, but it still left a bad taste in his mouth. Felix said softly, "A test. He's testing his protective measures."

"Kreacher felt he was going to die. The Dark Lord abandoned Kreacher and sailed away alone... But Kreacher remembered his master's orders and wanted to go back home. Regulus found Kreacher and was very worried. He hid Kreacher and took care of me by himself..."

The house-elf said, sobbing.

"After a while, Master Regulus came to see Kreacher... That night, his behavior was strange. I knew he was very troubled at that time, as if he was worried about something... The young master asked Kreacher to take him to the cave. We still hadn't encountered this rock wall. We got on a boat and came to the island in the lake, and then, and then..."

Sirius clenched his fists. He knew what was going to happen next. Regulus had drunk the potion himself, sent Kreacher back home, and forbade him from returning or revealing the secret to the mistress of the house, except to instruct him to destroy the locket—the Horcrux.

Regulus himself was dragged into the water by the infernal corpses in the Black Lake...

Felix was also moved by this story. It was hard to imagine a pureblood giving up his life for a house-elf. But he was conflicted. He had once been a fanatical follower of Voldemort and sincerely believed that Voldemort could bring a better life to wizards.

“My brother—Regrus, he was so young then, he believed Voldemort’s lies, he was only eighteen…” Sirius said in a hoarse voice, “What a… fool.”

Water droplets dripped from the cave entrance, masking Sirius's breathing. Felix, feigning interest in the magic depicted on the cave walls, stared intently, remaining silent for a long time. After a long while—

Voldemort was quite confident; when he later added the outermost layer of protective measures, he didn't check them—

“No, Mr. Hyp, Master Regulus made a fake locket… He threw it in when he came, after he finished the potion, and then let the potion submerge it again…”

“Hmm,” Felix said softly, “that makes sense. He missed an opportunity to correct his mistake.”

Sirius asked, "How are we going to get through this rock wall? I've tried some magic, but it's all ineffective, and the closer I get, the more interference I get with my spells. Look—"

He pointed his wand at the rock face, and a thin incantation flew from its tip. An archway appeared on the rock face, radiating a dazzling white light, as if a powerful light shone from behind the crack. But soon, the archway disappeared, and the rock remained as hard and thick as before, with nothing on it.

“My view is that the rock wall harbors a wicked intention—a rare curse that makes visitors pay a price, weakening themselves. Voldemort wants us to smear the wall with magical blood. However,” Felix said with a sarcastic expression and disdain, “all he’s doing is in vain…we have a better way.”

Felix took off the ring, placed it on a seashell beside him, and said gently, "Kreacher, would you be willing to help us get through this?"

Kreacher looked at him in surprise. "Me? Can I? I'm just a lowly, obedient servant—"

"No, Kreacher, in some ways you are better than Voldemort."