8mi Chapter 175 My Responsibility
Chapter 175 My Responsibility
Chapter 175 My Responsibility
"I promise!" Harry nodded hastily.
"Professor Dumbledore entrusted me with the task of finding the monster," Lynch said, answering Harry's first question. "I was behind the curtain to examine every inch of that corridor to find any trace of the monster's movements, not to perform any shady rituals."
Harry's heart raced: "So—did you find it?" he asked eagerly, almost forgetting to keep his distance.
Lin Qi turned his head and glanced at him. In the sunlight, a faint smile seemed to flicker in those deep eyes.
"I've found some clues." He gave a positive answer, but did not elaborate on what those clues were.
Lynch stopped and turned to face Harry. "Harry, listen."
His tone became more serious: "Finding and dealing with that monster is my responsibility. It's special that you can hear it, but that doesn't mean you have to shoulder the burden of defeating it. Understand?"
Harry opened his mouth, as if to refute something, but Lynch didn't give him the chance.
"If you hear that voice again," Lynch continued, his tone leaving no room for doubt, "wherever you are, immediately shout 'Tortz,' and I will be notified and arrive as soon as possible."
Harry paused for a moment, then nodded.
Tots, the strange house-elf who always wore a black tuxedo and was incredibly respectful to Uncle Lynch.
He remembered him.
"Your current job," Lynch's tone softened, and he raised his hand to gently press on Harry's messy head, "is to study hard, and—"
He paused, looking at Harry's green eyes, which had finally regained some light.
"—Prepare well for your match. If I remember correctly, your first Quidditch match of the school year is coming up soon. Gryffindor needs their Seeker to focus on the Golden Snitch, not the monsters roaming the castle."
The mention of Quidditch visibly lifted Harry's spirits, as if the gloom that had been hanging over him had been blown away by the wind. He nodded vigorously: "Yes, Uncle Lynch! I'll be playing in the match against Slytherin!"
"That's good." Lin Qi withdrew his gaze and turned it back to the castle. "Let's go back."
"Thank you, Uncle Lynch," Harry said, his tone much lighter, and turned to run towards the castle, his steps noticeably lighter.
Lynch watched his retreating figure until it disappeared far behind the oak door before turning his gaze away.
He turned away from the castle and strode toward the edge of the Forbidden Forest.
In the distance, smoke curled from the hunting lodge, and a huge, furry figure was busy in the chicken coop next to it.
As he got closer, Lynch saw Hagrid hunching over, dejectedly pulling one stiff, dead chicken after another from the henhouse and piling them aside.
The chickens had disheveled feathers and their necks were twisted at an unnatural angle, clearly indicating that they were already dead.
Hearing footsteps, Hagrid looked up, his large eyes filled with sadness and a hint of weariness. When he saw it was Lynch, an unnatural, slightly restrained expression appeared on his rugged face.
"Good afternoon, Professor Lynch." Hagrid's voice was a little hoarse. He wiped the sweat from his forehead with his free hand, while holding a limp rooster in his other hand.
"Good afternoon, Hagrid." Lynch's gaze swept over the pile of dead chickens and then looked at the chicken coop.
Hagrid clearly carried out his previous plan, installing new, thicker, and denser wooden fences on the chicken coop, almost completely enclosing the entire coop.
"Looks like your new fence hasn't come in handy."
Hagrid followed his gaze, a flush of anger crossing his face. He slammed the dead chicken in his hand onto the small pile of corpses with a muffled "thud".
"It wasn't a weasel or a fox!" he growled, his chest heaving. "They were strangled! Look at their necks! Who was it—if I find out which bastard did it—" He waved his large, fan-like hand, his voice trembling with rage, "I'll make him pay! Poor little chicks—they did nothing wrong—"
"Have you seen any suspicious people around here before?" Lin Qi asked.
Hagrid, panting, tried to calm himself, racked his brains for a moment, then shook his head, his thick beard swaying. "No—no, Professor. Only a few lower-year students used to come here occasionally to relax—but they were all too young."
Hagrid always possessed an almost obsessive kindness, as if he couldn't imagine any child associated with Hogwarts doing anything extreme. "Impossible, absolutely impossible. It's too cruel—..."
What they might do is far more cruel than you can imagine.
Lynch looked into Hagrid's eyes, which were still filled with anger and sadness, and kept those words in his heart.
He knew it in his heart.
The monster in the secret chamber was a basilisk, and the rooster's crowing was deadly to it. The person who opened the chamber, or the controller, clearly knew this weakness and calmly and thoroughly eliminated this greatest threat before releasing the monster.
Even when Hogwarts was under martial law, they took the time to kill the remaining chickens in the henhouse.
Is this a tactic to mislead the public? Or is it simply a case of bloodlust?
Lynch pondered for a moment, then shifted his gaze from the dead chicken to Hagrid.
"Hagrid," his voice was steady, "when you go back to buying chickens, save me a rooster."
Take the strongest one, the one with the loudest cry. Send it to my stone house.
Hagrid paused for a moment, his emotions seemingly interrupted for a brief instant by this abrupt request.
He blinked his bloodshot eyes, looking somewhat bewildered, but still nodded habitually: "Oh—okay, okay, Professor. No problem. I'll definitely pick out the best one for you—"
He seemed about to ask why, but seeing Lin Qi's expression that clearly didn't intend to explain further, he swallowed his words and just rubbed his rough hands together vigorously.
"Thank you," Lin Qi said, then nodded slightly to Hagrid and turned to walk towards his stone house deep in the Forbidden Forest.
Hagrid stood there, watching Lynch's departing figure, then looked down at the pile of dead chickens, sighed heavily, and continued his dejected cleaning work.
Lin Qi walked on the stone path, sunlight fragmented by the branches and leaves falling on him.
He silently calculated in his mind: the basilisk's movement path had been confirmed through molting, Snape's special tracking potion would be available tomorrow, and the key creature to deal with the basilisk, the rooster, would also be in his possession soon.
Next, the tracking potion will be injected into the pipeline system to map out the basilisk's activity range, locate its lair, and finally—wait for a suitable opportunity, or create one—to verify one's hypothesis.