The morning sun was warm but not scorching, accompanied by a gentle breeze that made the small garden especially pleasant.
Roses in shades of pink, white, purple, and red bloomed in vibrant competition. Layer upon layer of petals stretched out freely, exuding a sense of vigorous life.
A young man in a hospital gown sat on a bench in the garden as he gazed at the scenery with a trace of longing and confusion in his eyes.
His gray-haired father stood beside him and leaned down with concern as he asked, "How are you feeling? Is there any discomfort?"
The young man smiled faintly and said in a weak voice, "Dad, I'm fine. Just a little tired."
"If you're tired, let's go back to the ward," his mother said, also wearing a weary expression but forcing a smile. "These flowers will be in bloom for quite a few days. We can come again tomorrow."
"Alright, let's go back then." Supported by his parents, the young man slowly stood up and began walking out of the garden. Suddenly, he said, "I kind of want to eat hot pot."
"Okay." His mother choked up, but quickly wiped away her tears with the back of her hand. "When you get better, we'll go have hot pot, and barbecue too. We'll eat everything you've ever wanted."
"Yeah, eat it all!" The young man took a few more steps, then suddenly said, "If I... if I don't get the chance, then you two should go and eat all the delicious foods for me. That would be nice too."
"What nonsense are you saying?" his father scolded sternly. "The doctor said your condition isn't too serious. As long as you follow the treatment, you'll slowly recover. You must hang in there, do you hear me?"
"I hear you, I hear you..." the young man drawled helplessly. "I was just saying! Dad, you're so serious."
"Mr. Grey! Mr. Wade Grey!"
—Who's calling?
—Oh, they're calling me...
Wade leaned against a pillar in the garden and moved his body slightly. He knew someone outside was calling for him, but he didn't want to leave just yet.
He pretended not to hear and followed the three of them for a while, listening to them talk about the young man's travel plans after recovery. They sounded so hopeful, as if dreams really could come true.
Suddenly, Wade heard another voice — faint and distant, as if it came from behind a wall—
"Sorry, Master," said Cube. "If this doesn't work, we'll have to bring in Dumbledore."
—Dumbledore?
That name dispelled Wade's hesitation. He was just about to head out the door when, like a jolt of electricity, his entire body twitched. In an instant, he sat bolt upright in bed and gasped for air.
"It worked! It really worked!" Zoe cheered. "Zoe thought Mr. Grey had been knocked out by some dark magic! Zoe is so glad you're awake!"
Wade: "..."
Seeing that his master was radiating a gloomy aura from being forcefully awakened, the Cube didn't dare claim credit. It extended its mechanical claws with a few clicking sounds, grabbed the other dolls, and quickly darted back into the wardrobe space.
Wade silently stared at their retreating figures, grinding his teeth audibly.
"Mr. Grey, hurry up and get ready," Zoe tugged on Wade's sleeve and said, "or you'll miss the train."
Wade slowly exhaled and said, "Thank you, Zoe. I'll be ready soon."
By the time Wade finished washing up, the diligent house-elves had already taken his luggage to the train. Wade didn't bother catching a carriage from outside the castle.
After saying goodbye to Zoe and the other house-elves, he packed away the wardrobe space, opened the window, and transformed into a peregrine falcon and flew out.
The Hogwarts Express was stationed at the platform, and many students had already boarded. More carriages were arriving from the school grounds.
Wade circled in the sky, looking for a secluded spot to transform back. Just then, he spotted an open window in one of the compartments—Michael was leaning on the windowsill and waving at him.
Wade tucked in his wings and dove toward the window. Michael quickly moved aside, and the next moment, the falcon flew through the window and turned back into his familiar classmate.
"I should've called you when I left," Michael said, laughing when he noticed Wade's messy hair sticking up in tufts. "I thought you were off doing alchemy somewhere—or maybe went to find Dumbledore. Turns out you just overslept?"
Wade ran a hand through his hair and sighed, "I had a really long dream last night."
"Must've been a great dream if you didn't want to wake up," Michael said casually as he sat down and pulled out his pet puppet to pass the time.
Wade froze for a moment, a pang of melancholy hit him, and forgot to respond.
The compartment door suddenly slammed open with a bang. Before Theo even stepped inside, his voice came through:
"Harry didn't see Wade this morning either—he's going back to that Muggle aunt's house for the summer. I figured Wade must still be at school. Should we tell a professor—"
He had already seen Wade, but the momentum of his speech carried the last word out anyway: "—about it."
Then Theo caught up: "Wade? You left early this morning?"
"Nope, the guy overslept and just flew here in a panic," Michael teased.
Wade raised a hand in greeting.
"Good thing you didn't miss the train," Ryan said, closing the compartment door behind him. He and Theo sat down. "Otherwise, we'd have to alert the professors."
"What's the big deal about alerting the professors?" Michael said proudly. "Which professor doesn't like our Wade?"
Everyone laughed.
The train gave a long whistle and slowly began to move, pulling away from the station. The Hogwarts castle gradually receded from view.
"I heard Professor Troka resigned too. Is that true?" Ryan asked.
"It's true," Michael replied. "I overheard him talking to Professor Flitwick this morning. He was only temporarily filling in for Professor Abigail and only planned to teach for half a term."
"So will Professor Abigail be back next term?" Theo asked hopefully.
"Probably not," Michael shrugged. "Word is that Professor Dumbledore has already chosen a new professor. Supposedly, it'll be a very powerful wizard."
"I just hope they stay for a while," Theo said gloomily. "It feels like our Defense Against the Dark Arts professors are getting replaced faster and faster."
"But each new one has been better than the last, hasn't it?" Michael said optimistically. "Don't worry—Dumbledore definitely has a plan."
Suddenly, he noticed that someone in the compartment had been unusually quiet, so he took the initiative to ask, "Wade, do you have any plans for the holidays? Want to go see the World Cup together?"
Wade snapped out of his thoughts and replied, "I need to visit someone first… then, if there's enough time, I'll probably go to the final match."
"If I can, I don't want to miss a single game," Michael said. "My dad bought a full set of tickets! I'll be staying around the stadium pretty much the entire summer!"
Theo and Ryan were a bit envious—each of their families had other plans, so they wouldn't be able to attend any matches until the end of June.
The group eagerly discussed every team competing, listing famous players and past records, and speculating on which team might take the championship.
Recently, The Daily Prophet had been filled with World Cup coverage, listing detailed information about all the teams. The boys pulled out newspapers from their bags and pointed to specific articles to support their predictions.
The excited chatter around him slowly blurred into a background hum. The stone necklace in Wade's pocket felt heavy. As he looked out toward the distant mountains, he didn't know why, but his eyes were faintly damp.
He resisted the urge to take out the necklace and re-enter that corridor. Instead, he casually unwrapped a candy and tossed it into his mouth, crunching it into pieces. The sweetness spread across his tongue and triggered a small release of dopamine in his brain.
…
Amid the frigid seawater, a tall fortress stood alone on an isolated island. From within its heavy iron walls came disturbing sounds—
Whispers, moans, screams, manic laughter, and sobs of despair—all mingled together and blended with the wailing wind to form a nearly maddening cacophony.
Bullock was a Ministry of Magic official in charge of prison management and maintaining magical barriers. After a three-year term, he'd be allowed to leave. Now, with only a year and a half remaining, Bullock already felt like he was going insane.
The man shoveled two scoops of coal into the fireplace, pulled his coat tighter, and huddled in front of the flames, stared blankly at the flickering fire.
In a place like this, time seemed to lose all meaning. No one knew how long had passed when suddenly a bolt of lightning tore through the darkness, followed by the crashing roar of thunder.
Bullock shivered. He moved to the wall and peered through a tiny palm-sized hole. What he saw were countless dark shapes swirling eerily in the lightning-lit sky, sending a chilling aura even from afar.
"Dementors… Why are the Dementors back so soon?"
His heart pounded wildly. Bullock rushed to the wall and grabbed a lever, his eyes were fixed nervously on the Dementors floating across the sky.
Thunder rumbled and lightning snaked overhead. The intermittent flashes of light made the shadowy figures even more terrifying.
The lever in Bullock's hand was the most powerful safeguard he had in this place. Long ago, when Dementors became the wardens of Azkaban, the Ministry of Magic installed a powerful magical mechanism here.
Dementors could not enter inside this room, and if a guard pulled the lever, a massive surge of magical energy would erupt around Azkaban—severely injuring the Dementors, if not outright destroying them.
As Bullock nervously swallowed, he suddenly saw a carriage flying toward the prison from the sky. A familiar flag and emblem hung from it—the insignia of the British Ministry of Magic.
Bullock let out a sigh of relief and quietly released the lever in his hand. When the carriage landed on the nearby platform and a wizard jumped out of it, Bullock finally opened the door to the control room.
The wizard rushed inside, soaked from the rain. He shook the water off his robes and complained, "This damn weather, these damn Dementors! Thank Merlin this miserable assignment is finally over!"
He pulled a scroll of parchment from his pocket and handed it to Bullock. "Let's do the handover! Ministry orders—the search mission is over, and these monsters are to return to Azkaban."
Bullock unrolled the parchment and carefully checked the seals and enchantments. And then, he casually asked, "Did they catch the escaped prisoner?"
"No! Not even one of those damn rats! These Dementors were absolutely useless! They even attacked a few bystanders and caused a lot of trouble for us."
Talking about it made the Ministry official even more agitated.
"If you ask me, the higher-ups are downright foolish! They want us to catch a fugitive, but also demand that the Dementors stay away from crowds—what, do they think the prisoner's just standing around in an open field waiting for us?
Peter Pettigrew's Animagus form is so convenient, he's probably hiding in a city sewer somewhere!"
The official's frustration was so thick it almost felt tangible. Even the long-suppressed Bullock felt a fleeting sense of superiority.
He said, "Weren't they supposed to look for that Obscurus too? At least they found that one, right?"
"Nope. They gave one false report, then just drifted aimlessly across Britain—at one point, they even tried to fly overseas! Luckily, I stopped them in time! I think they were trying to escape!"
The Ministry official continued his rant, then asked, "Are we done here yet? Once these monsters are inside, I'm out of here!"
Hearing that he was leaving made Bullock's mood drop again. He dawdled, checked the handover documents three or four times, and finally asked, "If they didn't catch anyone, why's the mission ending now?"
"Because of the World Cup, of course! Wizards from all over the world are coming to see the matches—there's no way we can let these joy-sucking monsters roam freely! The first match is on the 15th. The Ministry only managed to drive the Dementors off the mainland on the 14th—cutting it really close!"
After a few more rounds of urging, Bullock finally completed the handover. He watched as the ill-tempered official practically fled into the carriage. The winged horses neighed sharply, then pulled the carriage up into the sky, galloping through the air.
Bullock stood at the tiny window and watched the carriage disappear into the clouds. He let out a long sigh.
He waved his wand, sealing the control room again, then trudged back to the fireplace. He wrapped himself in a soot-blackened sheepskin blanket and looked like an oversized lump of coal.
…
Inside the prison, the number of Dementors suddenly doubled. The inmates, who had enjoyed a few relatively quiet months, began to howl in misery.
Under the chilling sucking noises of the Dementors, the massive prison gradually fell silent, leaving only faint moans and sobs.
One Dementor, wearing a ring, floated past cell after cell, until it came to a stop at the deepest part of the prison.
Behind the iron bars sat a disheveled woman. Her hair was matted and greasy, and she stared back with a sinister, deranged gaze.
Squatting on the floor, she rocked back and forth like she'd completely lost her mind. Unlike the other inmates, she didn't recoil in fear at the sight of the Dementor. Instead, she grinned—a wide, twisted smile.
The Dementor stood still for a moment.
It remembered it was here to check on this woman—Bellatrix Lestrange… but why exactly?
With its limited intellect, the Dementor pondered briefly, then reached a conclusion: probably to prevent her from escaping too.
After all, she was one of the few prisoners who hadn't gone completely mad after being locked up for over a decade. All of them were extremely dangerous in the wizarding world.
The Dementor opened its mouth and inhaled slowly and deeply. A faint, intangible substance flowed through the air into its mouth.
Bellatrix let out a gurgling sound in her throat. She struggled against the floor as if trying to resist something. A moment later, her eyes rolled back and she passed out cold.
The Dementor paused, then thought the prisoners in the neighboring cells shouldn't be neglected either. So it floated past each cell, one by one. Soon, silence fell over the entire prison.
The Dementor hovered in the middle of the corridor, still filled with an insatiable hunger, yearning, and resentment. The feeding from earlier had done nothing to satisfy it.
It would never be satisfied.
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⭐Harry Potter: Becoming a Study God (HP:BSG)- 200+ Chapters
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