After listening to Dumbledore's account, Professor Snape's hand slammed down on the desk in front of him.
The desk shuddered violently. Everything on it bounced into the air and then crashed down again in a jumble.
The next second, Professor Snape's furious roar exploded in the room:
"It's all that bastard's fault! He's the one who got Lily killed! I knew from the very beginning that that little tag-along was no good. Damn it, I ought to rush into Azkaban right now and kill him myself… or maybe I should let the Dementors give him a kiss, let him savour the taste of despair!"
"Severus, calm down. He's been locked up in Azkaban for almost ten years. He's already received the punishment he 'deserved'. What's most important now is finding Peter. I suspect he's not dead yet."
Seeing how agitated Snape was, and how he'd already shifted his desire for revenge onto Black, vowing to kill him, Dumbledore had no choice but to speak up.
"Didn't you say Peter was killed back then?"
Snape's eyes were bloodshot as he glared at Dumbledore, his voice turning hoarse.
"What I said was that the blast destroyed that room," Dumbledore replied evenly while meeting Snape's gaze, "but I never personally saw him die."
As he spoke, Dumbledore rose from his chair, looked at Professor Snape and said, enunciating each word:
"What's more, the Mirror of Erised that used to be kept in that room has vanished as well. There isn't a single shard or trace of it left anywhere inside. It's obvious Peter took it with him when he escaped."
Hearing Dumbledore give concrete proof that Peter had run away, Professor Snape hissed through gritted teeth:
"Then where is that damned rat Peter now?"
Dumbledore's words were clearly loaded with meaning, and Professor Snape obviously heard the implication. He slowly sank back into his chair, as though mulling something over.
At this moment, Professor McGonagall spoke up in a slightly choked voice:
"We must get Black out. He's suffered a grave injustice. He did make mistakes, yes, but he's already spent nearly ten years in Azkaban. He has more than paid for his sins."
Professor Sprout and Professor Flitwick both nodded in agreement with Professor McGonagall's proposal, but Professor Snape, standing to the side, merely curled his lip. He would have been delighted to see Black locked in Azkaban until the day he died.
Hearing McGonagall's words, Dumbledore pinched the bridge of his nose.
"When Sirius Black was captured, Fudge was there in person. The Muggles' testimonies at the time were extremely unfavourable to him, and he was thrown into Azkaban without even a proper trial. Right now we have no solid evidence to convince Fudge to release him."
At that, all three Heads of House wore troubled expressions. Only Professor Snape's mouth tugged upward in a faint, satisfied smile.
Standing off to the side, Loren glanced at them still wringing their hands over how to save Sirius Black. Then he checked the time and realised it was already two in the morning. At this rate, they probably wouldn't be done even by five.
Loren hated having his daily schedule thrown into chaos. To make sure he could still get up for morning training, he spoke up directly:
Dumbledore shook his head and said,
"Fudge is the Minister for Magic. I have no authority to order him to do anything. Even if we laid out the whole story for him, he still wouldn't release Sirius Black. We don't have any evidence. And even if we did, they'd find every possible way to obstruct us. If the public ever found out that an innocent man had been locked up in Azkaban for years, the Ministry's reputation would take a massive hit."
Professor Flitwick also added quietly:
"Before Fudge took office, I thought he was just a kindly old fellow. After he became Minister, I realised he's a thorough-going political animal. He'll never do anything that might harm his political career, regardless of whether the matter itself is right or wrong."
"But isn't this actually a good thing for Fudge?" Loren asked. "Why would he refuse?"
At that, all eyes turned to Loren, waiting to hear what sort of idea he had.
To keep from wasting time with any 'throwing out a brick to attract jade' preamble, Loren went straight into a detailed explanation. He wanted his life rhythm intact more than he wanted to play at being mysterious.
"First," Loren said, "Sirius Black was sent straight to Azkaban without trial back in November 1981. That alone is a glaring procedural problem, and that's exactly where we can break in.
"Second, Fudge only became Minister for Magic last year. His actual ability isn't particularly impressive; he just happened to be in the right place at the right time and got pushed into that position. Right now he urgently needs something to boost his standing.
"Helping to overturn the wrongful imprisonment of an innocent man who has been held for nearly ten years because of his predecessor's mistakes—don't you think that's more than enough to win him plenty of prestige in the eyes of the public?"
As Loren spoke, he noticed Dumbledore and the three Heads of House looking more and more delighted, while Professor Snape was staring at him as though he wanted to bite his head off, teeth clenched so tightly it looked like he might rip his own mouth apart.
For the sake of Slytherin's House points, Loren could only apologise silently to Professor Snape in his heart, then continued:
"As for the evidence everyone's so worried about, Sirius Black can provide it himself. As long as Professor Dumbledore can persuade him to extract and hand over his memories, then with Fudge's support and sufficient proof, I imagine Sirius Black will be released very soon."
Dumbledore clapped his hands as he laughed.
"An excellent idea. I must say, Loren, your mind really is flexible. Unlike us witches and wizards who've spent our whole lives in the magical world—our brains simply don't turn that quickly anymore."
Hearing Dumbledore's loaded remark, Loren didn't respond to that part. Instead he simply asked directly,
"Now that the matter's settled, can I go back to bed? I'm only an eleven-year-old wizard, after all."
Seeing that Loren was already getting impatient, Dumbledore thought for a moment. Since there was nothing else urgent, he agreed to let Loren go back and rest.
Loren left the headmaster's office and immediately called Dobby to send him back to his dormitory.
Sure enough, Neville was still pacing back and forth in the dormitory, worrying about Harry and Ron's safety. When he saw Loren suddenly appear in the room, he hurried over and asked,
"Loren, how are Harry and Ron? Are they all right?"
Loren yawned.
"Don't worry. With Professor Dumbledore there, nothing serious is going to happen to them. Right now the two of them are lying in the hospital wing, and Madam Pomfrey is looking after them. They'll be fine."
After saying that, he went off to wash up, yawning all the way.
By the time Loren finished washing and was ready to sleep, he found Neville already lying in bed, fast asleep.
Over the next two days, all the students were talking about what had happened that night. Being dragged out of bed in the middle of the night and driven outside the castle to stand around in the cold wind had left everyone curious what exactly had gone on.
Dumbledore handled the matter promptly and decisively.
Not only did this divert everyone's attention, it also served as a wake-up call to all the students, letting them know that Voldemort had already begun plotting his return, and that they needed to be on their guard.
Very soon, the final Quidditch match of the term officially began: Gryffindor versus Ravenclaw.
Ravenclaw had been secretly rejoicing that Harry was stuck in the hospital wing and that Gryffindor therefore had no Seeker.
But Loren once again appeared on the pitch. This time, they finally understood what kind of monster Slytherin had faced before.
Oliver Wood was adamant that Loren could only truly unleash his power in the position of Beater.
So George took Harry's place and became the Seeker.
As soon as Loren took the field, he shot straight for a Bludger at top speed, raised his bat, and smashed it—directly knocking two of Ravenclaw's three goal hoops to pieces.
Seeing their own goalposts go from three to one, Ravenclaw's captain, Roger Davies, flew over to Madam Hooch and demanded that she repair the goalposts on the other side.
Madam Hooch rolled her eyes so hard they nearly disappeared into her skull. Loren had kept his promise and deliberately left them one intact hoop. There was no way she was going to make trouble for herself over this.
When he saw that the referee wasn't going to intervene, Roger could only grit his teeth and organise an all-out attack, planning to have his own Beaters find a way to knock out the opposing Keeper so they'd at least have a chance at scoring.
But to his despair, he soon realised that his two Beaters and his Keeper were all being menaced by the Bludgers Loren controlled, frozen in mid-air and not daring to make a single move.
With no other choice, he could only lead his players into a desperate, full-on defence, doing everything possible just to keep the other side from scoring.
Ravenclaw's only hope now lay with their Seeker, that she might catch the Golden Snitch faster—after all, their Seeker was a professional.
But George's behaviour nearly drove the Ravenclaw team to collapse.
Knowing he couldn't match a professional Seeker when it came to finding the Snitch, George simply adopted a full-on man-marking tactic.
He glued himself to the Ravenclaw Seeker, sticking to her side wherever she flew, constantly interfering with her attempts to catch the Golden Snitch.
Although Ravenclaw did eventually manage to grab the Snitch, Gryffindor had long since widened the score difference to over two hundred points.
Soon after, Loren got the news from Wood that starting next year, each Quidditch team would be allowed to recruit up to twice as many reserve players as they had regular players.
Loren had been a little surprised at first, but once he heard that the number of reserve players had been proposed by Professor Snape, he wasn't surprised at all.
No matter what Professor Snape was scheming, next year Loren would simply drag Neville and Hermione onto the team as reserves. Whatever tricks you have up your sleeve—he would crush them all with sheer strength.
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