Harry swam forward rapidly, glancing around.
Soon, he even saw a small Grindylow tied in front of a door—Merpeople emerged from all directions, curiously watching them, pointing at the strange bubbles above their heads, whispering to each other with their hands covering their mouths.
The two of them turned a corner, and finally, a golden light appeared, stimulating their retinas.
"...Do Merpeople have the habit of building pyramids?" Harry asked curiously, opening his mouth slightly.
"...Never heard of it."
Cedric shook his head somewhat blankly, but then they noticed a few familiar figures next to the shining golden stone tower, so they swam down and clearly saw those figures.
There were two people and one fish; Alexander Vladimir was still only wearing a pair of black shorts, standing quietly at the front of the square, showing no reaction to the two arriving. Instead, it was Yamamoto Senren, not far from him, who excitedly waved his long-webbed hands to greet them—
There was also a fish, which seemed to be the swordfish transformed from Abeba Hailu, shaking her sharp snout as if greeting them.
"Is everyone here?"
Harry heard Yamamoto Senren ask towards the other side, his voice slightly hoarse from the distortion through the water.
"Still missing one."
Harry heard a hoarse, deep voice say.
He blinked and instinctively looked in the direction of the voice, only to see behind the square's sculpture, a grayish-blue Merman, a whole foot taller than the Merpeople who had been watching them earlier, approximately seven feet tall, holding a sharp steel trident, with a string of white shells hanging at the connection of the fork.
The Merman's English wasn't very fluent, but they could barely understand.
"What do you mean by missing one? Aren't there four champions—?"
Cedric fell next to Yamamoto Senren, estimating that among the three champions present, only this one was willing to communicate, so he went up to inquire.
"It means three people have already been eliminated."
Yamamoto Senren swung his elongated legs, transformed by the Gillyweed he consumed, his cheeks had a pair of openings, constantly exhaling translucent bubbles, "Inside this tower is the second stage of the second task, it's said to be a maze in there, and we need to find treasures hidden inside—"
"Then why are we standing here and not going inside now?"
Harry also came over, looking curiously at the still-glowing pyramid, and asked.
"Because we have to wait for everyone to arrive before that Merman will open the door for us... and we still don't know who the last person will be?"
Yamamoto Senren shook his head, his gaze turning to the darkness not far away, seemingly hoping for another champion to quickly appear there—because his Gillyweed was about to expire.
Whoever it was—Harry and Cedric exchanged a glance—it wasn't going to be Old Cauliflower.
So, moving away from the expectant Yamamoto Senren, the two began to communicate with their eyes—
'What do you say, should we make a move?'
Harry gestured with his eyes towards Yamamoto Senren beside him, his meaning clear—since Piero, whom he accidentally knocked out with a Stunning Spell, was considered eliminated, then obviously, they could eliminate the other champions with the same methods.
As for underhanded tactics... the boy who had been "taught" by a certain unscrupulous transfer student for two and a half years decided to adopt the most barrage-laden strategy.
'...No, that's not right.'
Cedric had to admit he was intrigued by the plan, but after pondering for a moment, he still shook his head. The reason was simple; although they could quickly subdue one or two by surprise, there were now other problems. Firstly, whether they should go all out to eliminate everyone else, and—
Could this place be a safe zone?
The burly Merman, who seemed like he had committed quite a few homicides, surely wasn't someone to mess with.
So, while the two were in a dilemma, finally, a figure emerged from the dark seaweed. It was Krum—still bearing that half-human, half-fish appearance, with a human body wearing swimming shorts below and a shark's head above. His Transfiguration hadn't been very successful.
At least it couldn't compare to Heller's complete transformation.
Finally, the half-human, half-shark Krum swam up to the group. He didn't speak, merely watched the Merman with an expressionless face.
"Very well, now that everyone's here—"
The merperson nodded and then straightened up, using the steel fork of his hand to knock heavily on the floor.
"Buzz—"
Harry heard a buzzing sound. In the next moment, a golden light illuminated the ground. It was a magic circle. The murky lake surrounding them started to disappear rapidly, and Harry, finally feeling solid ground, instinctively removed the Bubble-Head Charm—
It was air, albeit with a stale smell, but air nonetheless.
Cedric reacted similarly, also removing his comical Bubble-Head Charm; Alexander closed his eyes, but Harry could tell he took a deep breath... wait, was he silent because he was holding his breath?; Yamamoto was on the ground, clutching his cheeks, as he hurriedly pulled out a handful of tender yellow grass leaves from his bulging pocket next to his swim trunks, consuming them to restore his form—
Abeba Hailu, however, acted somewhat clumsily. She seemed unprepared for this turn of events, and her silvery swordfish fell with a "plop" to the ground, flapping its tail twice like a fish on a cutting board before transforming back to human form. Emotions of embarrassment and annoyance finally appeared on the girl's usually calm face.
Of course, her dark complexion meant her blush wasn't very noticeable.
"Now, your trials are just beginning—"
The merperson's deep voice sounded again. Harry instinctively looked over and discovered that the merperson now had a Bubble-Head Charm around his head. Supported by his strong tail and steel fork, he barely managed to stay upright. "Champions, please raise your wands—" the merperson recited loudly.
So everyone obediently raised their wands. In the next moment, countless blue light dots flew out from their wands.
Then came a dull sound of mechanical movement. Under the stunned gaze of all present, six openings large enough for a person to pass through slowly appeared at the base of the pyramid. Above each opening, Roman numerals from I to VI were inscribed—
"Now, according to your order of arrival, step into your respective entrance."
"See, I told you the budget wasn't wasted, didn't I?"
On the guest seats by the shore, William sipped his tea while giving a knowing glance to the shocked Dumbledore.
"...Indeed."
Dumbledore nodded, admitting that this Eight-Team Tournament set a new standard. With "special effects" of this level, any future host school that couldn't pull off a similar show would frankly be a bit embarrassed—
For example, the faces of those principals and leading teachers present looked somewhat anxious, except for Castelobruxo's Old Cauliflower—because not only had his champion been eliminated early, he himself would retire in two years—meaning he had no need to worry about the Eight-Team Tournament being hosted in South America in five years.
"Dumbledore, I must say—aren't the two champions from Hogwarts slightly... out of line?"
It was at this point, while the "transition animations" played on TV, that Karkaroff couldn't help but speak, "We all saw it, that competitor named Harry Potter actually eliminated a champion from another school, that's utterly disgraceful—"
"Which rule says you can't attack other contestants?" William raised his hand to ask.
"Uh... it's a matter of sportsmanship, you know..." Karkaroff's eyes shifted as he continued.
"Who cares about that, are you the referee or am I?" William waved his hand dismissively, finding Karkaroff's slow speech maddeningly frustrating. "Sportsmanship? What do you think this is? The Olympics? Do you want to take Krum for a doping test right now?"
"...So, Chief Referee Richard, does that mean champions can attack each other?" Karkaroff paused before continuing to ask.
"Of course."
William felt Karkaroff was digging a pit for himself, but he nodded without hesitation, because even if the pit were deep, the ones falling in would be those two kids below the water, nothing to do with him.
Besides, William didn't think those two brats would lose; even if the other four champions attacked together, they could barely match the two kids he'd devilishly trained for a year. Cedric, after a year of intense training, was a given, and even Harry had sparred with him quite a bit this summer—
Of course, if the two were picked off one by one... then they were just unlucky, what else could be done?
Although cheating was a tradition in the tournament, he hadn't intended to falsify anything this time—that would be dull—and he still had something else to attend to. William looked up, his gaze fixating on the center of the screen where Harry and the others had just entered the pyramid.
Even though he and Cedric arrived simultaneously, Harry stepped into the square with his left foot first, thus entering the door marked with IV. Once inside, the stone door closed with a rumble behind him. The boy raised his wand, "Lumos"—
White light illuminated the room, and Harry glanced around for a moment before he could clearly discern the interior.
It seemed like a simply furnished stone house, with a space not particularly large, seemingly empty of any contents. On the opposite wall, however, was a brown-gray wooden door, on its edge hung a large padlock.
Faced with this scene, Harry didn't rush to act, but pressed his Copper Knut to his chest, murmuring quietly, "Squawk, squawk, over, please respond—"
"...Wait, was there a code I missed?" Cedric's slightly muffled voice emanated from the Knut, "And it sounds like the audio quality isn't too good? And aren't you just next door to me?"