Disclaimer: I don't own anything. This is not meant to infringe upon copyrights.
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After Halloween, November arrived, and the chilly weather made the young wizards even more reluctant to get out of bed.
At eight o'clock in the morning, Kyle, dressed in a thick robe, yawned as he arrived at the Great Hall, ready for breakfast.
As the owls swarmed into the Great Hall as usual, Cedric's long-awaited broom finally arrived. Just as he'd expected, it was a Nimbus 1700.
"Great, Cedric, great!" a senior Hufflepuff excitedly patted Cedric on the shoulder. "You're the Seeker. With this Nimbus 1700, the gap between us and Slytherin will be much smaller.
I've seen the strength of their Seeker, and honestly, he's barely better than a troll on a broom."
Incidentally, Hufflepuff's first Quidditch match was against Slytherin.
They'd been a little worried about the disparity in equipment, but then came this unexpected good news.
A Nimbus 1700 wasn't enough to boost their morale, but adding Cedric as their Seeker made all the difference.
During the practice match, Cedric's fastest time was five minutes, putting him just seconds away from breaking the Hogwarts Seeker record.
With a top-notch broom and a talented Seeker, the Hufflepuffs didn't know how they could lose.
Could Slytherin possibly be a hundred and fifty points ahead of them in five minutes?
No kidding.
Kyle was also delighted. Even though he wasn't involved, it would be wonderful for the house to win the Quidditch Cup.
He turned to look at Cedric's brand new Nimbus until a tingling sensation in his finger revealed an owl perched in front of him.
"Sorry, little one, I hadn't noticed."
Kyle quickly offered the owl a piece of Mutlap rat jerky before removing the letter from its claws and reading.
"Dear Kyle:
I'm so sorry it took so long to get back to you. I've been so busy lately that I thought I had, until I found the unfinished letter in my office this morning. I hope you'll forgive me.
We also received the Galleons you sent. I'm so proud of you, my child. I wasn't as good as you were in my first year.
Also, your mother asked me to tell you that she's accepted your Galleons, but don't even think about the broom.
She did prepare something else for you, though, and it will be delivered in a couple of days. I hope you like it.
That's all. I wish you a happy Hogwarts.
—Your father, Chris."
After reading the letter, the light in Kyle's eyes visibly faded.
Although he had long suspected that Diana wasn't as easily deceived as Mr. Diggory, Kyle was still disappointed by the result.
And it was so late.
He sent the letter in early September, and it was only in November that he replied. What on earth was Chris busy with that he hadn't been back in the office for two months?
Had Uncle Newt gone on a trip?
Just as Kyle was puzzled, Cedric suddenly slapped a copy of the Daily Prophet in front of him.
"Look, Kyle! Something terrible has happened! No wonder my dad took so long to mail me the broom."
On the front page of the Daily Prophet was a photo of many magical creatures, all imprisoned.
Next to the photo was a bold headline:
"Magical Beasts Disaster ."
"According to sources, on September 3rd of this year, Ministry of Magic Aurors failed to apprehend a group of magical creature smugglers, resulting in the escape of a large number of smuggled magical creatures. Among them were three highly dangerous magical creatures classified as Class XXXXX."
We still don't understand why the Auror made such a rudimentary mistake, nor why the Ministry of Magic kept the incident secret.
"This was to avoid causing panic in the wizarding community," Minister of Magic Cornelius Fudge said this morning. "We have recaptured most of the magical creatures, and no wizards have lost their lives."
The veracity of this finding remains unknown.
However, Chris Chopper, a spokesman for the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures at the Ministry of Magic, stated in an interview that, with the help of Mr. Newt Scamander, nearly all of the escaped magical creatures, including the Antipodean Opaleye and the Nundu , have been successfully captured.
However, one Swooping Evil remains missing.
He urged everyone to flee immediately if they saw one, casting a red warning spell into the air. The Beast Office and Aurors will arrive as quickly as possible to assist. "
After reading it, Kyle finally understood what Chris was busy with.
Judging from the photos, there were about fifty or sixty magical creatures caught. This is already the largest magical creature smuggling case in the British wizarding world in the past thirty years.
But this is not the point. The point is the Nundu.
Kyle was very curious about how they did it. They even got the Nundu.
Not only is that thing agile, even the breath it exhales is poisonous, and it can easily destroy a village.
Let's put it this way, the Ministry of Magic clearly stated in its description of it that under normal circumstances, it would take more than a hundred skilled wizards to subdue a sac-shaped cat.
Although there is a certain degree of exaggeration, it is enough to illustrate its danger. You know, it only takes ten wizards to subdue a fire dragon.
"Fortunately, it was the Swooping Evil that ran away. "Kyle sighed sincerely.
It's not that he looked down on the Swooping Evil.
Although the Swooping Evil was also defined as 5X, that was only because its danger level reached the standard.
The Nundu was defined as 5X because the Ministry of Magic's rating was only 5X.
The two are not in the same league at all.
The other senior students, or those who had some understanding of magical beasts, such as Cedric and others, all nodded in agreement after hearing Kyle's words.
As for the other young wizards, they didn't know much about magical beasts and were more concerned about the escaped Swooping Evil.
The words "highly dangerous" in the newspaper did not seem to be alarmist.
"Fortunately, we are at Hogwarts." Someone said thankfully at this time: "With Dumbledore here, we will definitely not be harmed. "
His statement was quickly unanimously confirmed by everyone.
Yes, with Dumbledore here, what do they need to worry about?
The atmosphere at the table suddenly became much more lively.
But this situation did not last long, and soon it became quiet again.
Then, a young wizard suddenly stood up, not even bothering to finish breakfast, and ran straight to the owl shed.
At his reminder, the others also reacted and stood up, some running to the owl shed, while others rushed directly back to the dormitory.
The originally bustling hall was soon empty.
[End of the chapter]