Natasha, the contestant from Durmstrang, had just dodged an attack from the Fire Dragon and was leaning against the wall to catch her breath when she suddenly heard a strange rustling sound in the Maze's passage.
She stood up alertly and saw something that looked like a spider carrying a Golden Egg, moving quickly.
Natasha was momentarily stunned, but quickly fired an Impedimenta Curse. However, the spell's light only grazed the spider-like Poppet's body and collided with the stone wall beside it.
As she was about to pursue, a roar suddenly sounded: "Stop! Incendio!"
Ashwinder swept through, the spider-like Poppet "snapped" and exploded, and the Golden Egg rolled away.
Following closely, Abby from Salem rushed out, her reddish-brown hair flying through the air. She unhesitatingly charged towards the Golden Egg, and halfway there, she locked eyes with Natasha, was startled, and immediately redirected her Magic Wand.
"Petrificus Totalus!"
"Speedy Imprisonment!"
The two spells collided mid-air and bounced off each other.
At that moment, a mantis-like Poppet sprang out from the vines, grabbed the Golden Egg that had rolled to the wall, and by the time Natasha noticed it, it was already holding the Golden Egg and dashed into another passage!
"Wait, leave the Golden Egg!"
The two of them set aside their confrontation and chased after it together.
The next second, Samuel and Hope from Salem Academy also burst out from the passage. Natasha immediately halted, pressed against the wall, and politely watched as they ran past her.
Three against one, the chances of winning were too low; it was better to give up early.
...
"Defodio!"
The mantis-like Poppet exploded, and the Golden Egg dropped once more. A locust-like Poppet descended from the sky and pounced directly onto Abby's face. She screamed, lost sight of where she was going, and slammed into the wall!
Hope ran over, grabbed the lower half of the locust and slammed it to the ground, then stomped the Poppet flat with a foot.
Abby was actually very afraid of insects. She was frantically patting her face and clothes in fright, and after being pulled up by Hope, she saw that Samuel had already smashed another ant-like Poppet trying to snatch the Golden Egg, taking the Golden Egg.
"It's really difficult." Samuel's pale face showed a hint of gloom: "That guy made us so busy with just a few Poppets; if we faced him directly..."
"He brought the Poppets in here!" Abby frowned and said: "Why don't the judges count that as cheating?"
"Because his Poppets were probably made here on the spot." Hope squatted down and poked at the remains of the locust Poppet, saying: "Look, these are all materials found in the passage."
Abby, who had been a bit angry just now, fell silent upon seeing the messy dead leaves, vines, and branches.
A moment later, she sighed with admiration and said: "His Alchemy... is really amazing."
Hope silently nodded.
The three subconsciously didn't want to face Vid Gray. They banded together to return to the previous passage, silent all the way, their steps quiet and slow.
Upon returning to the Golden Compass room, Abby and the others found that several people were already there, including some who had just arrived and Natasha, who had passed by earlier.
Everyone was dumbfounded, staring at the passage on the other side. Samuel quickly walked over, and he too gasped with his mouth wide open.
A spider-like Poppet was at the passage entrance, using vines to weave a web.
Of course, such a non-magical barrier could be easily destroyed by anyone present. But what caught their attention was that several Poppets stuck to the web were pulling fibers from their bodies, forming a string of words—
[Thank you for your enthusiastic cooperation
All remaining Golden Eggs are with me
——V.G.]
In fact, even without the signature, everyone knew who was behind this upon seeing the Poppets.
"Incendio!"
Ganesh from Mando used the Flame Curse, an extraordinarily hot and grand flame shot out, reducing the Poppets on the spider web to ashes.
He looked at the others and said loudly: "I don't believe he collected all the Golden Eggs by himself. Who wants to join me in checking it out?"
After a brief silence among the crowd, Natasha quietly said, "Ganesh, you arrived late, so you didn't see it... Just a moment ago, a Poppet carrying several Golden Eggs slipped into the passage right under our noses."
She pointed to another passage with her hand.
Ganesh followed her gaze, then turned his head back, eyebrows twitching, looking at them in disbelief: "And what about you? You just watched as the Poppet stole the Golden Eggs?"
He was puzzled: Could the Poppet stealing the Golden Eggs be exceptionally powerful? The ones here are so fragile!
"It mainly disguised itself too well." Zahid from Akadim awkwardly scratched his nose and muttered in a low voice: "That Poppet looked entirely like a vine. If it hadn't accidentally dropped a Golden Egg at the end, we might not have noticed it even after entering the passage."
Who could have thought? A plant mixed among a swarm of insects; the other Poppets were as rough as beggars, no one would pick them up even if thrown to the ground, yet that vine was so realistic that it was hard to distinguish even up close, especially with the Chamber of Secrets and passages already having a large number of vines.
"Accidentally?" Ganesh rubbed his brow and said in frustration: "Have you ever seen a Poppet be 'accidental'? It definitely deliberately revealed the Golden Egg to lure us over!"
Natasha sighed: "But could we not go?"
After a moment of silence, Ganesh, not giving up, still went in to explore, and the others, uncertain of what they were thinking, followed him inside.