Although they had made plenty of arrangements and gathered a great deal of intelligence, when facing Voldemort, especially with the enemy hidden and themselves exposed, for now Tver and the others could only respond passively.
"Well, it is Voldemort after all," Marvolio said smugly.
"During the last wizarding war, he was already capable of suppressing his own impatience and simply directing his subordinates without exposing a single opening to Dumbledore."
"If it hadn't been for that Potter boy, Dumbledore probably would have been dragged down to the bitter end by him!"
When Tver had first crossed over, he had actually not thought much of Voldemort.
After all, the Voldemort from the films was more like a warlord, terrifying, yes, but nowhere near enough to truly worry Tver.
But as Tver came to understand what Voldemort had really done, he realized that everything he did, at least while he still had his nose, had been deliberate.
The destruction Voldemort caused personally was actually quite limited, but the damage inflicted by the followers he commanded was far greater.
And that method served two purposes. First, it made it easier to spread terror throughout the wizarding world.
Second, and more importantly, it gave uninformed wizards room to cling to false hope.
If they joined the Death Eaters, or simply did not resist the Dark Lord, then wouldn't they be spared?
That silence was also a kind of psychological warfare. It kept most of the wizarding world too afraid to oppose him.
That was also why, when Voldemort fell the first time, so many wizards poured into the streets to celebrate, yet during the war itself, Dumbledore had been able to rely only on the ever-shrinking Order of the Phoenix.
Tver and the others could despise Voldemort on the strategic level, but if they underestimated the Dark Lord tactically, the consequences would absolutely be more than they were willing to bear.
So even though Voldemort's current movements were fairly favorable to Tver, he still had no choice but to stay on guard.
"It doesn't matter. Dumbledore has more than enough energy now to deal with Voldemort. We just need to handle our own business," Tver said easily.
He did not know the details of Dumbledore's operations with the Order of the Phoenix, but from what Lupin had let slip, they seemed to have stopped quite a few of Voldemort's attempts to infiltrate the Ministry of Magic.
"That's true." Cynthia's voice was clearly more cheerful. "Ever since Marvolio left the Auror Office, the Ministry of Magic hasn't just lost fighting strength. Even protection for its employees has dropped quite a bit."
"If Sirius and Kingsley hadn't worked together to uncover several cases of staff members being controlled by the Imperius Curse, the Ministry would already have been in a panic."
"Uh... are you sure that's a good thing?" Marvolio said awkwardly. "I'm controlling Dawlish with the Imperius Curse too."
"That is a good thing," Cynthia replied as if it were obvious.
"Once Dawlish is exposed, we can pin it on Voldemort. He's not exactly going to come out and deny it."
"Then if we control Dawlish again, it might even reduce people's suspicion of him."
"..."
Marvolio instantly fell silent.
"The longer I stay around you two, the more I feel like I'm the truly innocent one here..."
Innocent?
A teasing smile immediately appeared on Tver's face.
"If you ask me, the amount of time you've spent with Princess Catherine..."
Before he could finish, Marvolio cut him off roughly, embarrassed and furious.
"I already told you, that day I was just too bored, so I used imp magic to test whether my soul was still intact!"
"And the imp clinging to the little bear had absolutely nothing to do with me!"
"I don't know what you two are talking about, but if it was your own imp, why would it have nothing to do with you?" Cynthia asked curiously.
"..."
"Pfft."
Listening through the badge as one person fell completely silent while the other laughed so hard he was slapping his leg, Cynthia had the distinct feeling she had asked a very dangerous question.
Tver nearly laughed himself breathless. It took him a while to recover, but sensing that Marvolio looked ready to erupt out of sheer silence, he hurriedly changed the subject.
Even though he was the one who had started it...
"Ahem, let's talk about Marvolio's work instead." He cleared his throat, at least making sure his voice did not sound as delighted as his face looked.
"How's Joanne's work been lately? She hasn't poisoned you, has she?"
In the Joint Operations Office, Marvolio subtly rolled his eyes and picked up the manuscript he had been reading halfway through.
"She's doing fine. She's almost finished compiling the first volume of Travels with Vampires."
"That fast?" Tver asked in surprise.
It had not even been two months yet. Had Joanne already become familiar with how magic was used and what its effects were?
As if sensing Tver's confusion, Marvolio said loudly with disdain, "There's nothing profound in Lockhart's books. The stories are all stolen, and his understanding of the magic in them is shallow."
"Once you strip out all the parts where he boasts about himself, even two months feels too long!"
Tver immediately understood. He had felt the same way when he first flipped through Lockhart's works.
If the stories themselves had not been exciting enough, and if the persona and image Lockhart created for himself had not been so appealing to readers, Tver would not have chosen this set of books for Joanne to practice on.
"But in my eyes, this stuff is basically trash. Is it really that useful?"
Even now, two months later, Marvolio still did not understand why Tver attached so much importance to Joanne's "translation" work.
"It's trash to you, but to Muggles who know nothing about magic, it's treasure."
Tver knew that aside from himself, no one could understand just how much of a worldwide sensation Harry Potter could cause.
And no one would understand why, in order to recreate that kind of sensation, he would rather patiently let Joanne familiarize herself with magic and grow skilled at building stories about magic, instead of rashly pushing out Harry Potter right away.
"Joanne's work is very important, more important even than many of our earlier arrangements."
"So there's no need to rush, but make sure she understands magic as much as possible, and understands how the wizarding world works."
Tver himself had never read the original books, but he knew even more clearly that if Joanne's work were arranged according to the films' plot, Harry Potter would inevitably lose much of its charm.
So Joanne had to develop a genuine interest in writing the story herself.
"I keep feeling like she's more interested in understanding me. A few times now I've caught her looking at me with this scrutinizing gaze, like she wants to crack open my head and see what's inside..." Marvolio grumbled helplessly under his breath.
Normally he feared nothing, but now Joanne made him more nervous than Dumbledore did.
More importantly, Tver would not let him disturb Joanne, so he did not even have the ability to resist anymore...
"Just ordinary curiosity from a normal person," Tver said carelessly. "You just need to do your job."
"That's easy for you to say!" Marvolio snapped, throwing the manuscript onto the desk.
"There have suddenly been a lot more leak cases lately. Azkaban is almost running out of cells!"
"Aren't you coming back to work already?!"
"Hey, hey, seems like my magic power's running low. I can't hear you very well..."
Tver hurriedly tossed the badge into the drawer.
He had finally managed to steal a little leisure out of all this busyness. There was no way he was going back to the office to spend all day rushing around again.