Chapter 181: "I Failed," When the Mandrakes Mature
Long after Ethan left, the creatures that had fled in panic dared to come here trembling, wanting to figure out what exactly had happened here that caused them to be attracted one moment and driven away the next.
And on the outskirts of the Forbidden Forest, the centaurs who only slightly felt the lingering aftermath of the deterrence also carefully felt their way here after a long time.
Although Ethan had already simply cleaned up the scene, he had only cleaned up some footprints, claw marks, and other traces that easily exposed his identity. The trees he knocked down and scorched, and the like, were not cleaned up.
The black-haired centaur Bane looked at the traces in the clearing and asked, "Did a large dragon like a Ukrainian Ironbelly appear in the Forbidden Forest?"
"Look here, there are signs of being cleaned up, so it definitely wasn't just a large magical creature like a dragon.
"Just don't know if the ones who cleaned these things up are the werewolves living here or creatures from outside the Forbidden Forest." The white-blond-haired centaur Firenze said, looking at a cleaned-up spot where no information could be seen.
"Don't know. But a few days ago when stars could be seen, I once found a star exceptionally bright. Don't know if it's related to what happened here." Ronan, who was responsible for keeping watch, suddenly interjected.
"I noticed too, but no one has ever recorded before what changes this suddenly lit star would bring." Firenze nodded.
"Something is coming, and there is nothing worthy of attention here anymore. Let's go first."
Bane called all the centaurs, guarding carefully, preventing those magical creatures rushing over one after another from attacking them, and slowly retreated toward the outskirts.
"Should we tell Dumbledore about this? After all, he is the Headmaster of Hogwarts." Firenze asked Bane while retreating.
"No, this is a matter within the Forbidden Forest, having nothing to do with people in Hogwarts." Bane shook his head firmly.
"Alright." There were no more voices in the team.
When Ethan secretly flew back to the edge of the Forbidden Forest, he began constantly adjusting his expression, hiding the joy of success, trying his best to put on a sad and depressed look after failure.
Brewing for a long time, Ethan recalled his various painful memories before finally managing to suppress the joy a bit.
Ethan lowered his head, walked out from the outskirts of the Forbidden Forest, and slowly walked toward the castle.
When leaving the Forbidden Forest, he deliberately dispelled the Impervius charm on his body used to shelter from the rain, just to make himself look as wretched as possible.
"I can still feel my Animagus seems to be stored in a space I don't know. As long as I want, it will directly appear, replacing my body, becoming the carrier of my consciousness.
"Truly magical magic. Don't know who invented it. Even on the Chocolate Frog cards, only the first wizard who displayed this ability is recorded, not saying he is the inventor."
Walking halfway to the castle, Ethan hurriedly stopped thinking about this question, because now as long as he thought of things related to Animagus, his joy would well up from the bottom of his heart.
Continuing to adjust his mindset a wave, plus the sensation of the deliberately soaked wizard robes sticking to his body, Ethan finally successfully hid all facial expressions when walking to the castle doors, and even brought a trace of displeasure.
"Very right, just this state. If others ask later, just won't say a single word."
Ethan firmly remembered his mood at this time, lowered his head, and slowly pushed open the castle front doors.
Saying sorry to Filch in his heart, Ethan dragged his feet, leaving two lines of muddy footprints on the clean floor, and went underground along the stairs.
Keeping his head down all the way, Ethan slowly climbed through the doorway into the common room, slowly passed through the frolicking crowd into the boys' dormitory.
After entering the empty dormitory, Ethan slightly quickened his pace, nimbly took off his soaking wet clothes, and hung them next to the flame bottle keeping Little Black to dry.
Just as he nimbly changed into dry pajamas, he heard some movement at the door. Someone was opening the door.
Ethan hurriedly slowed down his movements, lowered his head again, pretending to be indifferent, and walked slowly toward his bed.
The door was pushed open. It was Draco returning.
"Are you okay? What happened?" Just now in the lively common room, the boy saw Ethan walking past them with water still dripping from his body, head lowered.
Moreover, when he greeted Ethan, he didn't get any response. So Draco was somewhat worried, threw aside the classmate asking him to guide Wizarding Cards skills, and hurriedly returned to the dormitory.
"Nothing." With his back to Draco, Ethan slowly pulled the curtains, climbed into bed, and put the curtains down again, letting Draco not see his movements and expressions.
He rubbed his cheek muscles, which were somewhat stiff from trying hard to keep a straight face all along, and revealed a smile.
"Alright, call me if anything. I'll write homework in the dormitory for a while. Still have a lot of homework not written." Hearing the dullness in Ethan's voice, Draco found an excuse and stayed in the dormitory.
"I'm fine. Go play if you should." Ethan's voice came from behind the curtains.
"Played enough too. Should write homework." Draco lay on the desk, occasionally looking back at Ethan's position.
And Ethan was somewhat moved yet somewhat helpless regarding Draco's behavior.
"Based on your performance, I recognize you as my friend, Draco.
"But, can you listen to me and go out to play? With you in the dormitory, I can't even be happy properly."
Helplessly, Ethan couldn't say this explicitly. He could only lie on the bed, pondering how to train so that he could cast some magic in the red dragon form like an ordinary Animagus.
Thinking and thinking, Ethan fell asleep.
This sleep, Ethan slept very soundly. When he woke up in the morning, he swept away the fatigue brought by lack of sleep for more than a week.
After a night, Ethan's joy decreased a bit, and disguised even more handily.
Just as he finished breakfast and prepared to leave the Great Hall, Dumbledore called him to the Headmaster's office.
Ethan followed silently behind the old man all the way into the room. Those portraits hanging on the wall, some were empty, some were dozing off.
Snap! After a snap of fingers, two cups of black tea appeared on the table.
"Ginger tea. Weather too damp recently. Drink some to warm the body." The old man pointed to the cup in front of Ethan.
Ethan picked up the cup silently. Just brought to his mouth, he heard the old man ask:
"I wasn't at school last night. How was your Animagus? You should have caught the first thunderstorm, right?"
Ethan's movement paused. Tried his best to recall some sad things in his mind, making his emotion and tone appear more sincere.
He slowly put down the teacup, covered his face with both hands. After a long while, he finally said in a muffled voice: "Caught it, but failed."
Actually, from the moment he saw Ethan, Dumbledore knew yesterday's Transfiguration had problems. Just now was also confirming his judgment: "Why? Where did the problem occur?"
Ethan leaned on the sofa back, closed his eyes, daring not meet the old man's gaze: "Don't know. Maybe some process in the middle went wrong. The potion didn't form."
"Was there a problem with the Mandrake, or did a deviation occur in the subsequent process? Or are my research steps problematic, this set of procedures is only suitable for myself, not suitable for others?" The old man had no doubts about him, began to ponder where problems might have occurred.
"Tell me what the state of the potion in the potion bottle was like. What exactly caused the potion not to succeed?"
"The materials inside had produced some changes, but the changes were incomplete. There were still some dragon materials and parts of my hair precipitated inside." Ethan fabricated a state of a failed potion based on failed cases in the family.
"In this case, it should be some stage in the first step and the second step went wrong." The old man pondered for a while, thought about those failed cases he collected, felt his improved steps should be fine.
Ethan sneaked a glance at the old man thinking seriously, feeling somewhat guilty inside: "Sorry Headmaster, actually I succeeded, just inconvenient to explain temporarily. Sorry."
Ethan didn't pick up the conversation. He was afraid his guilt would be heard by the old man.
"Then do you still want to conduct the next attempt? After the thunderstorm season of the summer vacation passes, start over from the first step?"
"No, let's just leave it at that." Ethan shook his head.
"Mm."
For a time, only Dumbledore's tea-drinking sound remained in the Headmaster's office.
In the silence, Ethan soon took his leave.
And after he left, those dozing headmaster portraits immediately began discussing.
"Did he really fail? Feels a bit too calm. If it were me, spending three months of painstaking effort at this age failing in one morning, I couldn't achieve this kind of calmness."
"Don't know, but I actually feel nothing abnormal. Feels just like a normal child's performance after failure. It's been a whole night already. Maybe his self-regulation ability is strong."
"What do you think? Dumbledore."
"I don't know." The old man shook his head.
Before, when Ethan just enrolled, his innate Occlumency ability wasn't that perfect yet. The old man could still read some of Ethan's emotional fluctuations relying on Legilimency.
But as Ethan's awakenings increased, now the old man couldn't read anything at all.
For the whole Sunday, Ethan stayed in his dormitory. On one hand to complete his homework, on the other hand, with fewer people in the dormitory, it was easier to hide his emotions.
Draco also knew the reason for Ethan's despondency last night, giving him plenty of personal space.
Soon, the new week arrived, which was also their last class time this school year.
"Exams next Thursday."
"Exams next Wednesday, be prepared."
As soon as professors entered the classroom, they announced the exams next week.
It was exactly because of this atmosphere that Ethan's failure quickly stopped being the focus of attention for insiders like Hermione and the twins, making him breathe a sigh of relief. After all, he didn't fail, and being constantly comforted was still somewhat shameful.
During Wednesday's Herbology class, Ethan looked at the Mandrakes in the greenhouse becoming taciturn and their acne decreasing, thinking: "Are these Mandrakes about to mature?"
They hadn't seen Mandrakes for a while because they were quite noisy some time ago, so Professor Sprout moved them to other greenhouses for classes.
Sure enough, Professor McGonagall announced this matter to the students of the whole school during breakfast on Friday.
"Students, Professor Sprout's Mandrakes have matured and can be harvested tonight. This also means that the attacked Mr. Ron Weasley and Mrs. Norris will soon be able to return to normal."
"Oh." But regarding this news, most students had no reaction at all.
The reasons inside were various. Some were because they anticipated this matter long ago. For example, second-year students, they used the greenhouse planting Mandrakes, had psychological preparation long ago, so were not surprised.
And some simply had faded memories of the Basilisk threat.
People are all forgetful. After all, time had passed for half a year. Except for when the incident just happened, everyone was actively discussing the treatment of victims and the identity of the attacker. After such a long time, no one discussed this matter anymore.
So, now except for a few second-year students familiar with Ron at the Gryffindor long table, and other people from the Weasley family, basically no one in the entire Great Hall reacted to this.
This made Professor McGonagall somewhat disappointed, because she also thought if she could catch the last chance before Ron woke up based on everyone's reaction, find this "heir" of Salazar.
"Alright, everyone review well on the weekend. Hope you can get good grades in exams next week."
Compared to the previous news, it was still this sentence that brought a greater impact. Many little wizards sighed and silently accelerated the speed of eating.
Especially fifth and seventh-year students, what they had to participate in were exams with profound impacts on them.
Some girls even got so nervous they couldn't eat. After Professor McGonagall finished speaking, they hurriedly left the Great Hall, looking for suitable places to review.
At the Slytherin long table, Draco stirred the oatmeal porridge in front of him with a spoon: "Don't know if the youngest son of the Weasley family knows who controlled the Basilisk to attack them. I really, very much want to know, who exactly is Salazar's heir."
Regarding this question, Ethan was also itching in his heart, very wanting to know the answer.
He shrugged: "Hope Ron has information.
"I am also very curious, who exactly planned the attack on him."
Before Ron was petrified, Ethan had already concluded based on various signs that Ron got the diary, becoming Voldemort's second-generation vessel.
But just when he was prepared to slowly find evidence and expose the Horcrux matter to Dumbledore, this confirmed host was suddenly petrified.
This made Ethan lose his grip at once. He didn't find traces of the diary subsequently either, could only wait for Ron to wake up and confess himself.
"After harvesting tonight, Professor Snape will soon finish brewing the potion. At most tomorrow can get the answer."
Ethan finished the milk in front of him in one gulp.
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