Scrrrk!
As the giant scratched his head and yawned, a tree as thick as Harry's waist snapped clean in half.
The trio watching this scene almost couldn't stay standing.
"What do we do now!?"
Ron squealed in a whisper.
"We go back the way we came!" Harry said, pale-faced. "Remember! Quietly! Even though we have the Invisibility Cloak, we must be quiet!"
Ron and Hermione both nodded.
But before they could actually move, they saw the giant's nose twitch a few times, as if he had caught some scent, and he turned his gaze toward where the three of them were hiding.
In that instant, Harry felt goosebumps erupt all over his body. His heartbeat nearly stopped.
"Run!"
Ron was the first to lose it. Screaming, he shot out from under the cloak and bolted.
A second later, Hermione and Harry could no longer suppress their own screams either.
The giant looked delighted. Using both hands and feet, he rushed after Ron with great excitement.
Ron was scared out of his wits. His adrenaline spiked so fast that he ran with the greatest speed of his entire life.
Unfortunately, compared to a giant, his legs were simply way too short.
The giant looked clumsy, but one of his steps covered more ground than a dozen of Ron's.
With one chasing and one fleeing, the distance not only failed to widen, it even grew shorter.
"Ron!"
Seeing this, Harry panicked. Without caring whether the giant had been brought back by Hagrid, he pulled out his wand.
"Leg-Locker Curse!"
A streak of gray light shot out, cutting swiftly through the trees, and hit the giant's legs dead-on.
The Leg-Locker Curse could glue a person's legs tightly together.
It was indeed an excellent spell for dealing with fast-moving targets.
Harry had once seen an unlucky student running in the corridor get hit by it, and fall flat on his face with a nose full of blood.
But he'd forgotten one thing.
The reason the Ministry treated giants like deadly threats wasn't just because of their massive size and destructive strength.
It was also because giants were born with extremely thick, magic-resistant skin.
Vmmm~
A low hum sounded in the forest.
The gray light vanished the moment it hit the giant. It had zero effect, not even the slightest pause from the giant.
Unwilling to give up, Harry cast "Expelliarmus" again.
It was the spell he was most proficient in.
But once again, it did nothing.
"Bloody hell!"
Harry cursed and, without thinking, threw aside the cloak and ran after Ron and the giant, firing spells as he ran.
Even if these spells couldn't hurt the giant, he hoped to attract its attention, to make it chase him, not Ron.
Hermione gasped, shocked. She reached out to grab Harry but only caught empty air.
Panicking, she clenched her teeth and drew her wand as well.
The giant's magic-resistant skin was thick, but that didn't mean he was immune.
If the three of them attacked together with enough force, it wasn't impossible to drive him off.
But just as Hermione raised her wand, something in her peripheral vision caught her attention.
Instinctively, she turned her head, and her expression grew strange.
It was a thick iron chain.
One end was locked around the giant's right leg, the other end tied around a massive tree trunk that would take five people to encircle.
Right now, as the giant ran, the chain dragged behind him like a massive steel python, carving deep gouges into the ground.
BOOM!
Finally, the chain went taut.
Splinters and leaves exploded everywhere, and anything in its path was shredded.
The giant, whose leg was chained, was yanked forward and fell flat on his face, motionless.
Harry and Hermione stared, stunned speechless.
Ron, however, was still screaming and running, he didn't dare look back. His mind was blank; he was avoiding obstacles purely on instinct.
Suddenly, a large hand grabbed the back of his collar and lifted him up.
Ron nearly cried from fear, kicking wildly.
"Hey! Hey! Ron, calm down, it's me!"
Hagrid tried desperately to soothe him, but Ron only struggled harder.
Only when Hagrid's familiar face appeared right in front of him did Ron finally roll his eyes and faint.
"Ron!"
Harry and Hermione ran up, calling out.
They didn't even have time to talk to Hagrid. While Hagrid was gently laying Ron down, Hermione pulled a deep-purple potion from her pocket. She fed Ron a bit, then held the open bottle under his nose.
"Cough! Cough, cough!"
Ron finally woke up, rubbing his nose in disgust.
"Merlin's beard! What did you make me smell?"
"Ghoul urine extract."
When Hermione said that, Ron was speechless. He turned away to vomit.
But the moment he turned, he came face-to-face with Hagrid.
His eyes widened instantly, terror written all over his face.
Everyone hurried over to comfort him, patting his back, while Hermione uncorked the potion bottle again.
After half a day of fussing, Ron finally calmed down.
Pointing toward where the giant lay, he stammered, "H-H-Hagrid, th-that… thing… is it…?"
Hagrid's expression darkened. With a sigh, he said, "You've already met Grawp?"
"Grawp?" Harry repeated.
"Yeah," Hagrid said. "That's his name, or at least that's what it sounded like to me."
"Wait! This is not the time to talk about his name!" Hermione snapped angrily. "The point is, Hagrid, you actually brought a giant back? And you're keeping him in the Forbidden Forest? Do you have any idea how serious a mistake that is?"
"I know. Of course I know it's not right for Grawp to live in the forest. But I couldn't leave him behind." Hagrid's tears flowed down his scarred face into his beard. "He's my brother!"
The trio fell silent instantly.
Hermione and Ron gaped at Hagrid.
Harry waited a long moment before speaking slowly, "Hagrid… when you say 'brother,' do you mean…"
"Half-brother," Hagrid sobbed.
"Back when I was traveling with Moody and the others hunting Death Eaters, I happened to find the giant tribe my mother used to live with in Poland. I asked around and found out that after she left my dad, she was with another giant, and then came Grawp."
The trio exchanged looks. They couldn't find any words.
Hagrid, however, seemed to have started pouring everything out, either addicted to talking, or desperately trying to justify his actions.
"At first, I didn't want to bring him back. Giants, like humans, are social creatures. Staying with his own kind should've been best. But he wasn't doing well there. The other giants bullied him, because he was too small!"
"Too small!?"
Harry, Ron, and Hermione yelled at once.
They wondered if they'd misheard.
The giant they saw earlier had to be over five meters tall.
A creature like that... too small?
"Compared to the other giants, he is a bit small," Hagrid said sadly. "My mother didn't seem to like him much, just like she didn't like me. For giantesses, the most important thing is giving birth to large, strong children, and he…"
Halfway through, Hagrid broke down crying again.
His devastated expression made Harry and Ron feel guilty.
Only Hermione spoke, her tone bordering on hysterical sarcasm, "Oh, yes, absolutely tiny! Practically a little baby!"
Hagrid burst into even louder sobs.
"Hey! Hermione, you shouldn't say that! He's Hagrid's brother!" Ron protested.
"You don't have siblings, so you don't get it. But I do! If I were somewhere getting bullied all the time, Fred and George would definitely do everything they could to take me away!"
Harry agreed, "He's right, Hermione. Maybe we shouldn't be so harsh."
Hagrid was moved to tears again and immediately hugged Harry and Ron so tightly he nearly crushed them.
Hermione's face turned red with anger.
She stomped her foot hard.
"I'm harsh? Do you two have any idea what we're dealing with? This is a giant! You cannot apply normal sibling feelings here! Look at the iron chain around his leg! Hagrid! If you truly believed he wasn't dangerous, why would you need that!?"
Hagrid's sobbing faltered. Uneasily, he said, "Well… I admit, sometimes Grawp doesn't really know his own strength."
Harry and Ron exchanged a look.
Now they finally understood why they hadn't seen any other animals on the way.
With a top-tier predator like Grawp nearby, nothing would dare come close.
Just then, an awful roar sounded from nearby.
Everyone turned, and saw Grawp, who had been lying on the ground, somehow gotten back up.
His nose was crooked from the fall, and there was a huge purple lump on his forehead.
But he didn't care. He just kept roaring happily at Hagrid.
"You all right, Grawp?" Hagrid called out in what he thought was a cheerful voice. "Good nap, yeah?"
"Roooar!"
Grawp roared happily.
He reached out a giant hand, snapped a nearby tree like a twig, then grabbed a bird's nest from the fallen branches. Yelling, he hurled the eggs at Hagrid.
The eggs flew at terrifying speed, like cannonballs.
Hagrid instinctively shielded his head with his arms. The eggs whizzed over him and smashed into the ground.
Egg yolk and mud splattered everywhere. Hagrid lifted his head, relieved, and excitedly said to the slack-jawed trio, "Look! Grawp was trying to give us the eggs! I've been teaching him human manners and language these past weeks. Seems like he's learned a bit! So Hermione, don't worry, Grawp will only get better."
Hermione stood pale and trembling, fists clenched, unable to speak.
Harry and Ron nudged her with their elbows, giving her pleading looks.
They knew how dangerous it was for Hagrid to keep a giant, but they also couldn't bear to tell Hagrid to give Grawp up.
Besides, where could Grawp even go?
His old tribe would never take him back.
And the Ministry's handling of giants was ruthlessly cruel.
If they just released Grawp, he'd only end up dead.
Hermione seemed to realize this too. Her pale face softened with pity and conflict. Finally, she pushed aside Harry and Ron, who were staring at her like puppies, and sighed to Hagrid, "Fine, Hagrid. You can… keep Grawp here in the Forbidden Forest. But you must make sure no one ever discovers him!"
"Oh! Really?" Hagrid beamed. "Don't worry, not many young wizards are bold enough to wander into the forest like you lot. With Grawp here, nobody should notice!"
"I don't want to hear words like 'should,' 'maybe,' 'probably,' or 'might'!" Hermione snapped. "You must hide him completely! You know the Ministry is fighting with Professor Dumbledore! What do you think Umbridge will do if she finds out about Grawp?"
Without letting Hagrid answer, she continued, "Grawp will be killed! And you'll be sent to Azkaban!"
Hagrid shuddered so violently he nearly fell.
Azkaban was his eternal nightmare. He never wanted to return.
Harry, unable to watch him suffer, said softly, "Maybe you could hide him deeper in the forest? This spot is still too close to the castle."
"No, I can't. Any deeper and we'll be near the centaur tribe." Hagrid groaned, holding his head.
"They already argued with me fiercely just for putting Grawp here. It burned through all the goodwill I had with them. If I push any further, they'll attack Grawp for sure!"
"Then what do we do!?"
Ron jumped up anxiously.
At this point, he was fully invested in the brotherly bond between Hagrid and Grawp, completely forgetting which giant had just scared him unconscious.
Hermione shot him a glare.
"For now, it stays like this. I'll come back later to set up some fog charms and warning spells. Hopefully they'll help."
At her words, Hagrid, Harry, and Ron all lit up with joy and thanked her repeatedly.
But Hermione's eyes were still filled with worry.
Meanwhile, hidden in the shadows not far away, Newland was observing Grawp, who was busy tearing tree trunks apart like toys.
As the only DA core member stationed inside Hogwarts, his job was to monitor everything that happened there.
Hagrid's return yesterday, and his odd behavior afterward, had already caught his attention.
But he never imagined Hagrid's courage was this enormous, that he had actually brought a giant into Hogwarts.
This was an enormous discovery.
Right now, Umbridge's attitude toward him was still in a probing stage, friendly on the surface, but wary inside.
If he told her this…
He would undoubtedly earn her full trust.
The only question was whether this would anger Link.
Rumor had it Link and Hagrid were on very good terms.
Newland sank into deep conflict.
But in the next second, the DA Galleon hidden against his chest suddenly heated up intensely.
Startled, Newland pulled it out.
The numbers around the edge had changed.
24, 12, 1995.