The noise was getting louder and louder, and also clearer and clearer.
It sounded like the screaming of some woman, or maybe a female ghost.
But in a place like Hogwarts, what kind of thing could happen that would make a woman (or ghost) cry and scream like that?
Link and Cedric carefully listened to figure out where the sound was coming from, then, without saying a word, both stood up and headed toward the entrance hall.
It was right before dinner, a critical time, and among the many students waiting for their meal in the Great Hall, quite a few were just as curious about what was happening as they were.
Whispering to each other, they formed a circle around the entrance hall corridor and the staircase. Some looked shocked, some even looked frightened, but more of them had expressions of schadenfreude on their faces.
The only person who looked downcast was Professor McGonagall.
She was standing directly opposite Link and Cedric, and seemed to be very distressed by what was happening in front of her.
With the help of some Hufflepuffs, Link and Cedric managed to squeeze into the crowd.
And only then did they finally see the true source of the piercing screams.
Hogwarts's Divination professor, Sybill Trelawney.
At this moment, she had a wand in one hand and an empty wine bottle in the other, occasionally waving them threateningly, then using both hands and feet to cling tightly to a pillar.
Her hair was all sticking straight up, her glasses were crooked, making one of her eyes look much bigger than the other.
All the countless scarves and shawls she normally took pride in were hanging in a mess, making her look like she was falling apart all over.
By her feet stood several large suitcases, crookedly propped up.
The edges and wheels on the bottoms of these big cases were damaged to varying degrees, and the marks looked fresh, as if they had just been thrown down from upstairs.
And that was exactly what had happened.
Because in the next moment, a small leather case was thrown down, hitting the floor with a loud thump.
Professor Trelawney seemed to be startled by the noise. She curled herself tighter against the pillar and screamed, "No! This can't be happening… it can't… I refuse to accept it… Dumbledore promised me!"
"You didn't think it would turn out like this?"
An unpleasant, pinched voice came from where the leather case had just fallen. Everyone looked up and saw Umbridge slowly coming down the stairs, surrounded by members of the Inquisitorial Squad. "Even though a fraud like you can't even predict tomorrow's weather..."
"As a person with a normal IQ, you should at least realize that your terrible performance when I observed your classes, and your complete lack of improvement afterward, were bound to get you fired, right?"
"No, you can't! I've lived here for a full sixteen years! Hogwarts is my home!"
Professor Trelawney screamed hysterically, waving her arms back and forth as if trying to make her words more convincing.
What she didn't notice was that the arm she was waving was still clutching a wand.
The faces of the Inquisitorial Squad members around Umbridge changed instantly.
One unit quickly pulled Umbridge to the back of the formation and raised a protective wall with the Protego charm.
The rest of the squad members all raised their wands together.
"Expelliarmus."
Amid the perfectly synchronized chanting, Professor Trelawney was completely swallowed by red light. Her whole body was slammed violently into the wall, then bounced back down onto the floor.
The huge impact clearly injured her organs and bones.
After hitting the ground, she barely managed to prop herself up, as if she wanted to say something.
But the moment she opened her mouth, a mouthful of blood flowed from the corner of her lips, mixing with the dust on her face to form a disgusting dark red.
A wave of gasps went through the crowd.
Everyone found it hard to understand why the Inquisitorial Squad had used such heavy force.
After all, Professor Trelawney hadn't shown much intent to attack at all.
Yet the squad members who had done this still didn't relax.
The red glow at their wand tips not only didn't fade, it grew even brighter.
More importantly, the direction their wands were pointed was vaguely aimed at the surrounding crowd.
That was actually easy enough to understand.
After all, just this morning a whole team of Inquisitorial Squad members had been sent to the hospital wing.
"Tsk, tsk, tsk, I'd bet she's got at least three broken ribs, and one of them looks like it stabbed into an organ. Poor thing."
John had somehow wandered over as well, smacking his lips as he spoke. "On this you can totally trust me, I just finished learning emergency treatment from Madam Pomfrey!"
Hearing that, Link and Cedric both turned to look at John.
Link asked in confusion, "Why did you go learn that?"
John glared at Link.
"Because Professor McGonagall doesn't dare punish you! So the blame for this morning's group brawl got dumped on me."
"And Madam Pomfrey felt it was necessary for the main culprit who made her workload explode to get some punishment too."
"So I got dragged off to practice healing spells all day long, and only just got released now!"
"My God! You have no idea how many cases of frostbite I handled today!"
"Those wounds were already starting to rot!"
"Link, you were way too vicious!"
Hearing that, both Link and Cedric couldn't help laughing. After John punched each of them once, Link assfinally held back his laughter and said, "Honestly, that's not really my fault."
"And I should tell you some bad news."
"Tonight's dinner seems to be stewed cured meat."
"You've seen that, right? After it's stewed, it looks almost exactly like frostbitten flesh."
John's face changed. He immediately covered his mouth.
"Oh! My God!"
Seeing that, Link and the others burst out laughing again.
Hermione finally couldn't stand it anymore.
She angrily shouted at Cedric and John, "Can't you have a little sympathy? Professor Trelawney was beaten until she spat blood!"
Hearing that, the smiles on the faces of Link, Cedric, and John slowly faded. They looked at each other, then Link spread his hands toward Hermione.
"What does that have to do with us?"
"How does it not?" Hermione continued. "She's our professor…"
"I have to correct you there!" John waved his hands repeatedly, interrupting her.
"She's just a part-time hire at Hogwarts, not my professor. I didn't take Divination, that kind of class where you just make up little stories about how you're going to be unlucky and still get credits."
Hearing that, Harry and Ron awkwardly rubbed their noses.
Their reason for choosing Divination was exactly what John had just described.
Luckily, no one paid attention to their reactions. Seeing Hermione still angry, Link went on, "What's going on here, Hermione? I remember you didn't get along with Trelawney at all before."
"That's true, but this time Umbridge is throwing Professor Trelawney out on the street!" Hermione grabbed her hair, looking distressed.
"Professor Trelawney doesn't have any savings at all, and now she's so badly hurt. If she's just kicked out like this, she'll die!"
"That's her own mistake," Cedric argued. "Hermione, you probably don't know this, but the reason Trelawney has no savings is because she spent it all on buying alcohol!"
"If you ever go look at her home in the attic above the Divination classroom, you'll see it's almost filled with wine bottles!"
"A lot of the time when you go to her classes and she looks all spaced out, it's because she's drunk!"
"A professor who has to get drunk just to teach should have been fired a long time ago!"
As he finished speaking, Cedric even pointed at the wine bottle that Trelawney still refused to let go of despite being so badly injured.
Hermione noticed it too. She lowered her head, left speechless.
"I don't agree with you!" Harry suddenly said.
"Professor Trelawney was hired by Dumbledore, and it was Dumbledore who allowed her to live at Hogwarts."
"I don't believe Dumbledore didn't know about Professor Trelawney's habits."
"And if he knew, but still didn't drive her away, then there must be some special reason that we don't know about."
"You can't just dismiss that with a few words!"
Harry stared hard at Cedric, his gaze sharp. Cedric looked back at Harry, his eyes narrowing.
The atmosphere between them started to grow more and more tense.
Only now did the others realize what was happening.
These two had already had a very unpleasant argument earlier; it had just been interrupted by Trelawney's sudden incident.
Now Harry was clearly trying to continue that previous topic.
Link shook his head helplessly.
Cedric had obviously noticed Harry's feelings for Cho Chang, which was why he was being so aggressive.
Otherwise, with Cedric's normally gentle and polite temperament, he wouldn't bother arguing with an emotional kid like Harry at all.
What Link really couldn't understand was where Harry got the confidence to go head-to-head with Cedric like this.
Cedric was the second most powerful person in Hufflepuff House, right after Link.
Compared to the original story, that might look like a downgrade at first glance, but in reality, because of Link's existence, Cedric, who had successfully survived until now, had undergone a qualitative leap in both influence and personal strength.
A campus star like that was already far beyond what a so-called "Chosen One" like Harry could stand up to.
What's more, the real reason Dumbledore had allowed Trelawney to muddle along at Hogwarts in the first place was actually because of Harry.
If Harry knew the truth, not only would he stop defending Trelawney, he would probably want to blast her head off with a Blasting Curse.
Sighing, Link finally spoke before the situation could get even harder to control, "Alright, stop getting tangled up in this."
"Someone tell us, how did Trelawney and Umbridge end up like this?"
Harry and Hermione looked at each other. After a long while, Ron finally raised his hand timidly, like he was answering a question in class.
"I think it's probably because Trelawney likes to make up predictions."
"That's actually really common. Almost everyone who's taken Divination has been told by Trelawney that they're about to die."
"Like Harry, Trelawney that fraud once said he was going to suffer misfortune, and that some black dog was a sign of his death."
"But what happened?"
"Harry's still perfectly fine."
"Everyone else she predicted for is fine too."
"So…"
"Get to the point!" John said impatiently, picking at his ear.
That made Harry glare at him, but John didn't care.
Ron shrank back in fright and hurriedly pulled Harry, who was about to say something.
Ever since experiencing the wonders of the M.O.M.H.L. factory, Ron had turned into a pure wage slave, a grind addict, desperate to spend all twenty-four hours a day there making money.
And John just happened to be a manager at the M.O.M.H.L. factory, so of course Ron was afraid of him.
After calming himself, Ron hurried on, "The point is, when Umbridge first became Hogwarts High Inquisitor, she inspected Trelawney's classes."
"Of course she was very dissatisfied, so Umbridge scolded Trelawney harshly and gave her a severe warning."
"Ever since then, Trelawney has held a grudge against Umbridge."
"At first, maybe because Umbridge was so powerful, Trelawney only dared to mutter about it to herself."
"But recently… she's gotten bolder."
"So," Link said, "Trelawney made up an unlucky prophecy about Umbridge?"
Ron said with some schadenfreude, "More precisely, Trelawney said Umbridge would be sent to Azkaban, and not just any cell, but one of the highest-security ones. I bet she must have been really drunk when she said that."
As soon as he said that, John, Cedric, and most of the other students nearby all laughed.
In a huge place like Hogwarts, there really weren't many people who liked Trelawney.
After all, nobody likes being cursed with bad luck all the time.
Especially since Trelawney loved to get students to curse themselves, those kinds of little prophecy stories always got high marks on her exams.
But unlike everyone else, Link didn't laugh.
On the contrary, his expression was unusually serious.
Because he hated Umbridge so much that he remembered everything about her storyline very clearly.
In the original story, Umbridge's final fate really was to be sentenced to life imprisonment, locked up in one of Azkaban's highest-security cells.
When you thought about that together with Trelawney's identity as a Divination professor, it was hard not to let your imagination run wild.
And just as Link was full of doubts, the Inquisitorial Squad members on the stairs finally seemed to confirm that the crowd below posed no threat.
They slowly spread out to both sides, and at last revealed Umbridge, who had been hidden at the very center of their formation.