Horace Slughorn hadn't contacted John for a while since John had asked him that question.
When John entered the room, he didn't see Basil, and Tom wasn't there either.
"Went to the owlery?"
John thought for a moment and quickly figured it out.
All the owls at school lived in the owlery—except for Basil.
Because Basil liked to fight. A few owls had been beaten so badly by him that they nearly lost all their feathers.
He was practically the tyrant of the owlery.
And with his loyal sidekick Tom, the owl-dog duo struck fear into every owl.
John headed toward the owlery. He figured Basil was probably off picking a fight with some owl again.
Other than Hedwig, most owls were pretty afraid of him.
On the way, John ran into Mrs. Norris.
She affectionately circled around John's feet. John chuckled and said, "Has Filch expanded his search range all the way to the owlery now?"
After feeding Mrs. Norris some dried fish snacks, John continued walking toward the owlery.
The owlery was located in the West Tower, where Professor Flitwick's office—the Charms teacher—was also situated.
Quite a few students liked coming here, and Professor Flitwick was always happy to let them eat a few dancing cookies in his office.
When John arrived at the owlery, he saw a group of owls huddled in a corner. Basil was standing triumphantly on some unfortunate owl's perch.
Tom barked with great pride. Besides Basil, she didn't respect any of the winged creatures.
Directly across from Basil, Hedwig was staring at him.
The two snowy owls were locked in a fierce staredown, eyes wide.
Suddenly, Hedwig made the first move, spreading her massive white wings and launching into a full "owl-dive-bomb" from above.
Basil counterattacked from a lower position, coming back with the force of a tornado wrecking a parking lot.
Snowy feathers flew everywhere. Tom barked from below, cheering them on.
John's breath hitched as he quickly shouted to stop the feathery brawl, "Stop!"
The two furious, flapping snowy owls froze. Basil flew down to perch on John's shoulder, still screeching provocations in Hedwig's direction.
Hedwig wasn't backing down either, hooting profanities right back.
Judging by how the other owls shrank back in fear, it was clear she wasn't being polite.
"John." Cho Chang had also arrived at the owlery, holding two letters and a package in her hands.
"Cho," John glanced at the feathers still fluttering in the air and said, "I hope your owl wasn't involved."
Cho let out a soft exclamation and said, "It's happened before—owls do fight sometimes."
John wasn't sure whether he should tell her which owl was doing the fighting.
"Just ten minutes ago, I suddenly remembered it's my mum's birthday today, and I'm out of candy as Cedric ate all of them. I still need to order some," Cho said as she waved the letters in her hand.
"He's been a bit busy lately, but that's not a bad thing. Cedric is still coating.. about that.. you know."
With the gentle temperament of an understanding girlfriend, Cho was very understanding of her boyfriend Cedric's busyness with student council matters.
John nodded and handed a letter to Basil. "Maybe try a different flavor. Cedric might like something sweet and sour?"
"Good idea." Cho thought about how Cedric had been eating a lot of chocolate lately, so a change of taste would be nice.
Basil took the envelope and looked smugly at Hedwig, as if to say I've got a mission, I'll let you off for now.
Hedwig refused to back down, hooting in protest.
Once Basil flew off, the owls in the owlery finally relaxed and returned to normal.
Tom trotted over to John's feet, and Cho called over a barn owl to send her mother the gift and letter.
Then she found another owl to send the order to the candy shop.
Just as they were about to leave, John saw Harry coming up the stairs.
Harry saw Cho, and his breath hitched, looking visibly nervous.
"Hello," Harry said awkwardly.
He was holding a letter in his hand—looked like he was here to send mail too.
Hedwig immediately flew down and perched on his shoulder.
As if only just noticing there was a third person, Harry said uneasily, "Hello, John."
"Harry," John's gaze swept over the letter in Harry's hand. Harry quickly pulled his hand back. "I'll get going first."
Without saying more, John left the owlery.
Harry was left standing there, awkward and unsure of what to say to Cho.
Cho let out a small exclamation—she had just remembered she was supposed to meet Cedric.
Harry looked a little disappointed. He did like Cho.
But Cho was already dating Cedric.
It wasn't like he could just go after someone who already had a boyfriend.
Clutching the letter he had written to Sirius Black, Harry yelped when Hedwig pecked him impatiently.
…
The Daily Prophet was tossed down.
Along with it came a copy of the Daily Bugle.
It was a newspaper from America, similar in nature to the Daily Prophet.
John first opened the Daily Prophet, which reported on several matters, including the Ministry of Magic's renewed focus on education reform, as well as the reassessment of Azkaban.
There were also some articles about the booming sales of Silverhand products.
I Swing a Greatsword at Hogwarts 2 had just been released and once again broke sales records, with the plot now entering a major twist.
One of the sections covering international news mentioned that the Plymouth settlement had been attacked by violent assailants.
Since the domestic paper didn't go into much detail, John picked up the Daily Bugle for a closer look.
The attack on the Plymouth settlement was reported in much more detail. It said that a branch of the Silverhand Johnny specialty store had been attacked, and successfully subdued the assailants.
The attackers were a group of Dark wizards known for their cruelty. With testimony from numerous witnesses, it was stated that Silverhand Johnny's store was forced to retaliate and killed several of the Dark wizards.
The American Ministry of Magic took the matter seriously, questioning the staff present at the time as well as over a dozen wizards who claimed to be merely "passing by."
All their testimonies were consistent.
The American Ministry urged shop-owning wizards to ensure they were properly prepared for defense and to avoid acting rashly in dangerous situations.
After reading through the entire article, it was clear that no blame was being placed on Silverhand Johnny shop.
After all, they were the victims.
Those dozen or so "passersby" had naturally been planted in advance, all to avoid unnecessary trouble.
The Aurors suspected something was off, but unfortunately, they had no way to prove it.
The security team brought back a Death Eater named Antonin.
With the tender care of Veritaserum, he very easily revealed their motive.
They had come to seize those mouthwatering "Zhi"-series products.
If Aurors could be equipped with them, then of course Death Eaters wanted them too.
Unfortunately for them, Johnson was basically born to fight—taking on five at once, he utterly crushed the Death Eaters.
Antonin hadn't expected the seemingly frail Nagini to launch a sneak attack, catching him off guard and subduing him on the spot.
After putting the newspaper away, John noticed a piece of news he'd missed in the Daily Prophet.
Sturgis Podmore had illegally entered the Ministry of Magic.
"Isn't that the unlucky guy who got bitten by Tom?"
John picked up the newspaper and quickly skimmed through it.
On August 31st, Podmore had broken into the Ministry and was now facing trial before the Wizengamot.
"Member of the Order of the Phoenix," John said with a smirk. "Looks like Dumbledore's got his hands full."
The same news had also reached Harry and the others.
"Do you think he was doing it for the Order of the Phoenix?" Ron asked in a hushed voice.
Harry remembered that on the day they went to the station, Podmore hadn't shown up.
At the time, Moody had been furious.
That reaction suggested Podmore hadn't been sent on a mission by the Order of the Phoenix.
"Then, maybe they didn't expect him to get caught," Hermione said.
Ron shouted excitedly, "Maybe he was framed!"
Under Hermione's murderous glare, he lowered his voice and said, "Think about it. The Ministry still hasn't acknowledged You-Know-Who's return after all this time. Maybe they're just trying to push Dumbledore out."
His brain suddenly seemed to be working for once.
Hermione thought that kind of made sense. Harry, however, just felt a headache coming on at the thought of that massive pile of homework.
Especially Snape's—long, boring, and stinking of ill intent.
No wonder the Weasley twins had said they wouldn't mind skipping a few classes.
The mounting pressure from O.W.L. exam assignments was exhausting them.
But not everything was bad—at least the Defense Against the Dark Arts class had some genuinely interesting lessons.
The beautiful Professor Hield was teaching them wand techniques and quick-casting skills in class. Even though Umbridge had her opinions, Professor Hield stubbornly kept teaching and wasn't affected in the slightest.
"At least Professor Hield is a good teacher, isn't she?" Hermione whispered.
Harry silently agreed.
__________
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