Chapter 425 Who Are You?

"Finally, I've sorted out the trivial matters before the Triwizard Tournament."

In the office, William didn't wake up until nine in the morning after a good day's rest, feeling completely satisfied.

Everything is officially on track. In addition to seeing whether the warriors can use clever methods to obtain some information, all that is left to see is how the Ministry of Magic torments these warriors - the Ministry of Magic spends a lot of money to do this. Being an unsung hero, the publicity in the later period is almost obvious.

But these have nothing to do with him.

For him, the most important thing now is to cook the elixir of happiness.

‘Calm down, William, it’s just a slightly more difficult potion brewing. ’

He took deep breaths repeatedly to adjust himself to the best condition, and then laid out the ingredients needed for the elixir at once - eggs of the fire-ash snake, wild horseradish, sea onion bulbs, mothrat, thyme tincture, bird snake Eggshell, rue powder.

'It's ridiculously expensive stuff - how rich is that Lockhart guy? He dares to use birds and snakes in his shampoo...'

He looked at the entire batch of ingredients and shook his head.

The egg of the ash snake, the best of the best - it sounds like this thing is like ashes at the bottom of a pot, but the reality is that it was this thing that burned down the Great Hall of Hogwarts last time, and he also asked the old professor Only then did we get these precious raw materials.

Even the ingredients for the elixir sent by Ilvermorny were inferior to those he had obtained. If it weren't for the significance of boiling the elixir for the first time, he himself would not be willing to use such good ingredients.

"Start processing the materials first...and then take the first step firmly...If you don't push yourself, you may never have the confidence to start."

He carefully peeled off the outer shell of the Fire Ash Snake's eggs, and then poured them intact into his best crucible - made from the fire crab shells given by Hagrid, the effect was right. Expensive materials.

‘It’s about to begin. ’

He murmured to himself, then carefully opened the wax seal of the elixir he had treasured for a long time, then gently used a tool to take out a drop, and dropped it on his tongue.

That magical feeling instantly covered his whole body, giving him a strong urge to go out.

But he suppressed this impulse and carefully felt the changes of the potion in his mouth.

'This is to assist... Well, it seems to be, by the way, low temperature... The eggshells of birds and snakes are ground by low temperature...'

'Otherwise it shouldn't feel like this...'

‘Rute powder, it seems... No, the smell of rue powder is too strong. Is it a problem with the handling method? Hmm...what was it mixed with? ’

'It's not this... it's not... it feels like... it is! ! ! ’

He quickly grabbed the blessing elixir and poured it all into his mouth, but did not swallow it. Instead, he spat out the extremely precious elixir, closed his eyes without any heartache, and ordered the quill to quickly copy it down.

"This bottle of sample has at least ten improvements - but I only tasted four of them..."

"But it already illustrates the problem. The four improvement methods are almost all reducing the loss of medicinal efficacy caused by long-term cooking - I don't know who did it, but the other party's method is very clever. He used no less than ten Use auxiliary magic potions or techniques to prevent the precipitation of medicinal properties..."

"Sure enough, just as I expected, the boiling time was too long... So we must ensure that the potion still retains enough magic power for such a long time... but we cannot restrict it too rigidly to prevent it from being unable to boil. It becomes that light golden state without impurities.”

"if it is like this…"

William stretched out his wand, summoned a cold flame under the crucible, and then began to deal with the bird and snake eggs in the crucible - this move made it start to glow dimly when it should have been burning violently.

'last all day...'

William nodded, then set the time and breathed a sigh of relief—at night, he could try to deal with it a second time.

——

"Potions, Harry."

Ron looked at the class schedule with a not-so-pleasant expression on his face.

"Yes, Potions."

Harry sighed, his face full of dissatisfaction - the two of them had just finished the extracurricular punishment of cleaning the toilet.

This is a punishment personally formulated by Professor McGonagall, and cannot be refused at all.

"Professor, she doesn't want to hear our explanation at all. She almost wants to expel us—"

Ron was a little scared when he said it now, "She also asked the academy's warriors to clean the toilet... It's really... It's obviously those Slytherins' fault!"

"They are just stupid enough to think that if they defeat you, they will give up your warrior seat to them!"

"The Triwizard Tournament has been held for so long, but there has never been a precedent like this! A group of people came to surround you, but you were beaten down - and then Professor McGonagall came to punish us!"

The more Ron talked, the angrier he became, "There are finally no classes, so you can go to the library and read books, but all your time is wasted cleaning the toilet!"

"Keep your voice down, Ron - Snape won't look down on you if you don't control your temper. I bet he'll be dying for us to clean the toilet again."

Although Harry was also angry, he tried his best to persuade Ron. He could use his wand to deal with the Slytherin students, but no matter whether Snape was taunting or insulting him, he could not pull out his wand. .

And there was no doubt that Snape would be taunting and insulting...whether it was him, Ron, Hermione, Neville or any other Gryffindor.

In addition, he is actually not in a bad mood at the moment - after personally sending five fourth-grade children to the school hospital, he actually feels pretty good...

"simply…"

Ron was still a little angry - he knocked one down with his fist, but he was also cursed and almost hit the ground.

"Okay, let's go to class...and ask Filch to check it out - I actually prefer to clean the toilet in one go. It's much cuter than Snape's face."

Half an hour later, Ron unfortunately found that his prediction had come true.

Snape didn't look good after learning where the absent students had gone.

This lesson was about the antidote to poison, but Snape's face was gloomier than the poison.

"You should prepare your own formula now. I ask you to cook it carefully, and then we will choose one person to try it..."

He almost said this through gritted teeth - this gave Harry an unpleasant association.

'Maybe he will let me drink the poison and then use the antidote prepared by Ron, then I will be dead...'

In particular, Ron's potion had an unsettling purple color, which made Harry even more desperate. Although his own green color was also disturbing, Harry could conclude that his potion was poisonous. Still within control.

"Would you like to remind Ron that you can secretly add some feces into the crucible?"

Just when such thoughts emerged, a student arrived to save Harry.

There was a knock on the door of the Potions classroom, and a short junior came in and announced a heavenly voice.

"Excuse me, sir, I need to take Harry Potter upstairs!"

Because he was not a student of Professor Snape, Colin's gaze was bold.

This provocation was met with a counterattack, and he looked at Colin coldly until his smile faded.

"Potter has another hour of Potions class." Snape said in a cold tone, "He will go upstairs after class."

"Sir—Sir, Mr. Bagman wants him to go," Colin said, feeling a little embarrassed. "All the warriors are going. I think they want to take pictures..."

"Very good, very good," but unfortunately Snape's voice did not match his words at all. After a pause, he sternly said, "Potter, leave your things here, I want you to wait for a while Come back and test your antidote."

"I'm sorry, sir - he has to take his stuff with him," Colin piped up nervously, "All the warriors -"

"Very good! Potter - take your schoolbag and disappear from my sight!"

Harry was sure that Snape seemed to have murderous impulses when he uttered the last words - but he was liberated.

While he was getting up, he secretly took out the concealed bezoar he carried and handed it to Ron, "Be careful. If it doesn't work, swallow it."

——

"Cold treatment..."

"Cold treatment with magic potion?"

"Physical cooling? Magical cooling?"

"Special plant extract?"

William stayed in his office, meditating hard on the best solution - before he tasted the elixir, he might have been more step-by-step, but after tasting it, he really wanted to risk failure. Take the risk to try a recipe that may be more stable and successful.

If the latter succeeds, it will not only be able to concoct the elixir of good fortune, but also greatly improve his ability to adjust the subtleties of the potion.

It's like following a recipe to complete a gourmet dish and developing a gourmet dish based on existing materials.

"Let's do a little experiment...use magic to deal with it first. The magic potion that uses bird and snake eggshells and is effective quickly is..."

He began to design and improve, and was extremely grateful that it took half a year to boil the elixir of happiness, which meant that there was enough room for trial and error in many subsequent potion materials, without wasting the precious fire-ash snake eggs before starting.

"Fortunately, there are enough crucibles, otherwise it wouldn't be able to boil..."

He carefully protected the crucible for boiling the elixir, and patiently expanded the space. Then he took out the second crucible and prepared to boil the pre-processed bird and snake eggshells.

——

"Please come in!"

After Harry knocked on the door of the room, there was a sound inside the room.

After he entered, he discovered that he was the last warrior to arrive.

‘Don’t they all go to class? ’

Harry thought doubtfully.

‘By the way, except for Hogwarts, a bunch of students came from other schools. Even after the selection of the warriors, those who failed did not leave, and the warriors were even less likely to leave. ’

‘They can’t just move all the professors over here—then, aren’t these people going to classes these days? ’

‘What about showering and washing? ’

His thoughts couldn't help but go astray - there was no way, Professor William kept telling him to pay attention to the slightest sign of trouble and respond to abnormalities at any time. As for Sirius, when it came to his work, it was the daily life of a detective, and he couldn't let go of any clues.

"Harry?"

Bagman smiled and said, "It's nothing, don't worry so much - today is just a simple wand test and taking some photos. The other referees will be here soon."

"Detection wand?"

Harry asked doubtfully - he didn't like handing over his wand casually now.

"We must check whether your wands are fully functional and in good condition, because in future competitions, your wands will be your most important equipment."

Bagman explained with a smile, "Today there will be experts, and then some small interviews, and the Daily Prophet will publish some small articles. It will be written by this woman, Rita Skeeter."

"That's no small thing, Ludo."

The reporter known as Rita looked at Harry greedily as he spoke - Harry Potter and the Triwizard Tournament are connected, that is the best news.

Her keen sense of smell had already determined the key target for this interview. Klum was originally very suitable, but in front of Harry Potter, it was not worth mentioning at all.

Harry couldn't help but look at Rita - although he didn't discriminate against her, he still didn't have a good impression of her...

Her hair was styled into delicate, stiff, weird curls, which looked particularly awkward when paired with her big-jawed face. She wore a pair of bejeweled glasses and clutched an alligator handbag with her fat fingers. Her nails were two inches long and painted bright red.

"Before we begin, can I have a few words with Harry?"

The reporter named Rita seemed to be talking to Bagman, but her eyes did not leave Harry. This made Harry extremely uncomfortable. He felt that he was being treated as prey.

"I don't think so."

Harry looked at her and responded quickly.

"Ha - of course," Bagman was just about to say that he had no objection when he heard Harry's decisive response.

"Um?"

Rita's eyes widened, as if she heard some outrageous answer.

"I said, no, I am just an ordinary member, so I refuse to accept interviews outside the group..." Harry quickly made up a lie, and then tried his best to recall that he seemed to have heard the name Rita somewhere...

'Yes, the professor said that when I went to study, the professor said that the reviews written by Rita Skeeter are more deceptive than the scammers in Azkaban...'

"Okay, okay - part of the team, the Warriors are the pride of Hogwarts after all, no problem."

Bagman tried to smooth things over, and Rita didn't express her dissatisfaction. She just excused herself to deal with the manuscript, and then left quickly.

After she left, Cedric smiled and breathed a sigh of relief. When he went out to receive the wand test, he said to Harry in a relaxed tone, "That guy finally left. Harry, in this regard, you are braver than me... I I really didn’t expect you to reject her.”

"Skeeter?"

"Yes, dad said that she is a powerful woman. She has a great reputation and is very popular, but to the person involved - Harry?"

Opposite him, Harry took out his wand and pointed at the foot of the wall, "Who are you?"

His tone was serious, not joking at all.

Just as Cedric also pulled out his wand, Harry withdrew his wand, shook his head, then pulled it out fiercely and fired a sleeping spell at the wall.

However, nothing happened except a crash.

Harry withdrew his wand, shook his head, and began to explain to the confused Cedric and the other two warriors who were looking this way.

"I don't know why, but I always feel like someone over there is using a magic spell or an invisibility cloak or something like that to spy on me, but I tried it twice and found nothing - maybe I'm too nervous these days..."

He smiled and looked again suspiciously, but still found nothing.