"Hiss!" After hearing Anthony's analysis, Terry belatedly smacked his forehead. "Now that you put it that way, it really does seem like that's the case!"
"But..." He frowned and added, "Even if these are unusual times, making a move in that kind of situation..."
He scratched his head, leaving his hair all mussed up. "No matter how I think about it, it's really strange that those Muggles did nothing at all!"
"Exactly..." Anthony sighed. "This morning, I even went out of my way to find those 'Education Investigators' and try to sound them out..."
Terry hurriedly asked, "What did they say?"
"First of all, regarding this matter..." Anthony continued, "the fact that Muggles can use magic—they didn't know about it."
"As for any actions the Muggle High-level might take... these 'inspectors' hadn't received any notice either. They were simply continuing their inspection at Hogwarts according to the original itinerary."
"It was because of all this that I finally concluded... that Muggles being able to use magic was probably true. But as you can see, Terry..."
At this point, Anthony's tone noticeably relaxed, and he raised a hand to point at Michael and Chris.
Terry froze for a moment, then grinned and burst out laughing. "Oh, give it a rest! The way you were hemming and hawing just now wasn't much better than us—probably worse than me!"
Anthony shrugged and rubbed his nose. "What else could I have said?"
After Terry's joking interruption, Michael came back to his senses as well. With a hint of helplessness in his voice, he said, "Can you really blame us?"
"Exactly!" Chris sighed, though his voice still trembled slightly. "I think Michael and I are already handling this pretty well!"
"Put it this way: if I went over to Slytherin right now, told them about