What on Earth?

The opening feast ended with one of Dumbledore's painfully awkward bad jokes. The young wizards drifted away in twos and threes, still unable to figure out why Amosta had returned to the school. It was easy to imagine that the first week of term would see a massive detective campaign unfold across the school.

Amosta had left before the young wizards. He had not forgotten that he had not returned to Hogwarts for a holiday. The moment all the young wizards had gathered in the Great Hall, his mission had officially begun.

For the foreseeable future, until he found the Chamber of Secrets, he would probably have to live with his days and nights reversed—sleeping in the daytime and working at night. It would be a very hard stretch.

In the surveillance room, Amosta sat in his chair, staring intently at the screens as they gradually filled with people. He focused on young wizards who were alone and apart from the crowd, watching for any behaviour that seemed out of the ordinary. Naturally, Professor Lockhart was also one of his targets of attention.

The Chamber of Secrets had not appeared earlier or later, but had opened precisely when Lockhart became the Defence Against the Dark Arts professor. He could hardly help being suspicious.

After dinner, under the prefects' guidance, most of the young wizards from each House returned to their respective common rooms. However, around a dozen of them slipped out in secret while no one was paying attention.

More than half of them were Gryffindor students.

Harry and Ron went to the Hospital Wing. Taking advantage of Filch's inattention during his patrol, the Weasley twins darted into the passage leading to the underground Hufflepuff common room. They stopped before a painting of fruit hanging on a stone wall, fiddled with it for a moment, then slipped inside.

Amosta also saw Penelope Crewe enter the Ravenclaw common room, only to come back out shortly afterward. At almost the same time, Percy Weasley left the Gryffindor common room as well. It was easy to predict that another passionate make-out session would soon take place somewhere in the castle.

Aside from Professor McGonagall and Professor Lockhart, who returned to their offices to work overtime after the feast, the other professors mostly remained in the Staff Dormitory. Before entering his office, Headmaster Dumbledore turned and gave the ceiling of the corridor thirty feet away a playful wink with his bright blue eyes, as though he were greeting someone.

Amosta curled his lip and shifted his gaze away from that screen.

Nothing unusual happened. Everything was normal, and that result had not exceeded Amosta's expectations. Unless he was exceptionally lucky, there was no hope of finding anything within ten days or half a month.

The fire blazed in the finely carved fireplace. Holding a cup of bitter hot tea, Amosta leaned back in his chair, his eyes occasionally sweeping across the entire wall, his expression calm.

About half an hour later, the people still moving on the surveillance screens had been replaced by ghosts. Amosta saw Peeves, wearing a ridiculous round cap and grinning wickedly, rush into an abandoned second-floor lavatory that had been unused for years. Before long, water began seeping noisily from beneath its door and into the corridor outside.

The long night had only just fallen, but Amosta was already bored. He went to his desk and fetched a copy of the book he was compiling, Basic Spell Models and Structural Optimization, flipping through it casually in search of inspiration.

Suddenly, movement appeared on the surveillance screen in the lower-right corner. Professor Lockhart emerged, having changed into a purplish-red robe and carrying several books under his arm. His face was wreathed in smiles, and he looked as elegant as ever. Judging by the direction he was heading, he seemed to be coming straight for the surveillance room.

Their offices were both on the first floor. Less than two minutes later, Professor Lockhart appeared outside his office.

Knock, knock—

The instant the knocking sounded, Amosta flicked down his wand. An enormous black curtain covered the wall, while the stool beneath him tap-danced its way back to the desk and returned to its proper position.

"Professor Lockhart?" Amosta opened the door, wearing an appropriately surprised expression. "What can I do for you?"

Amosta ushered the purpose-unclear Lockhart into his office and poured him a cup of tea, but Lockhart did not seem inclined to drink it.

"—Actually, it's like this,"

Lockhart was about to explain why he had come, but when he spotted a copy of Wander with Werewolves on Amosta's bookshelf, the smile on his face became almost excessively radiant.

"My mistake, my mistake, Amosta. I should have thought of it sooner, but somehow it never occurred to me." He winked at the slightly bewildered Amosta. "A cunning, mad admirer, am I right? What an unexpected approach!"

"Sorry, Professor Lockhart. Perhaps I'm being too slow-witted to understand what exactly you're trying to say—"

"No need to keep hiding it, Amosta. You went to all the trouble of getting into Hogwarts just to get close to me, didn't you?"

Lockhart laughed merrily. "Professor McGonagall told me that the Board of Directors had sent an Investigator to look into the Chamber of Secrets. I imagine you spent quite a bit of money making that happen!"

Following Lockhart's gaze, Amosta looked toward the bookshelf and blinked.

"If you mean that copy of Wander with Werewolves, well, I had a rather unpleasant encounter with a group of werewolves at the time. To better understand them, I found a few of the most famous books on the subject."

"Aha, so you've finally exposed yourself, have you?"

Lockhart looked as if he had finally caught Amosta red-handed.

"Just like second-year Miss Granger, you know everything about me, don't you? Yes, yes, when people mention that book, they're always amazed by the calm courage I displayed when the werewolves cornered me in a telephone booth. But you're different, Amosta. You want to learn how I buried the hatchet with the werewolves, don't you?"

An hour later, Lockhart left Amosta's office looking thoroughly pleased with himself. Standing outside the door, he lowered his voice and said to Amosta,

"No need to worry about how you'll explain things to the Board of Directors, Amosta. There won't be any more Chamber of Secrets attacks. As for why, you surely know, don't you?" Lockhart gave Amosta another wink. "Because I'm here!"

Amosta watched Professor Lockhart disappear into the distance. After closing the door, he stood before his desk and stared at Lockhart's gift—a complete set of signed hardcover books.

"Heh, what an interesting fellow!" Amosta suddenly laughed.

On the night he returned to Hogwarts, Amosta had discussed the suspicious people at the school with Professor Snape. When Gilderoy Lockhart came up, Snape's tone had overflowed with contempt and mockery, yet he had not thought Lockhart might be a problem at all. Amosta had found that rather puzzling at the time.

"Still, for a celebrity author known throughout the wizarding world, he's at least a fairly friendly wizard."

Someone with such a distinctive personality as Lockhart really wasn't easy to write...

Also, I'll try to update another chapter this afternoon.