Setting Out, Verifying the Prophecy

The next morning, the snow had not yet melted, and white clouds filled the entire sky, neither dark nor bright.

The pear jelly on Loren has melted again, this is the fourth time.

The black skin was covered with a layer of white frost, and the pear was as hard as an iron ball. After being thawed in a basin of water, the pear became soft, and the skin became like a layer of damp parchment.

Loren led the pear out of the dormitory.

In the lounge, the Twins brothers confronted Percy across a bench.

"Percy, as the Prefect, I order you not to pursue them any further," George said, pointing to the Prefect Badge on his chest.

"That's right, if you keep chasing us, we'll deduct points from your score!"

Fred, standing next to him, had his arms crossed over his chest, his chin pointing at Percy, looking arrogant.

Last night, the Twins brothers took advantage of Percy's fatigue and lowered guard to steal his Prefect Badge. They couldn't wait to show it off to Percy this morning—they really brought this upon themselves.

"Give me back my badge!"

Percy's eyebrows shot up as he glared angrily at George, then he leaped over the bench and lunged at the two men.

"Points deducted! Points deducted!"

The Twins ran around yelling, running back and forth in the Gryffindor Tower.

Loren left some pears in the lounge so they could eat them after they got tired of playing their game of tag.

He only brought three pears to the Great Hall, planning to have some breakfast to fill his stomach before trying the taste of the pears this time.

Christmas has passed, and the Christmas decorations that adorned the Castle are gradually being taken down. The ribbons in the corridors are much fewer and no longer glow, but the Christmas in the Great Hall is still there, though the candles have been removed.

The end of the Christmas party marked the official start of the holidays, and more students were staying in bed, leaving the hall sparsely populated.

A minority of people eat breakfast on time; most choose to sleep in a little longer, have a quick and easy breakfast, or grab something from the Kitchen and use the extra time to enjoy their holiday.

Hufflepuff have the easiest way to get to the Kitchen, but at the long table of the four houses, Hufflepuff have the most people eating breakfast. The little badgers never miss breakfast; they enjoy every moment of their lives.

Loren patiently placed the pear on the plate, first offering pumpkin porridge and jam bread to tide him over.

The slightly hot pumpkin porridge warmed him up, and after eating the bread, Loren felt much more at ease.

After shoveling the last mouthful of porridge into his stomach, Loren exhaled a comforting breath of warm air. Only then did he begin to enjoy the fruits of his labor. He plucked the stem from the pear, carefully peeled it, and brought his mouth to suck the juice from the Frozen Pear, swallowing it along with the flesh—it was sweet and delicious.

Loren exhaled cold air this time, savoring the sweetness from before, and smacked his lips contentedly. Eating like this is really unhealthy, but it's also really refreshing.

Dumbledore had somehow gotten to the side and was watching Loren enjoy his meal. He thought the Sorting Hat was right; Loren was indeed a good fit for Hufflepuff.

"It might be a little embarrassing to say."

Dumbledore's gentle voice rang out, Loren looked up, only then noticing that there was someone else beside him.

Meeting Loren's gaze, Dumbledore feigned embarrassment, but his face showed no sign of awkwardness. "You know, sweet things are always appealing." He then winked and looked at Loren expectantly.

"Here, here, here." Loren pushed the pear in front of Dumbledore with a disgusted expression. He couldn't stand this guy, whose beard was almost big enough to be used as a broom, yet he was still acting like a child.

Dumbledore chuckled and left with two Frozen Pear, saying before he left, "Pack your things and come to my office later. We're going to the Black Forest to fulfill that Prophecy."

It seems that the focus of this conversation was Pear, while the Prophecy was just a trivial, incidental matter.

Yes, Dumbledore understands priorities.

On his way back to his dorm, Loren began to rummage through his memories of Professor Trelawney's Prophecy.

The Prophecy the demise of Harry's family, the Prophecy the demise of Dumbledore...

"Hiss! "Loren gasped. "This Seer are all about death. What kind of 'King of Hell's name' is this?"

After a moment of tension, Loren returned to the common room and remembered that he was with Dumbledore. What was there to worry about? This was Dumbledore, after all.

Dumbledore and I, we're both incredibly strong.

After returning to the dorm and packing my things, I said a quick goodbye to Ron and left.

Watching Loren walk out of the lounge, Ron sighed, placed a black piece, picked up a white piece and put it in his mouth. "Busy, everyone's busy. It's good to be busy."

Slurp, sucking the juice from the Frozen Pear, feeling as lonely as an empty-nest old person.

When Loren arrived at the Headmaster's office, Dumbledore was wiping the juice from his mustache with a handkerchief, and there were leftover fruit pits and peels on the plate on the table.

Fawkes, perched on the table with its tail feathers held straight up, was pecking at Frozen Pear from another plate.

Seeing Loren enter, Dumbledore put down his handkerchief, smiled, and said, "This is truly the sweetest pear I've ever eaten."

Fawkes responded with a "creaking" sound.

If the Prophecy weren't about himself, Loren could sit here and chat with Dumbledore all day about how to make Frozen Pear.

But not now, he was in a hurry, "When do we leave?"

"To be honest, it's not easy for someone like me to enter other countries, especially during Christmas when many people in the Ministry of Magic are on holiday." Dumbledore lowered his head, rummaging through a drawer.

"But thankfully, I know some friends who can give us a little help."

A clattering and thumping sound came from the drawer, sounding like things in the whole room were colliding, cabinets hitting tables, tables hitting chairs.

"Ha, found it."

Dumbledore bent down and reached his whole hand inside, almost sinking half his body into the drawer, before finally pulling out a small silver comb that looked like it was used to groom his beard.

Thinking about how the drawer had almost contained the entire Dumbledore, Loren was absolutely certain that some kind of magic, Untraceable Extension Charm, had been used inside, and that the space inside might even be larger Hogwarts Castle.

"Let's go." Dumbledore placed the comb in his palm and extended it to Loren, gesturing for him to place his hand on it.

My fingertips touched the cool silver comb.

Before Loren could even process what was happening, he heard Dumbledore say, "Fawkes."

"Squeak!"

It seemed as if a hook was behind Loren's navel, suddenly plunging him forward with irresistible force, lifting him off the ground and sending him flying. He soared forward like a gust of wind, unable to see anything clearly.

Loren's hands were pressed tightly against the comb, which seemed to have a magnetic force that kept his fingers glued to it.

It felt like a moment, yet also like a very long time had passed.

Loren's feet landed heavily on the ground, and he was about to fall to the side when Dumbledore caught him in time.

Loren's hair was a mess from the wind, looking like a doghouse, and his clothes were askew.

He straightened his robes, looked up and saw that Dumbledore was still impeccably groomed, his beard perfectly neat.

"Where is this? Is the Black Forest just ahead?"

Looking around, they found themselves standing beside a muddy country path. The damp air mingled with the scent of earth and grass, a fresh fragrance tinged with a hint of earthiness. Ahead lay a vast forest.

"Albania, if nothing unexpected happens, this should be it."

Dumbledore pulled out a black Derby Hat from somewhere and put it on; it looked like a traditional style from decades ago.

Such a hat looks very out of place on Dumbledore, who wears a white robe, has a long white beard, and white hair.

"I need a little disguise, you know, being too famous isn't a good thing." Dumbledore winked at Loren.

You're just fooling yourself. With that beard, eyebrows, and hair, who wouldn't recognize him as the headmaster of Hogwarts, the most famous wizard of our time?

"So, if anyone exposes you, you'll pull out your wand and give them a good wand, right?"

"Hahahaha..." Dumbledore was amused by Loren's words.

With a hearty laugh, his beard quickly shortened, sprouting brownish-yellow at the roots, eventually becoming a full beard close to his face, brownish-yellow mixed with some gray. His hair also shrank back, becoming short, and even the sides of his forehead became somewhat bald.

Finally, Dumbledore patted his white robe again, and the wide robe began to shrink, clinging to his body and becoming a Double-Breasted Silver-Gray Flannel Coat, with Dress Pants and Wide Yellow Leather Shoes underneath.

This outfit goes very well with the derby hat.

Loren opened his mouth in surprise as the old white-robed wizard transformed into a young man.

"You know, I used to be a professor of Transfiguration Class."

Dumbledore's voice grew stronger as he patted Loren on the shoulder and wiped the Hogwarts and Gryffindor insignia off his magic robes.

On a muddy country path, Loren carried a briefcase, Dumbledore led Loren, sharing his insights on Prophecy.

"It all started with Professor Quirrell..."

Professor Quirrell was originally a professor of Muggle Studies at Hogwarts.

"During his school days, Quirrell was an outstanding Ravenclaw student. He always felt he possessed extraordinary talents waiting to be discovered..."

Quirrell possesses the Ravenclaw House qualities: he is intelligent and quick to learn, and he even earned 12 certificates in the O. W. L. exams.

But he still felt that people looked down on him, always believing that he possessed extraordinary talent waiting to be discovered. In order to quickly prove his power, he developed a strong interest in Dark Arts.

After receiving his appointment to the Defense Against the Dark Arts, he used the guise of a research trip to search for traces of dark wizards, partly out of curiosity and partly out of his desire to acknowledge his previously unnoticed importance.

Finally, Quirrell found his way into the forests of Albania.

"I suspect that he started out of a desire to track down Voldemort and learn something from Voldemort." Dumbledore's voice was no longer old, but his tone was tinged with helplessness.

Loren learned the rest: Quirrell became Voldemort's servant, possessed by Voldemort, and returned to Hogwarts with the intention of stealing the Sorcerer's Stone.

"At first I just thought he had joined Voldemort, but your reminder made me realize that it's not that simple."

Voldemort's possession of Quirrell surprised Dumbledore, gave him better options, and allowed him to verify some of his conjectures.

Loren carefully recalled the Prophecy: The Dark Lord has departed from his forest... his schemes... White had foreseen it... the Black Forest is the beginning of the tide... the Blue-Black Person must go there... at the turn of the old and new... desperate souls are crying out... the tide is about to rise...

"What is this transition between old and new, this desperate soul, and this wave?" Loren asked.

"The transition between the old and the new may refer to time, before the new year. As for the other two, that's the answer we're looking for on this trip."

As they were talking, the two arrived at the entrance of a hotel by the roadside.

The two-story building with a triangular roof was covered in black stains, making the shop name on the sign illegible. The black double iron gates were tightly closed.

Dumbledore pulled Loren toward the closed door, and a miraculous scene unfolded: the iron door seemed to disappear, and the two vanished inside.

Loren felt as if he were passing through a curtain of water, with the sensation of water washing over his skin.

Completely different from the dilapidated exterior, the entrance leads to a spacious hall with white floor tiles that reflect the bright glass chandelier on the ceiling, illuminating the entire room.

Behind the counter stood a fat, chubby-eared fairy who looked like an obese human with dwarfism. His head was about the same size as his body, his narrow nose was like a cone, and his ears were like bat wings.

"Oh, welcome, my dear wizard!"

The fairy's voice was very high-pitched and shrill; she was saying welcoming words, but her tone was very unpleasant.

Dumbledore looked like a middle-aged man, tossed out a bag of Galleon. "A room."

"Of course!" The fat fairy reached behind the counter, and a black key-shaped pendant flew into its hand.

The entire transaction took less than a minute, and both parties were very efficient, without exchanging any unnecessary words.

Dumbledore took the key, but instead of looking for a room, he turned and led Loren out of the hotel.

Hanging the key around Loren's neck, the two walked into the forest.

"Hold the key and shake it; no matter where you are in Albania, you can return to your room in this hotel."

Dumbledore certainly didn't need it; this was an insurance policy prepared for Loren, in case the two got separated in case of some unexpected situation.

Through Dumbledore's introduction, Loren learned some information about Albania.

This is a place that the Ministry of Magic can hardly cover. Many dark wizards gather here to trade Dark Arts items or all sorts of things of unknown origin.

Many mysterious events have occurred in Albania throughout history, and legends say that the forests are home to various dangerous creatures, Vampire, Werewolf, and evil Witch have lived for centuries.

Rumors circulated among the Hogwarts students that Quirrell had encountered Vampire there and was also cursed by a Witch, making him timid, stuttering, afraid of his students, and afraid of the subjects he taught.

"Grey Lady and Bloody Baron died here."

"To be honest, this place has always been on my list of travel plans after retirement."

The middle-aged Dumbledore winked at Loren, a gesture that was even harder to accept than the elderly, white-haired Dumbledore trying to look younger.

Loren felt as if his eyes had been attacked by magic. He suppressed the urge to complain and continued listening to Dumbledore speak.