The Old Fox

Kidnap my ass!

That was a well-intentioned lie! A well-intentioned one, got it?!

After returning home, Lynn bitterly gave his system a thorough dressing-down.

And he swore he would absolutely, absolutely never equip that disgraceful title!

It was a slander against his character, a trampling of his integrity. It had to be resisted.

Putting the system out of his mind, Lynn prepared dinner while considering a trip into London tomorrow.

There were less than ten days left before the time-limited mission expired, and there had still been no word from the professor Professor McGonagall had said would come.

Lynn certainly had no intention of missing out on the mission reward, so he could no longer wait.

Just as he was washing tomatoes and letting his mind wander, a sudden disturbance came from the living room window.

Hearing the sound, Lynn turned to look outside and found an owl staring at him through the glass.

Sure enough, good deeds were rewarded! He had only just told a well-intentioned lie today, and Hogwarts' owl had arrived that very night.

Lynn opened the window for the owl and took a thin envelope from it. Then he broke up some bread, poured it a bowl of water, and entertained this guest from afar.

Forgetting all about dinner, Lynn sat on the sofa and opened the envelope. There was only a single sheet of paper inside.

Dear Mr. Belloc:

Professor Adrien Foxx, Defense Against the Dark Arts professor, will visit at nine o'clock on the morning of July 3.

Minerva McGonagall, Deputy Headmistress.

A Defense Against the Dark Arts professor?

Lynn tilted his head, holding the letter as he pondered.

It was said that the position of Hogwarts' Defense Against the Dark Arts professor had been cursed by Voldemort. Lynn did not know whether that rumor was true.

But Hogwarts' Defense professor really did run into trouble every year, which meant they were replaced annually.

It was now 1990, one year before the plot began with Harry Potter's enrollment.

And this Professor Foxx, who shared a surname with Dumbledore's pet phoenix, was someone who had never appeared in the original story.

His temperament and character were unknown to Lynn.

That gave him quite a headache.

Who knew what kind of trouble this year's Defense Against the Dark Arts professor had gotten into?

Everyone knew Dumbledore had always been unreliable when it came to choosing Defense professors. What if this Professor Foxx was a Dark wizard?

It would have been better if Snape, with that wife-less face, had come instead.

Damn it! Weren't good deeds supposed to be rewarded?!

Just as Lynn was frowning in distress, the owl that had delivered the letter had eaten and drunk its fill. It contentedly circled the living room once, as though thanking Lynn for his hospitality, then leisurely flew into the night sky.

Unable to figure anything out, Lynn simply stopped thinking about it.

Since Professor McGonagall had sent him to take Lynn to Diagon Alley for supplies, that meant she trusted his character.

Professor McGonagall was a responsible headmistress. Since he was someone she trusted, there should not be any problems.

When the time came, he would deal with whatever came his way. Tomorrow's problems could be handled by tomorrow's Lynn. Today's Lynn needed to handle today's dinner first.

Early the next morning, after finishing his daily run and eating breakfast, Lynn prepared tea and snacks for his guest and waited quietly for Professor Foxx's arrival.

But he waited and waited, and by the time it was nearly ten o'clock, the professor still had not appeared.

Just as Lynn was growing impatient and feeling as though he had been stood up, a deafening crash suddenly came from his backyard!

Even through the window, he could see wet soil mixed with turf flying everywhere as if a plane had crashed outside.

Lynn's expression changed, and he hurried from the living room into the backyard, where he found a complete mess.

An old man with silver hair and a tall, lean frame was sprawled face-first on Lynn's lawn.

Behind the old man, a flying broomstick snapped cleanly into two pieces was trembling wildly.

What made Lynn so heartbroken he could barely breathe was the large patch of ruined lawn.

He had not inherited his estate yet. His monthly expenses came from a limited sum deducted from it, and the money he had saved needed to be exchanged for Galleons in Diagon Alley. He had no spare money to replace such a large patch of turf.

Just as Lynn sank into the sorrow of poverty, the culprit, the silver-haired old man, shakily climbed to his feet.

He wore a long trench coat over a white shirt and even had on a tie. The dirt and blades of grass made him look rather disheveled, but they could not conceal his otherworldly air.

"Lynn Belloc?"

The old man shook the dirt from his glasses, put them back on, and asked.

The sound of his voice snapped Lynn out of his daze.

"Uh, yes. That's me."

"Good. Then I didn't fly the wrong route. I am your Defense Against the Dark Arts professor, Adrien Foxx. You may call me Professor Foxx."

Professor Foxx spoke somewhat breathlessly. After steadying himself, he pulled out his wand and casually waved it at the two pitiful halves of the flying broomstick, which immediately fell still.

Then, before Lynn could say anything, he turned the tables and grabbed Lynn's arm, dragging him into the living room.

"Well, um..."

"Don't speak yet, kid. Listen to me." After entering the house, Professor Foxx began breathing heavily again and cut Lynn off in a hurried voice.

"Something has gone wrong with my body, so I need your help preparing something. This is very important, do you understand?"

Although he did not know what had happened, Lynn could see that the Defense Against the Dark Arts professor's face was indeed an unhealthy shade of pale.

"I understand."

Seeing that the situation was genuinely urgent, Lynn did not waste words.

Once inside the living room, Professor Foxx began continuously pulling things from his trench coat pockets.

Like Doraemon's pocket, the space inside seemed endless. Before long, a pile of miscellaneous items had accumulated beside Professor Foxx.

"Cauldron, alcohol burner, tubers, fat, powder... I need liquor. Neither rubbing alcohol nor red wine will do! It has to be alcohol fermented from barley!"

Professor Foxx quickly realized what he was missing. He looked at Lynn urgently, as though time was running out.

Lynn froze in confusion for a moment, then rapidly shook his head.

"There isn't any beer in my house, but there's a convenience store two hundred meters east of here. I can go buy some."

Professor Foxx looked as though he was in terrible condition. His gaze toward Lynn was filled with gratitude.

"I'm counting on you, Belloc."

"Hang in there, Professor. I'll be right back."

Lynn grabbed his coat and rushed out the door, heading straight for the convenience store.

Under the cashier's astonished gaze, he grabbed a pack of canned beer, threw money onto the counter, and ran home without even waiting for change.

Only after he had vanished from sight did the cashier remember that he was still a minor, and the law prohibited him from buying any alcoholic beverages. But by then, there was no way to find him.

On the way back, Lynn suddenly felt that something was off.

That professor had looked as though he was brewing a potion, but what kind of potion recipe required beer?

And the professor had been far too anxious. He did not look like he was being hunted, and if he knew of a potion that could solve his physical problem, that proved it was not his first episode. An emergency potion like that should have been kept on hand. There was no way he would need to brew it on the spot.

The more Lynn thought about it, the more something felt wrong, and the more wrong it felt, the faster he ran home.

The round trip took less than five minutes, and he was back home.

The moment he opened the living room door, Lynn smelled an enticing aroma.

What he saw stunned him.

On the cutting board, two kitchen knives were chopping rapidly up and down without anyone controlling them. Fresh potatoes and lettuce were sliced neatly into thin pieces, then hopped into plates on their own as though they had grown legs.

The old man calling himself Professor Foxx was seated in the middle of the living room, holding a pair of chopsticks taken from the kitchen and swiftly dropping mutton into the boiling cauldron.

"Ho, Belloc, you got back so quickly. I didn't expect your house to have chopsticks. Good, that saves me from having to Transfigure a pair."

The alcohol burner blazed fiercely. A clear sheen of oil floated over the red broth in the cauldron. Professor Foxx smiled at Lynn, who stood at the door holding beer with a vacant stare, like an old fox that had stolen a chicken.

Suning lost. It hurts, so I won't ask for votes today...