Exploration and Secret Schemes

Ye Ting was adding meat sauce to his fried noodles when Anthony Goldstein nudged him and whispered gossip into his ear. "Hey, genius, have you heard? Those three went exploring in that off-limits corridor on the fourth floor last night. That was seriously bold. When should we sneak in and take a look too?"

Before Ye Ting could reply, Hermione cut in from the other side. "I heard that, Anthony! How could you encourage him to do something like that? We'll lose House points because of it."

"Oh, Hermione, could you not be such a wet blanket?" Terry Boot said helplessly from beside them.

They all agreed that Hermione was good in every way, except that she was too serious and too fond of meddling in everything.

"Exactly, genius, please keep your 'little girlfriend' in line." Michael Corner joined in the teasing.

"I'm not his little girlfriend!" Hermione's face flushed red with anger, but her voice was a little quiet when she said it, and her eyes kept darting toward Ye Ting. Clearly, she lacked confidence.

"All right, Hermione, we're just talking. Don't take it so seriously." Ye Ting set down his fork and casually stroked the little girl's thick hair to soothe her. He had become very practiced at this gesture.

Hermione immediately fell silent obediently, which Ye Ting found rather strange. Ever since the accident in flying class, this had happened several times. Every time, Ye Ting could easily calm an angry Hermione.

But before that, Hermione would argue with him for quite a while every time, only giving up after Ye Ting had left her speechless.

On the other side, Cho Chang smoothly changed the subject. "Does anyone know what's inside that corridor? I heard that lots of older students have secretly gone in to explore, but they never tell me what they found."

"There's a three-headed dog in there," Penelope, who sat opposite Ye Ting, answered.

She was now also a member of their little group and often spent time with Ye Ting, Hermione, and Cho Chang.

"I tried sneaking into that corridor to explore before, but a three-headed dog blocked my way. That big dog was much taller than me, and it was terrifying, baring its teeth and snarling. It spent most of its time snoring away, but one of its heads was always awake. Oh, and I noticed there was a trapdoor beneath where the three-headed dog was lying. I think the secret is inside that trapdoor."

Then she lowered her voice and whispered, "I heard that over the summer holidays, Dumbledore gathered Professor McGonagall, Professor Flitwick, Professor Sprout, Professor Snape, Professor Quirrell, and Hagrid to build some kind of challenge course there. Each of them designed a stage."

"Is that true? Why would they do that?" Hermione found it hard to believe.

"I'm guessing something is definitely hidden there that they don't want anyone to get," Cho Chang said with certainty. "Otherwise, they wouldn't go to so much trouble to use challenges to stop people."

"I think so too."

"That's what I think as well."

The others all voiced their agreement.

But Ye Ting, as a transmigrator, offered a different opinion.

"I think it's a trap deliberately set by Professor Dumbledore." Then he explained, "If Professor Dumbledore wanted to hide something, he could have hidden it somewhere only he knew about.

"But instead, Professor Dumbledore chose to put it in that corridor and explicitly told everyone not to enter. That's obviously telling people: there's a secret here. And word has already spread that Professor Dumbledore invited the other professors to build the challenges, which further proves this point. Professor Dumbledore doesn't seem particularly interested in concealing that secret. It's even possible that he wants everyone to know something is hidden there.

"The purpose of the challenges is to screen people out. Ordinary students can't get through them; only capable people can pass the challenges and discover what he hid. And that is his real purpose."

At that point, he deliberately paused. Around him, the three girls and his three dormmates all looked at him with anticipation and approval, so he continued.

"I think these challenges might be Professor Dumbledore's test for us. He hopes the students can undergo a practical assessment by passing through them.

"Another possibility is that the challenges are meant to catch a thief. This thief wants to steal something from Dumbledore, so the professor set a trap with these challenges and placed the thing the thief wanted to steal inside as bait. The thief will probably think the challenges are merely Dumbledore's security measures, but in reality, they're only a disguise. Their true purpose is to draw the thief's attention and make him believe the item he wants to steal is hidden there—everyone believes that the more valuable something is, the better it will be protected. If the thief really enters the challenges, then he'll have fallen for it, because Dumbledore wants to lure him out."