The Monster in the Black Lake

"So, we're following in the footsteps of those great forebears?"

"Wow, my God, that's so cool!"

The excited young wizards chattered nonstop, breaking through the fear brought by the darkness.

Hermione proudly lifted her chin and winked at Chu Yang, subtly showing off.

To calm her down, Chu Yang was about to compliment her when an untimely voice suddenly rang out.

"Look! That little Muggle-born brat is educating real wizards about Hogwarts history?!"

"What a joke!"

A small boat drifted over from the side. Three boys sat inside; the boys on either side were huge, far sturdier than even Neville.

Between them sat a blond boy. He was rather handsome, but his eyes were sinister, and he clearly meant trouble.

The blond boy said in a low voice, "Mudbloods like you, born into lowly Muggle families, have no right to speak of those four great wizards, especially the great Salazar Slytherin."

"What the hell does it have to do with you?!" Hermione trembled with rage. Since entering the wizarding world, the thing she hated most was hearing others say her parents were Muggles.

"How can you use such vicious words?"

The timid, dull Neville acted completely out of character as he angrily pointed at the blond boy.

"What does Mudblood mean?" Hermione froze for a moment, instinctively sensing that it was not a good word.

Neville hesitated, then whispered a few words into Hermione's ear. Her expression changed drastically, and her eyes immediately reddened.

Chu Yang narrowed his eyes and stared coldly at the blond boy. Among the new students, there was only one person who could say such vicious things so casually: Draco Malfoy!

Ordinary young wizards probably knew nothing about Hogwarts' incoming student records, but Draco Malfoy was different.

His family was one of great renown in Hogwarts history, and his father, Lucius Malfoy, was one of Hogwarts' governors. Obtaining the list of new students in advance and finding ways to befriend and win over the prominent wizarding families on it was a tactic the Malfoy family often used.

When Lucius Malfoy saw that there were actually two students from Muggle families on the list, he flew into a tremendous rage in front of Draco Malfoy.

Every member of the Malfoy family had graduated from Slytherin, and they revered founder Salazar Slytherin's theory of bloodlines.

They believed that only Pure-blood wizards were qualified to learn and use magic.

Chu Yang found that rather amusing.

By their logic, the very first wizard to discover and use magic would not have been qualified to use it at all.

Because his parents would both have been Muggles...

Without the first Muggle-born wizards blazing the path of magic, exchanging knowledge and intermingling, where would wizarding families have come from?

This was completely different from the question of whether the chicken or the egg came first.

Muggle-born wizards had definitely come before Pure-blood families.

After being fiercely retorted by Hermione, Malfoy could no longer contain his anger and began hurling vicious insults at her.

"So this is the etiquette of Pure-blood wizards? The moment someone disagrees with you, you start spewing foul insults?" Chu Yang sneered. "I've only seen behavior like this from street thugs in London. Your upbringing is truly worrying."

Draco Malfoy immediately flushed red, sprang to his feet, and shouted, "I only show etiquette to wizards! You bunch of lowly—"

Before Malfoy could finish, the small boat suddenly lurched. He nearly fell overboard, but Goyle quickly grabbed him and pulled him back.

At that moment, tangled roots began pushing up from the bottom of the lake.

Under the moonlight, branches emerging from the lake slowly wrapped around Malfoy's boat, making it move slower and slower until it gradually stopped on the water. Then it began rocking violently.

"Damn it! What's going on?! Didn't they say this lake was completely safe?!" Malfoy clutched the edge of the boat and screamed hysterically, terrified out of his wits.

More and more branches coiled around the boat. In the blink of an eye, the three boys had nowhere left to stand.

Only then did Hagrid at the front notice the disturbance behind him. His eyes went wide as he shouted, "My God, what the bloody hell is that?!"

The pitch-black lake looked hazy beneath the moonlight.

To Hagrid, the branches and vines around the boat looked more like the tentacles of some monster, constantly rocking the boat as if trying to throw Malfoy and the other two into the water.

"Damn it, what do we do? I didn't bring my wand!" Hagrid began to panic. When he had left today, he had not brought the wand disguised as a "broken umbrella." After all, he was only escorting students; there had seemed to be no need for it.

But now that an emergency had arisen right in front of him, there was nothing he could do.

Just as Hagrid was regretting not bringing his wand, Malfoy and the other two finally lost their footing and fell into the water like dumplings dropped into a pot.

Glug~ Glug~ Glug~

Malfoy desperately tried to grab the boat, but branches in the lake wrapped around his feet and viciously dragged him down.

Gurgle~ Gurgle~ Gurgle~

Malfoy was like tripe in a hotpot, bobbing wildly up and down in the water. Every time he tried to call for help, lake water poured into his mouth.

Compared to Malfoy, his two companions, Goyle and Crabbe, were in much better shape. Although they had fallen into the lake as well, they quickly climbed back into the boat.

Strangely, after Malfoy fell in, the boat stopped rocking.

Other than being soaked from head to toe, they had suffered no injuries.

The same thought rose in Goyle and Crabbe's minds—the "monster" in the lake seemed to be targeting Malfoy alone!

Thinking of this, Goyle and Crabbe both looked toward Chu Yang and Hermione, who had just clashed with Malfoy.

They happened to meet Chu Yang's icy gaze.

Both of them shuddered and immediately lowered their heads, not daring to look again.

Terrified that the "monster" in the lake would eat him, Malfoy immediately burst into tears. "Save me! Hurry and save me! I don't want to be eaten by a monster! I don't care who comes to save me!"

"Goyle! Crabbe!"

Desperate, Malfoy cried out the names of his companions.

Goyle instinctively moved closer to Malfoy, bent over by the edge of the boat, and prepared to pull him up.

The boat immediately began rocking wildly again. Goyle screamed and fell into the lake as well!

Crabbe, beside him, was so frightened that he hurried away from Malfoy. Only by putting on an expression of having nothing to do with the matter did he escape disaster.

He was now certain that the "monster" was targeting Malfoy.

After Goyle climbed back into the boat a second time, having learned his lesson, he began copying Crabbe and pretended not to hear Malfoy's cries for help.

Poor Malfoy was nearly full from drinking lake water...

When Hermione first saw Malfoy fall into the water, she had felt immensely satisfied, as though all the anger in her heart had been released.

But as time passed, she began worrying that he might be in danger. At the end of the day, she was only an eleven-year-old girl, innocent and kindhearted.

Hermione asked anxiously, "Why aren't his companions saving him? They're both so big. Either one of them could easily pull him into the boat."

Chu Yang glanced at her in surprise. "He insulted you so horribly just now, and you're still worried about him? Has so little time passed that you're not angry anymore?"

"Of course I'm angry!" Hermione said matter-of-factly. "But I don't want to hate a dead person. Only if he stays alive will I have a chance to get revenge on him!"

Chu Yang wiped the cold sweat from his forehead. The old saying was absolutely right: the prettier the girl, the more grudges she held. Never provoke one lightly.