They looked in the direction Hermione was pointing.
In the very center of the fire, beside the iron kettle Hagrid had just picked up, lay a large, blackish egg.
"Oh... that's..." Hagrid stiffened and instinctively glanced at the door, his large hand twisting his beard. "Ha... that's..."
"A dragon egg, right, Hagrid?" Su Er glanced with a smile at the large black egg, which stood out strikingly amid the bright yellow flames.
It was what he had come for. Su Er had noticed it as soon as he entered the hut.
Knowing the answer in advance, Su Er immediately revealed the solution to the puzzle.
"Oh..." Hagrid suddenly looked rather uneasy, but he really could not find another excuse. That it was a late-night snack he had prepared, perhaps?
"Yes," Hagrid had no choice but to admit. "I won it playing cards. I wasn't in the Castle last night. I went out for a drink, and then a stranger played cards with me."
"Actually, I didn't think it was a dragon egg at first, either... maybe that man was only too glad to get rid of it."
Braving the heat, Su Er moved closer to the fire and examined the large egg more carefully.
"You... won't tell the professors about this, will you?" Hagrid asked with a pained expression.
"Keeping dragons is illegal, Hagrid." After receiving her answer, Hermione's little face registered shock and astonishment before she began reciting the legal provisions she had read.
"I read in a book that the ban on dragon breeding was formally passed at the Warlocks' Convention of 1709..."
Hagrid's fear reached its peak when he heard that one of the penalties for being caught illegally keeping a dragon in private was being sent to Azkaban for a few days of free prison meals.