Little Luna's attitude baffled Harry, yet Luna seemed to find Harry's attitude very strange too.
"Yes, I'm scared, but what good does being scared do?" Luna looked at Harry, her face full of puzzlement, and said slowly:
"There are far too many frightening things in the world of wizards. The deadly terror above the mountains, the lurker in the dark depths of the sea, the bitterly cold fire on the ice fields that can freeze souls, the Silent Screamer on the Hill, and many, many more—all terrifying beings that wizards cannot resist. Yet even they could hardly be called powerful in the face of truly terrifying forces. Compared with those frightening things, one little monster inside Hogwarts really doesn't amount to much."
Harry was bewildered. Utterly bewildered. He had absolutely no idea what any of that string of things Luna had mentioned were. He didn't understand. He didn't understand at all!
In fact, Harry hadn't even worked out what many of the words meant.
"Why are you looking like that?" Luna watched Harry's blank expression, her own expression turning suspicious as she asked in a thoroughly puzzled tone.
"Um... well, I mean, what are all those things you mentioned? I've never heard of any of them. Actually, I didn't really even understand what you were saying." Harry felt a little embarrassed. This seemed to make him look terribly ignorant.
This wasn't right.
Since coming to Hogwarts, Harry had deliberately picked up quite a lot of basic knowledge about the Wizarding World. He ought not to count as particularly ignorant anymore. Yet he really had never heard of any of the things this little girl was talking about.
Awkward. It was terribly awkward.
"You don't know any of them?" Luna looked incredulous. "That can't be right. How could that be?"
"I