Although Harry and his three friends had agreed that the thing guarded by the Three-Headed Dog was the Philosopher's Stone, that knowledge had not helped them much.
The Philosopher's Stone represented the highest achievement in alchemy, and even the Hogwarts Library had almost no information about it. At least, Harry, Hermione, and the others had found none.
Of course, there was another possibility: all the relevant material was in the Restricted Section.
Having made a new discovery only to find themselves unable to turn it into any real progress left Harry and the others feeling miserable.
In contrast, one person was absolutely delighted: Oliver Wood, captain of the Gryffindor Quidditch Team.
Lately, Wood wore a constant grin wide enough for everyone to see sixteen of his teeth, and even his tonsils. He could not help it; the Gryffindor Quidditch Team's results so far had pleased him immensely.
The Hogwarts Quidditch season consisted of twelve matches, with each house playing every other house twice. The twelve matches were divided into three stages: before the Christmas holidays, before the Easter holidays, and before the end of term.
Gryffindor had now finished both of its matches before the Christmas holidays and had won them both.
Harry had caught the Golden Snitch in both matches, giving Gryffindor victories by huge margins. If they kept this up, this year's Quidditch House Cup was practically in the bag.
Wood had already observed the other three teams, and from what he had seen, their chances of winning the cup looked very good.
What delighted him most, however, was that he had cultivated his own successor: Ron Weasley.
Wood had played during Charlie Weasley's time as Quidditch captain, and the team also had two very talented Beaters, the Weasley twins.
Although Percy, who was in his year, was not particularly good at Quidditch, that did nothing to shake Wood's belief that the Weasley children had Quidditch in their genes-even if the word "genes" rarely came up in the wizarding world.
Ron had provided further proof of that belief.
In the match against Hufflepuff, Wood had stood firm against the doubts of Angelina and the other two girls who played Chaser, putting Ron in the starting lineup.
Ron had won over both the spectators and his teammates with his outstanding performance. As a result, Angelina and the others felt that all they needed to do for the two upcoming back-to-back matches against Ravenclaw after Christmas was put Ron on the pitch.
Wood was arguing his case as best he could. Having to fight for a place in the lineup despite being captain probably left him torn between pain and delight.
With the pre-Christmas matches finished and their results excellent, Wood eased up a little on training. That also gave Harry and Ron more time to search for information about the Philosopher's Stone with Hermione.
Unfortunately, more than a month had passed without any particularly useful discoveries.
There were actually quite a few references to the Philosopher's Stone, but very few discussed it in any detail. The Philosopher's Stone belonged to the field of alchemy, and Hogwarts did not offer a course in alchemy, so there were far fewer books and materials on the subject.
The few that mentioned it generally said only that it could turn stone into gold and produce the Elixir of Life.
Even Harry did not think Snape would be particularly obsessed with gold. Although Harry and the others thought Snape was an utterly dreadful teacher, they all knew he held the title of Potions Master-and was the youngest Potions Master in all of Europe.
Someone like him could not possibly be short of money.
As for the Elixir of Life, wizards honestly lived quite a long time. Dumbledore, for instance, was already over a hundred, yet remained full of vigor every day. Harry and the others often saw Dumbledore at the staff table during dinner-something that was uncommon among the professors-with a great pile of desserts in front of him.
By comparison, Snape was only in his thirties. Harry and the others thought the idea that he had already begun worrying about death was rather far-fetched.
Unable to work out his reasons, Harry and the others found their investigation at an impasse.
It was worth mentioning that Snape had actually volunteered to referee the second Quidditch match, against Hufflepuff. This had caused Harry and Ron considerable worry for a while. Hermione had even suggested that Harry break his leg to avoid playing.
In the end, however, their fears had proved unfounded. Dumbledore had attended that match too.
Clearly, with Dumbledore there, Snape had not dared try anything underhanded, and the entire match had gone smoothly.
Snape's lack of further action was also the main reason Harry and the others' investigation had stalled.
Before they knew it, it was already the middle of December.
With the arrival of the first snow, the students had begun looking forward to Christmas.
The Hogwarts Christmas holidays lasted a full fortnight, and students could choose either to go home or to stay at school.
Hermione and Neville had already decided to go home for Christmas, while Ron had confirmed that he would stay at school-his parents were going to Romania to visit their second son, Charlie.
Harry had heard Charlie's name many times, though it was Wood, rather than Ron or the twins, who mentioned him most often.
Wood was always saying, "Wow, Harry, I thought Charlie was a brilliant Seeker, but you're even better than he was!"
Apparently, Charlie had been invited to try out for a professional club, but in the end, he had chosen to study dragons at the Dragon Sanctuary in Romania.
Harry had never seen a dragon and was very interested in them.
He remembered Hagrid mentioning more than once that he wanted to get a dragon to raise. Almost every time Harry visited him, he brought it up. That also made him the person who mentioned Charlie second most often. Whenever he talked about Charlie getting to live among a whole group of dragons, Hagrid looked terribly envious.
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