Mysterious Journey
Chapter 467: The Calculus Sprite and the Dice Maiden
As time went by, the incident on Halloween eve was quickly submerged in the mundane and trivial daily life of Hogwarts. Professor Quirrell's name was rarely mentioned alone in student discussions at the dining tables or during their leisure time, except occasionally as a point of "comparison."
The only thing that made Aileen a little uneasy was…
After this issue of *A Bite of Hogwarts* was published, Newt Scamander unexpectedly sent a letter, inquiring about the new ingredient featured in it: "Scottish Forbidden Forest Terrestrial Fuzzy Soft-Shell Crab."
Naturally, as a devoted fan of magical creatures, Mr. Scamander was deeply interested in most newly discovered creatures, especially those found near Hogwarts.
"... It's just a common large land crab, tasting similar to tender chicken, with not much danger. More habits and nutritional value need further research, so we do not currently offer postal delivery service."
Aileen nibbled on her quill, writing the reply on a piece of parchment, and handed it to the round-faced, plump chicken waiting for a response by the table. Even to this senior student whose strength was comparable to Grindelwald, she didn't even dare to send a cooked sample.
You see, Newt Scamander was not as easily fooled as Ron at the Gryffindor table.
Faced with such a novel creature he had never heard of, Aileen was 100% certain that Mr. Scamander wouldn't, like Ron Weasley, eat heartily and happily without any psychological burden, wielding one in each hand.
"Wow, is this really a letter from Mr. Newt Scamander?!"
Luna looked at Aileen, her eyes shining.
"Great, I have so many questions I want to ask Mr. Scamander in person."
"It's okay, we'll have plenty of opportunities in the future."
Aileen shrugged noncommittally. "Besides, even Newt Scamander can't know every animal in the world. Look, he's still writing to ask what a terrestrial soft-shell crab is, isn't he?"
"That's true, at least he hasn't discovered Crumple-Horned Snorkacks and Rainbow Bubblefish..." Luna nodded earnestly.
"That's because those two creatures don't exist in the first place."
Hermione raised an eyebrow, cutting the fried egg in front of her while calmly answering.
She still had a copy of *The Dark Forces: A Guide to Self-Protection* open in front of her. There was a Defense Against the Dark Arts class this morning, the first class for the first-year students after the new professor took over, and Hermione wanted to take some time to read more of the content to keep up with the pace.
"Granger," Luna pouted unhappily, "You can't deny the existence of those magical creatures just because you can't find other written records. It's like before the Rainbow Unicorn was discovered, everyone thought it was just a legend."
"Rainbow Unicorns are indeed legends."
Hermione shook her head dismissively, continuing to look at the Defense Against the Dark Arts textbook in front of her.
"Aileen-jie-jie doesn't say that. It's said that in the Muggle world..."
"She also calls owls round-faced plump chickens. Her Muggle world is not the same as the one I live in."
"Since we can't convince each other, why don't we play rock-paper-scissors to decide the winner?!"
"I refuse! Find some relevant literature to convince me if you can!"
"..."
Faced with the argument between Hermione and Luna, Aileen wisely did not get involved. As a normal little witch, actively interfering in the debate between Calculation-Ji and Dice-Niang was an extremely stupid thing to do.
In the previous two days of detention, similar squabbles had occurred several times.
At first, Aileen could come up with some absolutely fair methods to resolve the conflict, such as comparing sizes, playing rock-paper-scissors, or rolling dice.
But as the number of times increased, and Luna won every single time, Hermione no longer believed in luck and metaphysics. On the other hand, it greatly enhanced Luna's confidence. Whenever she was unsure, she would try to use her inspiration.
However, compared to the calm Aileen, Hannah was obviously much more anxious to see her friends arguing.
"Stop arguing, stop arguing... This isn't a solution."
Hannah looked around, her eyes falling on Hermione's *The Dark Forces: A Guide to Self-Protection* that was open in front of her, and suddenly her eyes lit up.
"Hey, why don't we ask Professor Apocalyps later what he thinks of this issue?"
"It's the same result anyway, non-existent is non-existent."
Hermione muttered impatiently, continuing to read her book while eating breakfast.
But strangely, no matter how much the two of them argued, they both maintained a strange understanding—the plate of "Roasted Soft-Shell Crab Legs" placed in front of Luna and Hermione remained untouched.
For Luna Lovegood, she always felt that the "crab legs" seemed a bit strange.
And Hermione's judgment was based on a simpler basis. From the beginning to the end, Aileen had not taken them to see the real appearance of this "Scottish Fuzzy Soft-Shell Crab." According to Aileen's previous behavior records, this was likely another alias for some strange creature—just like the Scottish Round-Faced Plump Chicken.
"But speaking of which, Professor Apocalyps and Professor Dumbledore should know what that is."
Hermione glanced thoughtfully at Aileen, who was distracted again, her eyes lingering on the staff table.
On the night of Halloween Eve, the story Aileen told ended only after rescuing the unicorn.
But from a logical point of view, from the time she rescued the unicorn to the time she returned to Hogwarts Castle, there was actually a rather long period of blank time. Therefore, Aileen definitely concealed some extremely important information.
You see, this period of time also included Professor Dumbledore's feeling unwell, as well as the important area in the Hogwarts Great Hall where Professor Quirrell and Professor Apocalyps were both absent before the accident occurred.
And more importantly, on the second day of Aileen's return, the Hogwarts kitchens provided dishes corresponding to "Forbidden Forest Terrestrial Fuzzy Soft-Shell Crabs." All these details indicated that these were definitely not simply independent events.
In fact, from very early on, Hermione could feel Aileen's specialness, as well as the relationship between her and the two old men that was not limited to ordinary students and professors. Behind many major events in the school, there were vaguely shadows of the three of them.
Unlike most silly little wizards, Hermione Granger, although she did not have accurate data, could roughly calculate that the number of potatoes produced by the Hogwarts "Happy Farm" far exceeded the actual consumption.
Otto Apocalyps... Aileen Casselana...
There must be some strange connection between these two!
Unfortunately, she was not a member of a pure-blood wizarding family.
If she could have the wizarding family tree as a reference, Hermione felt that she would definitely be able to discover more things.
To explain it in Aileen's casually spoken words—there is no such thing as coincidence in this world, only inevitable results.
But there was no need to rush. In the following Defense Against the Dark Arts class, she still had plenty of time to observe Aileen and that mysterious Professor Apocalyps, and find out what the secret hidden behind Hogwarts was...
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First update, making up for yesterday's delayed update~