In all the teams attempting the "Dark Arts Defense Trial" dungeon, Hermione Granger, Hannah Abbott, and Luna Lovegood were the most special, and the team most anticipated to be the first clearers.

This wasn't just because each of them possessed extraordinary advantages in different fields – Hermione being a genius, Hannah being a foodie, Luna being lucky, or their enviable friendship with Aileen Cassel – the most crucial thing was...

【Dark Arts Defense Trial】Dungeon Open!

Team Members: Luna Lovegood (C), Hannah Abbott, Hermione Granger

Dungeon Attempts: Seven

Difficulty Rating: 【?】0.66666……

Since Luna Lovegood hadn't yet started her official schooling, according to the rules, little Luna was still considered a pre-schooler in year zero. In other words, the Nana-Min combo was facing the lowest difficulty level available at Hogwarts.

On the other hand...

Not to mention that Hogwarts first years were taught by professors who hadn't yet reached the height of their powers.

Strictly speaking, even the professors and heads of houses of years past might not have been able to defeat any one of these three girls.

Well, except in Flying class... In that area, Professor Snape and Hermione Granger were, at best, evenly matched.

Oblivious to the mischievous thoughts aimed at her from behind, Hermione approached the dungeon entrance, drew her wand, and skillfully cast the unlocking charm.

"Alohomora!"

The tightly shut wooden door opened a crack.

With a creaking sound, the three warriors carrying the hopes of the entire Hogwarts student body disappeared behind the mottled, ancient wooden door, accompanied by Aileen.

…………

Behind the door was an extremely spacious room.

"Woof, woof, arrh!"

Hearing the door open, a chubby three-headed puppy raised its head, sleepily glanced at the entrance, and then pattered over, emitting the unique roars of a baby dog.

As a fearsome Cerberus, even in its youthful state, little Lo-Wei remained steadfast in its duty, which was to lie on the trapdoor leading to the lower level, carrying out the task assigned to it by its little mistress.

However, unlike its original guard duty, it now served more as a guardian beast.

After all, with the "Dark Arts Defense Trial" dungeon open to the entire school, Aileen couldn't be there all the time. She was more like a randomly spawning NPC, accompanying waves of young wizards "dungeoning," acting more as a cute three-headed puppy.

Whether it was the Herbology challenge, the Key challenge, the Chessboard challenge... or even the later Combat challenges, the hellhound of the Dark Lord, seemingly a milk dog but with strength beyond the norm, could easily prevent serious accidents from occurring.

Not to mention, there were house elves observing in secret throughout the entire process.

"Alright, Lo-Wei, quiet."

Luna crouched down, picked up the little chubby dog, gently patted its three heads, and smoothly pulled out a few "grilled crab sticks" from Ron's collection in her pocket, stuffing them into Lo-Wei's mouths.

Although she never knew where the Hogwarts kitchen found these crab legs, Luna's intuition told her that this stuff didn't seem good, so no matter how Aileen enticed her, she hadn't eaten a single bite of them.

Hermione had guessed what they were today after Ron recounted the fifth level's total wipe.

Now, only the simple-minded Hannah was left, mindlessly eating the "grilled crab legs" that Ron had given her, looking expectantly at Aileen, who was already standing in the center of the room, as if anticipating something.

Aileen cleared her throat and gently snapped her fingers.

In the center of the dim, spacious room, a cylindrical beam of light suddenly appeared. Amid the varied expressions of the other three little witches, Aileen walked into the beam of light without changing her expression, reciting in a rather mysterious and melodious voice.

"Legend has it that countless treasures are hidden within Hogwarts, a diadem that bestows supreme wisdom, a gold goblet with inexhaustible riches, an ancient pendant containing mysterious magic, and an indestructible Goblin-made sword..."

Accompanying Aileen's voice, the golden diadem of Ravenclaw, the golden cup of Hufflepuff, the locket of Slytherin, and the sword of Gryffindor appeared one by one around the girl like dust motes in the sunlight, hazy and dreamlike.

"However, of all the legends about the secret treasures of Hogwarts, there is one story that has been passed down since ancient times that is the most maddening - in some corner of this castle, there exists an extremely mysterious place, where anyone who can reach it will see all the things they desire..."

"To guard this place of legend, professors of each generation have used their respective magic and wisdom to create seven challenges. Only the smartest, bravest, strongest, and most resilient wizards can overcome these trials and reach that place..."

"Now, the three warriors who have found their way here, are you willing to follow in my footsteps to find the lost treasure..."

Click.

"Hey! Hey! We haven't gotten to that part yet! I haven't introduced the background story of the first level!"

Enveloped in a halo of holy light and shadow, Aileen interrupted anxiously, looking at Hermione Granger, who had already opened the trapdoor on the floor of the room and was looking down, her cheeks puffing up with slight dissatisfaction.

"Hermione, can you please listen to me finish the story patiently? I spent so long memorizing it!"

"You recite it every day in bed; I can recite it all from memory now, even with my eyes closed. Instead of coming up with this mumbo jumbo opening every time, why don't you just tell us what the last two levels are?"

Hermione rolled her eyes at Aileen in annoyance, showing no intention of playing along.

She had thought that with this white-haired dumpling by their side, Aileen would actively step in to stop them if they encountered any danger, and even if a total wipe occurred due to some operational error, they would at most just be sent out of the dungeon.

Who knew that Aileen was as cold-hearted as stone? Not only was there no preferential treatment, she was even more cruel.

In recent days, every time they were wiped out, Aileen would deliberately delay for a while before coming out, patiently watching them being bound into various positions by Devil's Snare, being chased and beaten by flying iron bars, being trampled by dozens of two-meter-tall statues, and convulsing on the ground after drinking the wrong potion...

Just yesterday, she had clearly conceded in advance, but the opposing White Queen chased her across the chessboard like a madman and landed a heavy punch to complete "Checkmate," and Aileen waited until she was knocked unconscious before coming out to heal her.

Although according to Aileen, she was giving everyone more opportunities to struggle, hoping that there might be some situation of miraculous reversal, of a counterattack from the brink of defeat, Hermione and Luna expressed deep suspicion, apart from Hannah.

If it weren't for the fact that Aileen would heal their wounds and restore their stamina after each level, Hermione would have almost planned to temporarily cut ties with this ruthless woman for a week as a warning after the first day of the dungeon.

"Atmosphere, atmosphere... This is background introduction; life needs a sense of ritual..."

Looking at the displeased calculation machine, Aileen scratched her cheek with an embarrassed smile and walked out of the beam of light.

"Besides, I already explained what happened yesterday..."

Of course, she knew what Hermione was angry about, mostly that she didn't provide rescue in time after losing the chess game on the third level yesterday.

But in that kind of situation, if she took the initiative to interfere with the assessment, the difficulty might jump from Lv0.666 to the legendary Lv8 - which was one of the conditions the professors agreed upon for her as a "guide NPC."

In the challenges set by the professors, Aileen could absolutely not interfere with the young wizards' practical assessment, unless she planned to challenge the entire faculty with three salted fish, otherwise she could only provide help at the end and beginning of each level.

"Hmph. I'm not angry at all, after all, this is your duty. Light as a feather."

Hermione snorted indifferently, opened the trapdoor in front of her on her own accord, tapped herself lightly with her wand, and then jumped down into the dark entrance.

A layer of light, invisible whirlwind wrapped around Hermione Granger's body, making her fall like a feather, gently and lightly towards the first level assessment site where a thick layer of Devil's Snare had already been laid out.

"Aileen, I guess the reason Hermione is angry is that she probably guessed where those soft-shell crab legs came from."

Luna glanced at Aileen, and whispered softly while returning little Lo-Wei to Aileen.

"Although Hannah doesn't know about these things yet, I have a feeling that it won't be able to be hidden for too long. You'd better think of a way to deal with it in advance, or else something big might happen - after all, she's eaten quite a few of them these days..."

"Eh?! This..."

Aileen's expression froze, and she subconsciously looked at the little iron girl who had already finished eating the grilled crab legs and was currently sucking on her fingers.

Noticing Aileen's gaze, Hannah Abbott revealed a silly smile, licked the crab leg shells in her hand with lingering taste, picked up the flying broom that she had placed by the wall, and waved at Luna.

"Luna, come on, we should go down too."

Luna nodded quickly, similarly picked up the flying broom placed beside her, kicked off from the ground in the room after straddling the broom, and flew down through the opened trapdoor towards the dark below after lightly hovering around in a circle.

Looking at the pile of "fluffy soft-shell crab leg shells" eaten clean by Hannah on the ground, covered with bite marks, Aileen breathed a sigh of relief as if she had survived a disaster. Fortunately, she had temporarily replaced the content of the fifth level - but since Luna Lovegood had already issued a warning, she should indeed carefully consider how to deal with it.

You should know that it wasn't just grilled crab legs in these days.

Whether it was egg yolk crab meat soup, spicy crab pot, crispy fried crab cakes, lemon crab boxes, crab meat seafood soup... all the new dishes that had "Scottish fluffy soft-shell crab" as the main ingredient were all tasted by Hannah alone.

Forget it, cross that bridge when you get to it... Anyway, even if she was the culprit, then the other two little wings who conspired together to hide it from Hannah Abbott couldn't escape the identity of accomplices. Sisters die together.

In the interlude where Aileen was slightly dazed, the light below had already lit up as bright as sunlight.

"Bright as day! Lumos Solem!"

"Hmm, fast... it looks like the racing mode can be prepared to start?"

Aileen smiled slightly, raised her eyebrows thoughtfully, tapped the wall beside her lightly with her wand, and her figure instantly disappeared from this layer of space, appearing at the corner of the passageway leading to the second level.

The "Dark Lord's Trial" dungeon is still relatively rough at the moment, and the gameplay is relatively simple.

Once people find the clearance skills, the fun will definitely be greatly reduced, and the teaching effect will also be reduced.

Therefore, Aileen plans to try to hide some copper coins and silver coins in each level if conditions permit, as well as parchment scrolls recording strange knowledge - after all, it seems that there is still a lack of level Boss drops and random rare drops.

However, these are things for the future. The most important thing now is of course...

Aileen gently snapped her fingers, and a soft beam of light silently shone down, enveloping her in it.

Carefully listening to the approaching footsteps, the silver-haired little loli cleared her throat, trying her best to make her expression look like the kind of steady guiding goddess she encountered in games in her previous life, and said slowly in a calm voice.

"Warriors, congratulations on passing the test of the first level. I can provide you with healing, stamina resto..."

Whoosh!

Whoosh!

Two brooms pulled a figure past Aileen in a blur, as if they hadn't seen anything, without stopping for even a second, heading straight for the stone passage leading to the next level without turning their heads.

"...ration, and subsequent level guidance..."

The corners of the white-haired dumpling's mouth, who was playing the guiding goddess, couldn't help twitching.

So, the most annoying thing is these fast-food players who like to skip the game plot, and only know how to fight, kill and clear the level. The next version of the dungeon update must fix this Bug. You must watch the cutscene CG before you can move.

"Hey! You three, wait for me!"

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Only one chapter today~ Happy Holidays!