It was evident that even before her promotion to probationary Greater Arcana, Aileen's little wings had already begun to "tie themselves in knots."

Admittedly, in the beginning, even the combined efforts of Hermione, Hannah, and Luna often failed to resist Aileen's overwhelming power.

However, as time passed, whether in terms of magic, skill, or intellect and physical ability, the trio of Hermione, Hannah, and Luna, starting this semester, could barely manage to suppress Aileen when working together—provided, of course, that Aileen chose to behave herself.

However, this loose "anti-white-haired dumpling" alliance was often fragile and lacked coordination.

Upon realizing that Hermione and Luna had initiated an attack, Aileen unhesitatingly chose to strike directly.

Taking advantage of Hannah's lack of reaction and relying on her overwhelming brute strength, Aileen caught Hermione before she could escape, flipped her over, and pinned her to the soft sofa, delivering several hard slaps as punishment for her proactive "involution" offensive.

"Nice try, but next time remember to explain clearly, or communicate with your allies beforehand—"

Aileen released Hermione, allowing the little beaver to shrink quickly to the other end of the sofa, her face red and glaring at her, clutching her bottom.

Only then, as Luna quietly explained, did Hannah, who was still eating roast goose, understand what had happened. belatedly, she protected Miss Lovegood, who had not been attacked, and stared warily at Aileen, in case she rushed over to bully Luna using her strength.

"Alright, don't look at me like that. I'm not a bad person—just leave that pile of approvals there. We'll send them to the Headmaster's office via Floo Network later and let 'The Tower' and 'The Pope' take care of them... Consider it compensation for them deceiving us."

In fact, even if Hannah hadn't proactively asked for help, she would have helped her with those tasks later anyway.

Due to the "Chamber of Secrets Hunt" plan, Hannah, Luna, and Hermione were not spending the holidays with their families as usual. In this situation, Aileen wouldn't be so twisted as to whip them into working overtime on document approvals on Christmas.

Of course, Dumbledore and Grindelwald were fair game.

Those two idle old wizards celebrated every day anyway.

A few minutes later, Luna, Hannah, and the others returned to the Hufflepuff common room, each with an excited expression on their faces.

At Aileen's urging, they had placed all the approval documents and even homework for the next few days in the Headmaster's office, and had even left a blatant note on the desk to "explain" their actions—something they had never dared to imagine before.

However, as Hannah emerged from the bedroom with a pile of gifts, the joy in Hermione and Luna's hearts quickly deflated like a punctured balloon.

Because there were many adult wizards in the castle at this time, and possibly even some of their servants, their activities were limited to the Hufflepuff common room, the Hogwarts kitchen, and the Headmaster's office, at least for today.

They couldn't go anywhere except these three places, which had bidirectional "local Floo Networks."

Hogwarts was full of secrets, and their presence was undoubtedly the biggest point of suspicion and trouble. To prevent prying eyes from outside the school, Dumbledore and others had even used their privileges to lock down the entrances to each house in advance:

The Fat Lady from Gryffindor had gone out visiting;

The Ravenclaw eagle knocker riddle was temporarily locked to proving the four-color theorem;

Magical barriers were placed on the Slytherin stone walls, with the reason being to prevent the basilisk from escaping into the dormitories.

As for Hufflepuff, which was closest to the kitchen, the same magical barrier was placed as with Slytherin, after all, both houses were located in the dungeons of Hogwarts. If the basilisk had a chance to escape upwards, the common rooms of both houses could become hiding places.

This also meant...

The Christmas gifts that Hermione and Luna had prepared earlier couldn't be given out for the time being.

The Hogwarts house-elves had brought all the gifts from their other friends, but the gifts that each of them had prepared for Hannah and Aileen were missing—the house-elves dared not rummage through wizards' belongings casually, which was unavoidable.

"There shouldn't be a curfew tonight, right? Why don't we go upstairs after those wizards leave?"

Hermione said, closing the singing storybook that Hannah had given her, and turning to look at Aileen with pleading eyes.

"Just for a little while, at least you can open the gifts I gave you on Christmas Day, instead of waiting until the next day—"

"Yeah, I can cast illusion magic too." Luna's silvery-gray eyes also stared at Aileen.

"It's not hard to get out, after all, we can go out from the kitchen, but we still can't get into the Ravenclaw and Gryffindor common rooms." Aileen shrugged, explaining for the third or fourth time helplessly, "These are not things I can decide. The power to seal off the common rooms comes from the Headmaster's orders. Professor Dumbledore has to undo it, but at least not tonight..."

"Oh."

"Okay."

After trying one last time, Hermione and Luna sat down in disappointment.

In fact, during this time, Aileen had also explained other possible reasons.

For example, referring to the exposure operation of countering "secretly arresting Quirrell," there were too many reporters and Ministry of Magic employees who arrived at Hogwarts Castle today. After the banquet, they might even take a stroll around the school.

Before those "eavesdropping" spells that might still be lurking in the castle were completely cleared, they should try not to move around casually.

"Sorry, I didn't think... this Christmas might be a little boring..."

Looking at the dejected Hermione and Luna, Aileen said uneasily, fidgeting with the hem of her clothes.

Compared to being at ease in various major plans, she clearly spent much less effort on holidays and play. If Dumbledore and Grindelwald hadn't helped fill the gap last year, she wouldn't have even remembered to give Christmas gifts to her friends.

Although she had made a little progress this year, it was only in remembering to prepare gifts for others, without considering Hermione and Luna's feelings.

The upper limit of the basilisk threat remaining in the Slytherin Chamber of Secrets was too high.

Even though in the original story, it was just Harry with a sword, plus Fawkes soloing the simple instance.

But when reality was in front of Aileen, she wouldn't hope that the world line that had already been shaped into her form would play a role. As long as those indirect gazes in the original story changed even once inappropriately, it would be a life. She didn't intend to give Death any chance.

Obviously, this could be said to be the place where the butterfly effect was most likely to occur, ultimately leading to unexpected deaths.

Therefore, before the basilisk was completely dead, Aileen's nerves were almost constantly tense—the Hyperion's full firepower coverage was not just talk. If that basilisk showed unexpected lethality, Aileen could even flatten the Black Lake directly in order to kill it.

And the consequence of such importance was...

She had hardly considered how boring Christmas would be for the other little wings if everything went smoothly.

"I mean, we've been on the Hyperion since last night preparing the battle plan, spending most of the day submerged in the water, and we can't move around elsewhere or go to the Great Hall or go home for a normal Christmas... I'm sorry..."

Aileen twirled a strand of silver hair that hung over her shoulder, saying somewhat dejectedly.

As Miss Fool, all she could do was admit her mistake, after all, it related to the future of too many people.

"Eh?! How could it be boring? What are you talking about? This is more interesting than going home for Christmas—"

Before Aileen could finish speaking, Hannah interrupted with a strange look, grabbing a scarf and crumpling it into a ball before throwing it at Aileen's head.

"You know, the Leaky Cauldron is our family's business. Christmas is probably the busiest time. Many homeless wizards, aliens, and foreign tourists temporarily staying in England will all come to the Leaky Cauldron on this day. Our whole family has to help, not to mention the drinks, turkey, pies, and cakes. We also have to help them clean up their resting places and watch them so they don't cause trouble—"

Hannah hugged a pillow and lay on the soft bed, rolling around lazily, recalling previous Christmases.

"This kind of busy scene has to last until the afternoon of the next day at least—as for Christmas banquets and stuff, we seem to spend it with the guests in the store—it's scary to even think about it. You know, last time I went back, I was so embarrassed I almost died. The walls were covered with my pictures..."

As if recalling some terrible things again, Hannah buried her head in the pillow and squirmed, seemingly intending to suffocate herself.

After serving as a full-time reviewer, model, and writer for *A Bite of Hogwarts* and *The Quibbler*, every time she went back to the Leaky Cauldron to help, she invariably felt like smashing her own walls, especially when her uncle was in the mood, he would pick up a "food review draft" with her signature, shake his head, and read it once, or even urge her to stand on the table and recite it.

However, the only thing worth comforting was...

Since she punched a table and smashed it to pieces in extreme anger and threw a drunken brawler out of the pub, the old customers in the Leaky Cauldron didn't dare to tease her too hard. If they were knocked down by little Hannah, they would be laughed at by their drinking buddies for months.

"So busy? But why don't you choose to rest on Christmas?"

Hermione looked at Hannah, who was rolling around on the bed, and asked in confusion.

"Mom said that the Leaky Cauldron is one of the few places in England that is still open on Christmas—"

Hannah raised her head from the pillow, recalling her mother's previous statement, and looked at Hermione seriously as she explained.

"As long as we're still here, those homeless wizards and people traveling abroad can always find a place to stay. No matter how unlucky they have been in the past year, at least they can have a warm and happy ending as the year comes to a close."

"Of course, sometimes it's not so warm and happy—"

Hannah's little face crumpled, with an expression of unbearable memories. "For example, there are often drafts at the door, and the guests cry and make trouble when they drink too much. I remember once they even fought in the pub, and in the end, more than a dozen people were knocked down with Stunning Spells, and the hallway outside the guest rooms was full of people sleeping."

"What about you? Hermione, what is Christmas like in the non-magical world?"

"It's not much better—"

Hermione shrugged helplessly, spreading her hands to explain, half complaining and half resigned.

"You may not know, my parents are both dentists—although they can rest on Christmas, they have to go to work the next morning. Patients seeing the dentist during Christmas can line up from morning to night. So we usually just have a simple meal and rest early..."

In fact, before coming to Hogwarts to study, she spent every Christmas holiday alone during the day.

Perhaps because she had started living at school for a long time, Mr. Granger had unexpectedly proposed a family outing plan for next year after returning home last summer. As for the travel destination, it was tentatively set in France, but that would have to wait until the end of this school year for the next holiday.

"Luna, what about your family? You..."

"We haven't spent Christmas at home for several years. Dad is always writing articles these years—"

Luna hugged her golden unicorn doll, her voice drifting softly, staring blankly at the roaring fireplace.

When she was a child, long before her father joined the Greater Arcana, not to mention during Christmas, *The Quibbler*'s hiatus would even run through December to January. According to Mr. Lovegood, it was—anyway, no one would rush the draft during the holidays, so just cut it off.

And whenever this happened, Mom would always find a way to conjure a sumptuous Christmas dinner, coaxing Dad to save some manuscripts.

This was almost a fixed routine for the Lovegood family every Christmas.

Until, later...

Luna's eyes dimmed slightly.

From the past two years, they hadn't celebrated every Christmas.

Xenophilius Lovegood had never mentioned taking leave or stopping updating. Christmas seemed to have disappeared from the Lovegood family. What replaced it was just a depressing, somewhat silent December 25th, and Luna had never said anything proactively.

"Uh—"

Hannah, who started the topic, blinked her eyes, glanced at Hermione and Luna, who had become even more depressed, and looked at Aileen for help.

Even if she was a little slow to react usually, Hannah could still sense her friends' emotions—did she say something wrong again?

"Well, speaking of which, when I was in the orphanage before, Christmas was also..."

Aileen was about to try to salvage the atmosphere for Hannah, but she suddenly froze halfway through her sentence.

————

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Hooray!