The investigation into Ellena's memory loss had come to an end.
There were indeed quite a few wizards at Hogwarts capable of casting the Obliviate Charm.
However, besides the three little wings, only Ellena herself could cast spells using Ellena's wand – and considering the spells shown before and after in the Flashback Charm, the time of the Obliviate Charm appearing in Ellena's wand was exactly around midnight.
That time node was precisely during her nighttime wanderings in the castle, when she faced the Mirror of Erised alone.
"Did I lock away my own memories..."
Ellena frowned, pondered for a while, and ultimately chose to give up.
Even if she clearly remembered what she saw in the mirror, those couldn't be used as evidence.
Just like the "switching desires" limited future prediction they had planned just now, if she herself chose to actively erase her memory, then she wouldn't be able to know how many mirror surfaces she had experienced before. Moreover, when alone, the Mirror of Erised would blur the sense of time.
However, she could only, or rather, had to choose to believe in "herself"'s judgment.
As for the reason why...
"Perhaps, you shouldn't have let Ms. Arkhipovna leave —"
Grindelwald's eyes flickered, and he said meaningfully in a low voice, "The initial attempt under theoretical assumptions is fundamentally different from the reproduction after several rounds of testing. If you continue like this, it's easy to become a 'Mad King'."
"So Ms. Kaslana will never become the next Dark Lord."
Dumbledore couldn't help but smile, and said gently, his tone sounding very happy.
He knew that the reasons for Ellena choosing "self-sacrifice" in her plan would never be that simple.
But for Dumbledore, the more grand the plan and ideal, the more difficult it would be for people to define their own positions.
And more importantly, compared to the words written on parchment, for an old wizard who had experienced too much illusion, the reality of the choice was the key – the greatest pain of mankind is the inability to cross the gap between knowing and doing, and self-deception is the most terrible kind of bondage.
"...Don't imagine things that aren't there. I'm not the kind of saintly mother who would sacrifice myself."
Ellena put away her wand and pointed to the Mirror of Erised, which had been re-covered with black velvet cloth, in the center of the room.
"As for the Mirror of Erised, I'll leave it to you to transport it — record and store it separately as a new 'SCP object'. You should be very familiar with this process, Mr. 'Hanged Man'." She glanced at Gilderoy Lockhart, thought for a moment, and added.
"If... well, you're planning to peek, it's best to look openly now."
Curiosity is the most boring temptation.
Ellena didn't plan to let this illusory mirror become any tempting reward.
It was merely a research tool, nothing more.
"Uh, then I'll take a look, you know I actually..."
Lockhart paused for half a second and scratched his cheek.
He stepped forward, his right hand holding the edge of the black velvet cloth, and suddenly turned his head to look at Ellena again.
"Do I have to say what I see?"
"Professor Dumbledore told me that he saw a pair of woolen socks in the mirror."
Ellena shrugged, thought for a moment, and answered with a serious face.
"So, I plan to buy a woolen sock factory to help him fulfill his wish."
"Thank you."
Dumbledore sighed.
Obviously, he would have to change to a new reason next year.
Looking at the happy-faced headmaster, Ellena narrowed her eyes happily.
"You're welcome."
Meanwhile, in front of the Mirror of Erised.
Lockhart stared blankly at the mirror surface.
After a long time, he breathed a sigh of relief.
So...
These were his wishes?
His gaze quickly swept over the confident, sunny man in the mirror, who was signing and introducing the story of "Shadow Blade," and landed on the face of the beautiful woman who leaned on his shoulder like a little bird, looking at him with a gentle, loving, and admiring gaze.
Well, this Russian harridan was just a bit temperamental, but she was indeed stronger than many witches in other aspects.
Compared to the usual look of disgust, this cute expression was indeed more suitable for this harridan —
Lockhart raised the corners of his mouth and released the velvet cloth in his hand with satisfaction.
It didn't seem very far away.
Although he had never been in a formal relationship before, Lockhart considered himself no weaker than anyone in terms of his attainments in the theory of love.
Compared to Arthur Weasley, Newt Scamander, and Xenophilius Lovegood, those pathetic "prey" who were "captured" by witches, he was definitely a hunter at the top of the food chain in terms of dissecting women's thoughts and insight into what women were interested in.
The biggest weakness of that Russian harridan was her desire and longing for "new knowledge."
And as the gathering place of a bunch of core departments such as "Hyperion Repair Base," "Gringotts Technical Branch," "Valkyria Armor Research Institute," "Destiny Science Headquarters," and "Humanity Continuation Security Organization," the "Succubus City" was definitely an academic holy land that far exceeded the imagination of Muggles.
Lockhart never doubted the "young lady"'s talent in this area, which was even difficult for Dumbledore to achieve.
Not to mention, just now, the angelic young lady had also helped him with an assist.
The rule of not leaving Hyperion for a moment allowed Lockhart plenty of time to lay the groundwork and imply his identity as the person in charge of the core area.
When that Russian harridan was completely shaken by those cutting-edge technologies and researches, he didn't even need to deliberately emphasize that these places were under his jurisdiction and built by him. Just the attitude of the employees in those regional departments would be enough to complete the reversal.
Similar to this interlocking, meticulous plan, an uninteresting office worker like Arthur Weasley would never be able to think of it in his whole life.
Perhaps, before the next adventure novel is finalized, he could first consider writing a "Law of Love"?
After all, many tasks could not be declassified for the time being, so he had to find some new writing directions first.
…………
The Mirror of Erised was transferred to Succubus City and sealed as an "SCP object."
With the successful research and development of the ternary computer (magic version) and the subsequent reproduction of products, Dumbledore, Grindelwald and others mainly focused on "inviting" future Internet giants. In contrast, Ellena agreed to temporarily let go of the poor Room of Requirement.
After all, only in this way could Dumbledore leave the castle with peace of mind and go to the International Confederation of Wizards to negotiate various clauses.
Therefore, in the remaining time of the Christmas holidays, Ellena returned to some of the most primitive pleasures.
In the underground ice cellar of the Hogwarts kitchen, there was also an old thousand-year-old snake waiting to be dealt with.
At the beginning, Ellena did want to try stir-frying it over high heat.
After all, this was Slytherin's basilisk after all. From a culinary perspective, following the taste of the current Slytherin House, whether it was Spicy Snake Segments, Spicy Braised Snake Meat, Sichuan Pepper Snake Meat... these were obviously very good snake meat dishes, but none of them applied to the thousand-year basilisk.
First of all, in terms of meat quality, the basilisk was obviously not suitable for stir-frying.
As a giant reptile that was dozens of feet long, its muscle toughness and strength would not be much worse than that of an adult dragon.
Even when the mature Fluffy was "tasting meat", it needed three heads to work together to barely tear off appropriately sized pieces of meat from the basilisk's body, and from the vague feedback of the "small braised flavor" soul, the taste was definitely not delicious.
And the more troublesome thing was cutting and disassembling...
The basilisk's scales had extremely high resistance, and ordinary swords and magic could hardly leave traces on it.
Severus Snape was temporarily out of the question, because the "Half-Blood Prince" had to work with several other Potions professors to deal with the most troublesome snake head part. The Sectumsempra spell was too busy dealing with the snake head to help her cut meat and remove scales.
Fortunately, there was a legendary piece of kitchenware stored in Hogwarts Castle.
"M-Ms. Kaslana, I'm just an old, confused, talkative old hat..."
The Sorting Hat looked at the silver-haired witch who appeared in the Headmaster's office through the fireplace flame, and twisted its body uneasily.
Ever since it offended this once-in-a-millennium witch of Hogwarts twice in a row during sorting, the Sorting Hat had been worried that it would face cruel revenge one day, and this premonition became even stronger after the phoenix Fawkes fell into the girl's clutches.
Compared to the previously murderous Ellena, the Ellena with a gentle smile now was obviously much more terrifying in the hat's eyes.
"Oh, what are you talking about? You see, we had some misunderstandings before —"
Ellena said with a smile, gently, as if she were Ravenclaw in the Sorting Hat's memory.
"Whether it was shouting my name in front of everyone in the Ministry of Magic, or complaining in front of the headmaster, or affecting some fairness due to Professor McGonagall's power... After our simple cooperation that time, haven't all of these things turned into fond memories between friends?"
"O-Of course, so you are here today to..."
The Sorting Hat stared at Ellena warily, carefully considering its words.
The Hogwarts headmaster's office was almost in a state of semi-subjugation. This was the current situation.
During the time that Dumbledore was away from the castle, the Sorting Hat had to start thinking about how to protect itself.
"I heard that the Sword of Gryffindor is temporarily in your custody... As a friend, as one of the students of Hogwarts, I hope you can lend it to me for a while — don't worry, the purpose is to dismantle the basilisk's body. That's very reasonable, right?"
Ellena said generously, raising her eyebrows triumphantly at the little wings behind her.
You have to know that the Sorting Hat usually doesn't pay attention to people.
And the secret that the Sorting Hat contains the Sword of Gryffindor is the top secret that only the headmaster knows.
"Uh — Professor D-Dumbledore, even this he told you?!"
The Sorting Hat paused for half a second, the cracked brim twitched almost imperceptibly, and almost uttered a short and powerful Scottish dialect.
Looking at Ellena, who was smiling without saying a word, the Sorting Hat instantly imagined most of the truth — Avoiding harm and seeking profit was human instinct. In order to appease this terrifying Veela hybrid, Albus Dumbledore could even sacrifice his phoenix, let alone this hat that had changed hands dozens of times.
"Okay, okay, I know what you're here for, but..."
The Sorting Hat sighed a few times, looked at the witch not far away with a sad face, and murmured softly.
"Only a true Gryffindor can draw the Sword of Gryffindor from the hat, Ms. Kaslana."
"I know, so today I specially wore the Gryffindor robe —"
Ellena nodded with a serious face, proudly puffing out her chest, the gold and red Gryffindor crest shining brightly in the fire.
"But..."
"Don't you think I lack true courage?"
Ellena blinked her eyes, gently stroking the crumpled wizard's hat.
This hat seems to be very brave?
As expected of the wizard's hat that Gryffindor once wore.
For a moment, the room fell silent.
Then, she felt a long, hard thing under the hat.
A shiny silver sword appeared in the hat. The hilt was inlaid with dazzling rubies that were at least as big as eggs, and a name was engraved near the hilt:
"Godric Gryffindor"
The legendary kitchenware, the Sword of Gryffindor, was obtained!
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Hooray!