007 Midnight Revelations (Re-Written)

Late at night around eleven o'clock, Bryan hastily concluded his meeting and left Dumbledore's office. Due to prolonged amiable smiles, his cheeks felt a bit stiff. Even though Dumbledore was no longer in sight, his expression still looked like he was smiling.

There was no way around it. When making a living, greeting others with a smile was not embarrassing. Although they had chatted for over three hours, he still didn't understand what Dumbledore's purpose was in summoning him tonight. Recalling the entire conversation, Bryan found that Dumbledore hadn't given him any chance to present his plans at all. Instead, Dumbledore had just pulled his thoughts to roam all over the world, like old friends who hadn't seen each other for a long time, casually chatting after drinks.

And the only thing he gained was the less than half a bottle of whiskey left in his hand, which Dumbledore had very generously given to him. This was very unreasonable. The trust Dumbledore displayed was completely at odds with his cautious and meticulous personality.

The corridor was empty. The people in the portraits on both sides of the walls were nestled under the torches, sleeping soundly. During the Christmas holiday, even the diligent castle caretaker Filch had left the school to visit old friends.

The biting cold wind that blew into the castle through the windows was still bone-chilling, but it had stopped snowing. In the thick clouds, the faint outline of the moon struggling to break free could be vaguely seen.

Bryan stood in front of a window at the corner of the stairs, gazing into the distance with interest. On a night without starlight, the Forbidden Forest was a pitch-black expanse that couldn't be clearly seen. The flickering firelight from Hagrid's hut was almost the only light under the bottomless night sky.

"I'm so glad you were able to walk out of Dumbledore's office alive, Bryan. I was even already thinking about how to arrange your funeral," Snape, who had changed into a purple nightgown, leaned tightly against the corner wall, staring at the bottle in Bryan's hand with a sneer. "Could it be that Dumbledore's Legilimency skills have regressed so much that he must rely on Veritaserum to dig out the sins you've committed in the past few years from your mouth?"

"Your way with words remains as sharp as ever, Professor," Bryan turned his head and smiled at Snape in the shadows. "Headmaster Dumbledore did not use veritaserum on me. However, it seems he has already figured out what he wanted to know about me."

...

A ray of moonlight that had leaped across mountains and rivers penetrated through the window lattice, forming several parallel rectangular light spots on the floor of the hospital wing ward.

"Lumos."

After confirming that Madam Pomfrey had gone back to her small room to sleep, Hermione quietly opened her eyes. She wriggled and shrank into the quilt, taking out a copy of "Common Magical Ailments" from under the pillow and opened it up. This was a book she had asked Harry to borrow from the library for her.

Although Madam Pomfrey had assured her that the hair on her face would shed cleanly in just a few weeks, Hermione hoped to find a way to shorten this time if possible. Otherwise, she wouldn't know how to explain to potential visitors why she had grown such a beautiful beard on her cheeks. 

Perhaps influenced by animal habits after the wrong transformation, Hermione crouched like a real cat. Her hand unconsciously curled into cat's paws and rested on the pages of the book. Under the tightly fitted quilt, a slender cat tail quietly slipped out and swayed leisurely on the edge of the bed.

Suddenly, footsteps coming from outside the ward caused Hermione's two ears perked on top of her head to stand up. In a very short time, after excluding the possibility of Harry and Ron coming to visit her and Madam Pomfrey patrolling at night, Hermione's fur instantly stood on end and a look of horror appeared on her face.

Could it be that she had encountered the perpetrator of the Chamber of Secrets attacks?! She hurriedly extinguished the light from her wand and lay back down on the bed with her hand tightly gripping the wand under the covers.

"Very little of what happens in this school can be kept from Headmaster Dumbledore, Professor. Are you sure he really knows nothing?"

"You can say he's hypocritical, but he won't allow anyone to harm the students here with tricks and schemes," replied a sinister, low voice to the previous question. Hermione was very familiar with this voice. It was Professor Snape; the Potions teacher Harry disliked the most and who had the biggest prejudice against Gryffindor students among all the staff.

As for the previous voice, Hermione, with her exceptional memory, dared to say that she had never heard it before. However, at least from the conversation, it could be understood that the visitor was not some Heir of Slytherin.

After a brief hesitation, Hermione's furry head emerged from under the quilt. Thanks to the thick pads that had grown on her feet, she didn't make a single sound as she made her way toward the door.

At Snape's indication, Bryan pulled open the shielding curtain and stepped forward quickly, carefully observing the two unfortunate little boys lying on the adjacent beds.

"The gray-haired one is Colin Creevey, and the other is Justin Finch-Fletchley. They come from Gryffindor and Hufflepuff respectively, both Muggle-born. You're very sensitive to magic, Bryan. Tell me what you think."

Bryan stood between the two beds and bent down with intense focus. There seemed to be two vortexes slowly rotating in his pale purple eyes. He looked at Colin Creevey, who was holding up his hand in a photographing gesture, then at Justin Finch-Fletchley, whose expression was one of horror. From time to time, he poked and tapped the hardened skin of the two, producing crisp knocking sounds that were extremely clear in the quiet hospital wing.

"What did Dumbledore say?" Bryan didn't answer the question directly. Instead, he sat down on the bed and stared solemnly at Colin's eyes, and asked casually.

"He believes this is an extremely advanced form of dark magic requiring immense power, beyond the capabilities of student wizards. Furthermore, he privately told Minerva that he personally lacks the ability to directly undo such a potent petrification curse."

"Heh, I have reservations about the latter point." Bryan pursed his lips. Then, pointing at Colin's eyes, he stated his opinion.

"This is not dark magic, but a curse. Abnormal magical energy has frozen the flow of magic inside their bodies, using these two unfortunate boys' eyes as a window. Outwardly, it manifests as petrification."

"Minerva, Filius, and Pomona have all subtly hinted to me." Snape looked a bit irritated. "I've observed it too - the children in the houses are all itching to show off these days. No one likes concealing their strength like you used to. They lack that ability."

"The Headmaster's collection of this bottle of Firewhisky is indeed well-aged." Bryan stood up to stretch his body, but unexpectedly felt a wave of dizziness in his head and almost stumbled and fell. He leaned against the bedpost and rubbed his temples. Many thoughts flashed through his mind. Upon hearing Snape's veiled complaint and recalling his former younger self who was wary of everything, Bryan smiled.

"You've misunderstood, Professor. As I said, their petrification was caused by magical energy of an abnormal nature. In other words, this power doesn't resemble that of wizards. It's more like...to use an example, the magical force flowing through a dragon's blood and nerves. Completely different in style from wizards."

Behind the door, Hermione's yellow eyes widened as she excitedly clenched her paws.

Bryan glanced in amusement at the ward across from him. In his field of vision, the young witch's magical aura, concealed behind the door, stood out like the moon rising in darkness.

"So, the absurd rumor that Salazar Slytherin left a monster in the Chamber of Secrets is not just a rumor, is it?" Snape's voice had returned to being sinister. The greatest of the four founders, Slytherin, had always been the pride of the wizards who graduated from this school. But at this moment, Snape's annoyance with the founder of the house outweighed his reverence.

"From the current situation, this possibility is the greatest." Thinking of those dark wizards in the underworld who coveted Slytherin's treasure, Bryan found it amusing. They probably wouldn't have imagined that what Slytherin had painstakingly left in the Chamber of Secrets was just a magical creature.

However, his task was to find what was in the Chamber of Secrets and hand it over to Kakus Fawley. As for what was left in the chamber, it had nothing to do with him.

After confirming that he didn't have the ability to immediately undo the curse, Bryan could no longer obtain more information from the petrified Colin and Justin. He re-covered the curtains for both of them. His tone was very casual.

"Actually, what I'm more curious about is why the attacker, who clearly had the ability to directly kill them after petrifying them, didn't do so. Could it be simply for the enjoyment of creating fear? This seems to be something only a twisted pervert would do—"

"This question, not only you and I are curious about it. I think Miss Hermione Granger is equally curious!"

Ow!

Bryan and Snape were about to leave, but as they passed Hermione's ward, Snape suddenly took out his wand and fiercely waved it at the ward. Hermione let out an unsuspecting scream from behind the door and stumbled out, rolling a couple of times before happening to fall at Bryan's feet.

"My goodness—" In the silent stillness, Bryan slowly opened his mouth. He glanced at Snape, whose face was full of mockery, then lowered his head to stare at the little wizard who was almost curled up into a ball. "Since when did the wizarding world have cat-eared girls?!"