175 Runic Marble, Background Politics

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Standing near the edge of an opening in the wall, staring down at the floor below, Quinn cracked his neck and stretched his body. He was back into the fourth vault — The Underground Vault. Ready to give the Beelzebub's Crawler field down below him yet another chance.

"For the brave and the bold, huh," he muttered, "yeah, not this time." Saying that, Quinn mounted his broom and flew out of the tunnel. "This isn't the Aquatic vault — I can fly all I want."

He had done his research on Beelzebub's Crawlers; they lived underground, due to that, they could only detect prey through tectonic vibrations in the ground; as such, if Quinn didn't touch the ground, he would go undetected by the vines that could secrete flesh dissolving liquids from their thorns.

Quinn flew straight to the wall opposite to him with the tunnel dug into it. At Quinn's command, the broom flew close and hovered away from the walls and the floor as he studied the tunnel. A ball of sharp white light manifested in the air before it rushed across the tunnel, dividing itself into more and more orbs of light that lined up near the top of the tunnel, turning the dim pathway into a brightly lit one.

He gently lowered himself enough to see straight into the tunnel while making absolutely sure that not a single part of his body touched the ground — Beelzebub's Crawler had a peculiar trait which pushed the vine species to merge, or connect, with every other vine in the vicinity, thus creating a vast network of them.

This meant that if even a single vine came out of the ground to entrap prey, the entire hive network would be aware of its actions. And if that singular vine didn't return with "meal," then the more vines would emerge to capture their "meal."

After peering into the now-lit tunnel, Quinn observed — nothing was sticking out to him as unusual or, to be specific, there was nothing that looked it would harm or hinder harm him his current task at hand. After making decisions, Quinn flew into the tunnel with the magical orbs shining much-needed light for him to see.

"How long does this tunnel go?" asked Quinn, looking around as he cautiously made his way through the tunnel while memorizing every scratch and cut on the rugged and dense stone walls — never knew what could come in use afterward.

His question was promptly answered as he saw the light at the path's end, making Quinn pick up some speed. He flew out of the tunnel, and with him, the light inside also left, once again leaving the tunnel dark.

The tunnel had opened up to another wide area. Quinn flew up to get a good look at the site, and the first thing that caught his eye was that a gigantic portion of the "ceiling" had broken off and had collapsed down below.

"Is that marble?" Quinn noticed white marble below all the collapsed rubble. He could see it was a truly wide circular platform of marble beneath all the pileup. He could also see some markings on the marble.

"Wait a minute. . ." He looked around and saw that there were no more exits other than the one he had entered.

". . . Is this it?" he uttered, "this isn't the end, is it? It can't be, right? That was too short. . . . only one obstacle."

Quinn realized that the vault could've been made before brooms became popular and mainstream — the now a common household item the flying brooms that allowed anyone to fly were not so commonplace as once brooms were nothing but causes of "splinter-filled buttocks and bulging piles."

If his assumption was correct, then Quinn's use of the broom might not have been covered by the original creator.

Quinn stared at the ground and conjured a big boulder before dropping it down to the ground. The boulder hit the ground with a large boom and shook the vault room. He waited. . . but Beelzebub's Crawler didn't come out — the vines couldn't differentiate between living and non-living.

"Is this really it? What was so difficult about this?" he exclaimed in confusion. Somehow, he couldn't get closure with such a simple vault, "but well, if I think it like that, then it makes sense. . . . it didn't need to be tough."

His thinking had been isolated — he was thinking with just the Underground Vault and in mind — he had missed the bigger picture.

"The Forbidden Forest was all the security one needed to hide something. Dangerous, cut-off from the outside world, and filled with beings who don't want anything to do with people outside of the forest."

There was no need to elaborate vault when the natural surroundings already provided the reliable security one could ask. Bow-slinging Centaurs, flesh-hungry Acromantulas, brutish Trolls, and many more species that had the forest held in its vast biodiverse embrace.

Quinn descended down to the ground and dismounted off the broom, and sighed as he stared at the rubble in front of him." I guess I'll work with this now. . . . but, this is a lot of it."

He could see enough pileup that he could climb it and reach a good height — a height high enough to be considered dangerous to jump down from (without magic).

Magic thrummed inside his body as Quin closed his eyes and concentrated on the rubble in front of him. He reached out to debris in front of him and exerted a lift.

"O-Oh. . . this is heavy!" he groaned, his magic groaned, the wreck groaned. Quinn had to raise his hands towards the collapse just so that his mind could better concentrate the magic into lifting.

He opened the tap to his magic entirely and let it flow. His eyes opened, and purple orbs glowed at the wreck. The rubble started to shake as everything started to lift and began to fall to the sides.

"Just a little more!"

There was no need to struggle like this — Quinn could shave off all debris bit-by-bit. But he didn't want to waste time — many hours spread across multiple visits would be spent just to clean the mess from the marble below. Every visit to the Forbidden Forest was essential and vital to Quinn — he had to slot visits to the forest between quidditch tournament preparation, Project Babel, other development projects, visits to the library, practicing magic to keep his skill up-to-date, among other things.

He was a bit too busy this year.

By the end, Quinn was sweat, heaving, and grabbing his knees as his chest heaved up and down.

"This was clearly not the job for one person," said Quinn, standing up straight.

But the result was worth it as Quinn could see the circular block of marble sitting in the middle of the cave. Quinn walked towards it before climbing up with a hop.

"Oh, these are runes, aren't they." Quinn could tell at one glance that the deep engravings on the marble were a cluster and network of large-scale runes.

There were many classes/groups on which runes could be classified — language, the number of layers, materials, effects, and among those categories, "size" classification was among the myriads of classifications.

The size classification was a scale-based category — it went from small-scale runes to large-scale in front of Quinn, laid into the marble. To give an example of the importance and use of size classification — a rune inscribed on a small wooden chip would be significantly weaker than one carved into a big piece of wood.

Quinn, himself, specialized in small-scaled runes as he liked to create articles that were potable in nature and could be carried with him — Recon was such an example.

Ironically, Quinn's most notable achievement — MagiFax, which, even though employed small-scale rube inscription in its receivers, worked primarily through large-scale runes.

MagiFax devices need a network to work, and that network was built through transmitting hubs spread throughout the globe — those transmitting hubs were large-scaled rune applications. On West-owned properties throughout the world, unique buildings were constructed, and inside those buildings, every (majority) usable surface was etched with giant runes that connected every registered MagiFax device on the planet.

Quinn walked on the marble, studying the runes, and after a while, he declared, "Yeah, no idea what this does."

Right from the start, there were a few problems. First, the runes were complex and needed to be mapped out before Quinn could even start studying. Second, Quinn had to check if there were runes beneath the surface as not all runes were required to be out on the surface. And, third. . . .

"The ceiling collapse broke the marble," said Quinn clicking his tongue. There were several cracks and crevices throughout the marble, essentially making the runes structure useless.

"I need to get it fixed," said Quinn and touched one of those cracks, "I can't use the Mending charm (Reparo) here, can I."

If it was an ordinary platform of marble, Quinn could've fixed all the cracks and crevices with a single snap of his magic. But the marble held so many runes that if he carelessly used the Mending charm to fix things, it would break the subtle and meticulously placed connections.

Quinn sat down on the marble and sighed, "This is going to require a lot of work, ugh. I don't even know what I'll get in the end."

He looked up at the ceiling blamingly. "Why did you have to fall down? If you didn't, I would be having fun right now."

He sighed at his lousy luck before a thought struck his mind. "The Sunken Crypt. . . . the wolves names the vault as such, didn't they? Does that mean their territory is just above here? Huh, maybe I'm right. Nice. I will check it out later."

Finally, after sitting in the dust, Quinn got up, dusted himself, took out a small notepad and pen from his pockets, and got ready to note the runes day.

"Hmm. . . . I predict that this is a way to communicate to the aliens, I call it!" and with that, he got to work.

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Snow was still thick upon the grounds, and the greenhouse windows were covered in condensation so thick that they couldn't see out of them in Herbology.

Nobody was looking forward to Care of Magical Creatures much in this weather, though as Marcus said, the fire-beetles would probably warm them up nicely, either by chasing them or flamethrowing so forcefully that Hagrid's cabin would catch fire. However, when the Ravenclaw trio arrived at Hagrid's cabin, they found an elderly witch with closely cropped gray hair and a prominent chin standing before his front door.

"Hurry up, now; the bell is about to ring," she barked at them as they struggled toward her through the snow.

"Who're you?" said Eddie, staring at her. "Where's Hagrid?"

"My name is Professor Grubbly-Plank," she said briskly. "I am your temporary Care of Magical Creatures teacher."

"Where's Hagrid?" repeated someone loudly.

"He is indisposed," said Professor Grubbly-Plank shortly.

Soft and unpleasant laughter reached the students' ears. They turned, and the rest of the Slytherins were joining the class. All of them looked gleeful, and none of them looked surprised to see Professor Grubbly-Plank.

"This way, please," said Professor Grubbly-Plank, and she strode off around the paddock where the Beauxbatons horses were shivering. Quinn, Marcus, and Eddie followed her, looking back over their shoulders at Hagrid's cabin.

All the curtains were closed. Was Hagrid in there, alone and ill?

"What's wrong with Hagrid?" Marcus said, hurrying to catch up with

Professor Grubbly-Plank.

"What do you reckon is wrong with him? You don't think one of those skrewt that the fourth years are studying— ?" speculated Eddie.

Quinn glanced at his two friends and injected, "You two should get into the habit of reading the newspaper. It's on the front page of the Daily Prophet." He put a hand into his attached pockets, pulled out a newspaper, and handed it to Marcus.

"You keep newspapers in your pocket?" said Eddie.

"I read a couple of them and can't read them all during the breakfast. Daily Prophet always gets left out, so it tends to end up in my market."

Marcus unfolded the paper and read it, with Eddie looking over his shoulder. It was an article topped with a picture of Hagrid looking extremely shifty.

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>>> DUMBLEDORE'S GIANT MISTAKE <<<<

Albus Dumbledore, the eccentric headmaster of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, has never been afraid to make controversial staff appointments, writes Rita Skeeter, Special Correspondent. In September of this year, he hired Alastor "Mad-Eye" Moody, the notoriously jinx-happy ex-Auror, to teach Defense Against the Dark Arts, a decision that caused many raised eyebrows at the Ministry of Magic, given Moody's well-known habit of attacking anybody who makes a sudden movement in his presence. Mad-Eye Moody, however, looks responsible and kindly when set beside the part-human Dumbledore employs to teach Care of Magical Creatures.

Rubeus Hagrid, who admits to being expelled from Hogwarts in his third year, has enjoyed the position of gamekeeper at the school ever since a job secured for him by Dumbledore. Last year, however, Hagrid used his mysterious influence over the headmaster to secure the additional post of Care of Magical Creatures teacher over the heads of many better-qualified candidates.

An alarmingly large and ferocious-looking man, Hagrid has been using his newfound authority to terrify the students in his care with a succession of horrific creatures. While Dumbledore turns a blind eye, Hagrid has maimed several pupils during a series of lessons that many admit to being "very frightening."

"I was attacked by a hippogriff, and my friend Vincent Crabbe got a bad bite off a flobberworm," says Draco Malfoy, a fourth-year student. "We all hate Hagrid, but we're just too scared to say anything."

Hagrid has no intention of ceasing his campaign of intimidation, however. Last month, in conversation with a Daily Prophet reporter, he admitted breeding creatures he has dubbed "Blast-Ended Skrewts," highly dangerous crosses between manticores and fire-crabs. Of course, the creation of new breeds of magical creatures is an activity usually closely observed by the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures. Hagrid, however, considers himself to be above such petty restrictions.

"I was just having some fun," he says before hastily changing

the subject.

As if this were not enough, the Daily Prophet has now unearthed evidence that Hagrid is not — as he has always pretended — a pure-blood wizard. He is not, in fact, even pure human. His mother, we can exclusively reveal, is none other than the giantess Fridwulfa, whose whereabouts are currently unknown.

Bloodthirsty and brutal, the giants brought themselves to the point of extinction by warring amongst themselves during the last century. The handful that remained joined the ranks of He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named and were responsible for some of the worst mass Muggle killings of his reign of terror.

While many of the giants who served He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named were killed by Aurors working against the Dark Side, Fridwulfa was not among them. It is possible she escaped to one of the giant communities still existing in foreign mountain ranges. If his antics during Care of Magical Creatures lessons are any guide, however, Fridwulfa's son appears to have inherited her brutal nature.

In a bizarre twist, Hagrid is reputed to have developed a close friendship with the boy who brought around You-Know-Who's fall from power — thereby driving Hagrid's own mother, like the rest of You-Know-Who's supporters, into hiding. Perhaps Harry Potter is unaware of the unpleasant truth about his large friend — but Albus Dumbledore indeed has a duty to ensure that Harry Potter, along with his fellow students, is warned about the dangers of associating with part-giants.

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Marcus finished reading and looked up at Eddie, whose mouth was hanging open. When Quinn saw that he asked, "You. . . didn't think he was just a big guy, did you?"

"E-Eh, said Eddie, "ahem, of course not. I knew that yeah."

"Don't worry, people really think he just has big bones," said Quinn as he got the paperback, "but you got to admit, Skeeter sure has excellent writing skills. She expertly painted the specific picture that she wanted."

"That's what you get from this?" said Marcus, raising his brow.

"The article doesn't matter," shrugged Quinn, "Hagrid has been here since he got expelled. Hagrid is around fifty, you know. He was here as the gamekeeper when your parent studied at Hogwarts. They know Hagrid personally; a lot of them know what Hagrid is really like, so this article might be tough for a while, but support will shine through."

"But, how did she know?" asked Eddie.

Quinn shrugged, but he knew the answer. 'She probably was here on the Yule Ball.' He hadn't checked Recon on that day, and even if he did, Quinn wouldn't have checked for Skeeter — she wouldn't write about him.

But he did have some circumstantial proof about Skeeters' presence.

'She might've listened to Hagrid and Olympe Maxime's conversation,' thought Quinn, thinking about the angry headmistress on that day, pulling Fleur with her. 'Skeeter must've listened to their conversation.'

'Though I did warn her about being careful about fluttering at Hogwarts, it seems she didn't get the point,' thought Quinn and hummed as the new professor proceeded to lead them towards today's subject.

"Oh! Unicorns! Nice," he exclaimed happily, and the somewhat threatening thoughts were thrown at the back of his head.

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Quinn West - MC - I have a need. . . need for_________ ? Fill in the blank.

Hagrid - Half-giant - Suddenly, a topic of discussion.

Rita Skeeter - Reporter - She knows her craft.

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