Chapter 80: Riddle's Diary

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In the following days, Tom focused most of his energy on carving the runes for the wand. In the blink of an eye, more than half a month had passed, and he had initially mastered all the basic runes on the parchment. The strokes carved were uniform and consistent. His next task was to practice continuously, making the runes smaller and smaller.

Mr. Ollivander was quietly busy with his own affairs each time, only coming over to comment when Tom finished carving. Despite his seemingly calm demeanor, Mr. Ollivander was internally astounded: Tom's progress was too fast! When he reached Tom's level, it took him about the same amount of time, but Tom was learning carving while working at the bookstore. The difference was quite significant.

Mr. Ollivander felt a bit disheartened at times, questioning if his own talent was just average. However, the thought of the wandmakers abroad and their skills restored his confidence.

As the days approached for the new students' admission, Flourish and Blotts became increasingly busy.

Although Hogwarts had not officially announced the Defense Against the Dark Arts professor, other professors had already released the textbooks for the new semester. Thus, Mr. Ollivander began bulk purchasing and assigned Tom a new task: sorting textbooks.

Since Flourish and Blotts mainly served Hogwarts students, the required textbooks for each grade were quite similar. The textbooks were the same for first and second years. From the third year onward, there were minor adjustments based on elective subjects.

Tom's task was to pack textbooks into boxes according to grades, then label the boxes. This way, when students came to the bookstore, they could quickly purchase their required books.

Of course, the textbooks for elective subjects were prominently displayed.

Everything was ready; they only awaited the announcement of the Defense Against the Dark Arts professor.

In late July one afternoon, Mr. Ollivander received an owl, his source of information. He always knew, almost immediately, the new professor and the chosen textbooks for Defense Against the Dark Arts. He swiftly purchased the textbooks.

Upon opening the letter, Mr. Ollivander's expression became peculiar: the new professor was Gilderoy Lockhart! Bestselling author Gilderoy Lockhart.

Mr. Ollivander couldn't understand; did Lockhart's mind go haywire? Why would he willingly step into this pitfall? The position of Hogwarts Defense Against the Dark Arts professor had claimed numerous casualties, with professors in double digits failing to last in the role.

And who was this person? On top of that, he required students to buy seven books as textbooks. This was an ugly sight. Mr. Ollivander, being a bookseller, knew a bit of the inside story. For each book sold, Lockhart made a profit of 20%. In other words, for a 5-Galleon book, Lockhart could pocket 1 Galleon.

For each student buying seven books, Lockhart could suck 7 Galleons of blood from one student. With hundreds of students at Hogwarts, Lockhart could easily amass at least 3,500 Gold Galleons.

Mr. Ollivander shook his head. Though he felt Lockhart's behavior was unsavory, he couldn't say much. In a way, Lockhart's actions were beneficial to him. As the manager of London's largest bookstore, the more books sold, the higher his commission.

However, his face stiffened as he suddenly realized a crucial issue: he had promised in the contract to provide Tom with a set of textbooks! And Lockhart required a whopping seven books as textbooks—these books were extremely expensive, costing as much as Tom's weekly wages.

How many weeks had Tom worked in total? This was practically doubling his salary!

Looking at Tom's busy figure, Mr. Ollivander couldn't help but admit: this kid was quite lucky. As for the bill? He wasn't that petty—it wasn't coming out of his pocket.

In the afternoon, a distinguished guest arrived at the bookstore: a senior Ministry of Magic official, a Hogwarts board member, a scion of the Abraxas family, and the current head of the Malfoy family: Lucius Malfoy II—there was a Lucius Malfoy in the 16th century, making Draco Malfoy's father technically Lucius II.

By the way, despite vehement denials in subsequent generations, there was ample evidence proving that Lucius Malfoy I was an admirer of Elizabeth I. So, to make Draco Malfoy lower his guard, one only needed to mention Elizabeth a few times.

Seeing Lucius's arrival, Mr. Ollivander immediately stood up, revealing a fawning smile. He bowed and respectfully said, "Good to see you, sir. If you need any books, you could've just sent an owl, and I would have them delivered to you."

Lucius, with a certain flair, smoothed his carefully maintained light golden hair and propped his cane against the bookshelf. He leisurely said, "The Malfoy family's thirst for knowledge knows no bounds. When it comes to books, it's better to personally browse."

Mr. Ollivander kept praising and admiring him.

"I need a set of textbooks for Hogwarts second-year students," Lucius said to Mr. Ollivander, who immediately bowed and then went to sort the textbooks for him. Lucius strolled around the store, seemingly wanting to pick up a few books to take home.

However, unnoticed by anyone, when Lucius passed through a corner, he discreetly placed an old-looking diary into the corner of the bookshelf. Today, he had a few purposes for coming to Diagon Alley, one of which was to get rid of this diary.

Of course, he also had another goal: to deal with some collectibles at Knockturn Alley. In early July this year, the Ministry of Magic issued an order: requiring relevant departments to conduct surprise searches for dark magic items and illegal items. Initially, Lucius didn't take it seriously; there had been similar searches before, but they never found anything on pure-blood families like theirs.

But this year was different. He heard rumors that Arthur Weasley was part of the search team! Lucius recalled his relationship with Arthur; it wasn't as close as bosom buddies, but at least they were friends on a physical level. So, he felt his family might not be able to avoid it this time.

What was even worse, Bartemius Crouch Jr., the Head of the International Magical Cooperation, actively invited Arthur to conduct a search at his place. For major pure-blood families, this

  set a bad precedent—they could no longer refuse Arthur's searches.

Feeling the impending danger, Lucius decided to dispose of any potentially prohibited items at home. He perfectly inherited the Malfoy family's ethos: you would never find a Malfoy at the crime scene, even if the wand used in the crime was covered in their fingerprints.

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(End of this chapter)