Isn't She Behind Us?

One of the black-robed wizards sneered at the burly wizard who had just gotten up from the ground.

"Joseph, you're really getting worse. I thought we didn't have to do anything…"

"You'd better worry, he's not easy to deal with!" Joseph said, pointing his wand at Ivan.

"What, four of us against one?" another wizard retorted, shaking his head.

'Four? Is anyone else in hiding?'

Ivan looked at the trio surrounding him in a semi-circle and frowned. Where had Sirius and Dobby gone? Or were there other enemies who were being held back?

As Ivan pondered this, Joseph spoke to them.

"Where's Kelly? Why are you the only ones here?"

"She's been following us, hasn't she?" one of the two black-robed wizards asked.

As the trio were distracted, a black dog suddenly leapt down from the roof and bit Joseph's right hand, which was holding the wand.

A shrill scream rose in the silent lane,

The first black-robed wizard to react was about to cast a spell, but Ivan was faster!

"Shadowless Blade!"

The invisible blade sliced through the black-robed wizard's body, spraying blood all over the wall.

As soon as the other black-robed wizard turned around, he discovered that the situation had taken a 180-degree turn. The originally foolproof encirclement instantly collapsed, and he was the only one left on the battlefield who could still fight…

"I…" The black-robed wizard opened his mouth to surrender, but Ivan did not give him the chance, sending a Stunning Spell at him, stunning him.

After dealing with the two black-robed wizards, Ivan turned to Sirius.

A man and a dog were fighting fiercely on the ground.

A chunk of flesh had been bitten off Joseph's right hand, and he had lost his wand, but he was strong enough to endure the pain and hit the dog with his fist.

Sirius was also extremely stubborn, forcing himself to use his Animagus form to engage in hand-to-hand combat, his dog paws leaving bloody scratches on his opponent's face…

"Stupefy!" Ivan waved his wand to help him, and Joseph, under the influence of the curse, soon lost consciousness.

At the same time, Dobby appeared in the middle of the alley, dragging a beautiful, unconscious witch with him.

It was clear that Dobby had dealt with the so-called Fourth Man.

To Ivan's surprise, he had seen this gorgeous witch before. She was the one who had been chatting with Tom, the landlord of the Leaky Cauldron. It seemed that she had somehow managed to get word to Joseph and the others.

"Dobby, take them and let's go back!" Ivan ordered, thinking that the noise of the fight might have attracted other peepers.

Dobby nodded and grabbed the black-robed wizards on the ground, teleporting them back and forth using Apparition.

It was not easy for Dobby to teleport multiple times in a short period of time, but fortunately, nothing went wrong.

Back in his temporary home, Sirius looked at the four wizards lying on the ground and said disdainfully, "It seems these people are not as good as you say…"

"They're just spies," Ivan said, shaking his head and using a Healing Charm to heal Joseph so he wouldn't bleed to death.

Ivan then took a bottle of Veritaserum and poured it down Joseph's throat.

Soon, Joseph woke up, but his eyes were empty and he sat there in a daze.

"Who are you?" Ivan asked tentatively.

"Joseph Grint…" came Joseph's deep voice.

Ivan nodded, then asked who Joseph was working for, why he was attacking his family's Dark Arts shop, how many members he had, and where they were located.

Joseph answered Ivan's question without hesitation.

It was then that Ivan learned that Joseph and the others were among a group of Dark Wizards who had been targeted by the Ministry of Magic last year while they were cleaning up Dark objects.

Compared to the rest of the Azkaban prisoners, they were lucky to escape with their lives.

However, even so, they suffered heavy losses. Many people even narrowly escaped death under the pursuit of Aurors.

The Ministry of Magic and Minister Fudge, who proposed the cleaning, were naturally wary of provoking them, and set their sights on the wizarding shop that assisted them.

If it weren't for the Auror captains' protective rings, they wouldn't have been hunted down so miserably.

"Beware of stragglers…" Yvonne listened to Joseph, thinking of the line of instructions in the Resurrection Task Note.

Towards the end of the summer holidays of the school year, Ivan considered dealing with them.

However, the Ministry of Magic hadn't finished its clean-up operation yet, and the Dark Wizards were hiding somewhere, and he couldn't find them, let alone kill them.

To be on the safe side, he befriended the werewolf wizards in Knockturn Alley so that they could watch out for each other while he was away.

I didn't expect to make such a mistake…

Ivan did not see this one coming, either.

"You mean the man who summoned you is the owner of Borgin and Burkes?" Ivan asked, enunciating each word.

Joseph nodded his head blankly.

"Krakatacus Burke!" Ivan said the name slowly, his anger rising.

Ivan did remember this man, of course, and he was very impressed. When Ivan first arrived at Knockturn Alley, Burke had used his Probing Eye on him.

If he hadn't fallen for the Occlumency trick, Alicia would have ended up in a fistfight with him in the Dark Arts shop.

It was clear that Burke and Alicia had a deep rivalry, perhaps related to the interchange at Knockturn Alley…

"Where's Burke now? How many other dark wizards are with him?" Ivan demanded, grabbing Joseph by the collar.

"I don't know…" Joseph's face remained impassive as he replied in a low voice. "We lost contact with Mr Borgin over a month ago."

Yvonne's first instinct was to wonder if Joseph was lying to her. He had broken free of the effects of the Veritaserum.

But Ivan soon remembered that Tom had mentioned something about an attack on Borgin and Burkes when they were chatting at the Leaky Cauldron…