Chapter 24

"Hey, look who it is?" Mike approached Hermione slowly. "Oh, a little kitty cat."

Hermione heard Mike's voice but didn't respond. Instead, she quickly turned her head, hiding her face from Mike's view, and used her hands to wipe her face, trying to conceal that she had just been crying.

Seeing Hermione in this posture, Mike couldn't help but think of his daughter from his previous life. When Trissy was upset, she looked just like this.

"Who hurt you? I'll go kick their butts," Mike handed her a handkerchief. "Stop wiping your eyes with your hands. It's not good for your eyes. You don't want to end up like Harry with big glasses, do you? That wouldn't look good."

Listening to Mike's gentle words, Hermione found herself unable to hold back her tears once again.

"They all hate me!"

Mike placed one hand on Hermione's back and gently patted her. The child was crying so hard she started coughing.

"It's okay, you still have me, right? I'll always be your friend."

Hearing this, Hermione turned around and threw herself into Mike's arms, crying loudly. Her tears and snot soon soaked the front of Mike's robe.

Mike held the sobbing Hermione in his arms, gently patting her back, and kept saying the words he used to comfort his daughter in his previous life.

After a long while, Hermione stopped crying, but she didn't leave Mike's embrace. With her face buried in his chest, she spoke in a muffled voice:

"Am I annoying?"

"Who said that? Tell me who said that, and I'll go kick their butt."

"Nobody said it. I feel that everyone thinks I am."

The poor girl was still protecting her friends, afraid that Mike would really go and kick Ron's butt.

Mike was very good at comforting children, having accumulated a lot of experience in his previous life. With just a few words, he managed to stop Hermione from crying. The poor girl was still protecting her friends, afraid that Mike would really go and kick Ron's butt.

"Alright, today is Halloween! Let's go to the Great Hall." Mike took Hermione's hand. "You've cried a lot today, so you definitely need to eat more later."

Hermione playfully hit Mike but didn't refuse his hand.

Mike led Hermione around the castle, initially without Hermione noticing anything unusual. However, after some time, Hermione finally realized something was amiss.

"This doesn't seem like the way to the Great Hall, does it?"

"Really? Maybe I remembered it wrong."

Mike casually brushed off Hermione, as this was part of his plan.

He planned to take Hermione to find the troll. Once they found it, he would immediately send Hermione to find the professors while he dealt with the troll alone.

This way, even if he couldn't defeat the troll, he could buy time for the professors to come and help, which was a safety precaution.

Finally, after turning a corner, a humanoid monster over three meters tall appeared in front of them.

"No! You have to come with me!"

"We can't let it roam around the castle. Go quickly!" With a commanding tone, Mike sternly spoke to the startled Hermione.

Startled by Mike's harsh tone, Hermione's eyes reddened again, but she didn't let the tears fall. Instead, she turned and ran towards the Great Hall.

Mike watched Hermione disappear around the corner, then turned to face the troll in front of him. His blackthorn wood wand had already silently appeared in his hand.

The hunt had begun!

In his previous life, Mike was an avid hunter who had ventured to Africa to hunt lions and rhinoceroses, well-versed in the tactics for dealing with such large creatures.

"Locomotor Mortis"

A precise Leg-Locking Curse hit the giant's right leg. When dealing with such large creatures, the goal was to reduce their mobility.

Because you can't kill them in one hit, and they usually become more aggressive when injured, you definitely can't outrun them with just two legs.

The giant, who had been examining the girls' bathroom door, suddenly jerked its right leg, but it didn't close with the left leg.

It broke free from the Leg-Locking Curse just now.

Just as the giant scratched its head, surprised at why its leg cramped, two more Leg-Locking Curses struck its right leg.

This time, due to the combined effects of the two curses, its right leg finally twisted into an unnatural angle, aligning with the left leg. Mike even heard a crack, and he was sure it was the sound of a broken bone.

The troll roared in pain and fell to the ground with a roar similar to a lion's.

The fallen troll finally noticed Mike, the little insect that had caused it such severe pain.

It endured the agony, using its hands and its intact left foot, and approached Mike at an almost unnatural speed.

Mike immediately started running to the side while continuously casting Impediment Jinxes.

This type of moving spellcasting requires high shooting skills, and most wizards would miss.

But Mike was different; he was a renowned marksman in his previous life.

The twisted giant's speed gradually slowed down, and every time an Impediment Jinx hit it, it would roar in fury. Its current movement was causing significant damage to its right leg, with intense pain shooting up from the leg with almost every twist.

Gradually, under Mike's continuous casting of Impediment Jinxes, the giant's movement speed was reduced to almost the same level as Mike's running speed.

Mike stopped casting Impediment Jinxes, switching to using the Full Body-Bind Curse, a spell that could immobilize a creature entirely.

As the spells rained down on the troll's two arms, it came to a halt. The troll's hands were tightly bound behind its back, and it emitted a roar of defiance while watching Mike, who continued to strengthen the spell from a short distance away.

After confirming that the troll couldn't break free from the bindings in a short time, Mike, gasping for breath, approached the troll. The spellcasting had drained a lot of his energy.

The troll in front of him continued to roar, and with each roar, a stench far more revolting than a long-neglected bathroom assaulted Mike's nostrils. Mike nearly retched from the stench and hurriedly pinched his nose.

In the process of crawling, the broken bones in its right leg had already pierced through the flesh, creating a large wound, and blood flowed like a stream, quickly pooling into a large, bright red puddle on the ground.

Watching the miserable troll still roaring at him, Mike raised his wand-holding right hand and aimed at the troll's open mouth, casting his strongest spell so far.

"Incendio!"

A red and yellow flame burst forth from the tip of the blackthorn wand, instantly engulfing the giant's massive head. The flames poured into the giant's mouth, burning its mouth and throat, causing it to struggle in pain and continuously emit pained cries. The more it opened its mouth, the more flames poured into its throat.

Mike controlled the flames and approached step by step. With the help of his necklace he could clearly feel the magic power flowing from all over his body to his wand.

However, during this process, some magic power would stray from the main flow and eventually dissipate into the air.

Mike struggled to control these stray magic powers to follow the main flow into the wand. These magic powers were extremely difficult to control, and Mike felt his head was about to explode.

At this moment, the necklace called Greed on his chest emitted bursts of coolness, alleviating the pain and making it bearable for Mike. 

As he continued to channel more magic power into the wand, the flames engulfing the troll gradually shifted in color. Eventually, the flames transformed from red and yellow to a bright yellow nearing white. This intense bright yellow flame was extremely potent, inflicting more damage on the troll in just a few seconds than the cumulative damage caused by the previous red and yellow flames.

Soon, the giant ceased its struggles, and Mike continued to burn it for a while longer, until he was sure the giant was dead, before stopping the release of the fire spell.

In this hunt, Mike emerged victorious!