Chapter 720: Memories in Chaos (Edited)

"Boom!"

A crunchy sound came from Fish's mouth.

"Pfff! Bla bla bla..."

Fish spat out the Resurrection Stone that he had bitten into three pieces, tilting his head to spit some of the tiny fragments onto the floor before looking at the astonished Dumbledore.

"It's broken, nya... Fish didn't think it would be so fragile, nya... obviously it broke after being hit hard!" Fish excused himself shamefully.

Dumbledore opened his mouth, unconsciously opening and closing it for a moment, then swallowed hard, reached out his hand to Fish, and said, "Bring it to me first."

Naturally, Fish handed him the three pieces together.

Dumbledore looked at the "disassembled" Resurrection Stone in his hand, raised his wand, and gently tapped it. "Reparo."

The stone didn't move.

He had tried to repair the cracks in the stone before, but again, there was nothing he could do.

Fish felt even more embarrassed seeing this scene because he had dared to bite it, thinking that even if it was broken, he could fix it with magic.

"Fish will buy you a bigger black gem than this!"

(??ˇ?ˇ??)

Fish promised solemnly.

"No need," Dumbledore smiled and waved his hand. "It's useless anyway, it's broken."

Having said that, he couldn't help but crumple the broken Resurrection Stone and give it three turns in his hand.

Still, nothing happened.

"Phew..."

Dumbledore didn't know whether to let out a long sigh of regret or relief, and then muttered, "It's for the best... it's for the best..."

"Professor... Is there anything special about this gem?" Hermione asked cautiously.

From Dumbledore's behavior, it was easy to see that this unimpressive black jewel was clearly more than just a Gaunt family heirloom, or rather, a Peverell family heirloom.

"That no longer matters," Dumbledore said. "Now that the Resurrection Stone has been destroyed, it won't provide any more explanations." He stored the pieces and took out a small glass vial from his inner pocket. "Next, we need to examine a memory... actually, that's the most important memory I mentioned..."

Hermione didn't press further, assuming that the stone was probably some kind of ancient magical accessory that Dumbledore had avoided discussing because he didn't want to blame Fish.

"Albus, can you give me the stone fragments for Fish?"

(?ω?)

However, Fish suddenly interrupted.

"Of course," Dumbledore asked curiously as he handed the Resurrection Stone fragments to Fish, albeit a little surprised. "May I know what you want to do with it?"

"Fish's transformation energy just increased suddenly, nya..."

(??~??)

Fish put the fragments back into his mouth, chewed them with a click, and vaguely responded.

But soon he spat out the fragments again, and at that moment, the Resurrection Stone had broken into eight pieces of different sizes.

"Blah, blah, blah! It's useless, it will only increase once."

Fish returned the pile of fragments with regret.

Dumbledore stored the fragments again and stared at Fish for a long moment with a strange expression before opening the glass vial in his hand and pouring its contents into the Pensieve.

Everyone turned their attention to the vial and noticed that the contents didn't seem to pour easily into the Pensieve, and it appeared somewhat condensed.

Was it because the memory was very important?

Not only Hermione, but Harry and Ron also suspected so.

"It's not much," Dumbledore finally emptied the vial when Hermione was perplexed and said, "We'll be back shortly. Well, let's enter the Pensieve again..."

Fish was the quickest, and then Hermione and the others took turns submerging their heads into the Pensieve.

There was another spinning sensation of falling, and one by one, they all landed on the ground.

As soon as they landed, they saw a strange yet familiar figure, the young Professor Slughorn.

He still didn't have a bald head and sported thick, shiny yellow hair, as if it were covered with straw, but the shiny bald spot, the size of a golden Galleon, on the top of his head was the first glimpse of what was to come.

His beard was shorter than it is now, and his body wasn't as round, but the golden buttons on his embroidered waistcoat had stretched quite a bit.

But one thing the young Slughorn did have in common with the present was his taste for...

He rested his tiny feet on a large velvet cushion, half reclining in a comfortable armchair, with a glass of wine in one hand and the other rummaging in a box of preserved pineapples.

Around Slughorn, half a dozen fifteen or sixteen-year-old boys sat on chairs either harder or shorter than his. Tom Riddle was among them, looking most relaxed, with his right hand casually resting on the armrest of the chair.

"Ah! It's the ring!"

Fish exclaimed, pointing to Riddle's right hand, where he was currently wearing Sorvolo's jeweled black ring.

In other words, at that moment, Voldemort had killed his father and grandparents.

Young Slughorn laughed and joked with the students, but basically, only he and Riddle were speaking while the other kids consciously kept them company and were not offended.

But soon, something strange happened. A white mist enveloped the room, and Fish could only see the companions of each other.

At the same time, Slughorn's voice resonated in the room, loud and unnatural: "...you will make mistakes, boy, remember my words."

Fish, the most agile of them all, rushed towards Slughorn and Riddle as soon as the mist appeared. Then he realized that at that moment, his physical image lagged and flickered as if they had a bad television signal.

While Fish was confused, the mist dissipated, and Slughorn and the others returned to normal. There was no surprise on their faces, and they didn't speak about the dense mist at that moment, as if nothing had happened before.

"Meow?"

(?ω?)

Fish looked around in confusion, and the others did the same.

Just as Fish was about to ask Dumbledore what had happened, the small golden clock on Slughorn's desk struck eleven.

"Good heavens, is it already that time?" Slughorn said. "It's time to go, boys, or we'll be in trouble. Lestrange, hand in your assignments tomorrow or you'll be punished. Same goes for you, Everly."

But when everyone had left, Riddle lingered.

"Come on, Tom," Slughorn said, turning to find him still there. "You don't want to get caught outside when the lights go out. You're the Prefect..."

"Sir, I would like to ask you something."

"Then ask it, my boy, ask it..."

"Sir, I would like to ask if you know anything about Horcruxes..."

Upon hearing Riddle's words, the room filled with mist again, the vision was only three paces away, and Slughorn, Riddle, and Fish began to lag and flicker once more.

Then Slughorn's voice sounded again, as loud as before.

"I don't know anything about Horcruxes, and even if I did, I wouldn't tell you! Leave right now, and don't let me hear you mention it again."

Slughorn's tone was firm and resolute, but Fish unconsciously sensed that it seemed a bit weak.

"Well, that's it," Dumbledore said calmly. "Time to go."

Everyone's feet left the ground and landed again on the carpet in front of Dumbledore's desk a few seconds later.