Chapter 368 "Surprise Attack"

Speaking of which, this was the first time Sean came to the Department of Mysteries. However, before Barty Jr. lost contact with him, he had always provided him with information about various things happening.

The Department of Mysteries is a top-secret institution of the entire Ministry of Magic. There are mysterious and unpredictable things here, and even the current minister cannot know all of them.

Sean transformed into a middle-aged bald man this time, looked back at the elevator, flicked his robe, Dave flew out, turned into a thorny sheath in mid-air and hung from the ceiling.

"Watch me, Dave." He ordered.

"Understood."

Sean walked towards the corridor in front of him, and soon he saw a plain black door. It was exactly the same like Barty Jr. mentioned it before. Without hesitation, Sean pushed open the door.

After walking it, he stood in a huge circular room. Everything here is black, whether the walls or the floor, just like a calm lake in the depths of the forest. Some candles are dotted between the walls, and the blue flames are flickering, giving Sean a little vision.

On the wall, twelve identical doors stood there quietly. They looked completely indistinguishable, without handles or marks. Sean slowly walked to the middle of the room, and immediately, the wall with the door on it spun rapidly, and the blue candlelight turned into a blurred band of light.

This is one of the defenses of the Department of Mysteries.

When the room stopped spinning, Sean walked towards the door closest to him. The door was pushed open effortlessly, and Sean saw the scene in the first room.

This huge square room is almost half the size of a football field, with a stone pit in the center and steep steps descending on all sides. Sean walked to the edge and looked down. There was no podium in the center but a raised stone platform with an old and worn arch.

There was no wall around the archway to support it, but a tattered black curtain or drapery hung on it. Although the air was cold and there was no wind, it swayed gently.

"Death Chamber..." Sean muttered, this was not the place he was looking for.

He looked at the great archway; the windless and automatic tattered curtain suddenly trembled. A strange feeling flooded Sean's heart as if someone was waiting for him behind the arch.

Occlumency activated instantly, resisting this indistinct but captivating temptation for him. There are too many unexplainable weird things in the Department of Mysteries. Sean didn't intend to stay too long, so he turned and walked towards the exit.

"Huh?" Just as Sean was about to walk to the door, a strange magic power fluctuated slightly and quickly disappeared without a trace.

It was as if something was attracted to the Death Chamber.

Sean checked his body carefully, and there was nothing weird. He poked his head into the ring, and Pudding counted the snowflakes in the snow globe.

"Did you feel anything weird just now?" Sean asked.

They all said that there was nothing wrong.

"Okay, let me know if there is something wrong." After giving an order, Sean closed the ring and walked out of the door.

When he walked out of the door, the circular room immediately spun quickly. When the rotation stopped, Sean closed his eyes and felt it. The Worm he had just left in the Death Chamber could no longer be contacted.

"I hope my luck will be better." Sean pushed open the second door.

It was a cold room about the height of a cathedral, lined with towering shelves. It was covered with small dusty glass balls. On the shelf below each glass globe was a small yellow label. Some glowed with mysterious light streams; others were dim and dark, like blown-out light bulbs.

Sean recognized the room; it was the Hall of Prophecy.

He suddenly thought, would the prophecy about himself be stored here?

Professor Trelawney said that wizards would have a strange sense of their prophecies. Sean closed his eyes and felt it, but he found nothing to attract him.

"Maybe it's not here." Looking at the shelves, Sean gave up the idea of looking for them one by one. He stopped looking at them and walked out of the hall.

In the depths of the hall, in a small dusty corner, on a low cushioned stool, a dusty crystal ball was shining softly. However, the crystal ball was covered by a glass cover. When Sean left, the crystal ball immediately stopped blinking.

Sean pushed open the third door. The moment the door was pushed open, he knew he was in the right place.

Thousands of ticking sounds were noisy and chaotic, and a diamond-like light filled his entire field of vision. When Sean squinted his eyes, he saw all kinds of clocks.

Alarm clocks, grandfather clocks, and many more. Countless clocks were ticking, and the continuous sound filled Sean's ears. The diamond-like light is a tall bell-shaped crystal case at the end of the room.

However, Sean has no time to look at this room because there are people there. Amidst the light and the noisy ticking sound, no one noticed that there was another person in the Time Hall.

Sean immediately cast a Disillusionment Charm, but he unexpectedly discovered that under the light of the bell-shaped crystal, the Charm had no effect. His figure is still hidden, but if you squint your eyes and take a closer look, you can find that there is someone there.

Sean hid behind an inconspicuous grandfather clock. Only now did he have the time to look at the two people standing in front of the bell-shaped crystal.

A man in a suit and leather shoes was rummaging for something, his wand was constantly waving, and a parchment was flying wildly, and beside him was a mysterious man covered in a black robe.

Through the gap, Sean narrowed his eyes.

That black-robed man is floating. It must be one of the Returners.

The man in the suit and leather shoes looked up, holding a stack of thick parchment in his hand.

"This should be the information you need, but it may be partial information. Although they are under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Magic, they always become silent after staying in the Department of Mysteries for a long time, and it is very difficult to deal with them."

"Alright." The black-robed man responded in a low voice. Sean didn't see his hand stretched out but waved it with his sleeve instead, and the thick stack of parchment flew into his arms.

The man in the suit bent over flatteringly and said, "If you're not in a hurry, I can search more for you again. There is still a lot of information about time travel incidents."

The black-robed man interrupted him with a hoarse voice, "No need, they are waiting for my news. I just need to get the important information."

"Very well then." The man in the suit rubbed his hands.

The black robed man floated towards the exit, followed by the man in suit. Sean frowned. They didn't find him, and Sean was facing a choice.

He can wait for the two to leave and look for his needed information. However, he mentioned that the black-robed man took away the information about the time travel incident, and it is very likely that Sean will not be able to find him or any information about it if he stays.

But if he follows them, it would be a problem. Mainly, he doesn't know the true strength of the black-robed man, and second, people from the Ministry of Magic may easily take him down.

Sean is now very sure that the black robed man must be one of the Returners, and the other person mentioned by him may be the leader of Returners.

From this point of view, apart from Dumbledore, even the Returners don't know the truth about this incident. They realized that it was related to time travel, so they sent people to the Ministry of Magic to obtain some information.

After a short thought, Sean decided he couldn't let them take away this information.

The magic power of the Returners is a bit kind of like an Obscurus, which Sean discovered from Gormlaith Gaunt. He thought that they were some special entity.

The Returners can be described as a half-ghost with magical powers similar to an Obscurus, and Sean has a way of dealing with them. Thanks to Voldemort for his spell knowledge and Gormlaith for being his test subject.

Sean didn't move but sent a message to Dave.

"If someone comes out, notify me immediately and make some noise. Don't let yourselves be known. Let the two people who will come out later go to the hall slowly."

"Understood." Dave's intelligence is getting better now. He can clearly understand Sean's words and follows his orders well.

Sean walked to the front of the bell-shaped crystal. He looked through the files that had been thrown around, and sure enough, he didn't see a single piece of information about a time travel incident.

"Most of them should have been taken away," Sean quickly flipped through all the files. As long as he saw something with the word "time," he would throw it into the ring first, whether it was useful or not.

Sean walked through the gap on the other side, he wanted to confirm one thing. He found what he was looking for, a huge glass cabinet that was constantly being shattered and reassembled.

Hourglasses of various shapes are placed in the cabinet. The hourglass is constantly broken into fragments and reassembled into a complete appearance as if a picture was rewinding.

What Stephanie told Sean was indeed accurate. All the Time-Turners were destroyed. There is a high probability that Grindelwald did this. Sean thought silently.

He can basically confirm now that the person who returned to the past was not Dumbledore at all but Grindelwald. It's just that he doesn't know what his purpose is in doing so and what kind of consequences will be caused.

Is destroying all Time-Turners to prevent anyone from going back in time again?

Just as Sean was thinking, a message came from Dave. He stopped thinking and ran out quickly.

When Sean walked out, the Disillusionment Charm suddenly returned to normal, and he quickly walked out of the circular room while maintaining his invisibility. In the corridor, the man in the suit and the black-robed man were dealing with the stones falling from the ceiling. Dave destroyed some of the ceiling parts there.

"Is there an enemy?!" The man in the suit shouted in panic.

The black-robed man was much calmer than him. After flicking his sleeves to knock the falling stones aside, he said in a deep voice, "Call for backup. Let's not go outside now. The elevator might be too dangerous for us."

Sean put the thorn sheath into his arms and disappeared in place without a sound. He returned to the hall near the Department of Mysteries.

At this moment, footsteps can be heard; Aurors come; some of them stand guard in the lobby while others run towards the elevator.

Sean snapped his fingers at a desk in the distance. A staff member who was sending and receiving messages paused for a moment, and the look in his eyes lost a moment. He stood up from his seat and ran to the center of the hall in a panic; other staff asked the Aurors about the situation because of worries.

Sean moved again and came to the side of the corridor, where an Auror was still staring at everyone as if he hadn't noticed the sudden appearance at all. Sean snapped his fingers, and the Auror left quickly, hiding himself in an empty room.

Sean's face changed, turning into that Auror's appearance.

Although it was a temporary decision to come to the Ministry of Magic, he still prepared some things in advance, like preparing himself to do some Imperius curses.

At this moment, the elevator returned to the lobby, and a group of people came out surrounded by a man in a suit.

Sean narrowed his eyes.

The moment this group of people appeared, several staff members surrounding the Auror who were asking about the situation suddenly jumped. Sean took out his wands and aimed at the man in the suit.

In other corners of the hall, several people also took out their wands with blank eyes.

Explosions suddenly enveloped the hall of the Ministry of Magic. The chandelier on the ceiling exploded and fell down. The security counter, The Fountain of Magical Brethren, and the Floo network were all attacked by Explosive Curse.

A group of people who had just stepped out of the elevator were instantly shrouded by the spell that hit them.