Chapter 528: Predicting Another Year's Death

Next, Hagrid told Ivan a lot of things about the breeding of the Blast-tailed Squirrels.

Now they had to find out what the Escregutes liked to eat, and that was the main assignment for this term's Care of Magical Creatures class.

In the morning class, Hagrid asked everyone to test them on ant eggs, frog livers, and grass snake. But it seemed to be wrong. The Scripps didn't like to eat those things, and Hagrid changed the assignments for the following classes to new varieties.

Ivan couldn't suppress his suspicion that it was all totally useless, because the Sprouts didn't seem to have a mouth.

More than twenty minutes later, the students gathered in Hagrid's hut.

The third-year wizards, who had come to their first lesson on the Care of Magical Creatures with great expectations, were obviously in shock after seeing those terrible things, and their little faces were full of dismay and disappointment.

They repeatedly turned to look at Hagrid to confirm that he was not joking with them.

Even without fun or amazing magical creatures like Scarabs or Unicorns, last year's Hippogriffs were much better than this. At least they could ride them up into the sky and circle around the castle, which sounded pretty cool.

But in the face of these things, the young wizards felt nothing but nausea. Needless to say, this was simply the worst course of the year.

When Colin was feeding them, he accidentally burned his fingers and never dared to go near those beasts again.

Hagrid had no record of any complaints or discontent from all of them. Instead, he shared his new discovery with great interest. "Look at the pointy things on the tails of some of them. They're stingers. I think they're the males. The females have sort of suckers on their bellies...I think they might be for sucking blood."

Yes, in addition to being able to make explosions and bite people, these Stigmata could also suck blood, which was truly a remarkable discovery....

Among all the young wizards, Luna was the only one who was happy. She seemed to think that those exploding-tailed Escregutes raised by Hagrid were very interesting and asked a lot of details.

This made Hagrid very happy, which added five points to Ravenclaw.

This class was attended by Gryffindor and Ravenclaw. Ivan hadn't seen Luna all vacation, but the girl hadn't changed much.

Her messy blonde hair down to her waist had grown longer, and the ethereal aura around her was stronger than before. Although she was very pretty, with a rare and unique beauty, she was hardly attractive to him.

Luna wore a necklace of Butterbeer caps and plum-shaped earrings from Dirigible.

She brought Ivan the latest issue of The Fussy One and told him there was the latest research on some mythical monsters.

Luna didn't go to the World Cup this vacation. Instead, she traveled to Sweden with her father using the money they earned from the sales of Ivan's articles published in The Fussy One to see if they could hunt down a Shriveled Horn Snorkack.

If there was one person in the school who was indifferent to Ivan's incredible performance at the Quidditch World Cups, it was probably Luna. To her, there didn't seem to be anything surprising about it. In her opinion, Ivan had always been strong, and she had no doubts about that.

All the students waited for the class to end before dragging their tired bodies and heavy moods back to the castle. They were glad to be rid of those exploding-tailed Sprouts.

As they ate dinner, Hermione spoke briefly with Ivan about her progress in protecting the rights and interests of house elves. She wrote an article calling on wizards to pay attention to the legitimate rights and interests of elves and mailed it to Professor Lupin.

He then told Ivan that he was about to do something for the house elves. Before Ivan could find out what it was all about, she hurried to finish her dinner and went to the library to look for information.

As for Harry and Ron, their mood was as bad as that of the third years, who were immersed in the shadow of the Scripps.

As expected, Professor Trelawney again predicted Harry's death. Her claim this time was that Harry had been born under the baleful influence of Saturn, so he would be very unlucky.

She told the students that the movements of the planets only revealed the mysterious omens to those who understood the steps of the celestial dance. He also said that human destiny could be deciphered by the intermingling planetary rays.

In short, it was very reasonable to use the planets to predict destiny. That sounded a bit like what the centaurs did, looking for omens in the sky.

Based on the changes in the position of the stars, Professor Trelawney saw that the days ahead for Harry would be full of hardship and would be very difficult. Harry's fear would come true, and perhaps sooner than he thought.

It seemed reasonable that Harry would be worried about Voldemort because of these dreams.

But on careful thought, it seemed to him that it was easy to guess that sort of thing without having a prophecy about it, and that Professor Trelawney was simply bluffing.

Then they were each given a complicated circular chart and tried to fill in the position of the planets at their time of birth. It was tedious work, requiring a lot of consulting timetables and calculating angles. For Harry and Ron it was a waste of time.

As for the next day, the first Divination lesson for the third years was as bad as Hagrid's Care of Magical Creatures class.

The layout of the Divination classroom was the same as Ivan remembered. The curtains were all closed; the circular room was bathed in a dim reddish light cast by the numerous lamps, which were all draped with scarves and shawls.

The familiar sweet scent wafting from the fire reached her nostrils, and there was a clutter of cretonne chairs and poufs.

Professor Trelawney asked everyone to drink tea and then read the tea in everyone's cup.

Although Ivan went through this last year with a little more confidence, this year Professor Trelawney sharply predicted that he would suffer disaster or even die. This was her favorite way of welcoming new students.

Ivan was already prepared, but the others didn't know it. They all looked at him strangely, as if he might fall at any moment.

The sign this time was not unfamiliar, nor was it an Acromantula, but a Kelpie.

Goodness knows how Professor Trelawney saw this magical creature from Ivan's teacup.

It is said that the Kelpie can take various forms, but most often appears as a horse with cattails for a mane, or as a sea serpent. After luring the unwary onto its back, it will dive straight to the bottom of its river or lake and devour the rider, leaving the entrails floating on the surface.

The correct means of defeating a kelpie is to put a rein on its head with a Placement Charm, which renders it docile and unthreatening. But don't let it go easily, because it will hold a grudge and curse you...

The world's largest kelpie is found in Loch Ness, Scotland.

Simply put, the Kelpie was man-eating and particularly dangerous. It appeared in Ivan's teacup, which meant that Ivan could drown in the water or be eaten directly by the monster in the water.

Ivan did not take this meaningless prophecy to heart at all. He didn't see where he could meet a Kelpie.

There was definitely no such thing in the Hogwarts lake, and Ivan wasn't planning to go to Loch Ness.

After last year's christening, he was now totally indifferent to Professor Trelawney's usual predictions. From the warmth of the Divination classroom, Ivan suddenly discovered that it seemed like a good place to sleep....