Chapter 426 Knockturn Alley (2 in 1)

The eyes of Lupin and the others turned to Jon.

To be honest, since Jon had become younger, his current appearance didn't exactly give off the impression of reliability; after all, when a six-year-old stood in front of you and said he would go after a top-class wizard currently at the apex of the magical world, a normal person's first reaction would be that the boy was pretty funny.

But of course, Lupin and the others didn't take Jon's appearance as reality.

It could even be argued that Jon's appearance was the best deception, and no one would be wary of a child who didn't even look like he was enrolled in a magic school.

After hearing Jon's words, Dumbledore then spoke.

"If it is Jon who follows you then there is no problem, we cannot send many people to Britain, but you can perfectly well pretend to be a mother and son, such a combination would not be conspicuous when moving around Britain and no one would suspect that the wizards of Witching Horizon would send a small child over to penetrate into the enemy camp."

Lily turned her head and glanced at Jon, who of course knew what kind of feats Jon had performed in the just concluded Triwizard Tournament.

It was safe to say that there was no one else in the Order of the Phoenix right now who could be given more credit for fighting Voldemort than he had.

"If Jon doesn't feel like he needs to take some time off, I have no problem with that."

Jon shook his head at that.

"The competition cycle in between the Triwizard Tournament was long enough for me not to feel tired and require a break or anything, and although my body is smaller now, it hasn't caused any changes in either my magic or my fitness, so there's no problem going to Britain."

Neither of them had any problems and Dumbledore finally looked at Lily and said with immense seriousness.

"I have one more request, if you guys aren't able to track down Snape in Britain, then you can deal with the general circumstances as you encounter them, but if you encounter something that's an emergency, you'll have to listen to Jon."

Lily, for her part, nodded her head in agreement without hesitation at this.

It wasn't that she had some straightforward trust in Jon, but she couldn't wait any longer. Every second more spent here risked Snape escaping altogether, so now she agreed to whatever Dumbledore was asking for first.

Dumbledore could also see that Lily's patience was at its limit at this point, and he didn't say much more of anything.

"Set off. Remember, if it drags on in Britain and you need a legal identity, go to the joke shop in Diagon Alley and see the shopkeeper there, he is our new stronghold connector in Britain."

Lily stopped lingering as she grabbed Jon's hand and proceeded to take Jon with her outside where she Apparated in place and disappeared from this Aurors' quarters.

Only Dumbledore, Lupin and the others were left on the scene.

It was only by this time that both Lupin and Moody felt that Dumbledore's decision to allow both Lily and Jon to travel to Britain had been made somewhat hastily.

They did not know the secret of Jon Animagus, although Jon's transformation into a six-year-old child after participating in the Triwizard Tournament had been spread all over Europe by those magical newspapers, no one even thought in the direction that he could turn into a phoenix and could be resurrected, and many people speculated that Jon most probably used some special magic in Hogwarts Castle which caused him to turn into this state.

So even though they didn't doubt Jon's strength, they were still uneasy about whether it would be safe to go deep into Britain like this with just Lily and Jon.

Dumbledore did not explain much about this but simply told them to go about what they were supposed to be doing and to keep the news of Snape's escape from prison under wraps so that no word could get out.

The good thing was that this was the core of the Witching Horizon, and the wizards who stayed here were all trusted wizards, so there was no need to worry about information leaking out so quickly.

Once Lupin and the others had left, Dumbledore looked to the west and murmured to himself or to someone else.

"What a hateful and pathetic love."

***

Lily's hands were cold, something Jon had felt when he was eleven years old.

At that time he was required to choose between the two, Barty Jr. and Lily, and although he hadn't yet thoroughly verified Lily's identity, he didn't hesitate to choose the Hogwarts wagon after learning Barty Jr.'s name.

It was from that moment on that his fate was deeply tied to Dumbledore's gang.

So even though he had never shown it in the open, Jon had always had a deep gratitude for Lily in his heart.

To them, risking their lives to snatch the students from Voldemort's men might have been an act of duty, but it was such a completely selfless act that pulled Jon out of the bottomless pit.

Otherwise, even if Jon had discovered that Barty Jr. is a dangerous man, he would not have been able to break free of that fate.

So even if Dumbledore hadn't asked for his help in advance, Jon wouldn't have refused to accompany Lily on this trip to Britain if she needed it.

After the Apparition manifested into a dark and enclosed hut, they landed.

Lily still seemed to be anxious to catch Snape with her own hands, but her anxiety did not cause her to lose her mind.

"Your current appearance has been featured in the newspapers, and even if your child-like appearance is not very recognisable, you will have to change your appearance slightly."

As she spoke, she pulled a bunch of vials and jars from the pockets of her robes, from which she soon found a clear vial of ointment, which Lily poured all over her hands and proceeded to dab half of it onto Jon's head, then smearing all the rest directly onto her own head as well.

"Rub all this hair dye in well, it will change your hair colour to a chestnut colour, which will look more realistic than the Transfiguration while lasting a long time, and it won't be washed out with normal water."

The effect of the potion was truly amazing, it was clear and sticky when it touched the person's skin, and once it came into contact with the hair it adhered smoothly to the hair and dyed it a chestnut colour straight away, and because of this Jon and Lily soon changed their hair colour, which made them look more like a mother and son.

Jon didn't need any more changes once he changed his hair colour a little.

It was only recently that his look had been featured in the newspapers, and his toddler-inclined face didn't have that much of a distinctive look, plus the fact that his body had been growing much faster than normal in the past five days, as Dumbledore had said, it had already changed his appearance quite a bit from a week ago, so even people who knew Jon well wouldn't be sure it was Jon without staring closely at his face for a few dozen seconds.

Lily, on the other hand, needed more preparation, using those complicated potions to make her appearance a little younger, looking like she was under thirty, more in line with the mother-son setting associated with Jon's current age group.

At the same time, she added some length to her own hair and changed the colour of her eyes from that remarkable turquoise to the same pupil colour as Jon's.

That is, in a minute, she looked like a completely different person, and with Jon around, it was easy to subconsciously assume that she was a young mother.

It was just that even after whatever changes in appearance, the cold aura that Lily exuded remained intact.

"Let's go."

Once all the preparations were completed, she led Jon out of the cabin.

It was at this time that Jon realised that they were in fact in Knockturn Alley.

It was a street that looked run down and desolate compared to Diagon Alley, surrounded not only by shops with signs that were all covered up, but also by run-down dwellings, and the room they walked out of was one of those dwellings that looked like a safe house that had been prepared by the Order of the Phoenix during their previous exile in Britain.

"Where are we going to check first? It's not a small street, and there are living people coming in and leaving all the time, so if Snape uses the Apparition again immediately after he arrives here, we won't be able to find it."

Jon asked, lowering his voice and following Lily's side like a normal little boy following his mother to a strange place, tugging on Lily's sleeve.

Lily didn't explain much, just said briefly.

"Follow me."

They soon crossed the area that was already considered shabby in Jon's eyes, but in fact, it was actually in pretty good condition for an area in Knockturn Alley.

And Jon saw several wizards scattered around in small groups.

The male wizards were basically wearing hoods over their robes, while the female witches all wore pointed hats with wide brims that blocked their faces.

It wasn't that Lily didn't want to, but she had Jon with her, and there was no point in hiding her face with such a combination, so she could just show her face openly, like some noble young lady with a young lord, and avoid a lot of trouble.

But as they went deeper into Knockturn Alley, there was no way of avoiding some of the trouble.

As they passed a cluster of shacks that looked like a gathering place for tramps, a man dressed in a ragged robe that could only be called a rag, with his hair standing up and a visible bush of chest hair, fixed his wolf-like eyes on Lily while standing up from the ground.

He looked at Lily's white neck, licked his tongue and followed slowly, while the people around him, who looked to be in similar condition in terms of clothing, just watched the scene with cold eyes.

Someone was bound to make an attempt, especially since this is a Knockturn Alley under Voldemort's rule.

It would have been easy, if not stress-free, for Voldemort to clean up this part of Knockturn Alley with his iron hand.

But it was as if he had deliberately ignored this place, he never ordered the Death Eaters or the British Aurors to clean up this grey area of the magical world, and even deliberately drove some special, less dangerous people who did not listen to him, towards Knockturn Alley.

This has led to this street of wizards becoming darker and darker over the years.

Originally, Knockturn Alley was a grey area at best, superficially subject to the magical laws of the British Ministry of Magic, and at least on the surface, it did not go too far.

But during Voldemort's reign, the place was completely out of order, and many powerful people from the magical world were driven here, including werewolves, lawless goblins, cruel and shady dark wizards, and wanted criminals who killed countless people.

It was only in recent years when the territory and power in Knockturn Alley had been divided up, that a little order returned to this place, and because of this, the street returned to its role as a place for the pureblood nobles or the wealthy half-bloods to trade in shady goods, thus restoring the original purpose for which Knockturn Alley was established.

It was during that period that the Order of the Phoenix had placed some of its men here, but now, because of the tensions between France and Britain, there was only one safe house still left.

Lily, of course, had noticed that they were being targeted.

And as the man with no wand in his hand, but hands covered in sharpened nails, was about to pick up the pace and start running towards Lily and Jon.

Lily turned back with a cold look on her face and without hesitation, she recited an incantation!

"Crucio!"

The curse hit the man who had only just run up in an instant, and the pain was so deep in his soul that he could no longer move his body's limbs and could only curl up like a boiled prawn and fall to the ground, wailing!

Lily's hands didn't stop moving!

"Crucio!"

The second Cruciatus Curse fell on the man once more, his body already in spasm, his eyes beginning to glaze over with pain, even giving the impression that he could die or go mad at any moment.

But no pity appeared on Lily's face at this, and the tramps cowering under the wooden shacks looked indifferently at the man who lay twitching on the ground.

It was the law of Knockturn Alley that if you wanted to go after someone, you had to be prepared to put your life on the line. If Lily hadn't struck back so strongly, she would have ended up worse off than the man on the ground, because once the innocent-looking prey had revealed that she was really just a sheep, there wouldn't have been just one wolf trying to eat her.

So Lily's strike was vicious, an unforgivable curse that was completely incompatible with a decent human being, but Jon did not have a single psychological difficulty with it.

A man like him who had killed a whole family of purebloods with his sword, with a serpent's fang, and with a killing curse, had no right to have a psychological disturbance, right?

----

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[In P@treon; the ongoing volume now ends today, the next volume will be the final volume which will end in a month or 2.

There will be no more bonus chapters on Saturday and Sunday from now on, as some single chapters' word count has begun to increase to 1.8 chapter for each 1 chapter, together with a decrease in updates of chapters by author.]