Chapter 119: The Frustrated Hagrid (Edited)

Friday.

After two grueling Potions classes in the morning, Harry and Ron stood together and muttered under their breath.

"I'd love to see Snape's face when his plan fails!" barked Ron angrily at Snape's aloof back, as he had just been badly attacked in Potions class.

Especially after Seamus had blown up the cauldron, causing Neville to leave early for treatment in the infirmary, Snape had used all his energy to taunt him and Harry.

"And young Master Great Brain and his minions, when your dean is fired, see if they're still so arrogant!" Harry, who had also been the target, added, as for every snide remark Snape made about Harry, Malfoy would bring in Crabbe and Goyle to set the mood and make harsh sneering noises.

After thinking about Snape and Malfoy's miserable future, the two decided to take Hermione with them to visit Hagrid's hut this afternoon.

They had stopped worrying about the Philosopher's Stone since they learned that Dumbledore had been watching the trapdoor, but at least they had spent a lot of time looking for Nicolas Flamel, so they thought they would go to Hagrid's for a moment....

And pay him a visit.

Gryffindor had no classes this afternoon, and Wood, the training nut, hadn't asked for extra practice, so they were free to show Hagrid the results of their efforts.

The behavior was a bit childish, but Harry and Ron were young and it was perfectly normal to have such thoughts.

Hermione, however, wasn't too interested.

"I have to prepare a revision plan for the final exam, I'm not going!"

Hermione refused without looking up from her desk, where she was scribbling.

"Final exams? A revision project?" Ron couldn't believe his ears as he shouted with an exaggerated expression, "Hermione, the exams are still a few hundred years away!"

"Twelve weeks," Hermione replied, "Not centuries, it's the blink of an eye for Nicolas Flamel."

Harry and Ron looked at each other speechless, they didn't understand the clever world.

"But we're not six hundred years old," Ron said, feeling the need to remind the erudite lady in front of him, "And besides, don't you know everything? why do you need to brush up?"

Ron was referring to Hermione's other nickname, Miss Know-it-all.

"Why do I need to go over it? are you crazy? do you know we have to pass these exams to get into second year? They're very important..."

Hermione ignored Ron's somewhat sarcastic reminder and rambled on, making both their brains ache and they were even about to convince themselves to revise together.

But Harry managed to come to in time, "But it's not such a bad afternoon, is it? don't you want to check with Hagrid to see if our reasoning is correct?"

Hermione rolled her eyes, there was no need to ask for proof when the answer was so obvious, and as Harry and Ron had said earlier, there was still Dumbledore watching the trapdoor, and she didn't mind that at all now.

But they were friends who had spent time together ogling the books, and they had invited her so sincerely that Hermione thought it would be acceptable to take an afternoon off.

"Fine, then I'll come with you" Hermione looked up proudly and reluctantly agreed.

After eating, the three of them made their way to Hagrid's hut and knocked on his door.

Hagrid opened the door for them.

"Is that you?" Hagrid didn't seem to be in a very good mood, he just looked at Harry as he opened the door and then stepped aside, "Come in."

Harry was a little puzzled by Hagrid's behavior, usually if he saw him visiting, his attitude would be more enthusiastic.

"Hagrid, are you alright?" asked Harry with concern.

"Thank you for your concern, but I'm fine." Hagrid smiled reluctantly and handed them three large wooden mugs, "Are you having some tea or rock cakes or something?"

"No, thanks."

All three shook their heads.

"You've heard, haven't you?" Hagrid sat down across from the three of them and said with a sigh, "Thanks for coming to see me."

"What?" Harry was confused.

"Hmm?" Hagrid looked confused, "You didn't hear about the boys and they came to see me?"

"Sorry, we don't know what you're talking about..." Harry scratched his cheek a little embarrassed, Hagrid seemed to have come across somewhat unhappy and they were still playing games at the moment, which seemed unethical. So he nudged Ron to his side with his elbow and winked.

Ron understood perfectly what Harry meant and immediately changed the subject, "So what's up? can you tell us about it? Maybe it will help."

"Thanks, Ron," Hagrid smiled reluctantly, then shook his head, "But there's nothing you can do about it..."

Hagrid said grumpily, "It's about the little ones in the Forbidden Forest, the Acromantulas have been targeted by other animals recently, they have lost many limbs in the last few days..."

The Acromantulas had been decimated because of Fish, and as Hogwarts School Ranger, Hagrid had noticed the situation, but since the magical creatures were actively covering it up, he had no idea that it was all Fish's doing.

At first, Hagrid thought it was the centaurs again, but when he approached them, they denied it, and when he asked them what was going on, he received many incoherent answers.

Unable to figure out why, Hagrid had to ask the other animals to stop pointing at the Acromantulas, but... it didn't work.

This made Hagrid very frustrated.

"Acromantulas!"

Hermione didn't care why Hagrid was upset, she shouted loudly, startling everyone else.

"It's a terrible creature classified as XXXXX by the Ministry of Magic, and they're in the Forbidden Forest!"

"Actually, they're not that dangerous," Hagrid replied, "The Ministry of Magic is too sensitive, and Aragog and his children are kind."

Harry and Ron had a look of disagreement, they didn't know exactly what an Acromantula was, but the XXXXX class classification said it all.

At the same time, they had a pretty good idea of what was going on..... Fish had said that lately he was going to the Forbidden Forest every night to hunt giant spiders.

It seemed that he was not only hunting himself, but also bringing his animal friends along.

The two looked at each other, and both decided to keep quiet about it.

Hermione didn't hear about Fish's night out because it implied that they inadvertently betrayed him, so Harry and Ron kept it to themselves, and only told her that Dumbledore had been watching the trapdoor.

Adding to the fact that the girls were very careful about Fish, Harry felt that if he told Hermione that Fish had gone to the Forbidden Forest with their help to get in trouble with the spiders that sorted XXXXX....

Harry shuddered, reaffirming his decision to remain silent.

Even so, Hermione was still angry, "Oh my God, there are such horrible creatures in the Forbidden Forest, AND you take Fish every weekend! What if he gets hurt? what were Professors Dumbledore and McGonagall thinking? how could they agree to something so horrible?"

Hermione, in her excitement, had abandoned her idol, Professor McGonagall.

"Hey, calm down, Hermione," Hagrid hastened to soothe, "I actually made a pact with Professor McGonagall not to take Fish to deal with magical creatures above XXX level."

'Although the agreement was broken on the first day...' Hagrid added silently in his mind, but like Harry, he wisely kept quiet.

Hermione, however, still looked worried and was still grumbling under her breath.

Seeing that this was likely to be interminable, Harry quickly changed the subject, "Actually, we came to ask your advice, Hagrid."

It was too late to worry about Hagrid's state of mind.

Besides, it seemed... inexplicable to Harry that Hagrid would feel sad about a group of spiders.

"It's about Nicolas Flamel..." Harry said.

"I told you I'm not going to tell you who it is!" Hagrid interrupted Harry with some annoyance, "This is not something you should know!".

"Actually, we figured out what it was centuries ago," Ron said smugly, as if he had figured out who Nicolas Flamel was, and we know what the dog guarded, it was the Philosopher's Stone..."

"What?!" Hagrid stood up from his stool in surprise, interrupting Ron's petulance, "How did you know that?!"

"I found it in a book, of course," Ron said with a wistful look as he remembered the hard times. "You can't imagine the amount of books we've been through in all this time!".

Hermione looked at him silently and said nothing, still too affected by Fish to worry about the Philosopher's Stone.

"Oh... that's it..." Hagrid looked a little nervous, and finally, he sighed, "Well, even if you know this, don't go around saying it, this isn't what the students should know."

"Of course we won't talk about it," Harry said with a frown, "It will alert Snape that he wants to steal the Philosopher's Stone."

"Huh? Snape?" Hagrid frowned, "You still suspect him? No way, Snape also helped protect the Philosopher's Stone, he wouldn't steal it."

"What? Snape!!!"

This time it was Harry and Ron's turn to be surprised, even though they knew Dumbledore was watching the trapdoor, if Snape had found out the rest of the mechanism, the Philosopher's Stone would still be in danger.

"Yes, Dumbledore borrowed Fluffy from me, and then asked some professors to design the mechanism," Hagrid recalled, "The Deans of all four Houses participated.... oh yes, and Professor Quirrell who was in charge of the Defense Against the Dark Arts class."

"He was the last to cast the spell because he had taken a leave of absence earlier, but of course Dumbledore himself had cast a protection spell, so there was no need to worry about the Philosopher's Stone being stolen"

"By the way, I also ran into Fish when I was taking Professor Quirrell to design the mechanism." Hagrid went on and on.

Hermione, who had been mumbling, finally stopped at the sound of Fish's name and turned her head to look at Hagrid.

As for Harry and Ron, they had heard Fish mention this before, so they were not surprised.

At the same time, they finally knew why Snape had been pressuring Professor Quirrell, since he had probably discovered the magic of all the other professors except for him.

But it was good that Fluffy and Professor Quirrell were still around, and that Dumbledore had been watching from the shadows.

It was a bit unsettling, but Harry couldn't think of anything he could do for a while, and after Hagrid said that, he started avoiding the Philosopher's Stone question again.

So the three of them sat for a while, and then left Hagrid's hut with a lot of worry on their minds.