great-warnovel Chapter 135 Sleeping Soundly Like Mud
Chapter 135 Sleeping Soundly Like Mud
Chapter 135 Sleeping Soundly Like Mud
When Dumbledore appeared, Barty Crouch Jr. was very excited. He rushed over and asked what was going on, but was politely asked to leave because Dumbledore was going to give a speech at the dinner party.
Hermione didn't pay much attention to what the old man was saying next. She had been looking forward to this feast for a long time. However, when Dumbledore finished speaking, among the stewed beef, pork chops, baked pudding, and buttered peas, Hermione seemed to vaguely see that little Barty clinging to her again.
This year, no foreign guests were specially invited, so it wasn't as lively as last year. In fact, because many students went home, the auditorium seemed a bit deserted.
But this suited the long table sweeper just fine. After finishing her meal, she left the hall with a satisfied pat on her stomach, packing up some easily digestible food. If Professor Lockhart had just woken up, he might not have minded enjoying a bit of the Christmas dinner afterglow.
In the corridor, she vaguely heard Barty Jr. walking with Dumbledore, McGonagall, and the others, saying things like "a powerful curse," "similar to the damage Grindelwald caused back then," "only Hogwarts can do it," and "we must save him."
But she didn't care; that was the professors' business.
Arriving at the medical wing with practiced ease, they found that Madam Pomfrey and Narcissa had gone to the banquet and hadn't returned yet. There were no other students hospitalized at this time, only Lockhart lying quietly in his hospital bed.
"Is the Dreamless Sleeping Agent really that effective?" He had been sleeping for over a day, but still showed no signs of waking up.
She had no choice but to cast a warming spell on the small cakes and pies before placing them on the bedside table, where a considerable amount of gifts had already been piled up, all sent by the girls themselves.
"Merry Christmas, Professor. I hope you don't sleep through the whole holiday." With that, she prepared to leave.
But after turning around and taking only a few steps, I suddenly felt a chill down my spine, as if a ghostly cold wind was blowing into my neck.
She turned around quickly, only to be surprised to find that Lockhart had silently appeared by the bedside at some point.
But he was clearly not awake; his eyes were staring blankly at the ground, and he was swaying as if he might fall at any moment.
"Professor?" Hermione frowned and called out softly.
She considered first widening the gap, and then letting the score inform the other professors.
"Why?" Lockhart murmured.
Hermione took the staff off her back; it's not always safe for a patient in the wizarding world to have an attack.
But the next moment, Lockhart fell to the ground in agony, clutching his head and screaming.
"Why!" he cried out in anguish.
Hermione was startled and quickly took two steps to Lockhart's side.
The next moment, Lockhart abruptly raised his head: "Why did you disturb my deep sleep!"
He was seen digging his fingers into his head, his face turning red and contorted. Countless shimmering white light burst forth from his eyes, mouth, nose, and every corner of his brain.
Hermione was caught off guard and was engulfed by these threads of light.
The dazzling pure white obscured everything around her. In an instant, Hermione could only cast an Ironclad Charm, but the light threads seemed to have no destructive power.
She lowered her hand, and as the bright light slowly faded, the surrounding scenery suddenly changed drastically.
Lockhart had disappeared from sight, but the place where she stood had become an endless expanse of empty water. She looked down and saw that she was standing steadily on the bottomless water, with clear, smooth, mirror-like water beneath her feet, soft yet firm, flowing under her boots.
But deeper and more profound, some indescribable darkness and restlessness seem to be brewing and expanding.
High in the sky, a moon was falling snow, and the faint sound of Christmas bells drifted down with the snowflakes onto the water and then disappeared.
"This is not the real world." Hermione quickly realized that no matter what Lockhart had encountered, he could not possibly teleport himself out of thin air within Hogwarts. To break through the castle's barrier with the Brilliant Stone at its core, it would probably require someone of Grindelwald's level.
Her body must still be in the school hospital with Lockhart; this space is currently likely some kind of mental realm.
"The professor is very good at remembering spells, and his loss of control may be related to that," Hermione analyzed.
Those filaments of light looked very much like the memories described in the book, which wizards extract from their brains and use the Pensieve to allow others to relive a certain experience from their past.
"So I've been dragged into the professor's mental world?" She looked around but didn't see Lockhart himself.
But is the professor's memory spell really that powerful? It can forcibly drag people into the mental world without needing a Pensieve.
She has practiced memory and confusion spells, but she is clearly far behind Lockhart, who specializes in them. In this illusory space, although she seems to be able to use various spells freely, she will probably have to start with memory spells to escape.
Of course, she could also choose to wait quietly; Harry and the professors outside would surely notice that she was missing.
At least when Mrs. Pomfrey and Narcissa return, they will notice something amiss, and we can wait for their rescue.
However, it cannot be ruled out that the flow of time in the mental world is different from that in the outside world. If Lockhart were even more outrageously strong in this respect, she might die of mental exhaustion before being discovered.
She took a few steps, and the sound of the shallow splashing water beneath her feet could travel far, creating an echo. There was nothing in the empty world; the only possible directions were the moon in the sky and the darkness beneath the water.
"Forget everything, and all is emptiness!"
She cast a spell on the moon.
Fearing it might cause the professor permanent amnesia, she didn't dare use too much magic.
But the moon seemed like a distant, illusory illusion. The curse flew far away and disappeared without a trace, while the moon remained unchanged.
"Looks like we'll have to try going underwater."
Hermione pondered for a moment, then fired a similarly weak Memory Charm at the water's surface.
The next moment, as if a slumbering dragon had been stirred, the water boiled up instantly, turning into a jet of water. Waves spread outwards from the spot where the spell had been cast, and Hermione had to use gravity magic to fly away to avoid being overturned by the raging waves.
When she landed again, two little girls, dressed in tattered clothes, expressionless and pale, were standing where she had just cast the spell, staring at her with dead eyes.
"Oh, this seems a bit bad. Could these be Professor Zaotian's two older sisters?"
Hermione is quite experienced in this. The more powerful a person is, the more terrifying their inner conflicts can be. Lockhart is also so skilled at memory spells. Could his two older sisters turn into some kind of troublesome twin bosses?
Just as I was thinking this, the two little girls vanished from the spot in the blink of an eye.
Hermione didn't dare to delay and immediately used gravity magic to pull herself into the air. The next second, two figures suddenly appeared, one in front of the other, and pounced on the spot where she had just been standing.
They collided like in a passionate embrace. If she hadn't dodged, she would have been sandwiched between the two and held tightly, and the consequences would probably not have been good.
"Stop immediately!" Hermione was still in mid-air when a binding spell was already being cast on the two girls.
But the rope formed by the curse pierced through their bodies without any hindrance and fell onto the water.
"A ghost?" Hermione frowned. She could use her spirit fire to deal with it, but she was worried that doing so would burn Lockhart's soul.