A ruined Hogwarts

At nine o'clock in the evening, the ghost band playing the saw floated down from the stage, and the harsh scratching sound that tested the human auditory nerve finally stopped. For a moment, the already crowded room was eerily quiet.

Owen stepped onto the high stage and looked at the crowded silver figures under the stage. Being stared at by so many ghosts was quite nerve-wracking. Even his body seemed to be freezing with cold. Fortunately, he was used to seeing big scenes in his previous life and often performed on stage, so now he has no stage fright.

He bowed gracefully to the audience, pointed his wand at his throat, and said "loud voice", then opened his arms with a warm smile, and the clear and loud voice filled the entire conference room: "Ladies, sir Welcome to Hogwarts! Welcome to this unprecedented event!"

Owen glanced at the bottom of the stage and saw the ghosts standing still and looking forward to it. He saw Harry and the others sitting around a table with blank expressions. Next to a table by the window, he also saw an unexpected figure.

Albus Dumbledore!

This old man with white beard and white hair was wearing a bright purple robe. He was smiling and sitting with a ghost who also had a big beard. He was looking at the ghosts around him with interest. As if sensing Owen's gaze, he looked at Owen and winked his blue eyes playfully.

"Tsk, is the principal so free?" Owen thought to himself. Obviously, Dumbledore came here to join in the fun.

He nodded slightly to Dumbledore and continued: "Today, we have invited three important and well-known figures. I believe that many people here have grown up listening to their legendary stories..."

"Let us invite the brave and fearless Knight Francis, the just and strict Sir Stuart, and the wise and kind Lady Elizabeth!"

Irving had no intention of warming up, but went straight to the point. The ghosts in the audience come from different eras, and their thoughts and concepts are very different. Moreover, they are all ghosts, and they cannot be warmed up no matter what.

He stretched out his hand towards the black velvet curtain behind the stage, and amid the screams and cheers of the ghosts, three silver-white figures floated out leisurely. When passing by Owen, they all glanced sideways at him, and then met the ghosts who came over enthusiastically.

Knight Francis is a burly ghost in tattered armor, riding a majestic ghostly horse with a broken sword hanging from his belt. He had a handsome face and a friendly smile. He was soon surrounded by the ghosts of the Headless Hunters, patting their shoulders encouragingly. Nick, who was almost headless, was squeezed into the outermost circle and was spinning around anxiously.

Sir Stuart was dressed in a gorgeous aristocratic dress and had two delicate mustaches. He was dressed meticulously and his movements were elegant and reserved. He shook hands politely with a large group of ghosts dressed as scholars and nobles, and greeted the band of ghosts who had played the saw before.

Ms. Elizabeth is a lady with a dull face. She wears a long dress similar to a nun's uniform. She is barefoot and has a beautiful face with no expression, like an empty and careless doll. Her long black hair was dancing in the air, and her skirt moved automatically without any wind, as if it was about to ride on the wind at any moment.

She nodded indifferently to the ghosts around her. Facing the chattering voices around her, her dull face moved, and she slowly squeezed out an undetectable stiff smile. The fat monk spoke to her in a lively and cheerful tone, and she responded seriously, but her eyes seemed to be looking into nothingness.

Owen looked at Ms. Elizabeth with some surprise. This ghost was known for his kindness and kindness during his lifetime. He was a great doctor who saved countless people... He did not expect that this lady would be so cold and indifferent, even though she had never received any letters from her. See, she's not that unreachable.

The most important thing is that Owen found that the other party always seemed to be looking at him intentionally or unintentionally, with confusion and doubt in his expression. Those beautiful but empty eyes were not the silvery white of ghosts, but glowed with a deep red color. This was simply an incredible situation for ghosts.

"What are you doing?" Owen touched his chin. He was not familiar with the Othello-loving ghost, nor did he think he was special enough to impress a long-lived and well-informed ghost.

He quietly exited the stage, leaving it to the ghosts. Soon, the harsh music sounded again, and the ghosts happily danced various dances on the dance floor, with their figures everywhere on the ground and in the air.

Owen leaned against the wall and looked at the lively and weird dance with a smile. He pinched his earlobes helplessly, took out two tissues from his pocket and crumpled them into a ball, intending to stuff them into his ears. Melete crawled from his pocket onto his shoulder, her golden eyes widened and her big ears twitching to the unpleasant music.

"Ms. Gray, do you think this kind of music sounds good?" Owen curiously asked the quiet ghost beside him.

"Yes, this kind of sound will make us feel happy." The Ravenclaw ghost looked at the stage from a distance with a somewhat sad expression, then floated lightly in front of Owen, and said in a calm tone, "I can make you Listen to the sound in our ears.”

She stretched out her hands to Owen, placing her silver-white palms against his ears, as if cupping his cheeks. A cold, void palm passed through his ear, and Owen felt as if his ears were filled with frozen lake water. The loud chatter of the ghosts around him seemed to come through a layer of water, becoming blurry and distant.

Only the originally harsh and unpleasant scratching sound was clearly transmitted to the ears. The melody was melodious and cheerful. It was a beautiful dance music that Owen had never heard before. The gorgeous and long tone was the violin, and the tinkling sound was the piano...

"It's indeed very pleasant." Owen said softly, and found that his voice seemed to be coming from a long distance away.

Ms. Gray seemed to smile slightly at him, and her beautiful face that was always arrogant and cold became a little gentler. Then she retracted her palm, her expression still so indifferent, as if everything just now was an illusion.

"Ms. Gray, do you want to dance?" Owen listened to the harsh and unpleasant music in his ears again, and extended his palm to her in a gentlemanly manner.

"I don't like dancing with living people." Ms. Gray stared at his palm for a while, then turned her head and said. Immediately afterwards, she stared coldly at a handsome male ghost who came over enthusiastically to invite her to dance, until he stared at him and ran away.

Owen looked at this scene with amusement, shook his head and said, "Ms. Grey, is there anything you like?"

"Acquire knowledge. Although with my current appearance, knowledge is of little use to me." Ms. Gray glanced at him. Although her expression did not change, Owen noticed that her mood had worsened.

"But there is no end to learning. The process of exploring the unknown is always full of surprises." Owen said.

"Maybe." Ms. Gray murmured to herself. After a moment of silence, she slowly said, "In fact, my mother left a secret room in the school..."

"On the eighth floor of the castle, the Room of Requirement?" Owen said, "If this is what you are talking about, I have already found it."

Ms. Gray froze in surprise and seemed annoyed with herself. She finally made up her mind to tell this matter, but she didn't expect that the other party already knew about it...

"Ahem, I found out from the fax machine." Owen coughed slightly, "I'm definitely not reading your mind."

"You have been looking for that thing for so long, and then you waste the opportunity on this kind of problem?" Ms. Gray said coldly, "So you have passed the test set by my mother? It seems that you have the intelligence that my mother values. Such wisdom."

Her expression became sarcastic: "Oh, my mother likes it..."

"You've never entered that secret room, have you?" Owen asked thoughtfully.

"I'm just a ghost that my mother looks down upon. I can't go in and I don't want to go." Ms. Gray said calmly.

Owen looked into her eyes and said seriously: "In fact, the test there is not knowledge and wisdom. Ravenclaw no longer cared so much about intelligence before she died, because she found something more important than that."

"What?"

"Family love."

"Family love?" Ms. Gray's expression became even more sarcastic, "Why does that person care about family love? You don't know, ever since I was sensible, she has never looked at my father and I, like a cold machine."

She fell into long memories and said with excitement: "I have always been eager to get her attention, so I tried to make myself smarter and better... But no matter how hard I tried, I couldn't get her at all. eyes, not to mention a word of appreciation. Yes, with such an excellent mother, all my achievements are insignificant in comparison..."

"I once thought, if I had the same wisdom as her, would everything be different..." She said with blurred eyes, holding on to the hem of her skirt with both hands.

"So you stole her crown, fled far away, and came back here after your death," Owen said softly.

"Yes, you learned about it from your mother's secret room?" Ms. Gray twitched the corner of her mouth slightly, "Many years ago, a boy also learned this secret from his mother's secret room. He found out my identity based on this. Clues, using smooth words to deceive the location of the crown from me..."

"My mother must have been angry and resentful until she died of illness. She was even ashamed to tell others about my shameful betrayal..." Her hazy lips trembled.

"No, she left with her thoughts and apologies for you." Owen raised his hand, caressing the other person's head as if stroking a kitten, and said in a sincere tone, "She is not real. Indifference was only due to the sequelae of a magic that made her fall into a state of absolute sanity... She only regained her emotions before she passed away."

"Before she passed away, she just wanted to apologize to you. Maybe she didn't ask for your forgiveness. She just hoped that you could live a more relaxed life and not continue to live in her shadow." Owen said softly.

Ms. Gray looked at him blankly, tears seemed to overflow from her eyes. She grabbed her body and turned her back to Owen, as if she had turned into a silver-white statue, and did not make any movement for a long time.

"What you said...is true?" After a long silence, she asked slowly.

"Of course." Owen stroked the kitten Nizi in his arms.

"...Thank you for telling me this." She sighed, "Although time has made all this meaningless."

"It's meaningful. As long as it makes you feel better, it's meaningful." Owen said seriously.

Ms. Gray turned her head and looked at him for a while, then suddenly revealed a stunning smile, as if shrouded in the morning mist, mysterious and beautiful: "Little boy, you are really good at confusing people."

"You can call me Helena." She said softly.