Archaeologists at Hogwarts

Chapter 315 Grindelwald and Death

Toby did not expect that Dumbledore would greet him at the gate of the castle.

If it had been before tonight, then there would have been an unavoidable conversation, and it would have been the type of conversation that Toby couldn't refuse.

But after meeting Regulus, things began to develop differently.

Toby had to walk forward quickly. After seeing that there was no one else nearby, he took the initiative and whispered to Dumbledore for the first time: "Go to the secret room quickly. There is a problem with Grindelwald. If you don't stop him as soon as possible,

There will be an unforeseen disaster tonight - it would be an easy thing to let him escape."

Although the jump in these words was a bit large, Dumbledore gave Toby unspeakable trust at this time.

He immediately turned around and walked towards the castle. His decisiveness made Toby stunned for a moment, but then Toby immediately followed him. At the same time, he said with a somewhat embarrassed expression: "Maybe you don't need to go there. I should be able to solve it myself.

.”

"No." Dumbledore said without looking back: "No matter how careful you are when dealing with Grindelwald. And, if my guess is correct, what will happen to Grindelwald will also happen.

This has happened to you too, am I right?"

"Then I have to go see it with my own eyes."

No one expected that Grindelwald would become the key to easing the relationship between the two. This was their first face-to-face conversation since the full moon that day.

Time was urgent, and Toby didn't care about so much anymore. He quickly told what happened when he just met Regulus, and then he seemed to be defending himself: "I don't know if there is anything hidden in him."

There are other means, there is no time to capture him, and there is no time to ask about James and Aberforth, especially Aberforth. Sorry."

"You don't have to be sorry to anyone." Before opening the door to the abandoned bathroom, Dumbledore looked back at Toby and said gently: "I believe it won't be long before Aberforth can come back safely.

Yes—as long as we survive tonight."

Toby immediately understood what Dumbledore meant - this was the escape route Grindelwald took the initiative to leave for himself, in order to use Aberforth as a threat so that he could be rescued by the two in time.

"Then why didn't he tell me earlier?" When Dumbledore opened the passage to the secret room, Toby frowned and said warily: "Could this be a trap? Just to drag us into it?"

Dumbledore stood in front of the dark passage. He pondered for a while and said: "In this regard, I also believe that Grindelwald will have sufficient reasons to do this. For example, only in this way will we pay attention, and he will always do more

Prepare a choice - if we don't find him in time, no one knows what will happen next, but this is also one of his purposes."

It seems that no matter what, I have to see Grindelwald with my own eyes.

Toby slipped into the passage without saying a word, slid down the pipe to the bottom of the secret room with Dumbledore, and walked non-stop towards the hall of the secret room.

At this moment, even from a distance, Toby noticed the palpitating feeling, which made his expression become a little ugly.

Finally, he and Dumbledore saw the figure with their own eyes.

In the final hall of the secret chamber, in front of the trapped Grindelwald, stood a black shadow.

Its voice came out bit by bit:

"So, can you tell me what my wish is?"

"Don't listen to it!" Toby shouted hurriedly: "Don't answer anything, this is a trap!"

Grindelwald cast his gaze towards Toby, his gaze hidden behind his visor, making it difficult to see his gaze clearly.

"You know," Grindelwald said, "You have fallen into its trap, right?"

Toby did not answer the question. He then shouted: "I warned you, you have no idea what you are facing. Even the most powerful prophet cannot predict your future destiny. It will affect you."

The fate of Nurmengard has deeply affected you. Or are you already affected by it, so you escaped from Nurmengard?"

The black shadow remained motionless, showing great patience.

Dumbledore stared at this scene inexplicably, and he listened to Toby's words word for word.

After being silent for a while, Grindelwald slowly said: "I heard it. You answered the wish of Death. It was also your wish. That's why you have such a profound knowledge of ancient magic, and it also makes you

Suddenly decide to help your friend solve two troubles at once - because you know that you have been targeted by death and there are not many days left. Unless you continue to study ancient magic, wishes become curses, this is

What happens after encountering Death."

"Thanks for the answer, Toby Highmore."

Just when Toby and Dumbledore thought that Grindelwald would achieve some unknown purpose in the next second, he continued: "Now there are three of us. This is the cause and the result. It seems that tonight I can

I escaped once."

After he said these words, the God of Death disappeared little by little, just like Toby did when he rescued Harry and the three of them on the night of the full moon. To this day, the trio still don't understand what happened that day.

I don't know that they have almost faced death.

After the God of Death disappeared, the hall became quiet again.

Grindelwald seemed to have done nothing, but he did everything.

"Don't look at me like that." Grindelwald said this specifically to Toby, who had an ugly expression: "Unlike you, I followed Albus' footsteps very early on -

—For the Deathly Hallows. Later, I was able to resist the temptation in my heart, and the life of imprisonment made me change a lot. If it were a young person, I think I would definitely be trapped by this trap."

"But it won't happen now, at least not yet. At least it won't happen until the next full moon."

"You won't have a chance." Toby said angrily. He threw a spell and hit Grindelwald, causing him to faint immediately.

Then Toby turned to look at Dumbledore, with questioning eyes.

"Don't tell me that you also participated in tonight's ceremony - just to get the secret out of me."

Dumbledore looked at him calmly.

"I've told you before that Grindelwald is best at deceiving people. I didn't know that something unexpected would happen tonight, even if it seemed to be planned by me. The time was just right, as I was about to return to Hogwarts.

This day in Gwarts. But I didn’t do that.”

"I will not cooperate with Grindelwald. In fact, the breakthrough I am looking for is Al and I try to communicate with it. Unfortunately, this only makes it more afraid of me."

Dumbledore was so frank that Toby didn't know what to say.

"Al?" After a long time, Toby said as if he was venting his anger: "It can't hide its thoughts anymore. All the secrets are written on its face. It can't be changed no matter how hard it is taught."

"I don't think there's anything wrong with it." Dumbledore added unhurriedly: "It's exactly the same as when you were in school. Of course, I mean before the full moon. Since then, you have started to change.

The results are different, which makes the education work more difficult, and it is also a challenge for me."

After a moment of silence, Toby suddenly said: "But you know now."

"Yes." Dumbledore said with regret: "I finally understand why you refused to ask me for help - who can resist death? Just like you erased your memory just to help Remus, you

It’s also to avoid getting me involved in this trouble. To avoid getting me involved in the trouble of Death.”

Toby couldn't accept Dumbledore's disguised praise, which made his skin crawl.

"It's time to go back," Dumbledore said.

They returned to the abandoned bathroom in silence, and then came to the ancient magic office very naturally.

Al couldn't help but exclaimed when he saw Toby and Dumbledore walking in together. For a moment, he thought Toby had been caught by the principal, and his thoughts of running away immediately became more intense.

"Go, go." Toby impatiently waved away Al, whose face was full of fear but couldn't help being curious: "You are really useless, you can't help at all, do you know that you

It has become my breakthrough point.”

"Yeah, yeah, yeah!" Elton screamed angrily. No matter how he shouted, he seemed a little lacking in confidence. At the same time, he kept looking carefully at Dumbledore beside him.

"Don't bother." Toby was lying on the sofa as if he had accepted his fate. He said weakly: "I was not threatened, and this is not a trap. Besides, we may not be able to escape under the principal's nose - by the way.

, and your beans, too bad, I forgot them at the train station. Forget it, I almost ate them anyway."

Al looked at Toby in surprise, and then turned to look at Dumbledore, completely confused as to what was going on.

What happened to these two people?

Wasn't there a lot of conflict a few days ago? Why did you suddenly change back to this ghostly state today?

The world of wizards is so complicated, but sniffing is relatively simple.

The crisp sound of chewing beans sounded in the room, and Al simply sat far away from them, taking out food and drink, as if he was watching a good show.

Anyway, Toby is not afraid, so what is he afraid of?

Dumbledore sat down on the sofa opposite Toby and asked softly: "So, can you tell me the origin of Al now? Is it also related to Death?"

"Roughly the same."

Toby's answer shocked Al, fearing that someone would catch him for research, and he felt that the entire magical world had become unsafe.

"Be quiet." Toby said angrily: "You can't hide it, neither of us can hide it - that's the thing. Grindelwald has made it very clear, the death wish is a trap

, is also a curse. I was still young at the time, and I self-righteously stated my wishes related to ancient magic—probably the same things I said in the first class when I first took office. Only later did I understand that the wishes of the God of Death

Wishes are like the Mirror of Erised. After making a wish, you must keep doing it to avoid the curse coming true."

"But even so, once you fall behind a little, you will still be constantly caught up, and the process of realizing your wish is also extremely difficult - the injuries on my body are all caused by this. Sometimes I really feel that it would be better to die.

.”

Dumbledore listened quietly, and even in the face of such soft words, he did not speak without permission.

This made Toby feel a lot better. He was most afraid of someone suddenly comforting him at this time, but this was the last thing he needed.

Toby continued: "In order to seek the secrets of ancient magic, I have traveled to many places and found a large collection - including the two skeletons. They appeared in historical scenes that I have seen with my own eyes.

, but I didn’t expect the existence of a third skeleton at the time. It wasn’t until recently that I learned about the Deathly Hallows and that it was hidden by the invisibility cloak.”

"But this is just the beginning."

"Later, in order to solve the curse of death, I also tried many other efforts - such as the devil, the Mason Gate, and Al - the origin of Al is related to the Mason Gate, which is the world I see from inside the door.

I found and brought him out. This happened very strangely, okay?"

Under Dumbledore's unexpected gaze, Toby changed his words helplessly: "Actually, it was like this. I could feel that I was about to die. The process of studying ancient magic has never been smooth sailing. I

I will also encounter bottlenecks, which leaves me little time. In order to continue to live, I have to try some extraordinary magic - soul, this is the only way I can think of."

"El is a part of my soul that I deliberately separated, but the price is that I can no longer summon my own patron saint. This bought me a very critical period of time."

"But it doesn't always work. The missing part has to be filled by something else - so there is the devil. The only difference is that I integrate the devil with myself instead of separate. This has won for me

The second critical period.”

"Now is the third paragraph. I can feel that death is getting closer and closer to me, but I have no other way. There is really no way, only those two skeletons are left - oh,

There is also a third body."

"Although I finally collected them all, the key doesn't seem to be with them - it's the Deathly Hallows, maybe. In short, that's it. I became a dark wizard who can no longer summon the Patronus.

I have become like this again, neither human nor ghost, so if possible, can you erect a sculpture for me after my death, principal?"

"My request is not much. It is best to place the sculpture at the door of Severus' office. I feel extremely uncomfortable when I think that he will be in charge of Slytherin House forever. What kind of Slytherin is he? It must be

It’s better to make it difficult for him too.”

I don’t know since when, Al stopped eating beans. He slumped on the table in a depressed mood, looking miserable.

But neither Toby nor Al thought about asking Dumbledore for help.

From beginning to end, they never thought of involving anyone.

Just like Remus, and Snape and Lily, and Albus Dumbledore.