Hogwarts: I, Tom, am really not Voldemort!

When Tom and Mr. Weasley arrived together at Wizengamot Courtroom Seven on the tenth floor, Dumbledore and Harry were still waiting outside the door.

Seeing Tom appear, Harry hurried over with a worried expression: "Tom, where did you go? We were so worried when we couldn't find you."

Tom immediately repeated the same excuse he had given Mr. Weasley to Harry.

Harry breathed a sigh of relief after listening: "Thank goodness, thank goodness, I'm so glad you're okay. We were so worried about you."

From an angle Harry couldn't see, Dumbledore was looking at Tom with a smile that wasn't quite a smile, clearly not believing Tom's explanation.

Tom returned a smile, not taking it to heart. It was just an excuse, something both sides knew, so why say more?

Dumbledore, as a witness and Sirius's representative, left early to prepare. Tom and Harry followed Mr. Weasley and pushed open the door to the courtroom.

The tiered seats on both sides had spectators scattered here and there, not many in number, clearly Fudge hadn't allowed public opinion to ferment and generate heat.

Scanning the hall, Tom pulled Harry to sit in the front row next to a woman with long, golden, curly hair and jeweled spectacles.

Noticing someone sitting next to her, the woman looked up and saw that one of them was Harry Potter. Just as she was about to start a conversation, she heard the boy next to her whisper in a voice only they could hear: "Rita Skeeter, Animagus, beetle, let's talk."

The four words shocked Rita Skeeter. She lowered her voice and whispered, "Who are you? How do you know? And what do you want to talk about?"

"This isn't a good place to talk. You know how to find me. We'll talk then." After speaking, Tom said nothing more.

Seeing that Tom was no longer speaking, Rita Skeeter didn't say anything, got up, and moved to a seat far away from Tom.

Harry looked at Rita Skeeter's strange behavior and asked Tom in a low voice, "What's wrong with her?"

Thick, dark gray hair, a scarred face, a nose missing a chunk of flesh, and that constantly moving magical eye. This face, which could make children cry, made it easy to recognize who he was, and the moment this guy opened his mouth, he became annoying.

"Evil Slytherin brat!"

Even Cassandra called Tom the Great Dark Lord, but how could you, a little Moody, call him an evil Slytherin brat? This is unbearable!

Tom didn't humor him and immediately retorted, "Oh, let me see who this is."

"Ah, isn't this our former greatest Auror—Alastor Moody?"

"Why isn't a retired old man like you resting at home? What are you doing here? Don't tell me you came to find me, this evil Slytherin brat?"

"Don't, please don't. What if you have a back spasm or a sore arm or something? What if you blame me, this poor, young, helpless, evil Slytherin brat? I can't afford that."

When it comes to sarcastic remarks, no one at Hogwarts can compare to Slytherin. Under Tom's output, Moody was already smashing the ground with his cane.

Just as Moody was about to retort, he didn't expect Tom's output to continue: "However, how did our great Mr. Moody determine that I, a Slytherin brat, am evil? Is there any evidence?"

"If Mr. Moody can't produce evidence, then unfortunately, we're in the courtroom today. After the interrogation of Peter Pettigrew and Sirius Black, I'll apply for an investigation into former Auror Moody for falsely accusing and harming a first-year Hogwarts student."

"Of course~ I don't mind using other means to protect my rights, such as a wizard's duel. What do you think?"

As he spoke, Tom took out his wand and gave Moody a dueling salute, the tip of the wand pointing directly at him.

This set of procedures was smooth and flowing, and Harry, who was watching from the sidelines, was amazed.

On the other hand, Moody, being treated like this by a first-year brat, had never suffered such humiliation in his life. He immediately took out his wand and pointed it back at Tom.

Seeing that things were getting more and more out of hand, and many people were already looking over, the good-natured Arthur Weasley had to step in to smooth things over.

"Tom, put your wand down. Moody didn't mean to."

"And Moody, you're really something. Who shouts 'evil brat' at someone right away? You're so old, don't argue with a child."

Just as Mr. Weasley was smoothing things over, Tom heard a "click" of a shutter. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Rita Skeeter retracting her camera, and the emerald-green Quick-Quotes Quill was frantically writing on the parchment.

Seeing this, Tom gave her an approving look of "understanding" and took the lead in retracting his wand, saying to Mr. Weasley: "I'm sorry, Mr. Weasley, I was really too impulsive. Please don't blame Mr. Moody. It's me, it's me, this orphan without parents, who is too uneducated and made Mr. Moody angry. I can apologize, really, as long as, as long as he can forgive me..."

Speaking of the end, he even squeezed out a few crocodile tears.

Tom also knew a little about tea art.

This time, Moody was made even more uncomfortable, and he angrily changed seats and went to sulk alone.

Just as Tom and Moody's farce came to an end, the small door on the side of the courtroom was opened.

Cornelius Fudge, accompanied by a gray-haired witch wearing a monocle and a wizard who looked like an old lion, took the lead in walking in and sitting on the high stool in the middle.

More than a dozen Wizengamot members in purplish-red robes followed closely and sat down on both sides in turn.

Sitting in the observation seat, Tom secretly matched the images of the male and female wizards on the middle high stool with their roles.

'Amelia Susan Bones, and Rufus Scrimgeour, the two bravest people in the Ministry of Magic besides the Order of the Phoenix. It seems that there will be no major problems with this interrogation.'

"Bring in Peter Pettigrew."

As Bones's gavel fell, the side door opened, and many people in the audience showed expressions of disgust and fear. Harry felt as if he had fallen into an ice cave, and he would have almost fallen if Tom hadn't held him up.

Two cloaked, decaying creatures with scabbed hands carried a short, balding wizard towards the armchair in the middle.

"What are those things?" Harry asked Tom, shivering.

"Dementors!" Tom replied calmly.

After the Dementors pressed Peter Pettigrew into the middle chair and locked him with golden chains, they floated out of the room.

This trial officially began.