Hogwarts: I, Tom, am really not Voldemort!

“Mother…”

Looking at the illusory figure of Rowena Ravenclaw before her, Helena opened her mouth, her voice trembling and almost inaudible.

“Helena, my child.” Rowena's gentle voice echoed in Helena's ears once again after a thousand years.

“I'm sorry, Mother. I stole the diadem back then, I… I disappointed you.” Helena lowered her head, uttering an apology a thousand years late, her voice choked with emotion, not daring to look Rowena in the eyes.

“You never disappointed me, Helena. You simply lost yourself.”

Rowena slowly approached, reaching out her hand, trying to touch Helena's cheek.

“No matter what you have done, you are my daughter, my most precious treasure.”

Just as Tom and Cassandra were quietly watching the touching scene of Rowena and Helena's mother-daughter reunion after a thousand years, an untimely voice came from beside them.

“What a touching scene of a mother and daughter reunited.”

Without anyone knowing when, Grindelwald stood next to the two of them.

Tom glared at the other party with disgust, his entire being filled with resentment towards Dumbledore: “Why are you everywhere? Is it because someone is old and their energy is failing, that they haven't managed to squeeze you dry, allowing you to run around everywhere? If needed, I can provide Indian magical medicine for free.”

Grindelwald was stunned by Tom's outburst. He had simply made a normal appearance, but Tom's foul mouth had caused his prestige to plummet. How could he, Grindelwald, show his face to anyone after they heard that?

Wait, that's not right. It seems like people have already heard.

At this moment, Cassandra suddenly blurted out: “Who's not performing? Professor Lockhart?”

Mother-daughter emotional dramas were never as appealing as gossip. At this moment, Grindelwald was extremely grateful that he was still wearing the Gilderoy Lockhart disguise.

Tom glared at Cassandra: “Little kids, stay out of grown-up matters.”

His words caused Cassandra to glare back angrily.

It seemed the play about forgiveness and redemption was coming to an end.

Tom wiped away non-existent tears from the corner of his eyes: “How touching. However, Rowena Ravenclaw's state is a bit strange. This doesn't seem like someone who won the resurrection round. Mr… Gri… I mean, Professor Lockhart, what do you think?”

Grindelwald felt that Tom's words were strange, but he didn't think much of it. Instead, he seriously discussed it with Tom: “Not alive, not a ghost either. More like a collection of consciousness and energy.”

“Indeed. Perhaps Rowena sealed a part of her consciousness and energy in the statue before she died, and the diadem is the key to activate it.” Tom nodded in agreement with Grindelwald's view. “Moreover, I seem to sense a trace of energy that doesn't belong to this world.”

‘What are they talking about?’

Listening to Tom and Grindelwald's conversation, Cassandra felt like she was a husky mixed into a pack of wolves, so out of place.

At this moment, Rowena, having finished her conversation, led Helena to the three of them.

“Thank you. For giving a mother the chance to see her daughter again.”

“You're welcome, Ms. Ravenclaw. It's what I should do, after all, Helena and I are very good friends.”

Tom unhesitatingly accepted Rowena's thanks, which drew an angry glare from Helena.

“You liar, how dare you say that? Back then…”

“Stop!” Just as Helena was about to bring up the past, she was stopped by Tom once again.

“If we're talking about what happened back then, let me have a good talk with you. You informed me that the diadem was hidden in the Albanian forests, hoping to retrieve it. So, where was the diadem taken afterwards?”

“You brought it back to Hogwarts.”

“Then didn't I fulfill my promise?”

Looking at Tom's expression as if he wanted to be praised, Helena became even more exasperated.

“But you turned it into a Dark Magic item!”

At this moment, Grindelwald, who had been watching the show from the sidelines, rarely helped Tom out.

“But there are no traces of Dark Magic on it.”

His words choked up the words that Helena was about to say.

Tom obviously didn't intend to let Helena off the hook and continued to say: “Moreover, you wanted to return the diadem to its original owner, and I did that for you. You wanted to see Ms. Ravenclaw again, and I helped you fulfill that wish.”

“Everything I did was according to Helena's wishes, so why should you feel angry, my friend?”

It seemed, perhaps, that what he said made sense. So why should she feel angry?

At this moment, Rowena, seeing Helena finish talking with her friend, spoke in a timely manner: “Alright, Helena, we don't have much time left. Now it's time to embark on a long journey. Godric and Helga have already gone far on that path, I hope we can catch up with their pace.”

Tom immediately grasped the oddity in Rowena's words: “Then, what about Salazar Slytherin, didn't he embark on this path? And can ghosts who have already made a choice at the time of death really embark on that path?”

“I don't know, at least I never saw Salazar during the thousand years I waited for Helena in Limbo.”

Rowena felt very sorry for Tom's first question because she didn't know the answer either.

“As for the second question, it will require a little help.”

As Rowena's voice fell, the runes hidden in the entire Ravenclaw Tower flickered with a blue light, and a huge amount of magic converged towards Rowena's location.

“Tonight, Ravenclaw will lose their ghost.”

Dumbledore, who had left the dinner early, stood at the castle window, watching this scene in the Ravenclaw tower and muttered to himself.

Tom, who was on the scene, saw a passage open in front of Rowena. He couldn't see what the other side of the passage looked like, but he felt the same source of energy that didn't belong to this world as Rowena, which Tom had felt countless times from the Resurrection Stone, the power of death.

Cassandra was still in a state of confusion, not knowing what was happening, but Grindelwald's eyes already revealed a different kind of brilliance.

“Helena, is there anything else you want to say to your friend?”

Rowena asked Helena softly.

Seeing Helena shake her head, Rowena bid farewell to Tom and the others: “I have left a small gift as a thank you. Goodbye then.”

Just as Rowena and Helena were about to step into the passage, Tom suddenly shouted: “Wait, I have one last question. Are Salazar and Godric really lovers?”

Rowena paused for a moment, leaving only one sentence: “They are the best of friends.” Then she quickly stepped into the passage with Helena, looking a bit like she was fleeing.

“Really, leaving so quickly, not even explaining in detail.” Tom muttered with some dissatisfaction, looking at the gradually closing passage.

However, in the last moment before the passage was about to close, Tom suddenly shouted at it.

“Goodbye, Ladies Ravenclaw!”