The Admiral of Hogwarts

The evening banquet was a very formal affair, and if Hugo had attended alone, he would definitely have been flustered.

Fortunately, after the ship girls had been in this world for a year or two, they had experienced many things in this regard, so they were able to guide him to perfectly handle this banquet.

"Indomitable's dress is indeed good." Standing in front of the mirror, Hugo looked at the dress robe that Indomitable had stuffed into his luggage before departure, and a satisfied expression appeared on his face after turning around a few times.

This was a set of dark blue dress robes, incorporating some features of naval dress uniforms, so it looked significantly more fitted than ordinary dress robes, making him appear more mature than his actual age.

"Of course it's good, this is the result of our collective design." At this moment, Enterprise pushed the door open and came in, then helped Hugo tidy up his clothes while saying.

She had already changed her clothes at this time, wearing a silver-gray dress robe also with an officer uniform style, with the First Class Order of Merlin badge hanging on her chest.

Of course, at the end of their preparations, they each took out a Hogwarts school badge made of gold enamel and hung it on the left chest of their dress robes to show their origins.

After simply tidying up their clothes, they followed the tunnel inside the mountain towards the palace located on the top of the mountain. They had once had a bird's-eye view of this palace when they arrived.

This palace looked very conspicuous from the air because the main body of the building was made of mutton fat jade, looking like a gorgeous and exquisite pagoda. It had a clear visual contrast with the cyan-gray island below.

As an ancient school, the Magic Institute's auditorium reflected a strong historical heritage. Whether it was the various sculptures, paintings on the building stones, or the tables, chairs, bonsai, and even the tableware in the auditorium, they all reflected a unique cultural style.

Because alchemy itself belonged to a very niche discipline in the wizarding world, and the requirements for participants in this competition were very strict, there were not many people participating.

When the banquet officially began, he found that although the participants came from North Africa, Europe, and the Americas, all the participants added up didn't even reach 40 people.

"Actually, holding this competition here is also out of necessity." Just as the headmaster of the Magic Institute, representing the host, began to deliver a welcome speech, Enterprise whispered to Hugo through the admiral network.

"As the creator of the only known Philosopher's Stone, Nicolas Flamel has a very high status in alchemy, so the entire Western magic world wants his legacy."

"Therefore, the International Confederation of Wizards, or rather, the Western wizarding International Confederation of Wizards, argued for a long time about the location of this competition, because each country's Ministry of Magic wanted to put the competition in their own country, but other countries would all object."

"So after about a month of arguing, everyone finally decided to hold this competition in Japan, located in the neutral zone between the International Confederation of Wizards and the Zhuxia Magic Alliance."

The Zhuxia Magic Alliance is a magic cooperation organization located in the East. In the earliest era of the Wizard Council, wizards from all over the world were unified under this banner.

However, when the stricter International Statute of Wizarding Secrecy was announced in 1692 and the International Confederation of Wizards was established, many countries and regions raised objections in this regard.

Among them, countries like Liechtenstein and Switzerland, although suppressed by the overall environment, had to acknowledge the Statute of Secrecy. However, they refused to join the International Confederation of Wizards and declared their permanent neutrality.

And in the Far East and Southeast Asia, it was another matter. Here, there was a completely different magic system from the Western world and equally ancient magic communities, and the overall strength was not inferior to the entire Western magic world.

So after realizing that the International Statute of Wizarding Secrecy did not meet their needs, they established an organization called the Zhuxia Magic Alliance and promulgated a similar but very different Statute of Secrecy according to their own circumstances.

And the wizards of Japan, for a series of reasons, first remained neutral, and then joined both organizations at the end of the 19th century.

Also because of this reason, whether it is the International Confederation of Wizards or the Zhuxia Magic Alliance, when they want to hold any activities, they will choose Japan as the venue to show fairness.

Due to this situation, the headmaster of the Magic Institute can be considered experienced in these tasks. After his welcome speech ended, the representative from the International Confederation of Wizards also gave a simple speech.

The content of the two speeches was very concise, so they didn't even last 15 minutes in total. Soon, all the speeches ended, and the banquet officially began.

Probably to cater to the tastes of guests who had come from afar, most of the dishes on the table were Western-style, and the few Japanese dishes were also chosen to be more universally acceptable.

For example, foods similar to various sashimi or some sushi-like raw foods were not placed on the table, and the dishes were not served according to the Japanese cuisine portion for everyone.

Fortunately, because there were few people participating in the competition, and wizards who had mastered alchemy in the wizarding world often had a higher social status, the dishes at the banquet were indeed delicious.

"It seems that everyone is focusing on those Beauxbatons students." Looking at the International Confederation of Wizards official who had just bypassed him and chatted with the leading professor of the Beauxbatons delegation, Hugo said unhappily to Enterprise in a low voice.

"There's no way, who made the entire alchemy center of the Mediterranean region now in Beauxbatons." Enterprise shrugged helplessly. "Not to mention that Nicolas Flamel and his wife are all Beauxbatons graduates."

"So for this competition, most wizards believe that the winner of this competition will definitely come from Beauxbatons, just not sure who the final winner will be."

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In addition, many Japanese wizards who helped serve the dishes also had cold faces, making people feel a little unhappy.

The taste of being ignored was not very good, so not long after the last dish of the banquet came up. Except for the Beauxbatons contestants, almost all the remaining contestants left as soon as they finished eating.

Of course, there was another important reason why everyone left directly after eating, and that was that the first competition would start at 10:00 am the next morning, so everyone hoped to do some preparation tonight.

Early the next morning, Hugo and Enterprise came to the hall where the banquet was held yesterday. The long tables used for the banquet before had been removed, and replaced with many single small tables, all facing the main stage at the end of the hall.

"The first exam is a written test to examine your breadth of knowledge of various alchemy knowledge." After everyone was seated, the official from the International Confederation of Wizards said on the main stage.

"Now everyone start answering the questions, you have two hours to use."

After speaking, the middle-aged wizard turned the huge hourglass on the table in front of him upside down and placed it aside, then waved his wand. In an instant, test papers, quills, ink bottles, and rolls of parchment appeared on the tables.

After hearing the order, all the contestants immediately picked up the test papers and pens that had just appeared on the table, preparing to begin the first round of the competition.