Chapter 2520 man on a mission (13)

When Pomona left the castle, the faint afterglow of the sun could be seen dyeing the western sky red.

She put on her cloak, and it was supposed to be the warmest day of the year, but it was as cold as autumn because of the dementors.

She went to the greenhouse along the path, and she could see a light on in the greenhouse from a distance, and that was the greenhouse where Neville was.

Although when facing Scamander, Neville said bluntly that he would be at the bottom of the final exam, it didn't mean he didn't work hard, at least when he wrote the thesis, he didn't deliberately write the words very large, so that Take up the space required by the teacher to assign the paper size.

When Severus just entered school, he knew more spells than half of the seventh graders knew. Among the talented people she had come into contact with, Neville's "talent" was almost nonexistent. Ghorn probably wouldn't look him in the eye.

She took a deep breath and continued walking. When she reached the greenhouse, she looked inside through the glass and found that Neville was looking at the magic plants with his back turned to her.

She tapped on the glass to get Neville's attention, and walked to the door.

"Password!" Neville called out from the door.

"Schimastatin." Pomona replied outside the door.

Immediately afterwards, the door was opened, and she walked into the greenhouse, shaking her thick bucket waist.

"Good evening, Professor." Neville said calmly, without the excitement he had before.

"Good evening, Mr. Longbottom." Pomona also greeted him. "I'm sorry, today is later than usual, which made you miss dinner. You should go to the kitchen before meeting the dormitory. I think you should know the way."

"I'm not hungry, Professor, Simon has brought me something to eat," Neville replied.

She knew Simon was Neville's and Harry Potter's roommate, but it still surprised her that he would come to the conservatory and bring Neville food.

"What is he here for?"

"Tell me about the test questions Granger predicted."

"Oh~" Pomona exclaimed, "Did she use arithmetic divination?"

Neville opened his eyes and mouth wide in surprise.

His face was originally round, although he was a lot taller than the freshmen after the third grade, but seeing his expression like this made her feel very cute.

"You will know how accurate her prediction is after you finish the exam. Maybe we will have more fortune tellers in the future. Now, pack your things and go back before Filch closes the castle door."

"Yes, Professor." After Neville finished speaking, he quickly ran to his desk and put the quills and books on the desk into his schoolbag.

Pomona walked to the place where Neville was standing just now. There was a clump of rue. She carefully observed the rue leaves, and even touched them with her hands. The blue-green color of the leaves seemed to be more vivid than before.

She looked back at Neville, there was actually a cluster of rue on his robe, the yellow flowers stood out against the black robe, but...

"I suggest you don't take it back to your dorm." Pomona said to Neville. "Most people think that its aromatic substance emits a stink."

Neville froze for a moment, looked at the little flower on his chest, and then touched it bewilderedly.

"What's the problem?" Pomona asked.

"Someone gave it to me," Neville murmured.

She couldn't figure out who would give Ruxiang away, but Neville was very persistent, and he didn't want to pick off the bouquet of flowers.

"Maybe, it doesn't smell as strong as the smell in your lounge." She smiled and said, "Take it and go."

But Neville didn't move, he kept looking at Pomona.

"I didn't mean anything else," Pomona explained. "I was just joking."

"I heard that you have known Professor Snape for a long time, and he doesn't look so bad." Neville said cautiously, "Is it true?"

"Who told you?" she asked strangely.

"At noon today, he came to the greenhouse to get potion ingredients, just like last time, but this time he answered the password correctly, and I let him in." Neville said in a trembling voice, "I know, if I pretended he said Wrong, he will leave like last time..."

"Why didn't you do that?" Pomona asked Neville, as if encouraging him.

"Because 'do the right thing, because it's the right thing'." Neville looked at Pomona with wet eyes, as if he was about to cry, "not to mention that Professor Snape is a Death Eater, my parents both It's an Auror, and I have no reason to be afraid of him."

Pomona didn't know what to say, but Neville went on.

"If he hurt me, then he'd be sent to Azkaban to be with his other Death Eater friends, so I don't think he'll do anything to me, even though I offended him."

"You can't think like that!" Pomona said immediately.

"Because he's different from the other Death Eaters?" Neville went on. "He tortured me, but he didn't use the Unforgivable Curse like Bellatrix did."

"No, Neville!" Pomona snapped sternly, "If you think so..."

"He will also use his position as a professor to make me suffer." Neville continued coldly, "just like he usually does to other Gryffindor House people."

To be precise, like Harry Potter, she didn't want Neville to be targeted in the same way.

"If you really don't think you're afraid of him anymore, how about I give you a job?" Pomona put her hands on her hips. "I have to deliver herbs to Slytherin's cellar every week. Do you dare to go?"

"Now?" Neville asked eagerly.

"No, next semester." Pomona said cautiously, she hoped that after a calm summer vacation, Neville could make a more rational judgment instead of acting impulsively like this now "Don't forget what you promised me, summer vacation Come and help."

"Okay, Professor!" Neville said happily, picked up his schoolbag, and hurriedly rushed to the door.

"Can I ask you a question?" Pomona asked as Neville was about to leave.

"What?"

"How are you not afraid of Draco Malfoy?" Pomona asked.

"What's so scary about him?"

"He bullied you and put a Tripping Curse on you," Pomona said, looking Neville in the eyes.

"As long as I know how to break the curse, the problem is that I don't use my wand well." Neville said with some frustration.

She listened quietly.

"Harry and Hermione have helped me many times, so when they need help, I can't be timid. Last year, some people speculated that Harry or Malfoy is more likely to be the descendant of Slytherin. I think Malfoy can't be, Ten Malfoys are worth one Harry."

"Oh, I see," Pomona said with a smile.

"I saw Malfoy making trouble for the younger students, and I couldn't stop him. The year before last, I tried to stop Harry and the others from going to the forbidden corridor on the fourth floor, but Hermione cast the petrifying spell on me."

"So what are you going to do next?" Pomona asked.

Neville scratched his head and said after a while, "I don't know, Professor."

"You know, Professor Lupine brought magical creatures to the school, and that didn't include the Boggart in the locker, which was in the staff room." Pomona laughed. It would be fun to have the first class, so we took the locker and the boggart to the third floor."

Neville looked at her in bewilderment.

"It's late, Mr. Longbottom, do you want to be demerited like the others?" Pomona asked.

Neville woke up like a dream, opened the door, and ran out of the greenhouse.

Through the glass of the greenhouse, Pomona saw Neville's back disappearing into the darkness.

She took out a basket of glass jars from under the operating table, and then went to the third greenhouse.

There are many dangerous magical plants in this greenhouse, such as adult mandrakes, poison beard, etc., which are prohibited trade items, so they are also very expensive in the black market.

She came in front of the poison beard plants. These magical plants thought that Pomona was here to water and fertilize themselves again, so they didn't take any precautions, so she took this opportunity to cast a cutting spell on them, cutting off their branches and leaves. down.

This time the picking was more than normal pruning. The magic plants complained, but they were not angry. She used the floating spell to put the cut branches and leaves into the glass jar.

Then she went to other plants, sorted the fruits, leaves, and roots into glass jars, and put them into flannel bags.

Although there is a farmer's growth curse, magic plants are not like pumpkins, they need more magic power. Using the wizard's own magic power to stimulate the growth of medicinal materials, and then converting them into the required power through the magic medicine, is redundant in itself, not to mention that the magic power will be lost in the process of brewing the medicine.

For the "wand faction", there is nothing that they can't solve with a wave of their wand, and if they can't, they don't know enough magic spells.

Albus didn't send the attacker to St. Mungo's, but stayed in the school hospital, for this reason, besides avoiding the news.

In addition to being brave, Gryffindor also loves adventure...

She hoped that Neville could get along well with Snape, so she asked him to deliver potion materials. It was better to have more contact than to hold prejudices and never communicate with each other.

But there is also the possibility of "bad contact", like a Muggle electrical appliance bitten by a hairy crab, the spark leads to lightning, and then it explodes with a "bang".

At first Pomona didn't understand why Neville was sorted into Gryffindor instead of Hufflepuff by the Sorting Hat, and he himself expected to be in Hufflepuff.

"What's so scary about Malfoy?" She repeated what Neville said with a smile, then pulled down the hood of her cloak and walked out of the greenhouse.

Although the black cloak is not an invisibility cloak, it almost blends with the darkness, and it also has the function of invisibility.

She came to Hogsmeade through the path of the Forbidden Forest, and as she was about to step into the light of the village, she took a glass bottle from her velvet pocket and drank from its contents.

After drinking it, Pomona's body quickly "shrunk", the polyjuice lost its effect, and she regained her original appearance.

Fortunately, the wizard is wearing a loose wizard robe, and the change in the waistline cannot be seen. So she came to the Pig's Head Bar with a basket of contraband.

The people who came here were more or less disguised, and no one would do it if she showed her true colors, but no one could connect her with Hufflepuff's headmaster.

The drinking people began to chat with each other, and some people unconsciously looked back at the door, and then stopped turning their heads. His gaze followed her, and then the people next to him followed his gaze. It didn't take long for the bar to be silent, and everyone looked at her.

She found a corner and sat down, feeling a little smug. Not long after, the bar owner, Aberforth, came over, and his attitude was as bad as ever.

"What do you want to drink?"

"No, I'm not here..." she subconsciously said.

"Why don't you come to the bar to drink?" Aberforth asked impolitely again.

"I'm waiting for someone," Pomona said.

Then Aberforth walked away.

"Waiting for someone doesn't hinder you from drinking. What do you want to drink? I invite you." A wizard with a prosthetic leg said by the bar.

She ignored him, and after a while Aberforth reappeared and put a glass of beer in front of her with a bang.

"Go back after drinking." He said like rushing people, and then went back behind the bar.

After a while, there were whispers in the bar again, and no one paid any attention to her.

After another ten minutes or so, a short figure walked into the bar.

In spite of his disguise and his traveling cloak, he was instantly recognizable as a goblin.

The goblin went to the Pomona table and climbed up on the chair with difficulty.

"What have you brought?" said the goblin in a husky, low voice.

Pomona took the glass jar of poison beard from his pocket.

"Fresh," she said softly, "still moving."

The goblin took the jar and cast a spell on it, but the poison beard did nothing.

"How many do you have?" asked the goblin.

"Let's talk in another place." Pomona said, and went up to the private room on the second floor with the goblin.

"Can you imagine? I was interviewing at the Hog's Head," complained Trelawney as Minerva gave Sybil a manicure. Still a descendant of Cassandra."

Pomona felt the same way, looking at the centuries-old sludge that had accumulated on the booth floor.

She exchanged those magical plants for a large bag of Galleons. Although the goblins were known to be stingy, at least the Galleons they gave were guaranteed to be real.

Humans can use the copy spell to copy Gold Gallon, but this copy is worthless. First, it does not have the magic cast by goblins. Second, gold cannot be copied with the copy spell. Only the Sorcerer's Stone can turn metal into gold.

Because of goblin magic, Galleons are not indestructible like Muggle gold coins. In addition, it has other secrets, which are also the basis for the Gringotts goblin to verify the authenticity of the gold coins deposited in the bank.

At least humans have no way of knowing what method the goblin used to make the sword of Gryffindor have the magical property of absorbing power stronger than itself. Without a copy of this property, no matter how much it resembles the real sword of Gryffindor, it is not real .

The goblin left first, and after he left, Pomona also left the Pig's Head Bar with the gold coins, but did not go back to school along the same route.

She first walked to the farmland outside Hogsmeade, where there were only a few wooden houses with a large field attached.

The moon rose, and all of Hogsmeade was in the shadow of the mountains.

She heard footsteps behind her, and without turning her head she knew it wasn't Severus following her.

She walked unhurriedly ahead, crossed a wooden bridge over a creek, and turned to face the stalkers.

There were three of them, and they didn't dodge when Pomona turned around, and stood on the other side of the bridge majestically.

"What's the matter, gentlemen?" she said with a smile.

It looked like the leader was eyeing Pomona.

"I don't even know what to ask you for?" The leader said, "Your money, or you."

"What if I don't give it?" She continued with a smile.

"Then I don't have to make a choice." The leader took out his wand, and the other two also took their wands and circled around Pomona.

She didn't feel sick, just amused.

This man's soul is gray and does not seem pure, but strangely he is not in Azkaban.

"Men always tell me how sacred their laws are, how just their trials are, and how upright their judges are. Do you think they are right?" asked Pomona.

"You don't think so?" the leading wizard smiled.

She laughed too. "Have you ever read a wizard fairy tale?"

"Wizards also have many fairy tales, which one are you talking about?" asked the leading wizard, and his two companions had already taken out their wands.

"The Tales of Beedle the Poet, The Story of Three Brothers." She said in a singing voice, "Once upon a time, there were three brothers who were driving along a secluded path. It was almost dusk. They were walking, They came to a river, but because the water was too deep, they couldn't wade through it, and it was too dangerous to swim. However, the three brothers were proficient in magic, and with a wave of their wands, a bridge appeared on the water. When they reached the middle of the bridge, one wearing a The hooded figure blocks their way."

Pomona held out her fingers and curled her hair. "Death said to them, why are you so stupid to ask for your own death."

"No, what the god of death said is that you escaped the god of death with your cleverness, and everyone can get something as a reward." One of the three wizards said.

"Shut up," said his companion.

"So, what are you going to do to us now?" the boss asked with a big smile.

"I have a question, what kind of river do you think is the most dangerous?" Pomona asked.

"What if I got the answer right?" asked the boss.

"It doesn't make any difference, except that you can be a fool," Pomona replied.

The three laughed together.

"I think you're crazy," said the man trying to right Pomona.

"I'll count down to ten, ten, nine, eight..."

The three looked at each other.

"Don't be afraid, she's just bluffing," said the eldest.

"...four, three, two, one."

Pomona counted and nothing happened.

The three were so angry that they raised their wands at the same time, regardless of whether she was a woman, as if they were going to use the most vicious spell they had ever learned to deal with her.

"The answer is rivers that don't look dangerous so people will try to wade across them," she said amusedly. "One more question for you guys, how did I do it?"

The three of them were stunned at the same time, but it wasn't because of her question.

They looked upstream along the creek, and a flood roared towards them. Suddenly, the shallow creek, which seemed to be suitable for soaking feet in summer, became extremely dangerous, and there seemed to be horse-shaped animals running on the waves. .

"ah!!"

They screamed in unison, and the next second the flood crest engulfed them, but the flood seemed to have eyes and bypassed Pomona.

"Aqua-menti" she whispered "Remember?"

The three people wrapped in the water polo floated in the air, unable to move their hands and feet, although their eyes tried their best to express "remember".

Pomona didn't hear their answer, so he didn't cancel the magic. As time passed, the faces of the three became paler, and the boss's mouth kept bubbling, which seemed to be suffocation. It seems to be swearing.

She didn't know why some people found watching the death process interesting, she was just thinking about a question, should she eat these unclean souls, like a swallowtail dog eats old tires discarded by Muggles.

"Wow!"

Suddenly there was a dog barking behind her, and when she looked back, there was actually another person.

He looked at her with an expression of extreme viciousness, viciousness, and fear, so that his face was contorted. Just as his wand was aimed at her and was about to cast a spell, a scruffy stray dog ​​rushed over and bit his wrist holding the wand Living.

"Ah!" The man wailed, and the big black dog continued to attack him until the man was covered in blood.

Probably because of hearing the screams of humans, the dementors patrolling Hogsmeade floated over "excitedly", the temperature began to drop sharply, and even the water froze.

"Woof!" the black dog barked at her, then turned around and ran into the mountains.

Pomona glanced at the dementor, then at the three drowning men, whose souls were about to leave their bodies.

Will the dementors miss this "good meal"? After all, the cause of their death can be attributed to "accident", but it is estimated that no one believes that three adults will drown in such a shallow stream.

"Woof!" the black dog barked from behind a big rock, as if urging Pomona.

She finally let go of the magic, sending them falling to the ground.

She had a hunch that the dementors would attribute the deaths of the three to Sirius Black.

Just to keep Sirius from getting into more trouble, she spared these people their lives.

Instead of following the black dog, she chose to apparate. After all, she might have the smell of rue on her body, and she didn't know if the dementors could smell it.

However, when she tried this, she found that she couldn't disapparate. Maybe the Ministry of Magic had set up an anti-apparition spell in order to hunt down Sirius.

She immediately lifted the hem of her robe, stepped on large and small stones, and caught up with the black dog in embarrassment.

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"What do you think of these clothes?" Bertin asked.

The three sets of men's suits displayed in front of Georgiana, or the new Belgian police uniforms, are all made of high-quality materials, made by Italian "golden scissors" tailors, and worn on male soldiers with good stature and appearance.

"That's right." Georgiana circled around the three of them, "Just go there like this."

The three stood at attention together, and then left the room one by one.

"Do you know why Mrs. Pompidou is liked by the king?" After the three left, Bertin walked up to Georgiana, "She is a person who likes to laugh, and she is good at telling jokes. The other mistresses of the king don't Said, can't laugh, including the queen, so..."

"Aren't I just smiling?" Georgiana smirked, took out her shell fan, imitated the woman in Versailles, and walked towards the bright and gorgeous corridor like a small hall of mirrors.