#401 - Chapter 401: Prisoners Appear

On the shore of the Black Lake, the audience's eyes were glued to the giant magical screen in front of them, each face filled with excitement and tension.

Swan Alchemy's magical photography sphere captured everything at the bottom of the lake, presenting the thrilling scenes there one by one.

There were so many wonderful scenes that the young wizards couldn't take it all in. Their eyes switched back and forth between the five magical screens, afraid of missing anything.

The winter wind was biting, but the enthusiasm of the audience completely overwhelmed the cold. They vigorously waved the scarves and flags in their hands, cheering for the champions they supported.

Ludo Bagman stood on the commentary platform, his face flushed red and his voice high-pitched.

“From the start of the competition to now, 1 hour and 16 minutes have passed. Let's quickly take a look at the competition situation.”

“Currently, the fifth-place team is the Ilvermorny champion squad. The three champions have performed very well and will soon be able to enter the third trial instance as a whole team. Of course, I believe their strength is more than that, so let's wait and see.”

“The fourth team is from Beauxbatons. Miss Fleur Delacour is in the third trial instance, but after being hit by the Shrinking Charm, she has slowed down and become more cautious. Her two teammates are also doing well and have now entered the third trial instance.”

“In third place are the Durmstrang champions. Krum is leading the way and has already passed the third trial instance, his speed clearly exceeding his two teammates by a large margin. After communicating with his two teammates, he is now swimming around with a body of thirty centimeters, taking on the responsibility of scouting the way.”

“The second team comes from Uagadou. Relying on superb human transfiguration, they have taken full advantage of their speed and have now all passed the third trial instance. Unfortunately, after being hit by the Shrinking Charm, the route that Champion Amsu took to reunite with his teammates was too aggressive and he was besieged by a group of Grindylows, unfortunately becoming a prisoner of the merpeople.”

“We can see that Safety Officer Professor Swan has judged that Amsu is not in mortal danger, so he has not taken action. That is to say, Amsu still has a chance to rejoin the competition with the help of his teammates.”

“Finally, let's take a look at the first-place team—the Hogwarts champion squad. Although Harry Potter was the first champion in the team to be hit by the Shrinking Charm, he remained calm and successfully passed the remaining two trials, becoming the first to reach the cooperative trial instance.”

“Cedric's speed is not slow either, but the merpeople village is on his only way, so for the sake of safety, he chose to detour. Champion Malfoy's performance is equally brilliant. Relying on the speed brought by the underwater thruster, he directly shook off the merpeople patrol, but those merpeople will not give up, they are driving a large number of Grindylows to chase after him.”

Listening to Bagman's滔滔不绝 commentary, Sebastian smiled gently at the camera.

As long as there are no problems with breathing, the champions will not encounter any life-threatening dangers.

In the absence of life-threatening dangers, unless they voluntarily give up the competition, he, the Safety Officer, will never take action.

During the competition preparation stage, Sebastian personally visited the leader of the Black Lake merpeople as a competition representative and reached a series of agreements with him to ensure the safety of the champions as the top priority.

At the same time, he also told the merpeople leader to shrink the patrol range of the patrol team and focus their efforts mainly on the fourth cooperative trial instance and the area around the merpeople village.

In his eyes, the competition had only just entered the main topic when the champions cleared their third instance.

These instances were quite simple, seemingly examining the various qualities of the champions.

In fact, the purpose was to allow the champions to adapt to the environment under the Black Lake and adjust their psychological state. As long as they were not so careless, almost every champion could successfully clear the instance.

The lake bottom area where the first three instances were located was also the stage and safe area for the champions to move freely.

As for the Shrinking Charm, it was one of the core links carefully designed by the competition organizers, which all champions could not avoid.

The competition organizers wanted to use this subtle method to examine whether the champions could remain calm and cleverly avoid the merpeople's patrol to enter the fourth cooperative trial and eliminate the curse when their strength was limited.

Of course, being captured was also something that Sebastian was happy to see.

If a teammate was captured, it would test whether the champions still maintained the courage to fight and did not forget the ambition to win the competition in extreme situations, and then used their wisdom and tacit cooperation to rescue their teammates and overcome this difficulty.

To be honest, according to the competition organizers' vision, each champion squad should have one member captured.

And if the champion squad could clear the cooperative trial instance after rescuing their teammates, they would still be able to eliminate the curse and restore their original size.

Sebastian was quite satisfied with the performance of the Hogwarts champion squad.

Harry cleverly used the Disillusionment Charm to avoid the merpeople's patrol. Cedric was also very cautious and avoided danger by detouring. Although Malfoy was aggressive, he was able to use the speed and flexibility of the underwater thruster to avoid the merpeople's pursuit, which was also his skill.

As long as they successfully entered the cooperative trial instance and then eliminated the curse, the Hogwarts champion squad's victory was basically a certainty.

On the other side, Harry had just finished speaking when he saw a dark mass of Grindylows behind Malfoy.

At the same time, Malfoy frantically waved his arms: “Let's get into the instance first, it'll be too late if we don't.”

Without the slightest hesitation, Harry turned around and swam into the instance, and after Malfoy and Cedric entered, he slammed the door of the instance shut.

“There are Grindylows everywhere, I almost fell,” Malfoy gasped, “I just saw Uagadou's Amsu being captured, and he's locked in a house outside the merpeople village. If there are no accidents, their team will stop here.”

“I also saw the house where Amsu is locked,” Cedric said, “The density of merpeople patrols is very high nearby. If you're not careful, you'll definitely be captured.”

“We have to think of a way, how to deal with so many Grindylows after clearing this instance. Our current size and strength are simply not….”

Just then, the instance's prompt sound interrupted their conversation.

Harry's eyes lit up: “The Shrinking Charm can be解除 after clearing the instance!”

“It's an underwater combat instance, it shouldn't be too difficult,” Cedric also relaxed a lot.

“What are we waiting for, let's get started! This young master is here!”