Chapter 266 Christmas Ball

"Good evening, Harry!" Hermione held Krum's arm and smiled brightly at Harry and Ginny, "Good evening, Ginny!"

Ginny had an expression of utter wonder on her face.

"Wow, Hermione, you look so beautiful after dressing up!" She said with some envy. "Speaking of which, Krum's vision is so good that he discovered the facts that these two idiots had not realized for several years."

"Ahem." The idiot standing next to Ginny choked.

Hermione's face turned red, while Krum nodded dully, giving Ginny a slightly stiff but kind smile.

At this time, Ron and Eloise Midgen walked over from across the hall hand in hand.

"Hey, Ron..."

Harry originally wanted to say hello to Ron, but he found that his good friend's face was terrifyingly gloomy at this time.

Ron didn't seem to see Harry and Hermione at all. He pulled Midgen and walked straight past them into the auditorium.

"You said... Ron, didn't he see us?" Harry asked Ginny hesitantly, "Or maybe he just didn't recognize Hermione and thought Hermione lied to us when she said she had a dance partner?"

"I don't think so." Ginny curled her lips, "I think his expression is probably jealous. After all, this fool didn't expect that Hermione, who he spends time with every day, is so beautiful."

"Of course, it's also possible that you're not satisfied with the fact that I secretly became your dance partner..." At the end of her sentence, Ginny's cheeks turned red.

After the other students were seated in the auditorium, Professor McGonagall looked at the Warriors and their dance partners, and asked them to line up in twos and follow her into the auditorium.

Harry could only temporarily suppress the confusion in his heart, and filed in together with the other warriors, heading towards a large round table at the front of the auditorium where referees and safety officers were seated.

When the warriors entered the stage, the students who were already seated applauded enthusiastically.

On Christmas night, the entire auditorium was decorated, brighter and more gorgeous than any previous Christmas dinner.

The walls of the auditorium were covered with shimmering silver frost, and the ceiling was a starry night sky, with hundreds of garlands of mistletoe sprigs and ivy suspended above.

The four long college tables were gone, replaced by a hundred small tables lit with lanterns, with a dozen students sitting around each table.

On the whole, young wizards who are familiar with each other in each college still sit together, but the boundaries between the colleges seem to be not as clear as before.

Harry concentrated his thoughts and maintained the manners taught to him by Professor McGonagall secretly turning on the stove. He was careful not to trip over the skirts of the various long dresses around him, and tried his best to maintain the image of a Four-wizard tournament warrior.

Ginny's face was red, but she seemed very happy. She held Harry's arm tightly and smiled brightly at everyone, as if she was showing off something.

When approaching the guest seat, Harry and Ginny saw Ron and Midgan.

Ron was squinting his eyes and watching Hermione walking down the aisle. Midgan's expression seemed to be a bit dumbfounded, and he moved his eyes back and forth between Ron and Hermione curiously.

"You are in a very bad state today." Midgen asked in a low voice with a look of interest, "Do you like Hermione?"

"Hmm...huh?!" Ron was like a kicked husky, his face suddenly filled with fright, shame, anger and confusion, "How is that possible! How could I like her? We are brothers! Brothers. Do you understand what I mean?!"

"I know, I know you are brothers." Midgen couldn't help but laugh, "You don't have to react so drastically, Ron."

…

While Midgen was eating the melon and Ron was desperately resisting, the warriors had already passed by the students and arrived in front of the guest of honor seat.

Dumbledore smiled happily and waved to the warriors and their dance partners;

Karkaroff seemed unhappy, probably because his disciple Krum was getting too close to a Muggle-born wizard from Hogwarts; Ludo Bagman was wearing a bright purple robe tonight, with Printed with big yellow stars, he clapped his hands as enthusiastically as his classmates;

Madame Maxime had shed her usual black satin uniform and wore a flowing gown of pale purple; Professor Hicks wore a gown woven of shimmering silver threads.

Of course, the most eye-catching person in the guest of honor seat was Professor Dracula as the security officer. Most of the young wizards in the entire auditorium focused on their Defense Against the Dark Arts professor, both boys and girls.

At first glance, Dracula's attire seems to be not much different from usual, it is still the same black and red wizard's robe as before. But tonight, he turned up his collar——

Just the change of raising the collar, for some reason, made a casual robe seem to change, and suddenly turned into a robe that was not inferior to any dress present.

At the same time, Dracula's long silver hair, which had always been loose, was rarely tied up, revealing a pair of pointed-looking ears.

He also wore an extremely luxurious and exquisite dark crown, inlaid with three dark red gems. The gems exuded extremely deep magic fluctuations and were obviously worth a lot of money.

Of course, the little wizards present did not know that the reason why Dracula wore this crown was actually because he had gone through a lot of twists and turns——

The Four-wizard Tournament is a major event that is rare in a century. As the host, Hogwarts must of course show its elegance in front of many foreign guests.

For this reason, before the Yule Ball started, Professor McGonagall personally went to Dracula's office to persuade him, hoping that the lazy Dracula would tie up his loose hair and wear a decent hat.

Of course Dracula was unwilling, but he couldn't resist Professor McGonagall's earnest persuasion, so he prepared to grab a hat and make up for it.

He immediately thought of the first Christmas he had just arrived at Hogwarts, when he put the cleaned Sorting Hat on his head to serve as his top hat... At that time, the Sorting Hat humorously shouted "Ah!" The name of the "branch" Zikaban...

However, Dracula's idea was rejected.

joke! Even if the Sorting Hat is not serious, even if it was indeed the hat of Dracula's friend Gryffindor more than a thousand years ago, its connotation has quietly changed after so many years.

Now, the Sorting Hat is a cultural relic that represents Hogwarts and a symbol of the different spiritual cores of the four houses.

What would they think of Hogwarts if he just put the Sorting Hat on his head in front of other guests?

Is the famous Sorting Hat just a dispensable toy for a professor?

...Although this is indeed the case, Professor McGonagall is unwilling to let this fact be exposed to other schools, at least this way it can save some face for the Sorting Hat.

Therefore, Dracula had no choice but to dig out the crown that he had not worn for who knows how many years.

Now there is only one vampire scepter away from the image when he ruled the entire Castle Dracula at that time...

This near-complete Dracula was undoubtedly very eye-catching, and it took a lot of effort for Harry to move his eyes away from the mysterious Defense Against the Dark Arts professor and look at the last seat of the guest of honor. .

He was surprised to note that Mr. Crouch had not arrived. Sitting in the seventh seat at the table was Ron's brother, Percy Weiss.

The warriors and their dance partners walked to the table, and Percy pulled out an empty chair next to him and looked at Harry with piercing eyes.

Harry understood what he meant and sat down next to Percy.

The next moment, Percy saw Ginny next to Harry and couldn't help but open his eyes wide.

"Ginny? How come you are Harry's dance partner?" Percy asked Ginny like a brother.

"What, can't I be Harry's dance partner?" Ginny, who had been shy at the beginning, had now let herself go a little bit, and said to Percy with her head held high.

"It's not impossible, it's just..." Percy scratched his head and forgot all what he wanted to say.

"Percy, why didn't Mr. Crouch come?" Harry was also a little embarrassed, so he quickly changed the subject and asked the question he wanted to know.

"Oh, by the way, I almost forgot to tell you-" Percy finally thought of what he wanted to say, with a proud smile on his face, "I got promoted!"

He adjusted his brand new navy blue ceremonial robe, with a smug and conceited look on his face.

"Mr. Crouch saw that I was hard-working and serious, so he specially promoted me to his personal assistant!" Percy said. Listening to his tone, he thought he had just been elected as the supreme ruler of the universe.

"As Mr. Crouch's personal assistant, I am here on his behalf."

"But this doesn't seem to have any inevitable connection with why he didn't come...?" Harry asked.

"I'm sorry that Mr. Crouch's physical condition is not very good...or very bad." Percy sighed and explained to Harry, "It seems that he has not been very well before the Quidditch World Cup started. It feels right.”

"But that's not surprising, the work of the International Department of Magical Exchange is too hard. And he's not as young as he used to be - although, of course, he's still very good and his mind is still as sharp as ever. But the World Cup is A terrible failure for the entire Ministry of Magic..."

"Well, as I just said, he is old and needs to be taken care of. However, the house elf in his family seems to have had an accident. His wife and son have also passed away. I guess there is no one around now. Take care of him……"

"Later, we had to prepare for the Triwizard Tournament and deal with the aftermath of the World Cup - that hateful woman named Skeeter spread rumors everywhere..."

"Well, poor guy, he's having a quiet Christmas, he needs a break so much. I'm glad he knows he has someone he can rely on to take care of things for him."

After all the talking, Percy finally turned the conversation to himself and praised himself generously.

"Speak less, Percy." When Percy was about to continue boasting, Ginny interrupted him in time, "I remember clearly that at the Quidditch World Cup four months ago , Mr. Crouch can’t even remember your name!”

Harry nodded in agreement.

He also remembered that Mr. Crouch called Percy "Weatherby" at that time.

"That was then! Now it's different from that time!" Percy's face turned red with anxiety.

At this time, everyone had a shiny golden plate in front of them. There was no food on the plate, but there was a small menu in front of everyone.

Harry blocked out Percy's chatter, picked up his menu uncertainly, and looked around - there was no house elf serving him.

At this time, Dumbledore seemed to notice his confusion. He looked at his menu carefully, then looked at his plate and read very clearly:

"Pork chop!"

A very appetizing looking pork chop appeared on the plate immediately.

Others around the table suddenly understood and followed suit, ordering their own favorite foods on their plates.

The dinner party started smoothly. While enjoying the sumptuous food, the professors and students present did not forget to chat with the dance partners around them, taking the opportunity to exchange feelings and discuss how to dance together in the next dance.

Hermione and Viktor Krum were engaged in conversation, seemingly not paying attention to what they were eating.

Harry suddenly thought that even though they had participated in a game together, he had never heard a word from Krum, who was as introverted as he was.

But he was actually talking now, and he was talking cheerfully—

"Ah, we actually have a castle. I don't think it's as big as here, nor as comfortable as here." He said to Hermione with a smile on his face, "Ours only has four floors, and it can only be lit when using magic. …”

Meanwhile, Fleur Delacour was criticizing the decor of Hogwarts to Roger Davis.

"It's nothing," she said contemptuously, looking at the starlit walls surrounding the auditorium. "At Beauxbatons Castle, our Great Hall is filled with ice sculptures at Christmas."

"Of course, those ice statues won't melt at all...like huge diamond statues, sparkling in the auditorium. The food is also superb. We also have a choir of woodland nymphs, who serenade us while we eat. We listen.”

"We don't have these ugly armors on our walls. If any ghost who specializes in mischief breaks into Beauxbatons, he will definitely be kicked out..."

Roger Davis watched her talk with an expression of fascination on his face, and several times he held his fork crookedly and failed to bring the food to his mouth.

Looking around the auditorium, Hagrid was sitting next to another staff seat. He put on the ugly fuzzy brown suit again and had his hair combed into a broomstick.

Compared with Professor Dracula's hair style, Hagrid's hair is just like a pile of weeds...

At this time, Hagrid was looking up at the guest of honor seat and kept looking at Ms. Maxim.

"Long time no see, come here Wes." A voice sounded in the ears of Harry and Ginny.

They turned around in surprise and found that Professor Dracula had changed his position at some point and appeared next to Percy without attracting the attention of anyone else.

"Ah, Professor Dracula, it's nice to see you again!" When Percy saw the professor he had always admired, he immediately sat up straight and changed from the personal assistant of a senior official of the Ministry of Magic to a good student.

"Do you mind telling me what you told Potter before?" Dracula asked softly, "That Mr. Crouch, what happened to him?"

…

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