Chapter 474: There's a really cool reward here, but guess who's not eligible to receive it

The behavior of Daphne, Astoria, and Les won the favor of many people, such as Cedric.

He really couldn't stand the actions of this group of people, so when Daphne took action, he was the first one to stand up and applaud.

"Okay, great job!"

With Cedric taking the lead, the other Hufflepuff students naturally followed suit. Suddenly, a not-so-loud applause broke out from the Hufflepuff stands.

With Hufflepuff students taking the lead, Gryffindor and Slytherin students naturally wouldn't just sit there and watch. Soon, the stadium was filled with applause and cheers.

Listening to the applause coming from behind him, Dumbledore smiled.

Well, the kids made the choice that satisfied them the most.

He looked at Daphne, who was killing all the enemies on the field, and a hint of relief flashed in his eyes.

This kid is so nice, he doesn't look like a Slytherin at all.

Godric, who was sitting in the audience not far away, said loudly without any hesitation: "This little girl was not sorted into Gryffindor? The Sorting Hat needs to be repaired, ha!"

His voice was so loud that even Les, who was standing far away, could hear it.

After hearing what Godric said, his face suddenly darkened. However, looking at Daphne who was in the fight, he seemed unable to refute.

Could the root of the problem be me? Rice even began to reflect on himself. After all, teaching one Adrian could be considered a coincidence, but teaching two students with such personalities would hardly be a coincidence.

But when his eyes swept over Astoria, who was also standing helplessly in the lake, Lester was immediately relieved.

It's definitely not my fault! Otherwise, why would little Astoria have this personality now? Or is it Adrian's blood that's to blame!

Rice had read the Muggle Encyclopedia and had heard of Mendel and his peas, so he felt that the difference in the personalities of the Greengrass sisters was most likely a matter of the dominant or recessive expression of the "Adrian gene".

After thinking about it for a while, a whistle suddenly came from the referee's team.

"Okay, the competition time is up, contestants please come to the referee's seat!"

Daphne stopped chasing the enemy. What made her stop was not the enemy's resistance, but the whistle that ended the game.

She excitedly came to the judges' seat and handed in her clearance treasure box and trial treasure box, and passed the certification. Behind Daphne was her sister Astoria and Les, who had a calm face but looked a little depressed.

Daphne and Astoria couldn't hide the shock in their eyes when they found out that Les only got one clearance treasure chest.

However, since they were in the spotlight, they couldn't pull Les aside to ask him questions. They could only tell themselves silently in their hearts that Les might have other ideas and he would reveal them when the time was right.

The two of them were worrying too much. Rice didn't have any "foresight" at all, he just didn't need the trial reward.

After the last contestant completed the certification, Mr. Henry stood up and announced the result of the game.

Thanks to the efforts of the hunter and Daphne, many people were eliminated in this game. Only fifty-three people passed the test and obtained the treasure chest from the mermaid. Among them, only nineteen people completed the advanced trial.

Among these fifty-three people, the majority were students from the eight major magic schools - of course, Durmstrang was an exception. Thanks to Daphne, they only had Krum left.

"Dear contestants, you have one week to prepare. After one week, the second stage of the competition will officially begin. The difficulty of this stage will be greatly increased. The clearance treasure chests and trial rewards in your hands will be an important help for you to pass the competition and even save your life." At this point, Mr. Henry's expression became serious, which was rare.

He said to the players very seriously: "You must take good care of yourself and make your own life the highest priority."

Mr. Henry's words added a solemn atmosphere to the scene.

It's a matter of life and death! Who wouldn't be careful when it comes to this?

Godric on the side lowered his eyes, with no emotion visible on his face.

At the end of the first stage, the seven elite young men he brought with him disappeared, which caused a small disturbance at the time. Now, the organizers of the event are emphasizing safety again... This is really interesting.

He didn't think the disappearance of the seven people was accidental. Someone must be secretly targeting the secret society.

But it didn't matter. The so-called elites in the sect were all targets brought by him. Let the mysterious strong man hit them. It would only be a loss of a few people. As long as it didn't hinder the execution of the plan, it was all worth it. Even the secret society was established for this plan.

'The mysterious strong man who appeared in the Quidditch World Cup finals, the one who secretly hunted down the monks of the Secret Order, and the guy who created such a competition venue... I want to see how much of Hogwarts and the wizarding world I don't know.' Figures flashed through Godric's mind, and then he cast his eyes on Dumbledore who was standing in front of him.

"Albus Dumbledore, did you arrange all this? You pretend to be unreliable and old, but secretly..."

After reminding the contestants to pay attention to safety, the competition officially came to an end.

Contestants who knew each other returned together and began to prepare for the next stage of the competition.

"Neville, Luna, how did you do it?" Harry caught up with Neville and Luna and asked the question that had been bothering him for a long time.

He thought he was the strongest Seeker in Hogwarts, but these two people caught fish faster than him? This puzzled him.

Do they have the same fishing skills as Cedric?

"Just talk to the fishes and they will automatically come to the basket - I promised them that I won't hurt them, and I will release them once they pass the test." Luna began to speak incomprehensible words.

For a moment, Harry thought there was something wrong with his ears.

"Did you mean, uh, cast some kind of spell?"

"No." Luna shook her head seriously: "These little fish can communicate, just like you and I are communicating. I just invite them to come to my fish basket."

Luna said that she just said a few nice words and the little silver fish took the initiative to get into her fish basket and helped her pass the mermaid trial.

Harry didn't understand, but was deeply shocked.

He felt as if he couldn't communicate with Luna, as if she wasn't speaking English.

"Neville, what about you?" Harry swore that if Neville was also communicating with fish, he would go back to the common room and have a good sleep to eliminate the hallucinations caused by excessive stress.

Fortunately, Neville's answer was much more normal, and it seemed that he didn't understand what Luna was saying.

"I caught those small fish in the fish basket through the flow of magic power."

"Magic flow?" Harry heard a very new term.

"Well... this concept is a bit complicated. It was taught to us by Professor White. It is a technique of ancient wizards."

Harry understood immediately, and considering that Cedric was also from Hufflepuff House, Harry felt that he had guessed what method Cedric used.

Sure enough, after he described Cedric's behavior, Neville also said that Cedric also caught the fish by controlling magic.

Harry thought that this flow of magic might be an ancient version of the Summoning Charm, which did not require a wand to be cast.

You know what, this is really convenient.

At this time, Rice and his two companions also passed by them.

"You can open the trial rewards as soon as possible. It will be very helpful for future competitions." Rice said to Daphne and Astoria. When he saw Harry and the other two, he nodded to them.

"Congratulations, it looks like you all passed the test."

"Les, you--" Harry was halfway through his words, but stopped himself.

There were six people present, and Rice seemed to be the only one who did not receive the trial reward. Would it be too hurtful to ask him the reason in public now?

Daphne and Astoria looked at Harry together and couldn't help but blame him in their hearts for not continuing to ask. They also wanted to know the reason!

"Are you wondering why I didn't participate in the mermaid trial?"

"Yes." Seeing that Les said it himself, Harry simply admitted it.

"Because my spell is about to end, I need to go to the lake to get some fresh air." Les gave a reason that sounded reasonable, but to those who knew him it sounded ridiculous.

Daphne and Astoria couldn't help but blink.

The spell has expired? Come on, even if the fish in the lake die of suffocation, you will be fine!

But this statement successfully fooled Harry and Neville.

The few of them returned to the castle chatting and laughing - no matter what, they had passed this round of assessment with the best performance and could finally breathe a sigh of relief.

As for the next stage of the competition, that will be something I need to worry about a week later. Now just relax!

After having a hot lunch in the auditorium, the contestants felt that they had regained all the energy they had lost in the Black Lake.

As he left the auditorium, Rice felt like someone was staring at him.

He stopped, looked back, and saw it was Luna.

"What's the matter?" He had plenty of patience for this girl who had a hint of Ravenclaw temperament.

"Just now outside, I felt like you weren't telling the truth."

Luna's straightforward words made Les laugh.

"If I say I'm just too lazy to get the trial rewards, would you believe me?"

"I believe."

Now Les was really a little surprised. For a moment he couldn't see through the young witch in front of him.

"So you followed me here just to expose my lies?"

Luna shook her head.

"I just want to ask you a question. When you mentioned the ancient mermaid kingdom, you seemed to hate those mermaids? Why?" Luna said it politely. She wanted to use the word "gloating" at first, but she finally restrained herself.

During her years at Hogwarts, her personality had not completely changed.

"That's it?" Les raised his eyebrows. He thought Luna had something important to talk to him about.

"I'm a Slytherin, Luna. Isn't it normal for me to hate these mermen? After all, our common room is under the Black Lake. If the mermen are very powerful, then the students of Slytherin House won't be able to sleep well."

Although the ancient mermaid kingdom was destroyed by Rowena Ravenclaw, among the four major colleges of Hogwarts, Slytherin College was the one that had the most conflicts with the mermaid kingdom.

After all, both the mermaids and the Slytherin school felt that this neighbor was an eyesore.

Les' words made Luna fall into deep thought, and her intuition told her that Les was not lying.

"If there's nothing else, I'll leave first." After answering Luna's question, Rice waved his hand and quickly left.

Luna wanted to stop Les, but it was too late. Les' figure had disappeared in the busy corridor.

She sighed softly. She actually had another question.

When I saw him at the competition venue that day, was what he said true?

But Luna felt that Rice would not answer her question. She felt that what Rice did in the competition venue might be something that ordinary little wizards like them could never dream of.

Soon after returning to the common room, Daphne and Astoria delivered information: the reward for passing the mermaid trial must be collected in the greenhouse of Hogwarts.

Rice's reaction was extremely cold. The word "greenhouse" alone made him understand what the reward was.

Sure enough, it was still the fruit from the same tree. It was the right choice not to get involved in any trials.

However, driven by curiosity, he still went to the greenhouse with Daphne and the others. He wanted to see what kind of fruit would recognize the two of them.

When the three of them arrived at the greenhouse, quite a few contestants had already gathered there.

It can be seen that everyone is still very concerned about the content of the rewards, after all, this is related to the difficulty of the upcoming competition.

However, most of the contestants who appeared here had passed the mermaid trial. It was extremely rare for someone like Rice who had not passed to join in the fun.

Soon after Rice arrived, Professor Sprout showed up with a large flower pot. In the flower pot was the transformation fruit tree that Rice, Rowena, and Helga had worked so hard to research.

Helga handed it over to Professor Sprout and asked her to present the trial rewards on her behalf.

This made Les quite happy. After all, if Rowena was present, she would definitely mock him severely afterwards and say something like "Everyone here has passed the trial, why are you here?"

"Welcome, children. You are all contestants who have passed the mermaid test. I will now present you with rewards - the rewards are the fruits from this tree!"

After these words were spoken, the contestants looked at each other, not understanding what the professor was up to.

----

Here’s an update, good night everyone~

See you at 12 o'clock at night!