Chapter 256 No. 12 Grimmauld Place

It turned out that the efficiency of wizard social media was not much worse than that of Muggle social media at the same time. News about Black's release was published in the Daily Prophet the next morning.

And because this matter was so popular, the Daily Prophet unceremoniously gave it a front-page headline.

In addition to explaining the results of Blake's treatment, the article also mentioned the matters of Peter Pettigrew and Barty Crouch.

Among them, Peter Pettigrew was confirmed to have become a Death Eater and betrayed the Potters, causing Harry to become an orphan. He also framed Black and made him spend more than ten years in Azkaban.

The result of his treatment was that he was deprived of his political rights for life and the Order of Merlin, First Class, which was awarded to him as a mourning honor, was withdrawn.

Finally, he was sentenced to 996 years in prison, to be executed in Azkaban.

To be honest, Mike was quite speechless about this.

What's the difference between a 996-year prison sentence and a life sentence without commutation? Even if Mike were killed, he wouldn't believe that Peter could live for a thousand years with his strength.

But there is no way. As we all know, Fuguo is an extremely rigid country.

The number of years to be sentenced for each crime must be calculated clearly, neither less nor more.

And in the entire Western concept, freedom is higher than life. In other words, in the eyes of those judges, the death penalty is not the most severe punishment, but letting a person lose his freedom forever is.

And this concept and way of doing things have been perfectly inherited by the wizarding world, which resulted in a group of Death Eaters and Peter being imprisoned in Azkaban instead of being executed no matter how great the evil they committed.

Mike thought this was really stupid.

Death is the ultimate punishment for a life. Those who think freedom is higher than life must have never experienced the feeling of dying, or they have been brainwashed.

But there is no way. Regarding the treatment of prisoners, Mike's words don't count.

As for Barty Crouch.

Our dear Mr. Barty Crouch took the blame and resigned directly due to the impact of this incident.

He also published a letter of apology in the Daily Prophet, which was sincere enough for everyone to understand how much he regretted his wrong decision.

Many people even began to sympathize with him because of this apology letter, which made Mike really speechless.

Are these people brainless?

For a person of Barty Crouch's level, if he says he is resigning, does he really resign?

From Mike's point of view, his operation was entirely about retreating in order to eliminate the negative impact on him caused by the Black incident.

Because according to Mike's understanding, Barty has a very high prestige in the Department of Magical Law Enforcement, and almost everyone respects him very much.

Such a guy is afraid that he will become the director again as soon as this news is over, and there will be no change from before.

Mike smiled and shook his head. Barty Crouch, this old guy, was really good at beer. He was able to turn the tide in this situation.

It's just that he has a son who cheats his father, and this son will cheat him again.

But this time, Mr. Crouch might not even be able to stand up.

With this in mind, Mike closed the newspaper and threw other miscellaneous tabloids into the trash can.

He didn't even have to look at it to know that all these tabloids were writing about Blake.

Thinking about such a big thing, these tabloids, known as hyenas, will not let it go.

"Shuke."

Mike called softly, and a house elf appeared in front of him.

"How is the construction of the base going?"

"Master, after our efforts, your laboratory is almost completed, but the living room and training ground will still have to wait for a while."

After saying that, Shuke's big ears drooped down, looking very disappointed.

In his mind, he had let Mike down by not building the base now.

How could Mike not know what he was thinking? Looking at the tired look on his face, Mike touched Shuke's smooth forehead, smiled and comforted:

"It's okay, I'm not in a hurry. Take your time, don't be too anxious, and take care of your body."

After saying that, regardless of Shuke's expression of being moved to the point of crying, he put his hand on Shuke's shoulder and continued:

"Okay, now take me to King's Cross station."

"I understand, Master!"

With the crisp sound of snapping fingers, Mike appeared in the crowded King's Cross Station after a moment of dizziness.

After saying goodbye to Shuke, Mike tidied up his Muggle clothes that had become a little messy due to the teleportation, and squeezed out of the station.

The purpose of his trip was the Black's hometown, the legendary ancestral home of the Black family, No. 12 Grimmauld Place.

That guy Black actually wanted to delay his payment and used the excuse that he couldn't leave Hogwarts.

This is really unacceptable to Mike.

So he thought he would go to the house today to check and accept the treasures that already belonged to him.

Grimmauld Place is not far from King's Cross Station, it only takes about 20 minutes on foot.

However, since Mike had not returned to Muggle society for too long, he was attracted by the bustling streets in front of him. In the end, it took him an entire hour to arrive at 12 Grimmauld Place, which Blake mentioned while walking and shopping. Number.

To be honest, Mike found it very strange at first that a family like the Black family, which despises Muggles, would actually place their ancestral home in the center of a Muggle city.

But after thinking about it carefully for a while, Mike realized that he was completely wrong.

It’s not that the Black family’s ancestral home was built in the city, but that it was included in the city’s expansion.

This is not difficult to understand.

As a super family that has been around for thousands of years, the Black family was probably still a desolate place when they first selected the site for their ancestral home, right?

And the ancestral home of the Black family that appeared in front of Mike at this moment did not disappoint Mike. He could feel the ancient atmosphere emanating from it at just a glance.

From Mike's point of view, it was a door painted in black. The black paint on the door was full of scratches due to the age, and its copper door handle was a ferocious line. The giant snake fully proves that the Black family has a certain Slytherin bloodline.

Perhaps it was because no one had taken care of it for so long. Through the window of the house, Mike could see that it was very messy inside, and the window itself was even more filthy.

Such a tall and dirty building is in sharp contrast to the bright shops on the side. Logically speaking, the city management department will not allow such a building that damages the city's appearance to appear here.

But magically, everyone ignored this building.

Mike knew that this was related to the Loyalty Curse, so he didn't care. He took a few steps forward and came to the door.

Except for the door handle, there was no keyhole or mailbox on the entire door. Mike understood at a glance that this door should be opened purely by magic.

Fortunately, there was a doorbell on the upper right side of the door. Mike shook the doorbell gently, and it made a clear and sweet sound.

It didn't take long for the door to be opened, and to Mike's surprise, the person who appeared in front of him was not Black, but an old house elf.

"Oh! What do I see? A Muggle! Get out! Despicable Muggle! Your unclean blood will defile this holy Black family house!"

The house elf screamed as if he had seen something terrible, and his scream seemed to awaken something in the room, and a woman's voice came out immediately afterwards.

"Kreacher, what did you say? A Muggle! This is absolutely terrible! Ah!!! Wake up all of you! Get this damn Muggle out of my house!"

The female voice screamed. Although her voice sounded muffled and seemed to be blocked by something, the huge volume still penetrated the entire villa.

Immediately afterwards, the dilapidated villa in front of him became lively, and the voices of countless men and women rang out from inside.

Mike frowned and stepped back slowly. A flick of the wand in his hand froze the old house elf who wanted to attack him.

Blake, who heard the noise at this time, also ran down the stairs. He was slightly surprised when he saw Mike, and then roared at a portrait covered by a rag:

"You crazy bitch! Stop it! Stop screaming! That's my friend!"

However, the female voice obviously did not buy his account. After a slight pause, she shouted in a slightly crazy tone:

"Why do you damn guy come back! And you brought such a dirty and despicable Muggle to desecrate my house! Why didn't you die outside? Ah..."

Before the female voice finished speaking, Blake wrapped it tightly with a dirty curtain. In just a moment, the female voice that made Mike's head hurt became quieter.

As the female voice became smaller, the other portraits in the house gradually became quiet.

"It looks like you are not welcome in this house."

Mike looked at the panting Blake with a smile and teased.

"Damn, why are you here suddenly? There shouldn't be a holiday at Hogwarts yet, right?" Black came to the door with a bad look and said to Mike, "Merlin, I haven't even had time to tidy up the house!"

"It doesn't matter, I'm just here to accept my reward, and I will leave as soon as I get what I deserve."

Hearing this, Blake frowned but said nothing more and directly made a gesture to invite in.

And when Mike took steps to officially enter the villa, Blake suddenly said:

"Can you remove the petrification spell from Kreacher first? I'll have to rely on him to clean the house next."

"The curse stops immediately."

Mike casually waved a Stop Curse without looking back and continued walking towards the house.

The villa has a long first-floor porch with peeling wallpaper, threadbare carpets, gas lamps and a large snake-shaped spiderweb chandelier and candelabra.

Most of the decorations in the entire corridor adopt snake-shaped patterns, except for an umbrella barrel coming out of the door, which looks very much like... a troll's foot?

Mike's attention was not attracted by the weird umbrella bucket for too long, and he quickly focused on the portrait that was still cursing.

"That's my mother, you saw it too, she wants me to die." Blake complained angrily, "Okay, stop looking, let's leave quickly."

After saying that, Blake passed Mike sideways and disappeared directly at the end of the corridor.

Mike followed Blake to the basement through the stairs at the end of the corridor, and Blake turned on the basement light early.

The structure of this basement is very different. A long table similar to the one in the Hogwarts auditorium is placed in the middle of the basement, and a fireplace is placed on the wall at the end of the long table.

There were two rows of huge bookshelves on both sides of the long table, and the books Mike needed were neatly placed on them.

"I have already transferred the books in the vault in advance. You can choose them yourself."

Mike glanced at Blake and said with a smile:

"It seems that you have already gone to withdraw the money, so by chance, Harry's Firebolt was dismantled by the Aurors. Why don't you give him another one?"

"Do you need to remind me? I have already placed an order with the Quidditch supply store, and I will send the new broom to him as soon as it is ready."

Seeing Blake's proud look, Mike chuckled and ignored him. He went straight to the bookshelves and looked through the books on them.

It has to be said that the Black family is truly a super family that has been around for thousands of years. The number of books in the basement is almost as large as the restricted book section of Hogwarts.

But after browsing for a while, Mike discovered that although there were a large number of books here, the quality was not as good as the restricted book area.

Not to mention anything else, but there are very few books on history and potions compared to the restricted area.

However, what makes Mike happy is that the Black family, as a family that has studied black magic for generations, has far more books on black magic in their collection than in the restricted area of ​​Hogwarts.

Mike rummaged around twice and found what he wanted most during this trip.

How to release the Fire Curse!

Moreover, right next to the Severe Fire Curse, the release methods of the three Unforgivable Curses also lay quietly there.

Mike was so happy that he quickly opened the bag with the Seamless Stretching Charm and used the Floating Charm to make the books about black magic fly neatly into his pocket.

Blake, who was on the other side, frowned immediately when he saw Mike's reaction.

"Mike, I suggest you not to learn those terrible black arts." Black said, "Many of our Black family's ancestors died because of studying black magic!"

Mike ignored Black's advice and nodded perfunctorily before continuing to load the books.

When Blake saw that Mike was ignoring him at all, he stopped talking.