Chapter 157

A few more days passed quickly.

"John, John! Something terrible has happened!"

Early in the morning, Titus found John while clutching a weekly magazine.

"What's this about?"

John asked curiously.

"Look for yourself, someone is deliberately smearing Hermione!"

Titus handed over the magazine; it was "Witch Weekly," which, unlike the official news of the Daily Prophet, leaned more toward gossip.

And today, it published a gossip article titled "The Puppet Master Behind Hogwarts' Genius Boy?", written by Rita Skitt.

【Miss Granger, a plain-looking but ambitious little witch, seems to be playing with the feelings of two boys.】

【Even the 12-year-old genius wizard Merrick has been bewitched by her, and she even shamelessly invited Merrick, who is three years her junior, to her home to spend the summer vacation together.】

【According to relevant sources, she may have concocted a love potion to bewitch Merrick.】

The entire article was filled with malicious speculation and false accusations against Hermione, implying between the lines that she was controlling John's emotions through improper means.

There were two photos above; one was of Harry and John being hugged by Hermione right after the first task ended.

The other was of John holding Hermione just after they came out of the Black Lake that day.

Seeing the article, John frowned, feeling both angry and puzzled.

He silently flipped past that page of the magazine, his fingertips lingering for a moment on the name Rita Skitt.

Hermione had only invited him to her house a few days ago; they were in a corner of the library at the time, and there was no one else nearby.

They hadn't told anyone about this, so how did Rita know?

Last time, she had also eavesdropped on Hagrid's secret as a half-giant when no one was around.

What means was she using to obtain information?

Setting that aside for now, he should go find Hermione.

Looking back, he happened to see Hermione appearing in the Great Hall with Harry and Ron.

She seemed unaware, but people nearby were already pointing at her.

John walked quickly toward Hermione, with Titus following closely behind.

"Morning, John, and Titus, what's wrong?"

Hermione saw John walking over quickly with a frown, her tone filled with concern.

"Hermione, Rita is smearing you in Witch Weekly."

John handed her the magazine; Hermione took it curiously to look, and Harry and Ron leaned in to look as well.

"How dare Rita say such things!?"

Harry was the first to shout after reading it; this was complete nonsense!

That day, Hermione hugging him and John was entirely due to the excitement of passing the dragon challenge, which anyone could understand.

As for using a love potion to bewitch John, that was even more of a load of crap!

Ron also stood up for Hermione, saying, "She's just spreading rumors!"

But after reading it, Hermione gave a disdainful smile.

"Rita can only rely on writing this kind of low-quality slander to grab attention; no wonder her articles are never respectable."

Hermione's mood seemed quite stable, not appearing to be affected at all.

"However... how did she know I invited John?"

Obviously, Hermione had also noticed this detail; neither she nor John had mentioned it to anyone.

There really hadn't been anyone else in that corner of the library that day.

It couldn't be that someone was eavesdropping on them while wearing an Invisibility Cloak, could it?

Hermione and John exchanged a glance, both seeing the confusion in each other's eyes.

But for now, that question could be set aside; the more pressing matter was how to help Hermione dispel the rumors.

Although Hermione didn't care, how could John let her face such baseless attacks alone?

So John's method was to hold Hermione's hand and walk around everywhere every day, using his actions to prove that he wasn't controlled by a love potion.

And Hermione could only blush and let John lead her around the school, showing off.

She seriously suspected that John just wanted to take advantage of her and show off their relationship everywhere.

Although she didn't dislike it...

But it was quite embarrassing.

Especially when they bumped into Professor McGonagall, and the old lady actually gave a rare, teasing smile.

Clearly, she had seen the rumor-mongering article, and seeing them like this, she understood they were using actions to fight back against the rumors, so she didn't stop them.

This made Hermione blush even more, because Rita wasn't wrong about one thing.

She really did have ulterior motives toward John, who was three years younger than her.

It made it seem like she was seducing a minor...

But in fact, Hermione had never thought of John as a child—well, when they first met last year, she did think of him as a child...

Although he often acted like a child, playing tricks, causing trouble, and even stirring up mischief.

But sometimes she would truly forget that John was only 12 years old.

Because after spending a long time together, you could feel the composure and sense of responsibility in John that transcended his age from his speech and behavior, which would make people subconsciously forget his age and see him only as an equal partner.

Hermione: So I'm not some kind of brother-complex! It's just that the person I happen to like hasn't grown up yet...

Ahem, I've digressed.

After John's high-profile actions over the past few days, although the whispering had quieted down quite a bit, the rumors hadn't completely subsided; instead, they were sprouting new branches in the shadows.

Because John was very famous now, many girls also wanted to get close to him.

But they were all blocked by the mountain that was Hermione, so they simply followed Rita's rumors to continue attacking Hermione, even sending curse letters.

Hermione ignored them all.

But when John found out, he used a Retracing Spell to identify the senders one by one, and then sent each of them an even more disgusting curse letter.

For example, if you didn't send this letter to five other friends and family members within three days of receiving it, you would be cursed to grow donkey ears permanently.

And then a chain reaction of students sending curse letters to each other appeared at Hogwarts.

John's prank soon triggered an absurd "curse storm" among the students, until Professor McGonagall found out that John was the culprit and scolded him, both angry and amused.

She made him publicly announce that those curses were fake, which barely quelled the farce.

However, because of this, no one dared to send Hermione curse letters anymore; after all, who knew if John would really come up with a curse.