Chapter 161: A Year-Long Vacation

To a certain extent, Harry, living at Downton, was also that kind of young master who knew nothing of the hardships of the world. Therefore, he didn't care that some of the things among the trash could continue to be used with just a "Reparo," but instead, following Zhang Qiu's suggestion, he packed everything she didn't need into a bundle and then cast the Reductor Curse.

"Damn it, why doesn't the Reductor Curse reduce the weight?" Harry struggled to hoist the bundle onto his back.

"Probably because of the conservation of mass and energy." Zhang Qiu's tone carried a hint of uncertainty. "I've heard my martial uncle mention similar things, for example, the Undetectable Extension Charm."

"Oh, right. That storage bag of yours, with so many things inside, isn't it heavy?" Harry asked curiously.

"The total weight inside the storage bag is positively correlated with its external weight; my martial uncle said it follows a certain function..." Zhang Qiu shrugged. "He has studied these things very deeply, but my suggestion is, when you feel it's heavy, just add another Levitation Charm."

"Forgot about that." Harry gave her a thumbs-up, then led the floating bundle and, draped in his Invisibility Cloak, headed toward the eighth floor.

When Harry was dragging Zhang Qiu's bag of trash alone on the Hogwarts stairs, his mood was very peculiar. Before this, he had almost never done such—Harry took a long time to think of the word—such domestic things for someone else.

He couldn't stop himself from recalling Zhang Qiu's face; most of the time she was smiling faintly, sometimes she would be serious, sometimes distressed, but she seemed never to have been angry. He thought again of the trash in the bag: from the shattered plates, he imagined Zhang Qiu eating in small bites; from the crooked snack rack, he imagined Zhang Qiu lazily curled up on the sofa; from the torn pantyhose, he imagined Zhang Qiu blushing and softly cursing "Wo kao." He felt this Chinese modal particle was very cute.

When Harry arrived at the eighth floor, he finally put away his thoughts and told himself he still had serious business to do.

I need a trash room, Harry thought hard, and a rusty, large iron door gradually appeared on the wall.

He tentatively pushed open this large door; inside were piled various types of discarded items, and four huge trash cans of different colors were placed side by side. All of this was exactly the same as the trash room Harry had seen in the Muggle World.

Harry took out a Disillusionment Charm and stuck it on the trash can, while he himself, draped in the Invisibility Cloak, slowly pushed it toward the Chamber of Secrets. When he walked into the Chamber, the two of them were happy to discover that this trash can carried an Undetectable Extension Charm.

The subsequent work was much faster: tidying up things, cleaning up traces, setting up a pitch-black, scary attack scene, and then sending Justin a pass for exemption from class that went straight to the summer vacation.

"Alright, next is waiting for Tang Nade to come." Facing the cleared-out Chamber, Zhang Qiu said softly, "He should check the basilisk corpse, but he will leave after checking."

"Right, but during the Christmas holiday, someone from the Ministry of Magic might come." Harry recalled the deduction he had made in his second year. "Deng Buliduo will bring people to visit, perhaps he will attribute the credit for killing the basilisk to Tang Nade; this is to persuade the Ministry of Magic not to send any special envoys to the school."

"I see. Then you should go back first." Zhang Qiu said softly, "Leave the rest to me."

When Harry walked into the time machine and suddenly felt that he should stay by Zhang Qiu's side to accompany her, the Doctor had already smiled and pulled down the operating lever, and the TARDIS sped away amidst a whistling sound.

The TARDIS stopped on a sunny day in March; the spring chill was biting, a temperature where Harry could barely avoid shivering even after taking off his Invisibility Cloak. He walked through the gradually familiar corridor and once again descended into the cold, damp Chamber of Secrets.

Zhang Qiu was sitting on a sofa, facing a huge square box, frantically shaking her hands. Harry distinguished it carefully before realizing it was a television. He walked closer and discovered that Zhang Qiu was holding a control device full of buttons, and on the television, a red ball-man with a fierce look was jumping up and down.

"Oh Harry, you're here." Zhang Qiu's eyes were still fixed on the television. "You sit down first, wait until I finish this level."

Harry sat down beside her and asked curiously, "What is this?"

"NES, also called the Famicom, but this is the magic-special version." Her tone carried a hint of pride. "My martial uncle also sent me ten extra limited-edition cartridges; the one you see is one of them."

"So..." Harry tried hard to understand her words, and suddenly he saw the words "Game Clear" jump out on the screen, and he suddenly realized: "This is a game console?"

"That's right, want to try it together?" Zhang Qiu handed over another controller. "Almighty Action X has a two-player mode; do you want blue or orange?"

"Wait, wait, wait." Harry didn't take it; his thinking was still stuck on Christmas Eve. "Let's talk about serious business first."

"What serious business do you want to hear?" Zhang Qiu's expression looked a bit confused; after all, she hadn't done any serious business for the past two months.

"I mean, wasn't that day waiting for Tang Nade to come down to the Chamber?" Harry scratched his head. "What happened afterward?"

"Oh..." Zhang Qiu recalled. "Later I wasn't in a hurry to rearrange it; after all, you also said that Ministry of Magic officials might come once too; they seemed to have come after Christmas."

"After you left, Na Wei came once, but at that time I was worried that Deng Buliduo would bring people to visit at any time, so I persuaded him to leave quickly. Then I waited for a few more days, I guess. Deng Buliduo brought people from the Ministry of Magic down, three men and one woman; that woman looked fat and foolish, wearing a pink suit, looking like a toad." Zhang Qiu stuck out her tongue.

"It's okay, the curse is suppressed in the little finger. There is at least two years before it starts to spread." Deng Buliduo said calmly. "I still have at least two years to live."

Harry nodded slightly, and Zhang Qiu continued: "Then the Chamber belonged to me. I summarized why I had been so anxious and decadent before; it was because the pressure was too great. So I wrote to my martial uncle, asking him if there was any way to dispatch pressure after class and pass the time."

"And then he sent you a game console?" Harry remarked with slight shock. "He really is a person hard to understand."

"He told me that games and the Doctor are the best match." Zhang Qiu shrugged. "This is the educational philosophy of a genius."

"So these one, two, three months, you've been playing games?" Harry leaned over to take a look; behind the screen was still the combination of a bed and a desk.

"Strictly speaking, only six hours a day playing games, and another six hours studying magic." Zhang Qiu raised an eyebrow. "I think my arrangement is very reasonable."

"Also true." Harry felt that there was nothing wrong with her being like this; now he probably understood a little. Perhaps for Zhang Qiu, finding the gifts of fate was indeed an important thing, but a year-long vacation without anyone to supervise was also an important reason why she chose to stay in the second year.

"There's no attack today, relax, Harry." Zhang Qiu smiled and patted his shoulder, taking a bottle of pumpkin juice from the cabinet nearby.

"Alright, let me see, how should this be operated?" Harry picked up the controller, and Zhang Qiu selected the words "Almighty Brothers" on the screen.

Playing games, drinking tea and chatting, exchanging magic, the two spent a relaxed and happy day; they tacitly didn't mention anything about Fu Di Mo.

April 17th, the day scheduled to attack Pei Nei Luo Ke Li Wa Te, Harry came to the Chamber again. He specifically reminded Zhang Qiu that Hermione and Tang Nade were only one corner away from the attack scene, and she must be careful not to be seen by them.

However, for established facts, time would not easily let them change. During that period, for an hour before and after, only Pei Nei Luo turned into this corridor. The two successfully ambushed her using an enlarged double-sided mirror, and then quickly cleaned up the scene.

Just when Harry and Zhang Qiu had just draped on the Invisibility Cloak, Tang Nade led Hermione and turned over.

The two held their breath, watching Tang Nade step forward to check Pei Nei Luo's situation, and then watched him protect Hermione as they left. Perhaps because Tang Nade's attention was entirely on Hermione, he didn't notice the invisible people standing by the wall at all.

Having completed the attack that was most easily discovered, Harry's tense heart suddenly relaxed. Almost as soon as he entered the passage to the Chamber, Harry let out a long breath and said with a smile: "Now we can relax, the attacks are all over."

"Did you forget? There is one last attack." Zhang Qiu corrected his statement. "The last time was someone disguised as Na Wei attacking Hermione; I still have to prepare a batch of Polyjuice Potion."

"Ah, right." Harry recalled. "The bottle the Doctor gave you, last time it was drunk up to disguise as Tang Nade."

"So I went to steal Snape's materials later." Zhang Qiu shrugged. "I have to find time to brew it; this thing takes a month—but there's no rush, the last attack is in June."

"So now, are we continuing to play games?" Harry remembered that before leaving, he had glanced at Zhang Qiu's desk; the opened book had only been flipped a few pages compared to a month ago.

"Of course, I've been playing this Dragon Hunter Z during this time..."

Dragon Hunter Z is a game designed for four-player cooperation; in the case of two people playing, the difficulty is a bit high. Harry found it hard to imagine how Zhang Qiu had finished nearly half of the process alone.

Time passed quickly amidst laughter and play; almost in the blink of an eye, Harry found it was dinner time, and his stomach also started to growl.

Thanks to the martial law system currently being implemented by the school, Harry and Zhang Qiu could sneak to the kitchen and dine there. The house-elves brought them a French oven-roasted spiced spring chicken, served with lemon, cherry tomatoes, and roasted garlic, as well as a pot of apple pie that was sweet enough to have no friends, and freshly squeezed raspberry juice. On the table was also a plate of cold salad made of cucumbers, tomatoes, carrots, and beets; Harry thought these seasonal vegetables were rich in nutrients and he could eat more, while Zhang Qiu denounced this pile of things as "dark cuisine" and didn't taste a single bite.

The next morning, before leaving, Harry said with a smile that this day was also very happy.

Zhang Qiu sighed low. "For you, it's playing with me for a week in a row. But for me, I've been counting on this day every month."

When he heard this, Harry was a bit down at first, but remembering her game progress, he couldn't help but shake his head; she still lived quite happily when he wasn't there. ===== CHAPTER 162 =====