Chapter 346: Beetle Pin

The Minister looked like he wanted to speak but stopped. Just then, there was a knock on the door, so he took the opportunity to end the conversation and greeted the person outside to come in.

The visitor was Ludo Bagman, who was now the Head of the Department of Magical Games and Sports.

"Ah, Bagman, I'm looking for you to ask about changing the Chairman of the Quidditch Association..."

Harry listened until he was drowsy. In his view, the weakness of the England team couldn't be solved by changing a Chairman.

All morning, except for talking to the Minister for a little while at the beginning (and it ended unhappily), Harry was either dazed, or flipping through the documents the Minister shared with him, or dazed at the documents—that pile of office meeting resolutions, or endless reports. For a new policy, they had to write a draft, then write a special report for each problem that appeared in the draft, perhaps also establish a special research group, and then each member had to write a corresponding special report.

This not only caused great obstacles to the implementation of the policy, but the mountain of documents and sea of meetings was also a kind of torture for the Minister himself. Harry found it hard to understand why anyone was so keen on this job.

However, when he tasted what might be the most perfect omelet he had ever eaten in his life at the Ministry of Magic, Harry suddenly understood this not-so-magical Minister for Magic a little bit.

In the afternoon, the Minister needed to go to Downing Street for a meeting, and Harry suddenly fell into a state of being unsupervised. After slight hesitation, he chose to sit honestly at the table, continuing the work state of "dazed at documents."

The internship for the whole day ended. After Harry returned to school, Luo Nade asked him curiously what he had done.

"Nothing," Harry shrugged. "Just as the Minister for Magic usually does, nothing."

"It seems we are about the same," Luo Nade didn't show a surprised or incomprehensible expression. On the contrary, he looked like he could understand very well. "Doudou read the newspaper all morning, he even shared some with me. In the afternoon he had to accompany the Minister to the Muggles to have a meeting, so I stayed in the Auror Office and continued reading the newspaper."

"Then you are happier than me, I read documents," Harry said with a wry smile. "At least there are pictures in the newspaper."

"I also just know now that although the Ministry of Magic doesn't have many Aurors, it actually has many Hit Wizards," Luo Nade said. "Actually, Hit Wizards are also law enforcement officers, it's just that they catch more petty theft, so they are a head lower than Aurors."

"Hit Wizards can be promoted to become Aurors," Harry nodded. "In other words, if you really can't reach the standard of an Auror, you can also start from being a Hit Wizard."

They chatted for a while, then did homework together, until Harry finally could force Luo Nade to finish the Potions homework, Nawei returned to the dormitory with a face of exhaustion.

"Why did you come back so late, were you in the library?" Luo Nade asked casually. "What did they find for you to read?"

"I guess it's theory, time and space, relative dimensions or something," Harry said casually.

"Snakes," Nawei said weakly. "The Department of Mysteries is renovating a room, it is said that it will be used to raise snakes there, I was helping there."

After a brief trance, Harry instantly realized that it was prepared for Nagini.

"You aren't working overtime, are you?" Luo Nade widened his eyes. "You look so tired."

"Not really, the workers responsible for the renovation left when the time was up, I stayed behind on purpose," Nawei looked at the door vigilantly. "I vaguely heard a piece of news that the Department of Mysteries hides something the Dark Lord wants."

"Are you looking for that thing?" Harry asked. He vaguely felt that the so-called "thing the Dark Lord wants" was just a rumor, and it was just Nagini.

"Yes, but it seems there was no harvest," Nawei sighed. "Many rooms were locked."

After a brief silence, Nawei continued, "I found a room soaking many brains, and a large empty room, inside there was a stone archway with a veil, other than that there was no harvest."

"But why do you want to look for it? And doing such a risky thing on the first day of going to the Ministry of Magic—" Luo Nade said. "Everyone knows Voldemort is finished, he can't come back, why care about those things?"

"No, Voldemort still has the possibility of making a comeback, I have never relaxed my vigilance," Nawei said alertly. "And, who told you that the Dark Lord must refer to Voldemort?"

"What?" Luo Nade looked at Harry unconsciously.

"The Death Eaters seem to want to choose a new Dark Lord. Didn't Harry also say that Voldemort actually cultivated a successor?" Nawei said in a low voice. "Then, what would this person want?"

"Horcrux, there is a 99% probability it is a Horcrux," Nawei said firmly.

"Uh, I have to correct one point," Harry scratched his head embarrassedly. "The existing Horcruxes have all surfaced. Lu Xiusi, Bella, Regulus, Sineipu, and Hofa each keep one Horcrux. The diary is at Torchwood, nominally belonging to the student group, and there is also the ring in the hands of the Phoenix Society, a total of seven pieces, that's it."

"But Voldemort could also have made eight or even nine," Nawei said.

"First, Voldemort is very superstitious about the number 'seven'," Harry explained. "Second, he remade a Horcrux after his resurrection, just one. This is because he calculated that the number just reached seven, otherwise he could have continued to make them."

"How can you be sure he didn't?" Nawei shook his head. "Assume Voldemort thinks nine is also a magical number, after all, the Chinese people like nine. Then he secretly made two other Horcruxes, one of which is hidden in the Ministry of Magic, this is very possible."

Harry didn't want to make things complicated, because no matter how many Horcruxes Voldemort had, he couldn't be resurrected, so he suggested: "You should first think about who made this rumor and what his purpose is."

"It was said casually by a renovation worker. I asked him at the time where this news came from," Nawei said. "He said, after he received the order to work in the Department of Mysteries, a friend he hadn't contacted for a long time found him—that person is a Death Eater. He said this is the Dark Lord's mission. He had prepared to go to the Department of Mysteries to steal something before, but he was troubled because he hadn't found an opportunity."

"How long before?" Harry keenly grasped this time modifier. "Is this 'Dark Lord's order' from Voldemort himself, or his successor?"

"Perhaps it's Voldemort himself," Nawei touched his chin. "According to that, indeed, perhaps it's not a Horcrux, or at most it's something Voldemort intended to make into a Horcrux."

"Yes, if Voldemort really wants something, he will come to grab it," Luo Nade echoed.

"It could also be some kind of weapon, the Ministry of Magic developed some kind of powerful weapon, hidden in the Department of Mysteries, Voldemort wants to steal it to deal with Deng Buliduo," Harry recalled Voldemort's mental state. Indeed, the question he thought about most often was "how to defeat and kill Deng Buliduo."

"Deng Buliduo!" Nawei suddenly clapped his hands. "If there is anyone who knows Voldemort very well, and even knows things that Death Eaters don't know, that is Deng Buliduo."

"So?"

"That pin, the Time-Turner," Nawei hurriedly took off the pin Deng Buliduo left him from his shirt. "Perhaps what he wanted to say was this matter, because I have seen it in the Department of Mysteries, all Time-Turners are stored in a glass cabinet there."

The three people stared at this pin for a moment. Harry didn't see anything, could only shrug helplessly. "Perhaps Deng Buliduo just wanted to give you a hint on the Ascending Spell? Just like my Snitch, it was empty after opening, I could only suspect he wanted to give me a lesson in political means."

"Great, he wanted to give me a lesson in fairy tales," Luo Nade teased. "The old bee couldn't get rid of the habit of being a riddle-maker until he died."

Harry didn't take this matter to heart. In his consciousness, the most important thing in the Department of Mysteries was the TARDIS. They must have put everything in the TARDIS.

After Harry finished his homework, he wrote a letter to Sirius. He wanted to ask if Tonks had found anything like a weapon in the TARDIS. After he sent the letter on Saturday morning, he received a reply on Saturday night.

"I will come to pick you up early tomorrow morning, we can look for it together in Gilneas. Also, if you plan to attend the party in the afternoon, you had better tell Sineipu."

Harry knew he was referring to Hofa attending the meeting. He indeed hadn't been there for a long time. Since the last time they agreed to rely on Nagini to choose the new Dark Lord, Harry felt that according to Hofa's persona, he should be sulking and looking for Horcruxes himself, so he hadn't been to the Death Eater meeting again. He even suspected that this meeting had lost its practical significance and had become the kind of time-wasting routine meeting that the Minister for Magic had to attend every week.

With a feeling of curiosity and anxiety, Harry knocked on the door of the Headmaster's office. He wanted to ask what else Sineipu needed Hofa to do.

"You ignored one thing, Potter," Sineipu said slowly. "Although I, Regulus, and Bella already know about Saruman, Lu Xiusi and Hofa don't know, and they don't know that we know. We still need to formally announce this matter at the meeting, yes, and William also needs to know."

"Uh, but didn't you say that my Occlumency is still a bit lacking?" Harry asked.

"This is just a foreshadowing. It's me telling the story to others, you just go as Hofa," Sineipu handed him a few pages of parchment. "If you happen to plan to go tomorrow, I will tell it tomorrow, because some details of this story need Hofa to help supplement." ===== CHAPTER 347 =====