Draco's instincts had always been sharp, and this time was no exception.
Right where Draco's gaze had just swept over, the voices of two people suddenly rang out in a strange way...
"Harry... do you think there is a chance that Malfoy noticed us?"
Something extremely odd was happening on this battlefield. On a hillside where, at a glance, it should have been impossible for anyone to hide, human voices had mysteriously appeared.
And from that position, the entire battlefield could be seen clearly. In other words, it was an excellent observation point.
If Ginny had heard that voice, she definitely would have recognized it at once. Or rather, it belonged to someone she knew very well.
Because the owner of that voice was none other than Fred Weasley, who was supposed to be somewhere safe, and whom Mr. and Mrs. Weasley were worrying over.
And not only that, from what he said, it was clear that this seemingly empty spot actually held one more person.
That person was Harry Potter himself, the Harry Potter Fred Weasley had just mentioned...
After getting no response, Fred assumed the other person had not heard him clearly, so he lowered his voice and called again.
"Harry?"
"Ah... Fred, did you say something just now?"
"Honestly, Harry, this is not the time to be spacing out. We are too close to the battlefield. If someone spots us, do not expect me to be able to deal with those Death Eaters."
"They probably will not. We are under the Invisibility Cloak. It is not easy to find us."
Harry Potter replied absentmindedly.
His tone and expression made it sound like he was brushing Fred off, but those words were indeed exactly what Harry Potter truly thought.
If it had been back when he had just gotten the Invisibility Cloak, Harry Potter might still have worried about being discovered.
But after using it so many times, and after successfully hiding from so many professors, Harry Potter had come to trust this Invisibility Cloak, which might well have been a relic left by his father.
So when it came to Fred's worries and the trouble that might come from it, Harry Potter had not thought about it at all, which was why the topic annoyed him.
Or rather, his attention was not on whether their whereabouts would be exposed, nor on how things were going with Ron and George.
It was on the three figures in the sky... no, to be more precise, Harry Potter was fixated on the red figure clinging tightly to Draco.
And the intimate way she held him while speaking...
...
Although Harry and the others had arrived later, luckily, they had come just in time to witness the aerial battle from earlier.
It had to be said, even Fred Weasley, who had once lost to Draco's wand and had already experienced Draco's extraordinary flying skill up close, and who had thought he would never be shocked by him again, was still so stunned by what he had just seen that he could not close his mouth.
Was it pure wishful thinking to imagine he could ever beat him?
No matter how much he disliked Draco, he could not force himself to claim that he could do what Draco had just done.
More importantly, Draco had apparently protected his sister as well...
Fred Weasley did not know exactly what had happened, but he could not deny that fact.
Watching Ginny flying through the air, clearly still a little excited, Fred's eyes filled with complicated emotions that were hard to describe.
"If that is the case, then how am I supposed to still treat you like an enemy?"
Fred let out a bitter laugh, without making excuses or trying to deny it.
This was different from the basilisk incident before. Back then, because Dumbledore had deliberately concealed the details, and Draco himself could not explain everything clearly about how he had fought the basilisk, simply hearing that Draco had defeated it was never enough to make Fred Weasley and the others accept it.
That was probably the result of their long standing prejudice and hostility toward the Malfoys.
But this time was different. Fred had seen with his own eyes that Draco had protected Ginny under the attacks of those Death Eaters.
It could not be said that his opinion had changed completely, but if they continued targeting Draco after this, then they really would seem petty and ungrateful.
Fred Weasley might like pranks at Hogwarts, but there was nothing seriously wrong with his moral compass.
Besides.
To put it bluntly, for Fred, Ron getting hurt and Ginny getting hurt were two entirely different matters...
Ahem.
In any case.
Trying to shake off the tangled emotions in his heart, Fred turned to Harry beside him.
"Are you okay, Harry? You look awful. Did it scare you?"
"..."
To be fair.
With blood raining down from above, and corpses falling at their feet with terror still frozen on their faces, anyone who saw that would probably look pale.
Even Fred himself felt sick from the blood soaked air, let alone Harry Potter, who was younger than he was...
Convinced he understood why Harry Potter looked so bad, and after trying to comfort him, Fred Weasley then looked excitedly at the Death Eaters who had been driven back by Draco alone.
"We won! And not only that, the Order of the Phoenix has arrived too. If that is the case, everyone should be safe now."
"...But he killed people, did he not?"
"Huh? What did you say, Harry?"
"There was no need for him to strike that hard, was there? Not if he is really that powerful."
Whether it was because Harry Potter had spoken too softly, or because Fred was too worked up at the moment, he had not heard clearly. He only caught the words about killing in broken fragments.
As for that.
Thinking Harry was simply overwhelmed by what he had seen, Fred could not help letting out a sigh.
"Yeah, it really is incredible. If I had not seen it with my own eyes, I would have found it hard to believe that he is also a Hogwarts student, and that he could take down so many enemies without even changing expression."
"..."
Perhaps because Draco had protected Ginny, Fred's view of him had changed enough that he could accept the fact that Draco had killed people, as well as the result of it, with surprising ease.
Of course, it was also possible that it came from the fact that they had grown up in the wizarding world.
The strong prey on the weak.
That was the true underlying rule of the wizarding world.
But judging from Harry Potter's expression, he clearly did not agree. He just did not say anything in opposition.
Instead, he kept staring at the figure in the sky with a strange, unreadable look...
So you... like that kind of person too?
Suddenly.
The lightning shaped scar on Harry Potter's forehead began to throb faintly again.
"Urgh!"
"Harry!"
Harry Potter bent over and covered his scar with one hand, then forcefully shoved away Fred when he tried to step forward and support him.
And without either of them noticing, beneath Harry Potter's concealed gaze, a flicker of green light flashed past.
...
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