"No matter the truth, I cannot let them down." Her knuckles had already turned white from her own grip.
Hermione slowly walked over to Draco's seat, trying her best to sit down as nonchalantly as possible.
"Hm?" Sensing the movement around him, Draco glanced at her, and then his gaze did not shift away.
Hermione's heart tightened immediately. "Could there be a flaw somewhere?" She felt her entire body tense up.
"Mm, the Dean is truly impressive; you can't even tell this robe was stained with ink." Draco had been examining her robe all along. "By the way, didn't that Potter come back with you?" he continued to ask.
"He is still being lectured by S... the Professor." Hermione breathed a sigh of relief and replied. The name 'Snape' had almost slipped out, causing her heart, which had just settled, to leap back into her throat, but fortunately, she corrected it in time.
"Our Dean certainly 'cares deeply' for Potter," Draco said with a smirk. Recalling the fantasies of fujoshi from his past life, he couldn't help but get goosebumps.
He himself was, after all, a victim of the BL world.
"How about this? I'm sure you don't have the appetite to eat anymore. Shall we go back to the common room?" After teasing himself in his mind, Draco asked Hermione.
"Sure." Hermione tried to speak as little as possible, which suited her intention perfectly; it would be easier to fish for information when there were fewer people around.
Draco felt like his brain was about to explode, so he decided to relax. "Training" Pansy should be a good way to unwind, and he felt it was necessary to test his teaching results today.
Their departure didn't attract any attention; most students' focus remained on the food in front of them.
They turned through various corridors and finally arrived beside an empty, damp stone wall. Passing through here would lead to the Slytherin common room.
"Pure-blood," Draco said.
A stone door hidden within the wall slowly opened. Draco strode in, and Hermione followed closely behind.
This was Hermione's first time in the Slytherin common room, and perhaps her last. It was a long, low basement with walls and ceilings made of rough stone. Round, greenish lamps were hung from the ceiling by chains. Beneath the beautifully carved mantelpiece in front of them, a fire crackled and popped. Perhaps it was too early; most students were still eating in the Great Hall, and now, apart from the two of them, there was no one else. The light from the fireplace cast the silhouettes of Hermione and Draco.
"Old rules." Draco approached Hermione and said to her.
"What is he doing?" Hermione felt her face flush like a boiled crab. Only then did she recall that Draco and Pansy's relationship had always been very close, and at this thought, a strange pang of sourness arose in her heart.
"Hmm, your face is so red, do you have a fever?" Draco reached his hand toward Hermione's forehead. "No, the temperature is normal." He examined Hermione for a moment before saying, "I'm not falling for your tricks; pretending to be sick is useless, and this sort of thing cannot be taken lightly." As he said this, he actually reached out toward her.
"What on earth is he doing? He's actually going to force himself on me?" Hermione felt as if her heart was about to explode. A teenage girl would naturally be clueless about such things, so it was normal for her to let her imagination run wild.
"Fine." As if realising something, Draco withdrew his hand. "I actually forgot you didn't have your wand." Draco stroked his chin, scanned the area, and then walked over to pick up an ordinary wand, presumably left behind by either Crabbe or Goyle.
"Make do with this." Draco tossed it over to Hermione. "Stop spacing out." Seeing Hermione standing there, dumbfounded after catching the wand, Draco was instantly annoyed.
"What are you waiting for?" he asked.
"Expelliarmus!" A red light suddenly erupted from the tip of Draco's wand, shooting sharply toward Hermione.
"Protego!" Hermione thought she had been discovered, her heart a tangled mess, but she still instinctively cast the Shield Charm.
The spell was deflected, shooting into the flames of the fireplace and vanishing into nothingness.
"Not bad." Draco's previously furrowed brow relaxed, and his tone sounded quite pleased. "Significant progress," he said.
Hermione finally breathed a sigh of relief. Now she understood the reason for his earlier behaviour, and she felt even more flushed thinking about her own embarrassing thoughts just now.
"Isn't this the perfect opportunity to bring up the topic?" Hermione had a flash of inspiration and said in a complaining tone, "But it wouldn't be of any use if we encountered the Basilisk." Her heart pounded like a drum being struck heavily, fearing she would hear something like, "It's fine, it's controlled by me anyway."
Draco looked at Hermione with a strange expression and said, "You're actually worried about the Basilisk? Didn't you always say that withDumbledore and me around to protect you, you weren't worried at all?"
Upon hearing this, Hermione felt a wave of regret. She felt she had been too rash and began to tense up again, fearing she would be exposed.
However, Draco was just commenting. He continued, "Indeed, if we really encountered the Basilisk, these wouldn't be of much use." He seemed to think of something headache-inducing, took a breath, and said, "The Basilisk's skin likely has armour-like properties, similar to dragon hide, capable of reflecting spells cast at it. Only its eyes and mouth are the weak points in its defence." He shook his head. "Although I'm reluctant to admit it, facing it, a wizard might only be able to succeed with physical damage; slightly weaker spells might just be rebounded."
"But you don't need to worry. The Basilisk only targets non-pure-blood witches and wizards; you are very safe."
Hermione's mood was a mix of happiness and disappointment. She was happy because, judging by this answer, Draco was not the one controlling the Basilisk. She was disappointed that she hadn't found the truth. Still, she asked, "Then how come that one from... the Weasley family was also petrified?"
Draco eyed Hermione suspiciously. "You're acting a bit strange today. You usually never care about these things, do you?" However, he continued, "There must be other reasons." Draco's answer was vague, which made Hermione suspicious again.
"How would he know there are other reasons? Could it be..." Hermione didn't want to continue down that line of thought, and she had clearly aroused suspicion, so she had to change the subject.
The back-and-forth went on peacefully enough, but Hermione felt her doubts deepening. Draco's answers were full of contradictions, and Hermione felt she was further from the truth than ever. She even let her imagination run wild: "Is he hiding things even from those closest to him?"
Suddenly, footsteps came from outside the door; it must be the other students returning. Hermione estimated the time; the effects of the Polyjuice Potion were about to wear off. She had to find an excuse to leave. This attempt to fish for information had not only yielded no results but had left Hermione even more confused.
Just as Hermione was about to find an excuse to leave, an unexpected event occurred.
"What did you just say?" Draco stopped a female student who had just entered and asked.
"I said I heard that Professor Lockhart is near the girls' bathroom. He said he seems to have found clues about the Basilisk there." The female student wore an expression of adoration. Lockhart was now like a saviour working for the welfare of the people, having given up his rare Christmas holiday to risk his life for the students' safety.
A male teacher wandering around the girls' bathroom was certainly abnormal enough, so he had to find a reasonable excuse.
"The opportunity has arrived." Draco felt a surge of excitement; Riddle was finally going to make a move. Then, he held Hermione's shoulders and said, "I have something urgent to attend to right now. You stay here and don't go anywhere."
Human imagination is powerful. Before the truth is known, any small action can lead people to invent a "truth" that is a thousand miles off the mark. At this moment, in Hermione's eyes, Draco was like Achilles whose heel had been exposed, desperately trying to cover his weakness. Her heart tightened again.
However, she still forced herself to remain calm and nodded, saying, "Okay."
Draco stood up immediately and rushed out the door, but in Hermione's eyes, the excitement on his face took on a different meaning.
"No, I have to stop him," Hermione told herself. "Professor Lockhart is there, too."
After a while, once Draco had gone far away, she hurriedly left the Slytherin common room. She didn't even have time to change her clothes back. She feared that if she were any later, there would be another victim. She didn't think at all about reporting it to other teachers because Lockhart was there, and she trusted him.
Perhaps she also had a little selfish motive, hoping that if someone could turn back from the wrong path, only one or two people would know about his repentance, so he wouldn't be expelled.
Hermione walked through dark corridors. The walls of these corridors still flickered with the words left behind when the Basilisk came out to harm the students. Her heart was extremely anxious. She walked to the door of Moaning Myrtle's bathroom. Suddenly, she heard a series of syllables that were both familiar and strange; it was Draco's voice.
Intuition told her she should memorise these. As she committed them to memory, she recalled that these syllables seemed to be the strange phrases Harry had spoken on stage back then. This made her even more confused: "Is Harry also involved in this?" She shook her head, believing it was just a coincidence; Harry should be being lectured by Snape right now.
Not long after, the sound stopped. She rushed into the bathroom and found Moaning Myrtle sitting on the tank of the toilet in the furthest stall, shivering.
Hermione had originally thought that ghosts wouldn't have the emotion of fear.
"The third one!" Moaning Myrtle's voice sounded extremely weak. "You are the third person to come here today." Her voice evoked fear; she seemed to be recalling a very bad memory.
"Where are they now?" Hermione couldn't help but ask. She needed to hurry. If it were usual times, she might have chosen to flatter Moaning Myrtle with a couple of compliments to extract information.
Moaning Myrtle pointed to the sink in front of her. Hermione hurried over. The sink looked very ordinary. She examined it inside and out, up and down, not even sparing the water pipes underneath.
"This tap never runs with water." For some reason, Moaning Myrtle's tone suddenly became cheerful.
"What about the two people from just now?"
Moaning Myrtle's face was filled with fear again, and she whispered, "Both of them said some things to this tap that I couldn't understand... and then..." Moaning Myrtle seemed to think of something, let out a shriek, rose into the air, turned around, and dove headfirst into the toilet, splashing water onto Hermione, and then vanished.
Hermione had no choice. She knew she couldn't get any more valuable clues from Moaning Myrtle. So, she closed her eyes, took a breath, and began to try to imitate the sounds she had just heard.
This sound was very strange, just like the hissing sound a snake makes.
Instantly, the tap emitted a dazzling white light and began to spin rapidly. Then, the sink moved as well. They watched as the sink slowly disappeared from view, revealing a very large pipe that could accommodate a person crawling inside.
Would a Gryffindor be afraid when facing danger? Of course! No one is afraid of danger, but would they shrink back because of it? The answer is also very obvious.
Hermione crawled into the pipe without hesitation.
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