Chapter 343: “A Girl and Time”

Sean didn’t wake up his roommate. He put on his clothes and walked towards the common room. The first thing he met was a petite silver-haired girl.

It was Stephanie, who is now in fifth grade.

She was different from the cold character he knew in the past, she was wearing thick bear pajamas, and her bright silver waist-length hair was lightly tied into a ponytail. However, it’s not just she’s different in terms of looks; her face also carries fear and shock that doesn’t fit her cute image.

The grievances between the two have disappeared now. Sean disliked Stephanie, who approached him with unknown intentions initially, and the gift she gave him was used to monitor him, making him very unhappy.

However, Stephanie is helping Grindelwald, and she is now the only known direct student of Grindelwald. With the continuous occurrence of major incidents later, Sean’s dislike for Stephanie was nothing.

He needs to treat her like an ordinary student. Sean waved his hands casually and walked straight toward the common room. He was going to ask the professors about the situation.

Originally, Stephanie pursed when she saw Sean. However, she saw that the boy who used to dismiss her waved at her with a normal expression. She turned her head quickly to ensure she was the only one around.

Under Stephanie’s gold-rimmed glasses, her pale blue eyes became as black as a starry night. She took off her glasses, and the struggle in her eyes gradually turned into firmness. On the other side, Sean was about to walk out of the common room, but his forward steps were interrupted by a voice.

“Sea…Mr. Wallup, you’re talking to me?”

Sean looked back and saw Stephanie talking to herself, but her usual unapproachable expression had disappeared. Although there is still no fluctuation in her expression, the voice can be heard. She was a little embarrassed and a little scared.

Sean paused and shrugged, “Yeah, as you can tell. But I’m in a hurry. I’m going to find the professor.”

Stephanie squeezed her hands hidden under her sleeves tightly, and her tone was even a little cheerful, “Soon. Your doubts will be answered…”

Stephanie replied, and then, as if she was worried that Sean would repent, she walked over quickly. With a flash of her bright silver low ponytail, she quickly walked up to Sean and looked up at him.

Her behavior hasn’t changed at all.

When he first entered Hogwarts, she was a little shorter than Sean. More than two years later, Stephanie was almost half a head shorter than Sean. Sean took half a step back.

Just a sign that she doesn’t get so close.

Stephanie bit her lip slightly, but she passed Sean and walked to the largest stone wall in the common room. There is the wall where the passageway is located. There is nothing but some potted plants and hanging paintings.

Stephanie walked up to the stone wall, closed her eyes, and started walking back and forth. This action made Sean’s eyes tremble. You should do this when you want to enter the Room of Requirements.

In the Ravenclaw common room, the only stone wall crawled up, and a wooden door appeared on the wall.

“So it’s you…” Sean narrowed his eyes.

Stephanie turned her head to look at him, then nodded slightly, “It’s me. You should have gone to Helena.”

As if she was worried about something, she added, “I didn’t follow you, but you know that there is someone who is one step ahead of you. Only Helena knows about this.”

Sean showed a rather strange expression. He didn’t expect that the person who entered the Ravenclaw chamber first was Stephanie.

And yesterday, Helena said someone would meet him and give him something in person.

What would Stephanie want to do toward him? This made Sean a little confused.

There is no conflict of interest between the two and no deep hatred. It’s just that Sean simply didn’t like people who approached him with different, unknown intentions from the beginning. Apart from helping Grindelwald monitor him back then, Stephanie did nothing to hurt him.

However, why is she helping him now?

Stephanie stood before the door, “In a few minutes, other students will come out. Some things are not convenient to talk about here; shall we go inside?”

“I promise I won’t hurt you. No one can open the door in the Ravenclaw common room except for permission from the Room of Requirement.” She added again.

Sean was silent for a moment, then finally nodded. Stephanie left Sean with her back and walked in before him. When Sean also walked in, the door sank back slightly until it disappeared without a trace.

Inside the room, Sean saw a bedroom with extremely simple decorations.

All the furnishings in the room were small, even the bed. Sean estimated that he could just stretch his legs when he lay on it. The biggest thing in the room was a cushion that was big enough for people to sink into. To be precise, It’s a beanbag.

Stephanie seemed to use this room to relax. She looked around and finally waved.

A velvet armchair appeared in the bedroom, and Stephanie pulled the beanbag over and sank herself into it. Sean went to the chair and sat down, and Stephanie looked up at him with an inexplicable look in her dark eyes.

After silence, the girl finally said, “You should have discovered that yesterday, October 27th, Thursday, only had four hours.”

Sean nodded, “My watch is not broken, but how do you know?”

“I found Ravenclaw’s Chamber of Secrets at the end of my second year. She left a lot of information, including the description of this situation.” Stephanie replied.

At the end of second grade, that’s before he started school.

Seeing that Sean didn’t speak, Stephanie continued, “Someone has traveled a very long distance in time and space, and that person may have returned to the very long past. Maybe ten years, or even a hundred years. Because of this, it caused the current time and space to become disordered.”

Sean frowned slightly and asked, “As far as I know, the only one that can travel in time and space is someone with the Time Turner, and the Time Turner should not be enough to provide the power to go back to such a long time ago.”

Stephanie nodded, “Yes, the common Time Turner can go back to the past five hours at most, and the Ministry of Magic has limited the Turner to avoid accidents caused by exceeding five hours. I don’t know who did this level of long-distance travel, but this change couldn’t have happened without any cause.”

She wrapped her arms around her knees on the beanbag, “I had access to the Time Turner files of the Ministry of Magic’s Department of Mysteries, which mention similar incidents.”

“There was a wizard named Eloise Mintumble. She was a person in the Department of Mysteries. She used a Time Turner to go back in time for an experiment but died because the duration was more than the limit.”

“In the experiment of returning to the past, Eloise was trapped in 1402 for five days. When she finally returned to the present, her body was aged by five centuries and damaged beyond repair, and she passed away at St. Mungo Hospital. Her travels changed the life trajectory of everyone she met in the past. At least 25 descendants disappeared from modern times and became “un-born”.”

“In addition, there are some worrying signs that past time has also been disturbed. Her return to the modern day lasted two and a half days on Tuesday and only four hours on Thursday.”

Stephanie’s words set off a storm in Sean’s heart. This is an extremely serious space-time paradox.

He asked, “Are you sure? This is different from the principle of the Time Turner. A wizard who returns to the past should live until the time when she uses the converter. Even if she really returned to five hundred years ago, she would just come back after traveling there for five days.”

Stephanie shook her head, “I don’t know about that. Theoretically, your words sound logical, but the entire wizarding world has too little research on time travel.”

Sean couldn’t help but fall into deep thought, his brows tightly knit together. This is a conclusion that contradicts one of his views all the time.

It’s not that Sean has never been curious about the Time Turner. He has also studied it carefully. Based on the experience of the trio in the original plot, Time Turner complies with Novikov’s self-consistency principle.

In other words, there are no multiple timelines, parallel universes, or grandparent paradoxes. You can go back in time, but you won’t change the course of history, as the world’s final outcome has been established.

But now, Stephanie’s information directly contradicts Sean’s idea, and there were already facts to testify. On October 27th, about twenty hours had directly disappeared.

Stephanie looked at Sean, who was frowning and thinking. She tilted her head and said nothing but showed a relaxed look on her face.

After a long time, Sean raised his head, “Any more information?”

Stephanie buried her head to hide the excitement in her eyes and said softly, “There are two pieces of news. First, there is no Time-Turner at the Ministry of Magic.”

“No more?” Sean asked suspiciously.

“Yes, that’s why I was able to ask about the time travel accident files. I don’t know when, but all the Time-Turners in the Ministry of Magic have been destroyed, and the Department of Mysteries doesn’t keep these top-secret files like before.” Stephanie said.

Sean thought of the previous conversation with Percy.

“Not even one?”

“At least in the Ministry of Magic, there is none left. As far as I know, every Time Turner will be registered by the Ministry of Magic, whether borrowed or worn out, etc. Everything is well documented.”

Sean thought of the person who traveled long distances in time; maybe it was related to that person.

Stephanie went on to talk about the second news, “I suspect that this matter may have something to do with Professor Dumbledore.”

“Professor Dumbledore? Why do you say that?”

Stephanie’s eyes showed a trace of struggle; her relaxed expression had just now disappeared, and her lips were already pursed. Doubt appeared in Sean’s eyes.

The room was silent again, but this time the atmosphere was much more calm. Finally, Stephanie took a deep breath as if she had made a major decision.

She didn’t mention Dumbledore but instead talked about the ‘betrayal’ they had never mentioned.

“I have always wanted to apologize for that incident before, but I don’t know how to say it, and…” Stephanie gritted her teeth and said out loud, “That day, when you entered Ravenclaw’s Chamber. I knew that it was you because I was there.”

As she spoke, she even struggled to stand up from the beanbag.

“I didn’t mean to follow you. I was just curious about who entered Ravenclaw’s Chamber and accidentally saw you. I don’t know how to show up and tell you this, so I’ve been hiding in the Rooms lately.”

Her voice gradually dropped, and she didn’t even dare to look up at Sean.

People with access to the Room can indeed know that someone has entered the Chambers.

Sean’s eyes narrowed slightly.

In the first grade, he came out to find the Room of Requirement in the middle of the night and hid in the Vanishing Cabinet because he heard footsteps outside the house, so he met Grindelwald.

At that time, Filch and Mrs. Norris were also looking for someone who came out to hang out in the middle of the night.

Normally, when there are people in the room unless their needs are exactly the same, the room will not open the door to the second person. Those who have authority or access can come in and out freely. Does that mean that the first time he met Grindelwald may not have been an accident?

Sean looked up at Stephanie.

Stephanie pinched the hem of her pajamas. Her hands trembled slightly, and she took a breath and shouted directly.

“I know what you think, and I know I have no grudges against you. The monocle is indeed used to monitor you. I am Professor Grindelwald’s spy at Hogwarts. Except for that monocle, I didn’t do anything else. And…”