Chapter 395

Felix walked through the pillars of the grandstand, Bagman’s high-pitched voice is very clear even amidst the sound of the restless crowd: “Welcome … the first task will be dragons, the champions must get the golden egg in the nest of the dragon and escape successfully… … staff please place the dragon egg, look, the dragons are still drowsy, this is the best time to observe them …”

Six dragons of various colours were sprawled on the ground, still unconscious by the looks of it, but their large size remained intimidating, even though the closest place is the judges’ gallery which stood about 500 feet from it.

“… Next, I’ll introduce the panel of judges, the five Headmasters, myself, and Minister Fudge, who is replacing my old friend Barty Crouch who has unfortunately taken an extended leave of absence … ”

Felix approached the busy Professor McGonagall, who kept walking back and forth around the edge of the venue in circles, with a distracted expression on her face, and as he walked over, McGonagall almost bumped into him without noticing him.

“Watch out, Minerva-”

“Oh! Just you, Felix.” McGonagall called out dramatically, her pitch much higher than usual, “Charlie’s looking for you. Charlie!” She shouted at a small group, then a short, stout male wizard turned back and jogged over in small steps.

“Hey, Felix,” Charlie said, looking very tense as he constantly rubbed his hands together: “We’ll be watching from the sidelines, carrying a whistle with us, and in case of danger, we’ll step up – And, of course, we need your back-up. ”

“No problem.” Felix said.

A hiss came from the distance, as a black dragon raised her head in slow motion, and the staff member next to her put the dragon egg down and scurried away.

The Hungarian Horntail found herself in an unfamiliar environment, with a noisy swarm of tiny bugs all around her. She also smelled the scent of her own kind, and with her two yellow eyes darting around, she soon saw five other dragons laying on a platform not too far away.

Her mood abruptly worsened, and she braced herself to stand up. Underneath her is a nest built of golden hay, with an egg in it, and she exceptionally felt an intimacy with it, telling her those are her cubs – a sentiment which she quickly accepted as her movements became more careful, “clatter~” the sound of chains rang out, she froze as she looked at the thick chains on her left foot, then she let out a roar towards the sky.

A searing flame rushed into the sky, rolling up a wave of air out of nowhere, and the temperature of the surrounding atmosphere rose rapidly.

With her action, the other five dragons also woke up, and they each raised their heads, flapping their wings and stamping their feet in a fury. The black stone floor made heavy thuds.

The Hungarian Horntail glanced around, she hates being here. It would be best to take her egg and leave for good. She tentatively tugged the chain, finding it not quite solid, and just as she was about to tug harder, she saw a familiar person.

“Ow~”

She yelped audibly, that awful barbecue cook!

Felix sized her usked Charlie, “Do the dragons have a good memory?”

“Of course.” Charlie replied, ” Norbert remembers Hagrid till now, and every time he misbehaves, I will show him a picture of Hagrid, but I don’t know how long I can fool … He is getting smarter and won’t let us give him inspection …”

Bagman’s voice kept leading the audience’s emotions, and he is good at that.

“Look, the dragons have awakened, they need a little time to adapt … to at least discover their egg, using this time, let me explain the rules of the contest …”

Felix took out a broom from the ring, and flipped it over to sit on it, stomping his feet, he rushed straight up into the sky, circling the field twice, enjoying the view below.

“This is a good spot for a view.” He smiled and said to himself.

Looking down from high above, the layout of the venue became clear – a silver tent for the champions to rest temporarily, a few hundred feet away from is a grandstand, and in the center of the crooked, barely oval-shaped stand, six areas divided and together resembled a daffodil flower.

In each petal near the central spot, there is a dragon crouched separately, they are large and small, as they raise their heads one after another and looked around agitatedly.

On one side of the grandstand near the silver tent, a gate has been opened, that should be where the champions would enter the venue, and on the opposite side of the gate, there is a large stand raised high up, which is the judges’ gallery.

Bagman, who is introducing the rules of the game, said gleefully, “Very well, most of our safety officers have already taken their place, the one who is flying will act as the last line of security. Regarding Felix, I don’t need to tell you, you should have read about him in the newspaper -”

His voice weakened, as Fudge’s gloomy gaze looked over.

Bagman stammered for a while, and finally realizing what he had to do, so he stood up and shouted, “Soo… Let’s welcome our champions!”

The cheers sounded deafening, and an extremely penetrating whistle rang through the air. The dragons raised their heads and looked around cautiously with restlessness, and soon, a wooden gate opened wide and the champions walked in.

“Hiss~”

Harry saw a man in front of him fall backward, he hurriedly reached out to support him, he is Beauxbatons’s champion, Harry could not recall the boy’s name, but he is obviously not in a good state, snot and tears flowed to the ground.

“Francois …,” whispered Fleur, “for the love of Nicolas Flamel, be brave!” She tilted her head to the side and commanded, “Jacqueline!”

The other girl shuddered and helped Francois up, though, from Harry’s point of view, she too looked terrified.

He felt a hint of distaste for Francois for a moment until he saw a mist of water in Francois’ eyes, and then he froze, probably because the expression on his face was too direct, which made Francois glare at him menacingly.

As a staff member lead them to an open space where the air is far hotter than outside, Harry saw how a stone in front of the blue Swedish short-nosed dragon melted into a soft flop like a liquid.

He couldn’t hear any sound, but he could see the searing, lava-like liquid dripping down as if it were dripping on his heart. But it is not their trouble, then he heard the sound of Ron swallowing frantically, so he followed his line of sight and saw their target, a black colossal hill.

Only this hill can move and is full of spikes.

Harry regretted not getting a good look that night. This Hungarian Horntail looked taller than ten of him stacked on top of each other, with black scales all over its body and a lizard-like appearance. It has yellow eyes and bronze horns, and a tail with spikes that are nearly bronze.

He heard Hermione reciting hoarsely the information about this dragon: “… Hungarian Horntail is considered to be one of the most vicious and aggressive breeds of a dragon… it is also one of the dragons that can breathe fire up to 50 feet away. When protecting its young, it will be even more aggressive … Females are generally bigger than males …”

“I’m just glad Mom didn’t come …” said Ron bitterly when he saw Sirius, who kept waving from the audience stand.

At that moment, Charlie approached, his calm voice made Harry’s heart settle down slightly, and then the dragon keepers appeared in their corresponding positions, when Charlie passed by, he patted the three of them on the shoulder, and opened his mouth several times before finally squeezing out a vague ” Come on.” from his throat.

The Hungarian Horntail is in front of Harry, Ron, and Hermione, and it looked completely different from the model that Harry pulled out; you can only feel its horror at a close distance, and compared to this dragon, they looked like three rats.

“This is Classroom Seven, Classroom Seven …” Ron kept hypnotizing himself.

Hermione’s face turned white as paper, she tried her best to calm herself down, “There are dragon keepers and Ministry of Magic Staffs around, even if we can’t believe them, we should believe Professor Hap … he is right above our heads!”

The trio looked up at the sky, amidst the light a vague shadow could be seen above, which gave them great courage.

Bagman’s passionate voice rang out again: “The champions took their positions, they are only seventy feet away from their target, which is a relatively safe distance because the dragons have chains attached to their legs.”

“When you hear a whistle, you can take action; timing, strategy, effectiveness, and courage shown will all be the basis for scoring… Good luck to you all! Ready – three – two – one! The tournament begins!”

The chaotic sounds around him seemed like they were being muted, and Harry had no time to look at the others; he needed to do his duty – to be more cautious, he had to scout first. So he called out from the bottom of his heart, “Accio Firebolt!”

Waiting quietly for a while, he discerned the exact familiar sound from the surging tide of voices as a blurred shadow flew in from the direction of the castle, and he jumped up into the air as a familiar feeling of speed quieted his heart.

I belong to the sky.

Harry said to himself, as he made his way upward, increasing his speed to the maximum, and in just a few seconds he passed a figure, which is Professor Hap. He caught a hasty glimpse of the professor rolling his eyes at him.

He turned the broom handle and his eyes skimmed underneath. From seven or eight hundred feet up, the dragons looked like a Salamander that Hagrid had taught in class, and he also noticed that the whole venue looked like a daffodil flower, with a dragon crouching near the center of each petal, while the champions standing on the other end of it.

Looking down from the air, he could see that among the six groups of champions, only the group of Uagadou and Cedric started to move. The unassuming male wizard, whose name Harry couldn’t remember, other than the fact that he wore a spiky hawk-shaped hairstyle, suddenly rolled on the ground and transformed into an imposing green eagle, which flapped its wings and shot up into the sky, flying bravely toward the beautiful Antipodean Opaleye.

A gasp echoed through the grandstand, as they got stunned by the actions of Uagadou’s student. “Animagus!” Someone shouted.

“Not Animagus!” Bagman’s voice reached everyone’s ears, “That’s Uagadou’s unique human transfiguration, and as far as I know, all three champions can do it!”

“Keyeww~”

The large eagle’s bronze feathers glowed in the sunlight, and the Antipodean Opaleye perceived the threat, as her shining, colourful eyes without pupils stared intently at it as she opened her mouth to spew out a fan-shaped ball of bright red flame.

The green eagle nimbly dodged while screeching provocatively.

On the other hand, Cedric raised his wand, a cloud of hazy fog convergence, the scope getting wider and wider, darker and darker, and eventually forming a dark-coloured rain cloud, which rose hundreds of feet high.

The rain pattered down and doused the sparks that came out of the Blue Swedish short-nosed dragon’s nose. Which irritated her, so she tilted her head and spewed out blue flames, her flames were so hot that even rocks could be melted, but she is only about twenty-three or twenty-four feet in size, plus her flames couldn’t reach the rain clouds overhead.

The rain is not a big deal, but it is getting heavier and heavier, making it uncomfortable, and the Swedish short-nosed dragon grumpily wanted to move with her egg, so she tugged the chains on her feet and rattled them.

Collins Foley did not know when she had disappeared, Harry grinned, he already had known that Cedric had chosen the most appropriate strategy.

Harry swooped downward, glancing at Fleur’s group as they seemed to be in trouble, except for Fleur, the other two champions were stalling.

Bagman’s narrative appeared at the right time: “Beauxbatons’s champions seem to be contradicting with each other, which they really shouldn’t be doing now … Look at Durmstrang’s side, they’re casting dark magic from afar, but it does nothing except making the dragon more irritable… … Oh no, look at Krum, he’s cast some magic to reduce his presence, and he’s moving closer, is he trying to grab the dragon egg just by using his legs? He should have been sitting on his broom, Durmstrang didn’t use their best advantage in their strategy!”

At the judges’ booth, Karkaroff’s expression looked vexed, “What’s he doing? He’s bothering Krum.”

The Headmistress of Uagadou, the slim, lean witch who was seated next to him grinned, and Karkaroff looked at her angrily, “What’s so funny, your other two students are watching dryly from the sidelines!”

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