Mafalda Hopkirk has been working for the Ministry of Magic since graduating from Hogwarts, and currently serves as Assistant to the Director of the Ministry's Improper Use of Magic Office.
Hopkirk's job on weekdays is to mail a warning letter to the violator on behalf of the director after receiving information about the violation, stating the laws that the violator has violated. If the situation is serious, the emergency team needs to be notified to take action.
However, today, Hopkirk encountered something that made her extremely depressed.
Someone actually wrote back to tell her: Your Ministry of Magic has made a blunder.
The sender's name was Albert Anderson, and he was studying at Hogwarts.
In the letter, Anderson clearly pointed out that he was on vacation in France with his family at the time and did not carry a wand when leaving the country, let alone use the Summoning Charm. The Ministry of Magic must have made a mistake, and he hoped that the Ministry of Magic could resolve the misunderstanding between the two parties and write him a reply letter.
In fact, Hopkirk did not think Anderson was lying, because the most compelling evidence was that Anderson did not know how to use the Summoning Charm at all, and he had just finished his first year at Hogwarts.
First-year students can use the Flying Spell
Even Hopkirk himself didn't believe it.
If you don't know how to use the Flying Spell, it's naturally impossible to cast a spell.
So there was no doubt that the Improper Use of Magic Office had made a mistake. This was not the first time this had happened, and Hopkirk was not too surprised.
But...what does this have to do with me
Hopkirk was only responsible for mailing letters and notifications. She was not responsible for handling such issues and did not have the authority to do so.
Oh, no, this matter does have something to do with her.
It was up to Hopkirk to decide whether to hand the letter over to the current head of the Improper Use of Magic Office, or just throw it in a trash can somewhere.
Based on her understanding of her boss, he probably wouldn't care about this kind of thing!
After all, this is just a small matter no matter how you look at it, and there is no need to delve into it too much.
Mafalda Hopkirk was ready to deal with it privately.
Well, the so-called private handling actually means destroying the letter or throwing it into a trash can. After all, she is just an assistant.
Although he had some understanding of the laws that reasonably restricted underage wizards, he was ultimately just an assistant, and his duties were limited to helping write warning letters and the like.
When Hopkirk was about to throw the letter into the trash can, she suddenly remembered something that happened last year. She still remembered the misunderstanding caused by the trace thread, which caused quite a big stir at that time.
Eventually, the story was exposed by the Daily Prophet, and Nutley, who was in charge of handling the matter, got himself into a lot of trouble and was almost transferred to the Centaur Liaison Office.
"It doesn't seem a good idea to throw it away. Let's hand it over to the director!" Hopkirk hesitated for a moment, but still thought that it was her duty. As for how her boss would deal with it, it was none of her business.
Of course, Hopkirk could also guess what the outcome would be after the letter was delivered.
As Hopkirk expected, his boss didn't even glance at the letter and threw it directly next to the desk.
When Hopkirk saw the letter again, it had been thrown into the trash.
However, what Hopkirk didn't know was that this result was also expected by Albert.
However, Hopkirk didn't know that they had unknowingly stood in front of a large pit dug by someone else, and right behind them, someone was ready to kick them into the pit.
…
After returning home, Albert began to write back to the people he wrote to.
The Weasley brothers naturally also received letters on Albert's sender list, along with a rubber duck, a gift that Albert bought for the twins.
Well, the yellow rubber duck was actually a gift that Albert bought at a grocery store near his home. He knew that Fred and George would not like this gift because it was for Mr. Weasley.
Albert wanted the twins to ask Mr. Weasley what they should do if they were in a situation like theirs.
Fred and George expressed their sympathy (gloating) for Albert's misfortune in their reply, and wrote in their reply:
… Dad thinks it's just a small matter and you don't need to worry. He suggests that you should write a letter to the Director of the Office for the Prevention of the Improper Use of Magic and explain the matter to him…
At the end of the letter, they also wrote: "By the way, Dad asked me to ask you, what is the use of rubber ducks in the Muggle world."
"A small matter?" Albert muttered, "Yes, to those who have nothing to do with it, it is indeed a trivial matter."
Albert put the twins' letter aside and continued to open the second letter.
Professor Broad's reply was a little unexpected to Albert. He also thought it was just a small matter and told Albert not to worry about it.
In Professor Broad's reply, he shared some information about the Extraordinary Pharmacist Association and also expressed his love for the gift Albert gave him. At the end, he briefly mentioned McDougal's new book.
"It's a small matter?" Albert put the letter aside, picked up the gold card and muttered, "Now let's see how Hertok Dagworth reacts. Does he also think that losing his gold card is also a small matter?"
From Professor Broad's letter, it was not difficult for Albert to guess the value of the gold card in his hand.
He believed that Hertock Dagworth would not remain indifferent.
…
…
There were several letters, and it was impossible to reply immediately.
The last letter was written by Rowena Smith. In addition to chatting about some common interests, Rowena Smith also mentioned in the letter that she would give Albert an unexpected surprise in a while.
Albert could probably guess what the so-called unexpected surprise was: Rowena Smith was going to be the Defense Against the Dark Arts professor at Hogwarts.
After reading all the letters, Albert put them into the box, stood up and stretched, drank the cold milk tea, touched Tom lying on the cushion beside the table, and refocused his attention on the remaining summer homework.
This was the homework that Albert had left before he went to France for vacation. Since he didn't have the habit of doing homework while on vacation, he temporarily put his summer homework aside when he went to France for vacation.
When he went on vacation to France, Albert only brought the books about ancient magic runes that McDougal had given him.
As long as you study these books carefully, your experience in magic skills will increase at a gratifying rate.
Now, we are one big step closer to level 3 magic runes.
It’s not that Albert doesn’t like using experience to level up directly, but he prefers the feeling of studying magic.
Every time there was a slight breakthrough in magic runes, Albert would feel an inexplicable sense of accomplishment, and this kind of achievement was what Albert wanted.
There was a sudden knock on the door. Nia pushed the door open and poked her head in. She said to Albert who was sitting at the table, "Dad told me to tell you to go to bed early today. We are going to Diagon Alley to shop tomorrow."
"Got it." Albert knew why Nia was so excited, because she would also go to Diagon Alley in London with him.
"Tom, it's time to go to bed!" Nia reached out and picked up Tom, who was lying on the cushion, and put him on the floor. "Walk by yourself. You've become so heavy that I can't carry you anymore."
"That's why I said Tom should lose weight." Albert said with a smile, "Go back and rest early."
"Go away Tom, otherwise your rations will be reduced by half tomorrow." Nia's threat was quite effective. Tom obediently got up and followed Nia away.
Albert looked at the door that had closed again and focused on his homework.
These holiday assignments are actually not difficult, they just require taking the time to write the answers on parchment.
He was thinking about staying up all night to finish all his holiday homework at once, but he finally gave up when he remembered Nia's expectation of going shopping in Diagon Alley tomorrow.
Half an hour later, Albert closed the ink bottle, put the quill back into the pen holder, stood up and lazily covered a yawn.
Sheila had just returned from foraging. Ever since Albert told her not to bring prey home, she hadn't brought any dead mice home since.
"Good night!" Albert looked at his owl, then looked at the night sky outside the window, suppressed a yawn, and lay back on the bed to rest.