On the day he became the Minister's Assistant, Percy locked himself in his room, trying to think about what to do next. He knew he had to take sides, especially if he wanted to keep his position as the Minister's Assistant, he had to make the right choice between Fudge and Dumbledore.
Is Dumbledore really senile
Of course Percy wouldn't be stupid enough to think that. Anyone with a bit of common sense would know what the current situation in the Ministry of Magic is.
The actions of the "saint" Albus Dumbledore obviously touched Fudge's interests, leading to a direct break between the two people who had originally had a good relationship.
This kind of thing is actually very normal. Just look at the bad advice Dumbledore gave to Fudge. Maybe he himself didn't have any special ideas, but it was not surprising that Fudge, as a politician, would have other ideas.
At present, Dumbledore will probably face a series of suppression. Percy has no interest in joining in the fun, otherwise his future will be ruined. Standing on Fudge's side is undoubtedly the best choice. Even if Fudge may step down in the future, Percy has already got the benefits.
To train an excellent official of the Ministry of Magic, he needs to be given sufficient experience, and Assistant Minister is a great position.
If you want to be promoted in the future, although connections are indispensable, your own abilities must also be strong enough. If you want to have good abilities, you need to go through experience and trial and error. The resources of the Ministry of Magic are limited.
However, Fudge's idea of him being a spy was ridiculous to Percy. He suspected that it was a bad idea that Fudge had come up with without thinking. He really wanted to climb up the ladder, but he had never thought of betraying his family. If his father was expelled from the Ministry of Magic, the family's source of income would be cut off. How would the family survive? Percy had four brothers and sisters who were still studying at Hogwarts and needed a lot of tuition every year. Could he rely on the unreliable Bill and Charlie to support the family's finances
Don't be ridiculous, they can barely support themselves, let alone others.
Every time Percy thought of the empty Gringotts vault, he felt inexplicably sad.
How could his father be so stupid? All the wizards in the Ministry were distancing themselves from Dumbledore. Although most of them were pretending to please Fudge, but... at least they had to pretend to fool Fudge first.
If I were really fired by the Ministry of Magic, could I still expect the Order of the Phoenix to help me find a job
Now Fred and George, who asked him about the patents of funny products, became the least worrying people in the family. He knew that the two naughty boys were ready to open their own store with Albert.
Percy plans to move out of home. Once he moves out, he can no longer rely on Fudge to find out information about the family. But what can he do to prevent Fudge from doubting himself
Percy had finally gotten the position of assistant minister, and he didn't want to lose it for no reason. It was related to his future. If he wanted to do well, he had to be flexible enough.
However, one must not think of Fudge too stupidly, otherwise he would really become a fool. If he pretends too much, he would definitely be found out. Moreover, one must remind that stupid father, lest Fudge really finds out and fires him one day, thus cutting off the family's financial resources.
At this moment, Percy thought of Albert. He felt that the guy might have anticipated the current situation from the beginning, thinking about the last letter he wrote to him a while ago.
The relationship over there also has to be cut off temporarily. After all, Albert is now attracting a lot of hatred, and he himself is obviously well aware of this.
I heard that Fudge was disarmed a while ago, and Amelia Bones was even tricked into going abroad. The Aurors searched for her for a long time but couldn't find her, and in the end Amelia Bones ran back on her own.
"What a bunch of troublesome guys!" Percy muttered, patted his cheeks hard in the mirror, and showed a smug smile. He knew it was time for him to start performing.
While everyone was eating, Percy proudly announced to everyone the good news of his promotion.
The Weasley family, who were originally discussing joining the Order of the Phoenix, suddenly became quiet.
"You were promoted?" Fred was shocked. "They actually promoted you?"
"Why not?" Percy glared at his brother in dissatisfaction.
"I thought you got into a lot of trouble with Crouch." George was also puzzled. This was really too abnormal.
"That's just an excuse they made for themselves. Anyone with a little bit of brains will know that no one would take the initiative to suspect that there is something wrong with their boss. Do they not want to work in the Ministry of Magic anymore?" Percy said contemptuously, "Mr. Crouch's investigation has ended. They think I am capable, so they promoted me."
The Weasleys looked at each other in disbelief.
Sensing something was wrong, Mr. Weasley asked tentatively, "What kind of position did they offer you?"
"I've become Minister Fudge's assistant in the Minister of Magic's office." Percy excitedly announced the good news to everyone.
For someone who had just graduated from Hogwarts a year ago, this was a dream job. However, no one in the Weasley family was happy about Percy's promotion, because some time ago, Fudge was furious in the Ministry and forbade anyone to have any contact with Dumbledore.
Now Percy is the Minister's Assistant, which seems strange no matter how you look at it.
"This is very strange. I suspect that Fudge put you in his office in order to use you to monitor our family, or - monitor Dumbledore." Mr. Weasley put down his knife and fork and stared at his son. "You agree?"
The atmosphere in the kitchen suddenly became weird and everyone held their breath.
"Yes, I promised." Percy admitted directly.
"How could you agree to let someone spy on your family?" Mrs. Weasley looked at her son angrily. She realized that something bad was going to happen.
"Why don't you agree?" Percy looked at his father and said, "You probably don't know how bad your situation is in the Ministry. You probably don't know how hard my life is in the Ministry because of you. People look at me strangely when they hear my name is Weasley. Ever since I entered the Ministry, I have been struggling desperately to get rid of the influence of your bad reputation. Otherwise, there is no hope of promotion and I can only stay at the bottom. Do you know how desperate that is? Fortunately, I am the only one in my family who has entered the Ministry of Magic, otherwise do you know how many people will blame you for this?"
Percy ignored Mr. Weasley's gradually distorted face and poured out all the suffering he had experienced in the past year.
"You haven't even considered my situation, why you haven't been promoted for so many years, and why your family's situation is so bad. Have you really never thought about the reason at all?"
"Are you done?"
Mr. Weasley threw the plate in front of him to the ground and glared at his son in dissatisfaction. If Mrs. Weasley hadn't held him back, he would have probably gone up and beat him up.
"Percy, you should apologize to your father." Bill frowned and stared at his brother. He suddenly felt that Percy had become very strange.
"Fudge is already suspicious of you," Percy warned coldly, "He's considering whether to expel you from the Ministry of Magic. If you lose your current job, what will happen to your family? Fred, George, Ron and Ginny are still in school. Do you plan to let them drop out? Don't you have any idea how hard it is for them in school?"
"Shut up Percy."
Bill felt that Percy was going too far and tried to stop him from continuing.
"Bill, you haven't experienced it yourself, so you don't know how many strange looks you have to endure when you go to school with second-hand books and robes. Especially in the first year of freshman enrollment, I was laughed at a lot." Percy glared at his father angrily: "Don't you know that this will probably make us lose face in front of others?"
Everyone else stared at Percy in amazement. Even though what Percy said was indeed correct, but... how dare he say that.
At some point, Mrs. Weasley started crying and everyone glared at Percy, they all thought he was going too far.
"I know you want to join the Order of the Phoenix, but have you really never considered Dumbledore's current situation? He has a lot of troubles of his own, and you are still trying to get along with him. Are you going to suffer with him? This is simply stupid to the extreme." Percy stared at his father without showing any weakness and sneered, "Everyone thinks that Dumbledore is senile and confused. He even dared to come up with such a stupid idea of letting Azkaban escape the control of the Dementors and sending peace messengers to the giants. Don't you really know what will happen if Azkaban escapes the control of the Dementors? Can sending peace messengers to the giants really win over the giants?"
"Dumbledore has his reasons for doing that. The mysterious man has returned, Percy, and Harry and Dumbledore all saw it with their own eyes." Mrs. Weasley looked at her son with pleading eyes, hoping that Percy would stop making trouble.
"Without evidence, who would believe it?" Percy's expression became even weirder. "The only evidence now is what they said. However, this alone cannot convince anyone, especially after Dumbledore said those stupid things. Many people think he is old and confused and cannot be trusted."
"Albert believed that the mysterious man would come back a long time ago. He said that in the next few years, the entire wizarding world would be in chaos." Fred and George looked at each other and reminded: "I remember that you have a good relationship with him. You should be aware of his divination ability!"
"Did you see Albert come out and announce that You-Know-Who is back?" Percy asked his brother. "No, Albert didn't do that because he knew very well how stupid it was to spread the news that You-Know-Who is back without any evidence. Most of the wizards in the Ministry of Magic are working overtime because Dumbledore spread rumors. Everyone hates Dumbledore for deliberately creating trouble."
"If Dumbledore really wanted to solve all the problems, he should have proposed to kill all the vicious prisoners in Azkaban and completely eliminate the giants from Britain, instead of making such stupid suggestions that would never succeed and cause trouble for everyone."
"Are you done?" Mr. Weasley threw something in his hand at Percy.
"I know very well who I should be loyal to. If you insist on betraying the Ministry of Magic and joining that illegal organization, I will no longer belong to this family." Percy dodged the things thrown by Mr. Weasley, went upstairs to pack his luggage, and Apparated away from the Weasley family.
Mrs. Weasley realized something was wrong after hearing the sound of Apparition upstairs, and when she hurried upstairs, she found that all of Percy's things were gone.
Percy left and left this home.
"He's gone." Mrs. Weasley looked like she might have a breakdown at any moment.
"Let him go, just pretend I don't have this son!" Mr. Weasley said coldly, and the hall fell into an eerie silence.
"No, Arthur, you can't do this."
Mrs. Weasley was going to find Percy and talk to him. She could probably guess where Percy would go.
In truth, there weren't many places Percy could go right now.
Everyone quickly finished their meal and gathered in Bill's room to discuss the matter. Soon they heard the sound of something being thrown downstairs again.
"There's something odd about this," George said bluntly.
"What's weird?" Bill asked puzzled.
"Percy is not a fool. It's impossible that he didn't guess that the mysterious man would come back." Fred analyzed seriously: "Then why did he do that?"
"Why?" Ginny's mind was in a mess.
"Because Percy is a power-hungry idiot," Fred sneered.
"Assistant to the Minister of Magic is undoubtedly a job he has been dreaming of," George said helplessly. "He must have been very frustrated in recent months. You know, Percy wants to be the Minister of Magic, so... he chooses to believe in the Ministry of Magic. This is more beneficial to him. He can use this opportunity to climb up."
"So, he is willing to break up with his father and leave our family?" Ginny's expression was quite interesting, as if she could hardly believe this.
"Don't be surprised, he just took sides." George said helplessly, "Standing on the side that is more advantageous to him."
"Dad, have you ever thought about these questions?"
Bill suddenly realized something and looked at Fred and George with strange eyes.
"He must be mad!" Fred shrugged and said, "Don't look at me like that. After spending a long time with Albert, your way of thinking will always become a bit similar to his."
"Is that really the case?" Ron stared at the twin brothers in amazement.
"Probably!" Fred shrugged and said, "Percy is a greedy idiot. I'm not surprised at all that he would do this."
"Many problems are actually related to interests. Fudge and Dumbledore fell out because of this reason." George explained to the others, "Dumbledore's actions would pull Fudge down from the position of Minister of Magic, and Fudge naturally could not tolerate such a thing. In order to maintain his own position and power, Fudge could only discredit Dumbledore and Harry and deny that the You-Know-Who has been resurrected."
"But… "
"There's nothing to worry about." Fred interrupted, "Fudge will never tolerate losing his position as minister because it will greatly damage his interests. As for the resurrection of the You-Know-Who, it's a matter for the entire British wizarding world. What does it have to do with Fudge? Maybe he has already resigned."
"That's why Albert hates politicians." George spread his hands and said, "He always says they have no moral integrity and will do anything for their own benefit."