Frank Bryce was a World War I veteran.
He was lucky enough to only catch the tail end of the final victory, which prevented him from leaving his body on the battlefield like his father did.
Before his mother passed away due to excessive grief, she drooped her skinny arms and told Frank that the most important thing was to be stable for the rest of his life.
But as a young and stubborn man, he hoped to avenge his father.
But again, he was lucky.
When he came back from the battlefield, all the war had left him was a leg that was so stiff that he couldn't control it, and an extreme aversion to crowds and noise.
Is my father's revenge considered complete
Frank never found the answer to this question.
After that, he decided to listen to his mother's words, find an ordinary job, and live a peaceful life.
At this time, in his hometown, the wealthy Riddle family happened to be looking for a gardener to hire.
This was perfect for him - he didn't need to have very agile legs and feet, and he could stay away from the noisy crowd. He believes that this must be a job that is most suitable for him.
To be honest, the Riddles do make a good match because they are both equally annoying.
But this has nothing to do with Frank. He doesn't care whether the wages are high or not. All he wants is to live a stable life - this is his mother's last wish.
But one day nearly five years later, the owner's family all died at home inexplicably. Frank, the only one living in the Riddle family, was taken away by the police as a suspect.
The villagers immediately started talking about it. After all, this kind of topic will always become a pastime before tea and after dinner.
Just when the situation was extremely serious for Frank, the Riddle family's autopsy report came back, turning the entire situation around.
Police said they had never seen a more bizarre autopsy report.
No one in the Riddle family was harmed by poison, sharp objects, or pistols, nor was they suffocated or strangled.
In fact, the report was written in a decidedly bewildered tone: All three of the Riddles appeared to be in good health—except that they were all dead.
The forensic doctors seemed determined to find something wrong with the body.
"Everyone in the Riddle family had a look of horror on their faces."
But as the policeman who was already at his wits' end said - who has ever heard of three people being scared to death at the same time
Since there was no evidence that the Riddles were murdered, the police had no choice but to let Frank go.
To everyone's surprise and suspicion, after the Riddle family was buried in the cemetery, Frank Bryce actually returned to his cabin in the Riddle House garden.
Frank was not too interested in the gossip in the village. He continued to work as his gardener and then for the owner of the land.
This work lasted nearly half a century.
Today, Frank is approaching his seventy-seventh birthday.
He was profoundly deaf and his bad leg was stiffer than before. But when the weather was nice, people could still see him working diligently in the flowerbed, even though the weeds were creeping toward him, and he couldn't stop them even if he wanted to.
Old Frank was actually not too confused. He knew that he was just wasting his efforts.
Moreover, Frank has more than just weeds to deal with—the village boys always like to throw rocks at the windows of Riddle House.
As for the smooth grass that Frank had worked so hard to maintain, they rode their bicycles and trampled on it.
Once or twice, they even broke into the old house to bet with each other.
They knew that Frank Sr. cared for the house and grounds with all his heart, almost to the point of obsession. So they liked to see him limping across the garden, waving his cane and shouting at them in his hoarse voice.
Whenever this happens, they feel particularly happy.
And what about old Frank
He believed the boys tortured him because, like their parents and grandparents, they believed he was a murderer.
But he had been doing this job for almost his whole life, and he had no reason to interrupt it. This may be for his mother's last wish, but it is also for his own life.
So, on that August night…
Old Frank was awakened from his sleep by the pain in his bad leg again - now that he was getting older, the pain in his leg was getting worse. He got up from the bed, limped downstairs and walked into the kitchen, trying to fill a hot water bottle to warm his stiff knees.
He stood by the pool, filling the kettle with water, and looking up at Riddle House habitually.
At this time, he saw the glimmer of light in the upstairs window.
"What new tricks did those little guys come up with to punish me, an old man?" Old Frank thought he had guessed what was going on.
Those boys broke into the old house again. The dim light in the windows flickered and flickered, and it was obvious that they had made a fire.
He quickly put down the kettle, dragged his bad leg back upstairs as quickly as possible and got dressed. Immediately, he returned to the kitchen and took off the rusty old key from the hook next to the door.
Finally, he picked up the crutches leaning against the wall and walked into the night.
There were no signs of forced entry at the Riddle House's front door, and the windows were intact.
Old Frank limped around to the back of the house, stopped at a door that was almost completely hidden by the ivy, took out the old key, and opened the door silently.
He hasn't been in for years.
But despite the darkness, he still remembered where the door to the corridor was. He groped his way over, and a rotten smell hit his nostrils.
With his ears strained, he picked up every sound of footsteps or voices overhead.
When he came to the corridor, there was a little light coming in because of the large grille windows on both sides of the front door.
He started to go upstairs, thinking that thanks to the thick dust on the stone steps, the sound of his footsteps and the sound of his cane were muffled and difficult to detect.
On the landing, Old Frank turned to the right and immediately saw where the intruder was - at the top of the corridor, a door was open a crack, and a flickering light shot out from the crack. An orange-yellow light shadow was cast on the dark floor.
Frank leaned sideways and approached carefully, holding the crutch tightly in his hand.
A few steps away from the door, he could see something inside through the slightly open narrow crack.
He saw now that the fire was in the grate - which, to be honest, surprised him.
He stopped and pricked up his ears, only to hear a man's voice coming from the room. The voice seemed a little stiff and the tone was dry, which was very uncomfortable.
"...Master, Lucius Malfoy is almost here."
"Um… "
Another voice suddenly sounded. It sounded very young, and its tone was soft and powerful. But for some reason, Frank felt that all the hairs on his body stood up, as if he heard something he shouldn't have heard.
"So, where is Wormtail?" the voice asked softly, "how is he doing?"
"died."
"Well, this is also expected," the man said calmly, "but what is the effect?"
"One Auror died, five civilians died, and twenty-two were injured."
"That's it?" The voice seemed to have become a little heavier, but it was still calm and natural, "Is it because that old guy Dumbledore arrived so quickly?"
"No, it was because of a student, and he was the one who killed Wormtail," the dry voice paused, then continued, "He called himself Maka McClain."
"McLean... a student..." The man seemed to think for a while, "Oh, besides that kid, who else could it be? Maka McClain... have you ever fought against him?"
"No servant dares to do anything without the master's order."
"...Okay, well, let's go feed the one at the door to Nagini first, and then report the details of the battle in detail."
At this moment, Old Frank felt the door in front of him suddenly open wide, and then his vision turned completely black. His life ended so unremarkably.
At the same time, a figure with a rich black aura surrounding his body, just like Peter Pettigrew, was standing there. He casually grabbed old Frank by the collar and dragged him into the hall of the old house.
As he threw Old Frank forward, a giant snake with the same black energy loomed out of the darkness and swallowed Old Frank's body in one gulp.
Looking at the huge figure that was still mostly hidden in the shadows, it was obviously not much smaller than the Basilisk.
"hiss"
It hissed at the figure, a hint of wisdom flashing in its provocative eyes.
…
Just as Old Frank was throwing himself into the arms of death, in the cemetery behind the black stone fortress known as "Azkaban", a young man was polishing several thin pieces of stone.
On this silent island, the sound of the rubbing stones seemed quite abrupt.
But no one would disturb his work here. He just concentrated on polishing, trying to make the edges of the stone flakes sharper.
No one knew what he wanted to do, and of course, no one here would be interested.
This boy is naturally Maka who was imprisoned in Azkaban.
"Huh!" He suddenly picked up the stone chip, blew on the stone chips on the surface, looked over it again, and then nodded with satisfaction.
This boy is naturally Maka - before the time comes, all he has to do is wait.
But waiting here all the time was definitely not what he wanted, so he decided to use everything here to continue some of his research.
For Maca, time is very precious, and one cannot completely give up on research and waste time just because of poor conditions.
"Well, not bad."
He picked up the stone shard and made a not too deep scratch on the trunk of a dead tree next to him.