"What... is this? Why is it still a little wet... Wait, someone must have been here just now!"
In the dark principal's room, Hermione was squatting beside the cupboard, twisting a round object in her hand, with a trace of confusion on her face.
When she was walking near here just now, she suddenly felt something stepped on the sole of her shoe, and then she discovered the existence of this small thing on the floor. Otherwise, how could one detect such a small thing with the thick black mist in the room
"Huh?" Luna, who was following her, heard this, and immediately squatted down beside her in the dark, and subconsciously stretched out her hand and asked, "What did you find?"
"have no idea."
Hermione felt Luna's stretched out hand, but after hesitating for a moment, she did not put anything into the other person's open palm.
"But who must have left this here," she paused while holding the object that she didn't know what it was yet, "and it definitely won't be long - although I don't know what the water stains left on it are, but It hasn’t evaporated completely yet, which shows that it fell here not long ago!”
Hermione was obviously not sure whether this thing was harmful to people, so she didn't give it to Luna who asked for it. After all, she had already come into contact with it accidentally, but she didn't want Luna to be exposed to such unpredictable risks again.
However, she failed to accurately estimate Luna's surprisingly strong curiosity.
In fact, while Hermione was speaking, Luna, who had not waited for her to hand over the thing, had already lowered her head on her own initiative, sniffing with her nose like a little mouse looking for cheese in the dark. Hermione's hand.
"Eh?" "What are you doing!"
Almost at the same time that Luna spoke, Hermione, who suddenly realized what she was doing, quickly shrank her hand and removed the thing from under Luna's nose.
"Do you want to die?" Hermione couldn't help shouting, "Is this thing poisonous? How can you just smell it-"
"It should be fine! I might know what it is," Luna said.
Hermione was stunned when she heard this.
"What is it?"
"Bibi's multi-flavor beans!" Luna answered in an unusually sure tone, "And they smell like shoe polish! I have tasted this kind of flavor before - the shoe polish smell of Bibi's multi-flavor beans is very distinctive. It’s more irritating than real shoe polish!”
"Varied-"
After the first moment of astonishment, Hermione hurriedly threw the round beans in her hand. Because after Luna's reminder, she finally discovered that the slightly concave feel in the round was indeed very similar to the Bibi multi-flavor beans in her memory.
And more importantly, that strange sticky feeling with a hint of sugar in the wetness... Oh! It must be a Bibi Bean that just popped out of someone else's mouth!
In contrast, she doesn't care whether this multi-flavored bean smells like shoe polish or something else, okay
After a while, Hermione wiped her hands with a soaked handkerchief with a heavy face, while frowning and murmuring in a low voice:
"Who is eating Bibi's multi-flavored beans here? First of all, it's definitely not Harry and the others. How could they have such leisure in this place? So in other words, is it really just the enemy?"
"I don't think so. The possibility of it being Maka and the others is very high!" Not far away, Luna, who had wandered near the desk at this moment, suddenly took over and said, "Only they will be like us. , I thought I should take some time to come to the principal’s office and take a look.”
If it were Hermione, even if she thought so in her heart, she would not speak so absolutely like Luna.
However, after thinking carefully along the other party's train of thought, Hermione still had to admit that Luna's guess did make some sense.
After all, there is nothing in this principal's office. As of now, it is only special for former students like them.
"Then, if it is really what you said..." Hermione pondered for a few seconds, "it means that Maka and the others have also been here. And when they came here, the situation was probably not urgent yet - At least they still have room for some Bibi’s flavored beans!”
When she expressed this inference, there was still a bit of complaint in her tone, obviously she was very dissatisfied with Maka or Harry and others who might have carried out some random actions here.
"So, it seems that Maka is the only one with the greatest possibility." She couldn't help but add at the end.
"Well, it should be Maka." Luna couldn't help but agree with Hermione's speculation this time, "Although, Maka doesn't seem to like Bibi's all-flavored beans."
"So, if this is a hint he left for us, at least now we probably know that this is probably not a place worth searching." Hermione thought for a while and said, "We should go."
"Where to go?" Luna asked.
"To the secret passage!" Hermione replied without hesitation.
…
Of course, the "secret passage" Hermione was referring to was not the secret passage in the Room of Requirement that they came from.
In Hogwarts Castle, in addition to the secret tunnels leading outside the school, there are also several known internal secret passages. The original function of these secret passages is no longer known, but after so many years of word-of-mouth transmission from successive students, they have long become a quick way for students to rush to class, and they have been deeply imprinted in the hearts of young wizards. In the mind.
Now, these fast passages finally have a new use in Hermione's hands, that is, while ensuring concealment, they can move quickly and inconspicuously on all levels of the castle.
Now that Hermione has decided to explore the entire Hogwarts Castle with just two people, it is obviously impossible without some preparation in advance!
The only thing that caught her off guard now was the black fog that seemed to have filled the entire castle. In the already very difficult exploration mission, such an environmental condition that was extremely unfavorable to the search work was added... To be honest, her mood was getting worse and worse.
"Luna, how are you feeling, are you okay?"
"It's okay. In fact, I seem to have gradually adapted to this feeling..."
"That's good! But if you feel any discomfort again, remember not to force yourself."
"Well, I understand."
This conversation happened several more times during the continuous exploration, and after that, Hermione gradually stopped asking. After exploring in the dark for a long time, Hermione gradually accumulated great fatigue even if she was not affected by that special perception.
"Except for the secret room, there are only the first floor and the underground that have not yet been explored... If you bear with it a little longer, it will be close. As long as you bear with it a little longer..." She murmured in her heart.