The sky was gloomy, and the sky in the distance was a white and pale purple. A few clouds were floating, and a thin dusk gradually rose.
The majestic castle stood under the pale purple sky. At the highest point of the main tower, there was a row of small towers extending from the middle of the spires of the high floors of the main tower. That was the principal's office of Hogwarts.
The window of the principal's office was open, and a light breeze blew into the room, causing the candles on the candlesticks to sway slightly.
At some point, a figure suddenly appeared by the window, with silver hair fluttering in the breeze like the flame on a candle.
"You seemed to know I was coming and even left the window open?" Dracula looked at Dumbledore, who was sitting behind his desk looking through documents, and chuckled.
This sounds strange. After all, when others receive guests, they always leave a door open for them. But for Dracula, leaving a window open is enough.
Of course, Dumbledore was already accustomed to this rather bizarre conversation.
"That's not the case. It's just that the weather is nice today, so I opened the window to get some fresh air." He put down the document in his hand, raised his head and joked to Dracula, "Come to think of it, two weeks ago I really left the window open for you for a whole day, but I didn't see you, Professor Dracula, come over until I caught a cold from the cool night breeze."
Dumbledore shook his head. "So I was too lazy to leave the window open for you. It was only today that I happened to have the idea of opening the window for a while because the weather was nice. I didn't expect you to come at the right time."
Only then did Dracula realize that it had been two weeks since he had "visited" Azkaban.
After he left Azkaban, he wandered along the route from Azkaban Island to mainland England, trying to see if he could find some traces of Sirius Black. If he was lucky, he might be able to capture him and bring him back to the Black family and give him to Regulus, and then watch an emotional drama between brothers.
Unfortunately, Sirius didn't seem to use any magic along the way. It was as if he swam back to England simply by relying on his physical body, and no trace of magic was found.
Dracula was very depressed, so he went to Azkaban and tortured the Dementors for a while, and did not return to Hogwarts until the day before the opening dinner.
"Professor Dracula, tell me the truth, did you go to Azkaban two weeks ago?" Dumbledore asked, crossing his arms and staring into Dracula's eyes.
"Hey, you know all this?" Dracula raised his eyebrows nonchalantly, "The news came pretty quickly."
As he spoke, he casually opened one of Dumbledore's drawers and took out a handful of bloody lollipops and blood pudding.
His movements were extremely skillful, and he had no embarrassment at all about taking other people's things, as if he was back home.
"It's been two weeks since this happened, Professor Dracula..." Dumbledore's eyes twitched as he watched his treasured candy being eaten by Dracula. "Besides, you don't seem to be hiding your intentions at all."
"Two weeks ago, a collective protest took place on the seventh floor of Azkaban Prison, accusing the Ministry of Magic of lax supervision and allowing strangers to enter the cages and torture the prisoners. The Death Eaters there seemed to have been severely tormented by the Dementors."
"Not only that, they also gave an accurate description of the person who came - long silver hair, handsome face, wine-red eyes... If I can't infer that it's you based on this information, then I don't have to be the principal anymore."
Dumbledore rubbed his brow and looked at Dracula helplessly.
"I thought they were all tough guys who would rather die than surrender, but I didn't expect they couldn't even withstand a few Dementors. I was thinking about whether I should find some other ways to deal with them." Dracula curled his lips, obviously very dissatisfied with the performance of those Death Eaters.
"That's not just 'a few' Dementors, Professor Dracula." Dumbledore's mouth twitched. "On other floors, at most three or four Dementors entered at the same time to feed, but on the seventh floor, 27 entered at once! Who can withstand this?"
Dracula shrugged and said nothing.
In fact, he had not expected that his casual instruction to ask the Dementors to take good care of the seventh floor would be followed so conscientiously, and even exceeded the task!
"What does the Ministry think?" Dracula asked casually. "Can they guess that I did this?"
In fact, Dracula doesn't really care about the Ministry of Magic's opinion now, because he has rarely appeared in the Ministry of Magic's field of vision, and few officials know him as a professor of Defense Against the Dark Arts.
In addition, the oral testimonies of the prisoners in Azkaban were of no use at all, so even if he was really suspected, few people would have the time to cause trouble for him.
"Fudge refused to admit that Azkaban was secretly infiltrated." Dumbledore introduced succinctly, "He believed that the prisoners were under the influence of Dementors and had mental problems."
"Sure enough," Dracula sneered, "It really fits the style of the current Minister of Magic."
Dumbledore smiled but said nothing.
After Fudge's "efforts" to get rid of Dumbledore's influence in the past two years, even a wise headmaster like him would find it difficult to find any reason to whitewash the Minister of Magic...
"Let's not talk about those boring things for now. The main reason I came here this time is to ask you something." Dracula stuffed a piece of blood pudding into his mouth and sat down on the soft sofa in the principal's office.
"What do you think... Sirius Black's purpose for escaping from prison this time?" he asked softly.
"How would I know such a thing?" Dumbledore shook his head slightly. "People outside speculated that he attacked Harry in order to bring Voldemort back."
"But there is a big question here," Dracula said, "He has been in Azkaban for more than ten years. Why did he escape during this period? He must have a definite motive for escaping this time, right?"
"Perhaps Sirius simply couldn't stand the torture of the Dementors anymore after so long?" Dumbledore shrugged with a faint smile on his face.
"Principal Dumbledore!" Dracula said in a serious tone, "I am discussing the issue with you seriously, and you are actually teasing me here? Do you think I am an idiot like Fudge?"
The smile on Dumbledore's face faded, and his expression gradually became a little gloomy.
"Professor Dracula, I don't know where you got the information about Sirius Black, nor do I know where you started to doubt his deeds..." He sighed and said softly, "But from the information I know, he is indeed a sinner who betrayed his friends and joined the Death Eaters."
"Tell me about it?" Dracula's expression calmed down and he spoke softly.
"This matter starts with a prophecy," Dumbledore took off his half-moon glasses from his nose and wiped them slowly, "Because of that prophecy, Voldemort chose Harry to be his destined enemy, so he planned to kill Harry's family in advance..."
Dumbledore told the story in a soft voice, tinged with a hint of sadness.
"… Ultimately, the Potters chose Sirius as their Secret-Keeper and settled in Godric's Hollow, hoping to escape Voldemort's pursuit."
"You should already know what happened next. On the day they established the secret keeper, without any preparation, the address of the safe house was exposed, and Voldemort came to the door that night."
"The end of the story is that James and Lily were killed, Voldemort turned into a wandering spirit, and Harry survived... After that, Sirius killed one of his best friends, Peter Pettigrew, and twelve Muggles, and then was imprisoned in Azkaban for twelve years until he escaped from Azkaban more than two weeks ago."
After finishing the story, Dumbledore finally wiped his glasses, put them back on his nose, and looked at Dracula in front of him with his deep blue eyes.
"Is Sirius Black such a vulgar person? This shouldn't be the case..." Dracula frowned.
He couldn't help but think of Sirius's younger brother, Regulus Black.
Even though Regulus went astray under the influence of his parents and joined the Death Eaters, he was later able to recognize his mistakes and parted ways with Voldemort.
He used his great willpower and action to steal Voldemort's Horcrux. He risked his life just so that Voldemort would be a mortal of flesh and blood when he met his destined opponent.
Although Dracula didn't say it, he actually admired Regulus's behavior in his heart.
Since Regulus, as the younger brother, can be so brave and so loyal to the house-elves, then Sirius Black, who has been unwilling to go along with the corrupt family since childhood, should be more loyal, right
Why would such a person suddenly betray his friends and join Voldemort's camp
"In fact, you are not the only one who doesn't believe it. Many of us don't believe that Sirius would betray James." Dumbledore sighed and said somewhat dejectedly.
"At that time, the precious friendship between James, Sirius, Remus, and Peter was a unique landscape of Gryffindor. They were inseparable, attending classes together, eating together, playing together, playing tricks on Severus together, breaking school rules together, and being put in detention together..."
"Is there something strange mixed in?" Dracula's mouth twitched.
Dumbledore went on to say, "None of us wants to believe that these four people will ever be separated, let alone believe that one of them will betray his best friend."
"But we cannot help but believe the facts, because under the effect of the Fidelius Charm, only if the Secret Keeper voluntarily reveals the location of the safe house can the spell become ineffective!"
Dracula nodded slightly, and his curiosity about Sirius Black became even stronger.
And this time, his curiosity was not only about the novelty of him being the first wizard to escape from Azkaban, but also about his thirst for knowledge about the truth of what happened back then.
"Come to think of it, there's one name among those four friends that sounds very familiar." Dracula supported his chin with two fingers and muttered thoughtfully, "Remus Lupin, why do I feel like I've seen this name somewhere?"
"Remus?" Dumbledore looked at Dracula curiously. "It should be a coincidence, right? Because of his status, Remus usually keeps a low profile."
"I had wanted to arrange a job for him at Hogwarts this year, so that he could look after Harry more after Sirius escaped from prison, but I was unable to contact him."
Dracula frowned and was about to search his memory when he suddenly felt the sky suddenly darken.
He turned around and looked up into the sky with a frown.
The pale purple sky had disappeared, and it started raining outside without anyone noticing.
The sky outside the window was a thick, sticky gray, and it was gradually deepening. The distant sky at the end of the black lake had almost become a pure black like ink.
"It shouldn't be dark yet, right?" Dracula asked. "And even if it was completely dark, how could such thick clouds suddenly form without even a single star left?"
Dumbledore also looked into the distance, opened his mouth, and seemed to be hesitant to speak.
"Professor Dracula, actually, there are... um, some employees sent by the Ministry of Magic to check whether Sirius has sneaked into the train the students are on." He explained.
"Employee?" Dracula was slightly interested. "What kind of employee is so powerful that he can cause changes in the celestial phenomena?"
As he spoke, he looked towards the distant sky, light flickering in his wine-red eyes.
The next moment, Dracula's interested expression turned gloomy.
"Principal Dumbledore, is this the employee you mentioned?" he asked coldly, emphasizing the word "Principal".
"The Ministry of Magic has issued the order. Even as the headmaster, I have no reason to refute it." Dumbledore spread his hands helplessly, "Don't worry, Professor Dracula, Fudge promised me that the Dementors will not disturb the students."
"But this is my territory!" Dracula said heavily, "I am not a kind-hearted person like you who would be restrained by the Ministry of Magic. I will never allow those disgusting creatures to invade the vicinity of Hogwarts!"
After saying that, without waiting for Dumbledore's reaction, Dracula suddenly stepped on the window frame of the principal's office, jumped lightly into the air, spread his wings, and flew straight to the end of the Black Lake where the dark atmosphere was the strongest.
There was a train struggling to move forward, going slower and slower.
With a sudden jolt, the Hogwarts Express came to a halt, and all the lights suddenly went out, plunging everything on the train into complete darkness.
Countless monsters in tattered cloaks surrounded the train and flew towards it, carrying an extremely terrifying aura!
…
…