"After the Wizengamot trial, Peter Pettigrew violated thirteen laws including the Regulations Strictly Restricting the Use of Dark Magic, the Criminal Code of the British Wizarding World, and the International Statute of Secrecy, and was sentenced to life imprisonment in Azkaban!"
The verdict of Amelia Bones, Director of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement, was actually quite fair, and in theory no one should have any doubts about it.
But Sirius was still worried.
Because he knew that Animagus could easily escape from the many Dementors in Azkaban.
The big black dog he transformed into at that time was actually not a small animal, but it did not attract anyone's attention. A mouse with better concealment would surely have been easier to escape from prison.
After Sirius raised this issue in court, Amelia Bones promised to use a more secure cell to detain Peter in order to prevent him from escaping Azkaban by transforming into an Animagus.
Without waiting for Sirius to raise any further objections, she grimly declared the trial over.
"Bones doesn't realize that this is not a problem that can be solved by just changing the cell!" Sirius said gloomily after leaving the courtroom, "Rats are the most annoying creatures. If you are not careful, you will let them run away."
"Even if Peter is locked up in a completely sealed cell, does that mean we don't need to deliver food to him? That damn rat could easily get out through the window while the food is being delivered. It's impossible for the person delivering the food to remember to stare at the window every day!"
Sirius clenched his fists, "In my opinion, a coward who betrays his friends should be killed immediately to prevent him from doing anything bad again."
"It's okay, he can't transform anymore." Dracula waved his hand nonchalantly.
"What?" Sirius looked at him in surprise.
"Before I left, I cut off the source of magic in his blood. He will just be a squib in this life." Dracula smiled indifferently, but his smile seemed particularly cold.
"If the rat really escapes, it will definitely seek Voldemort as its backer, and then it will be a bit troublesome to deal with it. With this in mind, it is better to solve it once and for all."
"Well done, Professor Dracula!" Sirius waved his fist in ecstasy. "Hahahaha, Peter, the traitor, this is what he deserves!"
"Professor, can a wizard who can cast spells turn back into a Squib?" Harry blinked and asked curiously.
"Of course." Dracula said, "In fact, there are some magic contracts or black magic that can achieve this, but it is a bit cruel, so few people would do it."
"So... Professor, are you using a magic contract or dark magic?" Ron also leaned over and asked.
"The magic contract will take a long time to take effect, and the conditions will be quite harsh." Dracula slowly raised the corners of his mouth.
"What do you think?"
…
Dumbledore took Harry and Ron back to Hogwarts through the fireplace in the main hall of the Ministry of Magic, and Sirius also returned to 12 Grimmauld Place through the fireplace.
On the surface, Dracula stepped into the fireplace together with Dumbledore and the others, but he had no intention of returning to Hogwarts so soon.
He threw a handful of Floo powder into the fireplace, but said nothing about his destination, and let the green flames engulf him.
Floo powder trips without calling out a location will often connect to a random fireplace.
For example, in the middle of the last century, a witch named Violet Dillman had a quarrel with her husband. She went into the fireplace without reciting any location, and then fell in love with the man who was randomly teleported to a certain location at first sight, and escaped from her original husband...
However, Dracula's Floo trip was different.
Before the fireplace randomly selected its destination, Dracula forcibly reversed the direction of the space, so that the fireplace was instantly connected to an ordinary torch.
The next moment, accompanied by a burst of green sparks, Dracula's figure leaped out from the flame of a torch and then landed lightly on the ground.
"Huh, this should be the right place." Dracula brushed off the ash on his body and looked around with interest.
This is a deep corridor covered with dark tiles. Two rows of torches are inserted into the dark tiles on the wall, flickering blue and white light, adding a sense of mystery to the entire space.
At the end of the corridor there is a solitary, black door…
This is the corridor on the ninth floor underground of the Ministry of Magic.
The lonely door of the Department of Mysteries had aroused Dracula's curiosity before today's trial began, and the familiar power inside the door also made Dracula want to come and take a look.
As for Fudge and other officials of the Ministry of Magic, they had just finished the trial of Peter and had just passed through this corridor. They never thought that Dracula would come back and appear in the important place of the Ministry of Magic!
Dracula stood in the corridor, looking carefully at the black door in front of him.
There is no handle or keyhole on the door, only a completely flat plate, which is most likely powered by magic.
Dracula looked for a long time without any clue, so he shrugged, took a step forward, and appeared behind the door in an instant.
Since he can Apparate anyway, it is not necessary for him to open the door.
Behind the door was a circular, enclosed room with a dark marble floor that had been wiped clean to the point of glistening, making it look like it was covered in a layer of clear, stagnant water.
There were many candles in the room, emitting a cold blue light, illuminating the twelve handleless doors on the circular wall.
The twelve doors would swap positions from time to time, and the walls would rotate rapidly. Without the correct magic key, no one could be sure which door was the right one they were looking for.
Not only that, there are only five laboratories in the Department of Mysteries, namely "Brain", "Prophecy", "Time", "Death" and "Love".
Among the twelve portals, excluding five laboratories, the remaining seven doors are all behind extremely dangerous mechanisms.
However, Dracula would naturally not be bothered by such means.
The mechanisms behind the doors posed no threat to him, and he had no intention of looking for a specific door.
He wanted to see what was behind each door, just to have some fun. Finding the familiar power became a secondary matter...
Dracula casually pushed open one of the doors.
The door opened silently, revealing a long, narrow rectangular room filled with dancing lights that made the entire room glow like a jewel.
The room was completely filled with all kinds of watches, including pendulum clocks, quartz clocks, pocket watches, wristwatches, etc. The ticking sound of the hands could be heard from all directions.
There were several silent people wearing pure black wizard robes standing in front of various experimental equipment, working silently, with no expression on their faces and not saying a word.
When they saw Dracula suddenly walk in, they just shrank a little, showing almost no surprise, and raised their wands to point at Dracula who was looking around with interest.
These silent people have no idea how long they have been working here. Now they seem to have completely fallen into numbness, as if they have long lost the luxury of emotions such as joy, anger, sorrow, and happiness... Working in the Department of Mysteries has gradually made them lose their minds and even their humanity!
"Strange." Dracula frowned slightly, "What are you researching every day? You actually made yourselves look like this."
However, those silent men seemed to have not heard what Dracula said at all, and just cast non-lethal attack spells at him with expressionless faces.
"It's really in the way."
Dracula sneered, raising his hand to grasp all the incoming spells.
Then, he chanted a spell -
"Obliviate."
All the silent people suddenly froze and their eyes became blank.
"Supefy." Followed by the second spell.
The Silent Man fell to the ground in a daze.
"It's boring. There's no fighting power at all." Dracula curled his lips and looked up at the furnishings in the room.
There is a huge crystal jar here that is shaped like a clock, and bright light emanates from it from time to time.
This clock-shaped jar constantly produces a dancing bright light, and inside the crystal water, a small, jewel-like egg floats.
When the egg was lifted up by the bright stream of water in the bell jar, it suddenly broke, and a tiny hummingbird flew out of the eggshell.
Once the hummingbird appeared, it was lifted to the top of the jar so that it could fly high up without being covered by liquid.
But every time it tried to land on the water to drink, its feathers would get wet again, and then the whole bird would be brought back to the bottom of the jar, sealed in its egg again, and the eggshell would become intact again.
This process repeats and cycles over and over again.
The hummingbird in the jar also keeps getting older and older until it falls into the water, where it is reborn and becomes older, and the cycle repeats endlessly...
Dracula looked around the room for a long time before finally determining that this was the Time Hall of the Department of Mysteries.
Not only because the numerous clocks around and the countless objects here are related to "time", but also the clock-shaped jar is filled with a strong breath of time energy.
Dracula once felt this kind of aura in the time-turner he took from Hermione.
"That is to say..." Dracula's eyes lit up.
He glanced around the time hall and saw a glass cabinet full of neatly arranged pendants. The pendants had a golden ring and a rotating hourglass.
A cabinet full of time-turners!
Dracula suddenly remembered that after Dumbledore found out that he had taken Hermione's Time-Turner, he told him that the Ministry of Magic did not have enough time energy, only enough for internal research and a few samples for students to use.
"I really believed Dumbledore's lies..." Dracula said gritting his teeth as he looked at the time converters in the cabinet in front of him.
He naturally took a time-turner from the cabinet, then woke up the Unspoken Men and cast a Confusion Charm.
After doing all this, Dracula left the Time Hall and walked towards the next door.
The time energy was not the familiar breath that Dracula had sensed before. He could feel that the breath was closer to him and more mysterious.
…
In the next three rooms, Dracula saw a brain soaked in green solution, rows of tall shelves filled with crystal balls, and fountains spraying a liquid similar to a love potion.
The three rooms represent "Brain", "Prophecy" and "Love" respectively.
Adding the first room Dracula entered, "Time", the last room is the laboratory representing "Death".
I don’t know if it’s because it’s too spacious, but the Death Hall seems larger than the previous few research rooms.
The room was dimly lit, square in shape, and sunken in the center, forming a huge stone pit about twenty feet deep.
Stone steps surrounded the entire room, like stone benches, gradually descending one step at a time. Each step was very steep, just like a lecture hall or the Wizengamot courtroom that I had visited not long ago.
In the center of the stone pit is a raised stone platform, on top of which stands an archway of unknown material. It carries a sense of historical vicissitudes and is also in tatters, giving it the impression that it will collapse at any time, but in fact it is as still as a mountain.
There was no wall around the arch, and a tattered black curtain or drapery was hung above it. Although the air was cold and there was no breeze, it swayed gently, as if fanned by an unknown force.
When Dracula saw the curtain, his heart, which had not beaten for a thousand years, suddenly twitched.
"That's... the power of death?" Dracula muttered, but then he shook his head, "But this is death, not darkness... Then why does this power bring such a familiar feeling?"
He exhaled deeply and slowly raised one hand. The deep red magic power gathered in his hand and gradually condensed into a blood-red river.
Then, Dracula walked up the surrounding stone steps step by step, towards the archway in the middle of the room, towards the curtain that was swaying without wind.
With every step he took, the familiar feeling became stronger, and the deep red magic power gathered in Dracula's palm also produced more and more distinct fluctuations, as if it wanted to meet the curtain at any time.
It seemed like another thousand years had passed, and finally, Dracula walked to the arch, only one step away from the curtain.
He stretched out his hand and slowly touched the curtain.
However, the deep red magic power in his hand surged out first, merging with the curtain like a river flowing into the sea.
The curtain is black, and Dracula's magic is crimson, but after the two are intertwined, it is difficult to distinguish one from the other, as if they came from the same source!
…
…