When the Sorting Hat said "Azkaban", the air in the professor's seat was silent for a moment.
The professors looked at the Sorting Hat in surprise. Their eyes moved back and forth between Dracula and the hat on his head, their expressions extremely shocked.
"After being the headmaster for so many years, this is the first time I know that Hogwarts has a fifth branch!" Dumbledore spoke first, and said cheerfully, "Then let us congratulate Professor Dracula for becoming the first member of the Azkaban House. By then, he will be promoted to the headmaster of Azkaban in no time!"
Dumbledore led the applause.
Professor Kettleburn, who only had one arm and half a leg left, came to watch the fun and walked to Snape's seat on crutches.
"Severus, now that we have the Azkaban branch, you Slytherin students don't have to go through the formalities anymore. You can just be sent directly to Azkaban!" He happily patted Snape's shoulder with his only remaining hand and laughed loudly, "It's so troublesome to have to study for seven years before going to Azkaban!"
As a Hufflepuff of the older generation, Professor Kettleburn naturally enjoyed making things difficult for Slytherin. After all, Slytherin had a long history of looking down on Hufflepuff wizards.
Snape's face was dark, but considering Professor Kettleburn's sixty or seventy years of experience as a professor, he, a young man who was only thirty years old, could not directly retort.
Listening to the teasing of the professors around him, Dracula's mouth twitched.
"Are you itching for a burn again? Do you want to experience the feeling of being burned?" He took off the Sorting Hat from his head and said with a stern face, "Don't think I don't know. I think you are still thinking about how I cleaned your skin and you want to take this opportunity to take revenge!"
"My Lord, I didn't!" The Sorting Hat said in a wronged tone, "It's Christmas, I just wanted to be humorous and liven up the atmosphere..."
"Well, the Christmas party is indeed lacking some entertainment to liven up the atmosphere." Dracula looked at the hat in his hand, with a malicious smile on his face. "Then I'm going to perform a show of the Sorting Hat jumping through a ring of fire for everyone present. I need you to cooperate with me."
Dracula twirled the Sorting Hat with one hand, and as he looked frightened, he casually snapped his fingers with the other hand, and a circle of fire burning with blazing flames appeared in front of the Sorting Hat.
"Wait, Lord Count, I haven't finished what I want to say!" The Sorting Hat lowered its voice in a panic and said to Dracula, "I did this for a reason, and it involves the four founders!"
It deliberately controlled the sound so that only Dracula could hear it. Dracula's eyes moved.
The next moment, the circle of fire in front of him suddenly disappeared, and the Sorting Hat stopped spinning, hanging listlessly in Dracula's hand.
"This hat needs to be frightened from time to time, otherwise it will cause all kinds of trouble." He smiled at the curious professors around him and put the Sorting Hat on his head elegantly. "Now my Christmas hat is completely in place. Professors, hurry up and eat. The main course will be removed soon."
After all the other professors had looked away, Dracula adjusted the brim of the Sorting Hat with his hand.
"Let's start. Let me see what reasons you come up with this time." He put on the hat and began to communicate with the Sorting Hat silently through the Sorting Hat's Legilimency ability as a bridge.
"My Lord Count, this is so hard for me!" The voice of the Sorting Hat sounded in Dracula's mind, and it began to complain as soon as it came up, "You know, you have lived for a thousand years! Excluding the time you were asleep, there are seven or eight hundred years! Even if you deliberately released the brain occlusion technique, I can't judge which founder's temperament is suitable from this long thousand years..."
"So I'm the one who's making things difficult for you?" Dracula asked in his mind as he stuffed a mouthful of blood pudding into his mouth.
"Not really." The Sorting Hat said sincerely, "It's just that I'm not capable enough. I will definitely work hard to improve!"
"Actually, I thought you would just set up a college for me, at least to deal with it." Dracula laughed.
"I want to do the same, but there is no way." The Sorting Hat said, "A thousand years ago, the four great founders of Hogwarts injected their thoughts into my body, giving me the unique ability to sort students into different colleges according to their talents and qualities."
"But the wills of the four founders have therefore always remained in my body, and their memories and feelings towards you, Count Dracula, have also existed for a long time. If the above are only secondary, then what really troubles me is another point - the founders' minds will quarrel!"
"Wait, you're saying that the four minds left behind by Salazar and Godric will quarrel?"
Dracula immediately became interested and didn't even eat the pudding in front of him. He sat up straight, ready to listen carefully to the story told by the Sorting Hat.
"That's true. In fact, when I was put on your head, the remaining wills of the four founders wanted me to sort you into their respective houses. You know, Ravenclaw has always had a strong liking for you, while Gryffindor and Slytherin have always wanted to prove who is the wizard friend who has the greatest influence on you..."
"What a joke those three of them." Dracula chuckled and shook his head, a look of reminiscence and remembrance unconsciously emerging in his eyes.
At that time, he was far from the terrifying vampire lord he would become later, and the four founders of Hogwarts were just fledgling young wizards. Four like-minded wizards, and a vampire friend who joined halfway, walked together on the frozen Black Lake. That was his youthful memory thousands of years ago.
After recalling for a long time unconsciously, Dracula suddenly thought of a question.
"Why didn't you mention Helga? Doesn't she want me to be sorted into Hufflepuff?" he asked the Sorting Hat in his mind.
"My Lord, please wake up." The Sorting Hat couldn't help but complain, "Look at yourself, where is your integrity, loyalty, honesty or fearlessness of hardship... Hufflepuff has long lost hope and has not participated in the quarrels of the other three founders. Instead, he has been acting as a peacemaker."
Dracula's face darkened.
"After all that, the question remains." His tone became malicious. "Why did you shout out 'Azkaban'?"
"Well... well... why don't you blame Gryffindor?" The Sorting Hat said uneasily, "As Gryffindor's hat, I must have inherited his inappropriate sense of humor. Yes, that must be it!"
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