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Chapter 962: Recruitment and Detention
🕑 Added 2023-12-16 12:51:02 +0000 UTCFudge’s worry about the students engaging in combat training had infuriated them, and at the same time made them more concerned about learning magic from Evan, especially Hermione, who was already thinking about this. Now that they heard Sirius's advice, she simply proposed to form an army.
Since that was what the Ministry of Magic feared the most, they wanted to do the opposite.
Even if they were discovered and expelled by the Ministry of Magic because of this, they would not hesitate to fight against the Ministry to the end.
In Sirius’s words, it was better to be expelled in self-defense than to sit safely in school with your eyes in the dark.
The war had started the moment Voldemort returned, and they couldn't just stay at Hogwarts and do nothing.
Because they needed to be prepared to fight Voldemort and the Death Eaters at any time, practicing combat and improving their skills had become more important than studying and taking exams.
It had to be said that it was quite surprising that such words came out of Hermione's mouth.
And once she became passionate and decided to do something, or thought her reasons were right, then she would absolutely follow through to the end and would never give up, no matter how many school rules this might violate, Hermione didn't care.
Just like no matter how busy she was now, she found time to spend in the kitchen every week to promote the Society for the Promotion of Elfish Welfare among the house-elves. In fact, no one listened to her except Dobby, but she still didn't give up.
If it weren't for Evan’s persuasion, Hermione would have planned to sew clothes for the house-elves as gifts...
Since they planned to form an army for combat training, the first priority was to "recruit soldiers."
With their current scale, they couldn’t do it, and they couldn’t post notices directly. Evan and Hermione studied it and decided to adopt a recommendation system to develop members.
That was to say, everyone would find and recommend reliable candidates, informing them secretly.
Of course, that was not something that could be accomplished overnight. They decided to gather everyone to discuss it first.
Evan had no objection to that; he originally wanted to form such an organization.
Before the start of the war, he wanted to help as many people as possible to improve their skills. Although it might be a bit too fast and unsafe to directly recruit people from the entire school, he also did not have much time to advance step by step.
The information brought by Sirius had let Evan know that the situation with the vampires was already very unstable.
Although Dumbledore was there, Voldemort was also there, and no one knew what would happen.
Once the situation changed, Evan had to intervene immediately, which meant that he might leave the school at any time.
With Hermione's efforts, the first draft of the plan and regulations for this matter was drawn up.
The first meeting was finally scheduled for the day they first went to Hogsmeade, and the location chosen was the small, dingy, and very dirty tavern "The Hog's Head Inn ". Hermione thought it was less crowded and inconspicuous, and Evan had no objections.
On the surface, the secrecy there was not very good, but considering that the owner of the tavern was Dumbledore's younger brother Aberforth and the Order of the Phoenix had permanent members there, it was actually the safest place.
Everything was unfolding in an orderly manner, and three weeks had passed quickly since Sirius appeared in the fireplace, Hermione proposed to actually form an army, and everyone separately informed the others.
During that period, Harry was given detention again for contradicting Umbridge in class.
The reason was that when Umbridge asked the fifth year students to continue reading Chapter two, of Defensive Magical Theory: ‘Common Defensive Theories and Their Derivation,’ Hermione informed her that she had already read the whole book.
She originally meant not to waste time on this, but to learn some knowledge that could be used in the exam, but Umbridge obviously regarded this normal inquiry as another challenge to her authority.
After losing to Hermione in a debate, she directly deducted five points from Gryffindor House.
This set Harry on fire, and he confronted Umbridge head-on again.
"Why did you deduct points for Gryffindor?" Harry asked angrily, standing up from his seat.
“Don’t you get involved!” Hermione whispered urgently to him.
“For disrupting my class with pointless interruptions,” said Professor Umbridge smoothly. “I am here to teach you using a Ministry-approved method that does not include inviting students to give their opinions on matters about which they understand very little. Your previous teachers in this subject may have allowed you more license, but as none of them — with the possible exception of Professor Quirrell, who did at least appear to have restricted himself to age-appropriate subjects — would have passed a Ministry inspection …"
“Yeah, Quirrell was a great teacher,” said Harry loudly, “there was just that minor drawback of him having Voldemort sticking out of the back of his head."
This pronouncement was followed by one of the loudest silences Harry had ever heard.
“I think another week’s detentions would do you some good, Mr. Potter,” said Umbridge sleekly.
This was Harry's second detention, and Umbridge had already ordered a new quill that cut the user's hand, and this time, the detention wouldn't be as easy as the last one!
With Rawya’s help, Evan had figured out how the curse worked. But he doubted whether telling Harry would make him understand and successfully use the counter-curse.
Evan originally wanted to warn Harry to be calm and ignore Umbridge, but he soon found himself in detention, too, thanks to Umbridge.
The reason for Umbridge's anger was due to Rita Skeeter's latest article in Hogwarts News. Umbridge believed it was all fabrication, and as the actual controller of the Hogwarts News, Evan naturally had to bear the responsibility.
Since Harry's hearing at the Ministry, Rita had been relentlessly focusing on the incident of the uncontrollable Dementors attacking Harry. She used it to criticize the various loopholes in the Ministry's management. The Ministry, however, did not respond to this matter nor conduct an investigation.
Fudge believed Harry was lying and that there were no uncontrollable Dementors involved.
The Order of the Phoenix secretly investigated, and finally found that two Dementors had left Azkaban uncontrollably and never returned. Lupin provided the relevant evidence to Rita, and she immediately published the story.
As expected, the news of two uncontrollable Dementors roaming freely caused a huge uproar. It quickly surpassed Umbridge's becoming Hogwarts High Inquisitor to become the hottest news in the recent period.
As the real mastermind behind the scenes, Umbridge might have panicked a bit!
However, she had been careful not to leave any evidence that could link her to the matter. It was a pity...
