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Chapter 161: The Acromantulas' Reward
🕑 Added 2018-07-07 02:57:20 +0000 UTCGoing down the steep slope for about twenty minutes, Evan came to the ridge of a vast hollow, a hollow that had been cleared of trees. Looking up, he could see the vast starry sky.
The open space in the center of the hollow was covered with thick leaves. Stepping on them, Evan had a feeling of walking on a carpet. He saw Peter Pettigrew and the spider that took him in the middle of the open space. In front of them was a huge, misty, domed spider web.
"Evan, Evan, you came to save me! I knew you would come!"
Pettigrew wept in a low voice, he looked extremely miserable. He shivered on the ground with no dignity. He crawled over like a worm, trembling and said, "Please, don't leave me alone here, don't..."
"Shut up!" Evan said furiously.
Peter continued to cry and he was disturbed. His appearance made Evan feel sick and look down on him.
He was sad, weak, stupid to the extreme… Why does such a person even exist?!
Evan did not look at Pettigrew; he turned his eyes to the spider on the side.
It lingered on the thick leaves, its eight legs swayed slightly, four of his eyes on one side were watching him and Pettigrew, and the other four eyes looked at the huge spider web not far away.
Click, click, click...
It moved its pincers rapidly, giving a sharp hasty clicking.
Evan suddenly realized that the spider was saying something. It had been hard to tell, because he clicked his pincers with every word he spoke.
"Aragog!" it called, "Aragog!"
And from the middle of the misty, domed web, a spider the size of a small elephant emerged, very slowly. There was gray in the black of his body and legs, and each of the eyes on his ugly, pincered head was milky white. He was blind.
Seeing Aragog, Evan involuntarily clenched his wand in his hand.
This monster should be Hagrid’s pet, the ancestor of all the Acromantulas in the forest.
The image in front of him was too frightening, although he was mentally prepared, when this giant spider appeared, Evan discovered that he had been underestimating the size of the monster.
It had eight legs, each of them was even thicker than Evan’s own body!
Peter Pettigrew, who had been curling up on the ground, suddenly stopped shaking; his mouth widened, and seemed to be making a silent cry, his eyes bursting out.
This was simply a nightmare. No, this was a thousand times worse than that!
With the advent of Aragog, countless Acromantulas came out from nowhere.
Each of them was bigger than the three that attacked Evan and Peter Pettigrew. They crowded together. When they saw the people in the center of the field, they were excited and moved their big pincers, sending out terrible and disgusting clicking.
Pettigrew got goose bumps, and he swore that if he could choose the way of death, he would rather be shredded by Sirius Black, or get his soul sucked out by a Dementor, than be the food of these spiders.
“What is it?” he said, clicking his pincers rapidly, sounding a bit majestic, "Why do you call for me?"
“Men,” clicked the spider who had caught Peter Pettigrew.
“Is it Hagrid?” said Aragog, moving closer to them, his eight milky eyes wandering vaguely.
"No, strangers."
“Kill them,” clicked Aragog fretfully. “I was sleeping…”
Hearing Aragog, all the other spiders were excited.
They gathered around the center of the field, waiting for Aragog to return into his domed web, so that Evan and Peter would be their food.
"No, don't, think of a way out!" Peter squatted on the floor, holding on Evan’s robe tightly, and looking at the Acromantulas around him in panic.
Evan kicked him aside, and took a step forward; he could even see Aragog’s fluff clearly.
He gulped, His heart seemed to have left his chest to pound in his throat.
"Hold on, Aragog!" Evan shouted. "I am a friend of Hagrid’s!"
"Hagrid's friend?!" croaked the old spider, he paused and said slowly, “Hagrid has never sent men into our hollow before.”
"My name is Evan Mason, I am from the castle, I’m close to Hagrid..."
"I’ve heard of your name!"Aragog clicked his big pincers," Hagrid told me that a few months ago, you killed that thing in the castle. "
"Yes!" Evan replied eagerly, "Harry and I killed the Basilisk!”
Hearing the Basilisk’s name, all the furious clicking suddenly stopped, and the whole place suddenly became quiet as never before.
Besides his heavy breathing and Peter’s sobbing, Evan could no longer hear anything else.
He even thought that all the Acromantulas had left. He turned his head and saw that they were still crowded there, but they were all quiet and even stepped backwards.
Their ugly spider faces were very humane and showed fear.
"How dare you mention this name!" Aragog madly clicked his pincers and made an unprecedented click. It said with intense emotions, "The thing is our nemesis!"
Aragog clicked his pincers furiously, and all around the hollow the sound was echoed by the crowd of spiders; it was like applause. Evan saw again the rustling of many long legs shifting angrily; large black shapes shifted all around him.
"Hurry up, say something else, don't mention that thing!" Pettigrew reminded Evan with an almost suffocating voice.
It was clear that Aragog thought the same. It changed the subject and said to Evan, "Hagrid's friend, what did you come to our hollow for?"
"I followed this guy and accidentally came here. He is an evil Black wizard. He planned a despicable plot in the castle!" Evan hesitated and continued. "This guy is working for Voldemort... ..."
Hearing the name, Pettigrew convulsed.
"Voldemort?!" Aragog repeated slowly, seemingly without any particular reaction. It said, "I have heard of this name. Fifteen years ago, this wizard sent someone to contact me. You humans were going on a war at the time. He asked us to join his camp, but I refused. I was not interested in the war of the wizards, although my children were very eager to follow him. Voldemort promised them a very generous reward.”
Hearing “Voldemort”, the spiders around them became significantly more excited. They all seemed to recall Voldemort’s promise in those years, the promise that they simply could not refuse: as long as they were loyal to him, they could get fresh human flesh as food.
