Chapter 169

"Wow. That's scarily accurate. How did you do that without ever meeting her?"

"Really?"

"Nah," he said, chuckling, "I'm just screwing with you. She sounds nothing like that."

"Hilarious. Now go get ready. I'll see you at breakfast." Harry shot back, before he headed down the stairs out of the common room, trying to keep his balance with his weighted vest on. Thankfully, his DEX was at a very decent place, and he could handle himself with no problem.

The moment he reached walked into the room, he heard a familiar ring.

Ping!

Due to using torso weights gear, you have gained +1 to Str.

With a smile, Harry headed down the tower staircase to breakfast.

Halfway to the Great Hall, it became very evident that turning his entire vest to stone was a very stupid idea. His movement was not only incredibly restricted, but also felt very clunky and odd.

Deciding to immediately rectify that, Harry quickly slipped into a nearby bathroom and shut himself in a stall.

A couple of Scourgifies later, the stall was entirely clean. He took off his shirt and robes, before he cast the counter-spell onto his vest, turning it back to cloth so that he could move about easier.

Pulling out a used old shirt from his inventory, he cut several rectangular pieces out of it using a few Diffindos, and made sure that they were about twice the size of his hand.

Then, he cast Duros on each of them, turning them into stone, and proceeded to glue them in a spaced-out manner to the front and back of his cotton inner vest, making sure that they wouldn't restrict his side to side movements or bend movements in any way.

Having done that, he put the weighted vest on, and did some actual stretching, making sure that his Strength-cheat-vest version 2.0 was working fine. Thankfully, the vest was one of those that Perenelle had brought for him, and was magical, so it wasn't going to be tearing under the weight anytime soon.

With a grin, Harry put his shirt and robes back on and headed out of the bathroom in a brisk walk. He'd been delayed quite a bit by the impromptu enchanting he had done in the bathroom which meant that Terry would have arrived at the Great Hall by now.

The news that Hannah Abbott had been attacked on Monday and was lying as though dead in the hospital wing had spread through the entire school by the evening Tuesday. And today, two days after the attack, its effects on the school's psyche had never been clearer to Harry as he walked through the corridors towards the Great Hall.

The air was thick with rumor and suspicion. Most of the first and second years were now almost exclusively moving around the castle in tight-knit groups, as though scared they would be attacked if they ventured forth alone.

Meanwhile, behind the teachers' backs, a roaring trade in talismans, amulets, and other protective devices were sweeping the school. Harry was a bit surprised to see Neville Longbottom buying a large, smelly green onion from a shady looking sixth year near the Grand Staircase. Harry stopped to point out to the jumpy Gryffindor that he was in no danger; he was a pureblood, and therefore quite unlikely to be attacked.

"Hannah was a half-blood. And besides, they went for Filch first," Neville said, his round face fearful. "Everyone knows I'm almost a Squib."

Leaving the boy behind to complete his purchase, Harry entered the Great Hall and made his way over to his usual spot on the Ravenclaw table before he loaded up his plate with potatoes.

He got as far as his first bite before he noticed that something was wrong.

Pausing, Harry blinked and looked all around him to check that he wasn't seeing things before he put down his spoon and turned to Terry.

"Terry," he asked, "where are all the Hufflepuffs and Slytherins?"

Terry looked at him blankly for a second, "You haven't heard? The Slytherins were attacked this morning."

"Attacked!" Harry said, shocked, before asking, "Was someone petrified?"

"Petrified?" Terry seemed thrown off for a second before he realized what he meant, "Oh no. Nothing like that. It was the Hufflepuffs."

"The Hufflepuffs?" Harry asked, getting even more puzzled.

"Yeah. I was talking to Dean and Ron before you came in, and they told me what happened. Apparently, the Hufflepuffs got really mad over Hannah being petrified, and students from all the seven years banded together and attacked the Slytherins on the way to Breakfast. Picked 'em all off in ones and twos. It was a bloody massacre."

"Today!?" Harry exclaimed, "And were they caught?"

"Yeah. Professor Sprout has locked them all in their dorms and took off a load of Hufflepuff's house points. She hasn't come out yet, but Fred and George Weasley somehow snuck into their common room and heard that they won't be allowed out of the common rooms for three days except for food and classes. Plus, they're saying most of the Slytherins won't be released from the Hospital wing until at least tonight. Lots of broken bones and stuff."

Harry didn't know what to say, "Damn…" he muttered, "This is…it is just crazy…"

"Not really," Terry said as he sipped on his pumpkin juice, much to Harry's surprise, "I mean, I know it was bad, and they shouldn't have done it and all. But I get it. One of their own is hospitalized for months now. They have to feed her with tubes and potions now to stop her from starving. She would have died of starvation had Dumbledore not found her in the right time. I can understand where they're coming from. Besides, it's almost a guarantee that one of the Slytherins was the Heir. Now that the Heir is hospitalized, we won't have any more attacks."

"Terry," Harry said softly, "You don't know that. The Heir might not be a Slytherin."

"Really?" Terry maintained with a raised eyebrow, "So you're telling me that the Hat read some kid's mind and saw that the kid was the Heir of Slytherin, and it decided not to put that kid into Slytherin? Just for fun?"

"It could have, but that doesn't make it okay for the Hufflepuffs to just take out everyone in an entire house," Harry insisted, "That's a quarter of the entire school! Besides, Dumbledore said that this kind of dark magic was beyond any student."

Terry shrugged. "Maybe it is, or maybe the heir is just telling the Chamber's monster who to target. Besides, better a quarter of the school than the whole if you ask me," he said before going back to his food, leaving Harry at a loss for words.

And so the breakfast silently continued. Hermione joined them soon after, having almost skipped breakfast to finish the Charms homework in the common room. A few minutes later, Harry finished his breakfast and went over to the Gryffindor table. Making his way over to where Ron and Dean were teasing Ginny about her and Colin Creevey being Potions partners, Harry got their attention and asked, "Hey guys, could you meet me after the classes near the Arithmancy classroom?"

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