348 Chapter 347 Crazy (2 in 1)
It was a little after six in the evening when Jon found the Antipodean Opaleye.
The dragon's location had been marked by him previously while riding Hoss, so it wasn't too much trouble to find it now.
Of course, Jon had also expected that all the golden snitches around this dragon had already been captured by Diane or Emil, so he actually had two alternative dragons, only that they were far from the location where the exit of the Forbidden Forest happened to be, and they were not listed as his first choice of target.
That dragon was in the middle of eating when they came to the Antipodean Opaleye territory.
Two sheep that had been bitten to death lay beside it. There were certainly no wild sheep in the Forbidden Forest, these sheep had been put inside together by those Romanian dragon trainers when these dragons were brought here to ensure that even in their limited time here, these dragons could catch enough prey to eat.
And all around, although it was not clearly visible, it could still vaguely perceive a lot of golden figures wandering around.
The Antipodean Opaleye looked very unhappy with the golden flying snitches around it; these things, even if they were all alchemical items, flew like mosquitoes and were a nuisance.
It could not destroy them or simply expel them, so it could only look at them with a bored face and then lower its head to eat a sheep.
It showed little desire to attack in response to Jon's presence and was far more gentle than the other dragons, even deliberately refraining from looking at Jon as if trying to pretend not to notice his arrival.
Jon had no problem with this, a dragon that had no humans in its recipe and got on very well with them for the most part, they had no essential conflict at all.
It wasn't as if the golden snitches are dragon eggs, and even if those dragon trainers had told these dragons to keep an eye on them by ear, it's unlikely that every one of them would do so honestly.
The one that Diane had met at the beginning, the other Antipodean Opaleye one, and the one that Jon is currently seeing, are not interested in these "golden flies" at all. It would be easier for the dragon if Jon would just take them all away and make the place less annoying.
To be able to finish off the first task like this so easily, Jon was certainly happy to do so.
He didn't bother the Antipodean Opaleye one who is eating its dinner, he just used the levitation charm to rise into the air, then added a simple general counter-spell on his body and flew a few laps around the place with the most golden flying snitches, and in a short time a lot of magic from the golden snitches was absorbed by the gem on his ring, and they fell to the ground.
Jon's luck was not bad, about twenty golden snitches were flying around this Antipodean Opaleye, if he caught all of them he would be able to get more than two hundred and ten on this trip, and then he would be guaranteed to get the first place in this task.
He flew for about half an hour before all the golden snitches around him had sucked up all of their magic and dropped onto the grass.
Jon glanced at the time on his pocket watch, it was just after seven o'clock, quite a bit faster than he had predicted before.
He began to gather up all the golden snitches on the ground, thinking that he could still meet up with Diane later by the exit of the Forbidden Forest so that he could even secure a more solid ranking in terms of time.
But just as he was picking up the golden snitches, one of them suddenly caught his attention.
There was no difference in form between this golden snitch and the others, all being the same size, with a golden metallic sheen on its exterior and a pair of small, thin wings on either side of the sphere.
The difference, however, was that this one had a distinctive mark in the middle of its sphere.
A mark that Jon recognised, a serpent passing through a skull - the Dark Mark!
This mark still existed in the magical world, it is an exclusive mark of the Voldemort Death Eater Squad!
And the moment Jon saw the Dark Mark, an extremely bad feeling welled up in his heart, and just as this feeling rose in him, the golden snitch with the mark suddenly cracked down the middle!
Jon reacted instantly.
Without hesitation, he threw the Golden Snitch, which was widening and looked like it was about to open completely, straight into the air!
But at the very moment, he threw it out, a sticky, glue-like liquid abruptly gushed out from the golden snitch, directly enveloping Jon's entire body!
Jon's heart sank to the bottom in an instant, while a slightly fishy smell reached his nostrils.
The sticky liquid was all over his hair and robes, and Jon didn't reach out to touch it at first, nor did he have any curiosity to investigate what it was.
Without half a moment's hesitation, he raised the wand in his hand and aimed it at himself and used the cleaning spell.
"Scourgify!"
The effect of the cleaning spell quickly took effect, and a second later, all the slime on his body disappeared cleanly, at least there was no trace of it left on the surface.
But Jon still frowned, the slimy liquid was gone, but the faint fishy smell lingered around him.
It was at this point that he also noticed that the surroundings had suddenly gone silent at some point.
The sound of the Antipodean Opaleye feeding leisurely disappeared, and even the sound of the wind seemed to have been muted by a pause button.
Jon gripped his wand tightly as he raised his head just in time to meet the huge, bloodshot and raging, pupil-less eyes.
"ROAR!!!"
A dragon roar that could be said to have resounded completely throughout the Forbidden Forest, mixed with anger, rage and resentment shook Jon's eardrums!
In a matter of seconds, the wind swept through the nearby meadow, and it was the Antipodean Opaleye flapping its wings violently, its colourful scales glistening like the moon in the night sky, and the trees that were in its way were swept away by those strong, powerful wings!
All the while, its eyes were fixed on Jon, as if he had just done something so horribly wrong that it had become furious!
As he watched the dragon rise into the air, Jon held his wand in his hand, his brow furrowed, with no fear in his eyes, just listening intently to his surroundings.
Soon, just as he had guessed the worst had happened, in all directions, in all parts of the forbidden forest, the roar of countless dragons was continuing to ring out!
***
Once Diane had separated from Jon, she didn't hesitate and headed straight for the exit in the same direction she had taken when she had first entered the Forbidden Forest.
There was nothing wrong with the goal Jon had planned for her, for whether it was for Jon or Emil, this Forbidden Forest, which belonged to Hogwarts, could be said to be half of their home turf.
With such an advantage added, she could not, in any case, be like the two boys, who were like fish in water in the Forbidden Forest and were able to find the location of the various dragons and catch the golden snitches in the fastest time possible.
So even if she had stayed on, she would not have been able to get an advantage in the number of golden snitches caught.
Therefore, it was necessary to finish the task first in time-wise.
Using the moonlight, Diane quickly traced the outer path that led from the direction of Hogwarts into the Forbidden Forest, and she followed it all the way to the clearing where the four had prepared to start at the beginning of the tournament.
At this point in the clearing, the three judges from the International Confederation of Wizards were waiting, and they were surrounded by perhaps a dozen or two dozen journalists and Aurors.
These journalists were well aware that one of the participants was bound to finish the tournament task on the third night to secure points on the time ranking, which would be first-hand news, and with the vast majority of wizards throughout Europe now following this Triwizard Tournament, to get this news and publishing it first would represent newspaper sales.
Just as Diane saw those people in the clearing, the three judges and the journalists waiting here saw her too.
At once, countless flashes came on and every camera present captured the sight of Diane walking out of the forbidden forest.
But it was only seven o'clock and a full hour still remained before the first task could officially end at eight o'clock, so even if Diane had arrived here, the tournament was not yet over, and she had to wait until eight o'clock before she could cross the silver line, from which the protection had been removed, to finish the tournament.
Just as Diane was standing in front of the silver line, a red spell suddenly and silently shot up from behind her!
Such a sneak attack left Diane, who was already blinded by the flash of the cameras, with no time to react!
But just as the spell came within ten centimetres of hitting her back, a shield reflecting the glow of the red spell suddenly lit up!
Diane's shield charm, which she kept on her body at all times in the Forbidden Forest, saved her once again!
The silently cast spell did not break through her shield charm, but only caused a few cracks on the surface and was unable to do any more damage.
Diane turned around with a stony expression on her face, and without hesitation, she gripped her wand in her hand and instantly hurled a silent spell in the direction the sneaky spell had come from as well!
The bright red light pierced the darkness of the forbidden forest and illuminated Emil's gloomy face.
The spell was not very accurate, as Diane was only countering with her sense of where she was being attacked, and Emil only slightly sidestepped as the spell plunged past him!
The sneak attack and counterattack happened in a matter of seconds!
The journalists who saw it all let out a gasp, their fingers pressing the shutter faster and their flashes constantly lighting up.
Durmstrang's champion and Beauxbaton's champion had met at the finish line, and as long as they both wanted to finish first, the battle would be inevitable!
The journalists couldn't have been more excited about what had happened, which meant that they would have more explosive things to write about and more magical photos to show to the public in tomorrow's publication.
Diane and Emile knew this better than anyone else.
With their wands in their hands, they confronted each other at a distance of relatively twenty metres, and Diane uttered with a sneer.
"Do pureblood nobles with the Lestrange family name only use sneak attacks?"
The gloomy look on Emil's face changed negligibly; he had suffered enough humiliation at Jon's hands, and Diane's words were nothing to his mental capacity now.
"The means are not the priority as long as the objective can be accomplished, and I feel that the diehard Rosiers' should understand that point better than I do."
Although they both came from pureblood families, they stood on two very different lines, and the focus of their taunts was naturally on their families.
Just as this duel between them was about to begin, the ground suddenly began to tremble!
Everyone in the scene felt the tremor, and many of the journalists holding up their cameras almost fell to the ground without standing still.
Immediately afterwards, along with the tremors, came the sound of countless roars of anger that rang through the sky!
In the forbidden forest, a dozen places were lit up with dragon flames spewing into the sky, followed by those huge creatures rising into the sky!
Such a huge commotion made everyone present turn pale, and Matthew, one of the three judges, looked up into the sky with a grimace, and the next moment he turned his head to the dragon trainers from Romania.
"What's wrong with those dragons!"
The dragon trainers all turned pale when they heard the dozen or so dragon roars, and they stared wide-eyed at the patch of sky that had been stained with golden dragon flames, and no one answered Matthew's question.
Of all those present, Emil was the only one whose face showed little surprise.
He glanced back at the forbidden forest that was already enveloped in golden fire, and the corners of his mouth had even curled up in an insignificant curve.
This first tournament task had been suggested by the Hogwarts Castle side, so how could they not have made some preparations against Jon?
Jon certainly didn't know right now exactly what was going on there at the outskirts of the Forbidden Forest's entrance, and he didn't have the energy or mood to think about it either.
After that roar from all the dragons resounded throughout the Forbidden Forest, he flopped right onto Hoss's back without half a second's hesitation!
"Runoff! Hoss! Go in the direction of Hogwarts Castle! Run towards the outskirts of the Forbidden Forest!"
But before Hoss could even step his first hoof, the Antipodean Opaleye came crashing down from the sky, blocking in front of Jon and Hoss!
At the same time, the heat evaporated the moisture from the air and dried up even the gusty wind!
"Roar!"
With the roar of the dragon, golden dragon flames erupted from its mouth, the flames, full of dragon magic, were like living snakes of fire, and the moment they erupted, they began to surround Jon and Hoss!
Seeing that the way ahead was blocked and that there was no way for Hoss to break through the flames, and at the same time with the distant undulating roar of the dragon getting closer and closer, Jon made a split-second decision.
"Head back! We must get out of here first!"
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