Chapter 135: Kanaloa (Edited)

After some consolation from Professor McGonagall, Fish recovered the next day and found the pile of books he had thrown away, and found that, as Professor McGonagall had said, they were all about cats and big cats.

Especially the book about fish that Sister Canary had given him, and he suddenly remembered that he had been thinking about going to the Black Lake to catch a fish or something.

So Fish finally accepted the gifts...except, of course, the "Atlas of Cat and Dog Anatomy."

This was a great relief to Sharpay and the others, who were upset.

When Fish returned to the Gryffindor Common Room in the evening, Sharpay brought the silly girl who brought the wrong book to apologize to him, and Fish graciously forgave her.

Although he really wanted to take this opportunity to waste his time and not do his homework for another day or two, after assessing his daily performance and Professor McGonagall's intelligence, as well as his mother's knowledge of him, Fish felt it was a bit difficult to hide his actions from the other party, so he could only reluctantly give up the idea.

So, with a sour face, he finished his homework under the tutelage of Miss Sharpay and the others.

After his usual walk around the castle and a brief visit to Professor McGonagall's office to listen to a story, Fish slipped out of the castle and headed for the Black Lake.

Today, instead of going to the forbidden forest, I'm going fishing in the lake!

Fish ran to the Black Lake and, without hesitation, jumped into the water.

Unlike normal cats, Fish was a good swimmer, but not as good as the fishing cats he had seen in books, and it was the first time Fish had met a webbed-footed cat in the world.

After a few failed attempts to become a fishing cat, Fish gave up, not that he couldn't swim anyway, he just swam a little slower.

As for diving, he had long since learned to breathe underwater, which was even better than the bubblehead spell, and thanks to that he was able to practice swimming, otherwise he would have drowned the first time he accidentally fell into the water.

Once in the water, Fish found it dimly lit, with the moonlight from the sky and the faint glow of some plants and animals in the lake.

For a cat, however, this light was enough to allow him to see.

Although the range of vision was not the same as on land.

Fish waved his paws and swam less than ten meters downstream when a soft, tough tentacle emerged from the darkness and curled around Fish, who was submerged underwater.

It was the giant squid that had lived in the lake for years, and when it spotted Fish, it pulled him in and carried him back to shore.

"Meow meow meow?"⊙w⊙

The cat was stunned when it was returned to shore.

This was something the giant squid had often done, as it had established a good relationship with Hogwarts long ago and occasionally helped out when a student fell into the water.

The giant squid did not recognize Fish's cat-like form as a Hogwarts student, out of pure animal affinity, but also because of Fish's disastrous way of swimming, which caused the giant squid's incomprehension.

Oblivious to the situation, Fish pulled away from the shore for a moment before diving back into the black lake with a "plop," only to have the giant squid's tentacles curl around him again before he could dive two meters.

"Meow meow meow!" ?(=｀Д′=)?

Fish waved his little legs, preventing the tentacles from coming closer, and spat a stream of bubbles out of his mouth.

The outstretched tentacle retracted, and then a huge eye appeared in front of Fish.

[You, aren't you drowning?]

The giant squid understood what he meant by Fish's bubbling sound just now, so he tried to communicate with Fish.

Communicating with animals was a fairly simple task for a druid, and Fish naturally understood what he was saying as he opened his mouth and spat out another series of bubbles.

"Meow~meow!" (=｀Д′=)

[I think I know who you are]

From time to time, students would swim in the Black Lake, or sit on the shore chatting, and the teachers of Potions and Herbology classes would wander into the lake from time to time to look for ingredients, so the giant squid knew a lot about Hogwarts.

[Your name is Fish, right?]

"Meow" Fish nodded.

[Hello, my name is Kanaloa.]

After briefly introducing himself, the giant squid named Kanaloa followed Fish, slowly diving to the bottom of the lake.

The two swam and talked nonchalantly, but when he learned that Fish had gone down to catch small fish, Kanaloa offered to catch them for Fish, but the kitten refused.

Fish, who had not eaten raw food for a long time, had not gone fishing in the lake primarily for food, but for fun.

[In that case, let's split up for a while.]

Kanaloa told Fish, that, as absolute master of the Black Lake, most of the fish would not dare to stay by his side.

[But before that, I will take you to meet the Merfolk of the Black Lake, they should be able to help you with the fishing, the fish I will catch are a bit big for you].

If Kanaloa is the most powerful individual in the Black Lake, then the Merfolk are the most powerful race in the Black Lake.

Fish did not refuse Kanaloa's kind offer.

"Meow~" (=ΦwΦ=).

After receiving Fish's bubble message, Kanaloa extended a tentacle, gently pulled Fish up and swam faster towards the mermaids' meeting place.

Kanaloa is a very fast swimmer, no faster than a unicorn on land, mainly because she is so large that she can move far away in one motion.

As he went along, Fish would occasionally see squid much smaller than Kanaloa approaching, but of course this was because the comparison was between Kanaloa, a large squid. By comparison, the small squid were not small, or at least larger than Fish's clouded leopard form.

After a brief greeting to Fish, they were shooed away by Kanaloa with a wave of his tentacles.

[They are my people, or possibly my offspring], Kanaloa explained to Fish, [I have been in the Black Lake so long that I have lost track of my own offspring, as the generations in the lake have changed from one squid to another].

Soon, Kanaloa led Fish to the bottom of Black Lake, where a huge rock appeared in the murky water.

The rock depicted a group of half-human, half-fish creatures with spears, hunting some creature from the water, including squid, and there were many of them.

"Meow?" asked Fish, pointing his paw at the paint on the rock and spitting bubbles.

[Ah... it was a long time ago, when the mermaids wanted to claim the whole Black Lake as their own and tamed most of the intelligent creatures that lived in it, and as for my people, some of them were tamed too, but now we are at peace with each other]

Kanaloa's tone was full of disdain.

[That's because I have no interest in ruling the Black Lake, otherwise.... hmph!]

Fish looked carefully at the paintings on the rock, the size of the squid was only 2 or 3 times the size of the mermaids, and it was completely incomparable to Kanaloa.

Whether the scale of the rock painting was correct or not, Fish believed Kanaloa's story, after all, he was so big that no creature would choose to go after him as long as he wasn't stupid.

Kanaloa led Fish onward, and soon they came to a village of sorts.

[Here we are]