Chapter 440: Conflict (Edited)

Fish and Hermione arrived in the hall holding hands, the entrance to the Great Hall was crowded with people, everyone rushed to dine here right after class, a group of people were crowding the door, shouting and pushing and shoving nonstop.

In addition to the crowd, there was a ghost named Edmund Grubb in the Great Hall.

The ghost, who was fat and wore Victorian clothes, caused trouble because he had died from eating poisoned plums and had died right in front of the Great Hall at Hogwarts. So when he was in a bad mood, he stopped people from eating to vent his frustration.

Edmund and Fish were old friends, and when Fish had started school, it had been Edmund who was the ghost he picked on.

"Edmund, are you in a bad mood again?"

??

Fish pushed through the crowd at the entrance and stepped in front of Edmund, who was blocking the entrance.

"Fish!"

Startled, Edmund saw the cat reaching out to him, and immediately gave up trying to stop the others from eating, and ran off towards the wall in a flash.

"Why did you run away? Is Fish so scary?"

(●??●)?

The cat scratched its head and muttered in confusion....

The students, blocked at the door by Edmund, thanked Fish.

"Thanks to you, Fish, otherwise our dinner would take another twenty or thirty minutes at least."

Edmund had a reputation at Hogwarts, and the Weasleys had also been stopped by him when they were students.

After shooing Edmund away, the crowded hallway soon cleared and Fish took Hermione by the hand and hurried forward to the long Gryffindor table for dinner.

"Nya?"

(??~??)

As the two ate, Fish suddenly looked down the hall, his triangular cat ears turned that way.

"What's up, Fish?" asked Hermione curiously.

"Harry and Ron, having an argument with Draco again..."

Fish said with a helpless look on his face as he held out his hands, wiggled his ears and added, "Looks like Arthur's in the papers, and Draco's teasing Ron about it..."

"Weird, isn't it good to be in the papers nya? Fish's cat's head was in the papers too."

(●??●)?

Fish looked at Hermione curiously, hoping she could clear up his doubts.

Hermione thought about it, and had a rough idea of what was going on, probably that reporter Rita Skeeter had made something up to make Mr. Weasley look ba... she'd done it before.

Briefly explaining to Fish why, Fish shook his head in confusion and looked back down the hall.

"Looks like they're going to fight, let's go watch the action nya!".

?()?

False reports are no more interesting than fights, so Fish dropped the knife and fork, grabbed Hermione and ran into the foyer.

...

"There's another picture, Weasley!" said Malfoy, turning the paper over and holding it up high. "A picture of your parents, in front of your house! You call that a house?"

As usual, he continued to make fun of the Weasley family's financial difficulties, and Malfoy initially wanted to make a comment about Molly's figure.

Only considering that Fish and the Weasleys were close, and that Malfoy was worried that Harry and Ron would really pounce on him like in first grade, he had to smack his lips regretfully and swallow his sarcasm.

But even so, Malfoy's words still made Ron shudder with anger.

"Piss off, Malfoy." scolded Harry, then turned to his friend and pulled him back, "Don't get angry, Ron...".

"Oh, by the way, Potter, you lived with them this summer, didn't you?" Malfoy continued to sneer, "So, please tell me, is it true that the Weasleys are so broke that they don't even have a spare room for you?"

"I'm going to kill you!"

Ron tried to lash out at Malfoy, but Harry had a firm grip on his robes.

Malfoy remembered the bad experience of being knocked to the ground by the two of them, he unconsciously backed up two steps and hid behind Crabbe and Goyle.

"Ha, coward."

Harry snapped back sharply as he saw Malfoy's retreat. "Little Malfoy wouldn't dare go anywhere without his two henchmen."

"I just don't want to roll around on the floor with you like a barbarian," Malfoy grimaced, drawing his wand, "Speaking of which...it doesn't look like our duel back then was decided, Potter."

"Gladly!"

Replied Harry gritting his teeth as he let go of Ron's robes and pulled out his own wand.

Ron stepped aside, a little confused....

Wasn't he supposed to fight Malfoy at first? When did he switch to Harry?

When Fish and Hermione arrived, all they saw was Harry and Malfoy facing each other with their wands, while Ron stood off to the side with Crabbe and Goyle.

"Fight! Fight!"

?()?

The Gryffindor and Slytherin houses, two houses with deep-seated grudges, were clearly on the same side of the fence as the two boys, while Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff were on the same side as Fish, watching the action.

Of course, many of them were still on Harry's side, not because of his reputation as "The Boy Who Lived," but simply because Slytherin was unpopular.

"What are you doing?!"

Just as the two were about to attack, Professor Moody limped down the marble staircase, his terrible magical eye glancing back and forth at Harry and Malfoy, causing them both to reluctantly drop their wands.

"Nya..."

(?≥△≤?)

The cat meowed in annoyance and then looked at Professor Moody, who had come down the stairs....

Because of him the fun was over.

"Well, you're in luck!" Malfoy put away his wand, pulled his robes back and prepared to leave. "Crabbe, Goyle, let's go!"

But he had only taken two steps when he heard Professor Moody bellow behind him, "Wait a minute, lad!"

"What else is there, Professor?"

Malfoy turned to him and asked in a soft tone.

"You haven't cleared things up yet," Professor Moody took two steps forward, the normal eye along with the magic eye were fixed on Malfoy, "So you can't leave yet!"

"I've pulled out my wand, I was just having a bit of fun with Potter," although Mad-Eye Moody's appearance was intimidating, Malfoy didn't think he would dare do anything to him, so he kept that same blasé attitude. "We haven't even used a single illumination spell, so we have nothing to say to you."

"Is this how Lucius teaches his children?"

Moody's magical eye twitched twice, as if they were about to pop out of their sockets, and he leaned in, bringing his scarred face close to Malfoy's, and growled gruffly, "I don't suppose he ever told you how I nearly put him in Azkaban in the first place."

Professor Moody's teeth ground together at the mention of Azkaban and his gaze turned dangerous as he looked at Malfoy.

Professor Moody's look was so powerful that Malfoy swallowed saliva and backed up a few steps, distancing himself from him.

But at this point, Malfoy still didn't believe Moody would dare do anything to him, so he said stiffly, "Yes, you haven't mentioned it to me, after all, our family is full of high ranking Ministry of Magic officials, such as Barty Crouch, Ludo Bagman and the Minister of Magic, Mr. Connelly Fudge."

He said, with a look of disgust at Professor Moody's slightly threadbare robe.

The pupil of Professor Moody's one normal eye suddenly shrunk and, hearing Malfoy announce his father's name, young Barty Crouch managed to get irritated.

"I want to teach you, in the name of Lucius, to respect a professor!"

He snarled, raising his wand and pointing it at Malfoy.

As the crowd gasped, a white light shot out from the tip of Professor Moody's wand, hitting Malfoy solidly, launching him into the air and turning him into a ferret.

The ferret flew through the air for some distance and then landed hard on the ground.