Chapter 348: Chapter 348: Find The Way Back Home
Disclaimer:
Harry Potter and all of its characters belong to J.K. Rowling.
I own nothing but the original characters I create.
"Dialogue"
'Thoughts'
-Author notes-
Chapter 348: Find The Way Back Home
"Where did all those students come from?" Madam Maxime asked, her confusion evident.
"Albus! Is this some ploy to help your second champion? I won't stand for it!" Karkaroff shouted, clearly agitated.
"Igor, I assure you tha—"
"Albus! This is a disaster! You have to get those boys off the arena. They are interfering with my tournament!" Mister Crouch demanded.
Dumbledore sighed. "I have nothing to do with that, but… I do agree that we need to do—"
"I also have something to say!" Madame Umbridge screeched at the Headmaster, standing abruptly.
"Albus Dumbledore, I don't know what…" The fury on her face was quickly replaced by confusion.
"I don't know what I was going to say…" She sat back down, leaving everyone perplexed.
"Mmm?..." The Headmaster stared at the toad woman with an inquisitive look and wondered what was wrong with her today.
'Now that I think about it...she has been a bit off, as of lately.' He thought.
"Dumbledore! Look!" Professor Silverbell pointed at the Firebolt broom in Dumbledore's hands.
It was becoming transparent.
The tiny professor hurriedly pulled another tool from his belt and began performing checks on the item, but he couldn't do much before the broom vanished completely.
"What in Merlin's name is going on?" Madam Maxime had never felt so baffled in her entire life.
"What does this mean?" Dumbledore asked Silverbell, concern growing in his voice.
"I'm not sure yet…" Silverbell's eyes shifted to the arena. "I need to examine that body from before, and perhaps the dr—"
Creaking noises echoed from the sky, startling everyone, followed by a series of loud roars that reverberated through the arena.
Then… they saw them.
One dragon after another began to appear, filling the rocky area.
"More dragons?!" Mister Crouch shouted.
"But where are they coming from?" Maxime asked, alarmed.
This time, they saw it clearly. The dragons didn't fly down from the sky, instead, they simply appeared out of nowhere.
"Is this an attack?…" Karkaroff muttered, worried this might be something orchestrated by his old master to kill everyone.
"Oh… this is much worse than I thought!" Professor Silverbell caught a glimpse of the dead dragon as it disappeared, followed by the corpse of the unknown boy.
"Dumbledore, we must hurry!" Something had occurred to him.
"Quick! Someone call the dragon handlers!" Mister Crouch ordered.
"No!" Silverbell quickly objected. "You must not interfere!"
"What is this gnome talking about? We can't just let those dragons run wild! I'll get fired for this!" Crouch shouted.
"Hold on, Bartemius. The professor here knows a lot about these… phenomena. We should listen to him," Dumbledore said calmly.
"Do you know what is happening?" Maxime asked, sensing that Dumbledore was withholding information.
"Dumbledore, there is no time! You have to get me down there. I must speak with those boys before they do something that could doom us all," Silverbell urged.
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"See? This is what I was worried about," Neville said, as four more Hungarian Horntails manifested into their world.
There was one extra dragon for each extra individual that had appeared. Counting the one that had already been there for Neville's test, that made five.
"Whoa… that's a lot of dragons. This might get tricky," Hadrian Potter commented nonchalantly.
"Where did they come from?" Skinny Harry asked, his voice tinged with nervousness.
"They came from the same place as you all did. These are your dragons," Neville explained.
"What about that one?" Tall Harry pointed at the corpse lying on the ground.
"He was already like that when he appeared… I guess the dragon killed him right before crossing over...wait. " Neville was interrupted as the dead dragon and the corpse both disappeared, vanishing into thin air.
"Where did they go?" Tall Harry asked.
"Did they go back to their world?" Victoria asked, looking at Neville.
"Is that what we have to do to return? Do we have to die?"
"Wait, hold on! Is that true?" Skinny Harry asked, panic rising in his voice.
"I don't have all the answers, okay? Just give me a moment to think…" Neville was clearly frustrated.
At least all the dragons had appeared with their chains, which gave them a bit of time to come up with a plan.
Neville's eyes drifted to the spot where the dragon he had killed had been before it vanished.
'Maybe they'll go back as soon as their dragon dies…' Neville considered.
"Maybe we should just kill these dragons and see if that works. Because I'm certainly not willing to die myself. I don't know about the rest of you," Hadrian said, reaching the same conclusion.
Hadrian began walking away from the group, but Tall Harry stopped him.
"So you want to do that alone?" Tall Harry asked.
"No offense, but you all look like a band of weaklings. I can handle this myself." Hadrian smirked.
"You don't have to thank me. Just stay there and watch."
"Hold it, leather pants," Victoria said.
"Oh? Did you change your mind?" Hadrian gave her a wink.
"You do realize that you're all different versions of the same person, right?" Neville commented.
"Ew… I'd rather not think about that," Victoria grimaced. "But what I was going to say is… we don't know if killing all the dragons will send us back. What if it makes things worse?"
"So? It's not like we can wait all day. Look." Hadrian pointed at the dragons.
The Hungarian Horntail is a notoriously aggressive species of dragon, and even though they were chained, they were now struggling fiercely to break free. It was clear they wouldn't remain restrained for much longer.
"Wait, please! Don't do anything yet!" Professor Silverbell's voice echoed through the arena.
He and Dumbledore were descending slowly onto the field on the Headmaster's flying carpet.
"You should all listen to what he has to say…" Dumbledore spoke in a grave tone.
"Everyone's future may depend on it."
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