Carrying a lantern, Filch hurriedly arrived in front of the Fat Lady's portrait and suddenly smiled. The guardian at the entrance of the Gryffindor common room was nowhere to be seen.
Not being able to enter the Gryffindor common room meant that the students wandering at night could only continue staying outside.
No one could escape from Filch's hands.
No one!
"Ah-choo!" George sneezed again.
Fred, in front of him, stopped in his tracks and looked at George with a bewildered expression.
"Which way should we go?" George rubbed his nose and leaned closer to ask.
Fred moved his wand onto the Marauder's Map, observing Snape and Filch's positions. He involuntarily quickened his pace and planned to circle around the eighth floor to shake off Filch's pursuit while avoiding Snape and Filch's cat.
However, Filch unexpectedly didn't chase after the sound but turned back instead. He blocked a corner of the corridor, waiting for Snape to appear there, intending to stop them from leaving through the nearby secret passage.
"When did that guy become clever!" Fred quickly halted his steps and started walking back. Seeing that Filch planned to block the corridor, his heart sank.
Snape was approaching the eighth floor, and once he arrived, they would be trapped here.
"Professor, they should still be on the eighth floor. I heard some noise just now," Filch's tone was filled with unconcealable excitement as he spoke, "You go from this side, and I'll go around from the other side. They can't escape."
"We're done for, trapped!" Fred's face was filled with despair. Now, there was no space left for them to evade Filch's pursuit.
However, as Fred and George hurriedly passed by the tapestry where the giant club struck Barbary the Barbarian senseless for the third time, they accidentally noticed a door appearing on the wall opposite the tapestry.
"How did it appear?" George stared at the door on the wall, surprised.
They had no idea that such a door existed here, and the Marauder's Map didn't provide any markings for it.
Fred gritted his teeth and said, "Forget it, let's hide inside!"
The two of them opened the door and hid inside, only to find a dusty broom closet with a few old brooms inside.
When Filch and Snape approached from both sides, the entrance to the Room of Requirement had already disappeared.
They were completely fooled.
"Where are they?" Filch's face showed a momentary bewilderment. He had just heard sounds coming from this direction, so why couldn't he see anyone?
Did they hide?
Or... did they escape?
"No, they couldn't have gone far. I heard someone sneeze," Filch's cheek muscles twisted together in anger.
He thought he could trap those Gryffindor students who had been playing tricks on him and teach them a harsh lesson, but they still slipped through his fingers.
The immense sense of frustration made Filch feel extremely stifled.
Inside the broom closet, Fred and George both covered each other's mouths, afraid to make even the slightest sound that would attract the attention of the two outside.
There was no choice. Filch and Snape were standing just outside the broom closet where they were hiding. If they opened the door, something extremely terrible would happen.
As if someone was favoring these lucky twins, Snape and Filch eventually left. They searched other areas on the eighth floor for the whereabouts of the twins.
Of course, they found nothing.
"If anyone wanders around at night again, come and report to me immediately," Snape said to Filch before leaving.
Hearing the footsteps gradually fading away, both Fred and George couldn't help but breathe a sigh of relief. However, they didn't immediately leave.
They didn't know how long they had been inside the broom closet. It wasn't until they saw on the Marauder's Map that Snape and Filch had given up searching for them that they cautiously pushed open the door, afraid to make any loud noises that would attract Filch's attention.
"That was close. We almost got caught by Filch. But what's the deal with this broom closet?" George raised his wand, preparing to examine the broom closet they had just hidden in, only to find that the door on the wall had disappeared.
"What's going on?" Fred was equally puzzled. He reached out and tapped the wall a few times, then looked at the Marauder's Map beside him.
There were no hints on it.
"Hogwarts Castle still holds many secrets. Even Moonface, Dungbottom, Bigfoot, and Pointy Fork don't know all these secrets!" George couldn't help but marvel. He looked at his twin brother and asked, "By the way, how did that door appear just now?"
"I don't know!" Fred gave up after fruitless research. "Forget it, let's go back. Hopefully, the Fat Lady has returned."
Both Fred and George breathed a sigh of relief as they returned to the portrait of the Fat Lady.
The Fat Lady, in her nightdress, looked at them and asked, "Where have you two been?"
"For a stroll," George immediately said the password. "You sang beautifully."
The portrait opened, and they immediately climbed into the common room, collapsing onto the armchairs and couldn't help but laugh at each other.
"It was really thrilling tonight," George's excitement hadn't completely subsided.
"I bet Filch must be furious," Fred laughed joyfully. Honestly, he didn't like that caretaker.
By the time they returned to their dormitory, it was close to five o'clock. Although they felt tired, neither of them could fall asleep. It wasn't until they were awakened in the blurry morning by someone.
"Ah..." Fred let out a big yawn, too lazy to even open his eyes.
"When did you come back?" Albert put on his running clothes, casually opened the window, letting the cool morning breeze into the room.
"Probably... around five in the morning," Fred yawned again, sleepily asking, "What time is it now?"
"Seven-thirty in the morning."
Looking at the drowsy twins, Albert shook his head. "I told you both not to go wandering around at this time. We have two Herbology classes this morning, up at the greenhouses. Don't be late."
"I told you..." George picked up his pillow and threw it at Fred, who just fell back onto the bed, looking exhausted.
"You said the Fat Lady wasn't here last night, and you two were almost caught by Filch. In the end, you hid in a broom closet on the eighth floor to escape?" Lee Jordan listened to George's account and found it unbelievable. He was curious about how Fred and George managed to escape from Snape and Filch's pursuit.
Or perhaps George was lying?
"And then, when you looked again, that broom closet was gone?" Albert listened to George's description of the closet's location and immediately knew what they were talking about.
The Room of Requirement.
These two guys hid in the Room of Requirement and narrowly escaped danger.
After Fred and George left the broom closet, they found that it had disappeared without any warning.
That day, Fred and George skipped their morning Herbology class and naturally woke up in the afternoon.
.....
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(End of this chapter)