Chapter 60: The Collapse of the Middle Ages (I)

"Hogwarts Academy", Oxford, Kingdom of England, 1 February-1348

The cold winds that blow from the boundless permafrost glaciers of the Arctic Ocean and Scandinavia sweep through the lead-gray foam of the North Sea in the middle of winter every year, and howl across the island of Great Britain, howling and spitting endless frost on the heads of every Scotsman and Englishman. Because the island is generally low and flat, and lacks a rugged mountain range to shelter from the cold snaps, even Oxford, on the southern tip of the island of Great Britain, is not immune to the snow and cold - in the early days, the cold snaps and snow were often accompanied by the Viking Clippers. However, the English people of this day and age need no longer worry about the presence of Vikings: the Plantagenet dynasty, which currently rules them and will rule until the twenty-first century, is the descendant of a group of Vikings.

In the 1348th year after the birth of Jesus, the winter of the dark year of the great plague that swept through Euro 6 seemed to be a little more difficult than usual, and just entering November, a few light snows fell intermittently. Even on days when it doesn't snow, the sky is always covered with thick and dark clouds, obscuring all the sun, and it is just after noon, but it is already as dark as Cheng dù after dusk.

Just after Christmas, an overwhelming blizzard roared, and the powdery snow in the lead-gray sky was almost so thick that it was so thick that it covered the fields, forests, mountains, and cities in a thick white coat, and the eaves of the city's buildings were covered with dense crystalline ice edges. Even the surface of the River Thames was covered with a layer of ice overnight. The snow piled up on the streets of Oxford requires the entire Hogwarts cadets to mobilize and use fire spells to complete the basic clean-up work. As for the wild roads, they are completely unroadable.

However, although the climate outside can be described as cold as ice, in the banquet hall of Hogwarts House in one of the ancient towers, a red charcoal fire is burning in the huge fireplace, making everyone who attends the New Year's banquet feel warm like spring.

- Even though they are in a miserable world on the verge of death and destruction

Since there were only thirty spells in the whole learning content, this copycat version of Hogwarts House became a two-week short course, and by the end of the year, the fifth batch of regular students had already graduated—and the number of students in this batch had swelled to as many as four hundred.

As for the literacy class opened by the remnants of the former Oxford University, it has recruited nearly a thousand students in one breath, from Lori Shota to the old man and lady: after the large-scale appearance of spells and the world entered the magical age, as long as anyone with a discerning eye can see it, the knight's armor and sword have been eclipsed in front of [Flame Blast] and [Dragon Breaking Slash]. "Knowledge is power" has become an ironclad fact......

In the same way, after teaching the first batch of students, the time-travelers basically got rid of the heavy teaching work, and directly appointed some graduates to serve as the deans and mentors of the four branches of Gryffindor, Ravenclaw, Hufflepuff and Slytherin, and the natives of the plane taught spells to the younger students in the form of "old students leading new students", and the teaching effect seemed to be good.

- As the first graduate of the landlord and "angel" professor, Queen Joan of England. Plantagenet took upon herself as the president of Ravenclaw. As for the abbot of Gryffindor, the Pope appointed his royal physician, Joric. Queen Giovanna of Naples is also a graduate of Hufflepuff Academy, so she is very interested in mastering Hufflepuff Academy, but unfortunately her country is in ruins, and there are many affairs, even if there is a [random door], she can't stay in England for a long time, so a Louise Sister under the "Paladin" Levi got Doraemon's blue eyes because she was good at teasing cats, and became the head of Hufflepuff in one step, and achieved the status of being equal to the Queen of England......

Finally, there was the position of Dean of Slytherin, which the Venetians had originally wanted to occupy. But others believe that the Venetians have taken advantage of this plague crisis to greatly expand their sphere of influence, and that they must be humble in this matter...... In the end, after some arguments, he actually cheapened the prodigal writer Boccaccio in Florence and made him the head of the Italian male therapist

Of course, as a guy who relied on writing and tongue to eat, Boccaccio was indeed one of the best people to master the "spell......

As for the most exalted Headmaster of Hogwarts, it seems that only the Pope is qualified to serve in this day and age - of course, His Majesty the Pope is too busy to stay in Oxford all day, so he is just a name. In fact, all academic affairs are still handled by the four branches.

At this moment, the four deans and their teachers were sitting in the teachers' seats on the high platform of the banquet hall, listening to the speech of the principal.

“…… Ahem, the year that has just passed has been a dark year, a sad year. Millions, if not tens of millions, of Christians have been called by the Lord to leave the world in the midst of the catastrophe of the Great Plague. Frightened people lost their souls and even mistakenly thought that the end of the world was coming.

In the past tragic year, every country in Europa has suffered pain and devastation not seen in a century, from Denmark to Sicily, and every once prosperous region has been devastated. Cities are in ruins, the countryside is turned into wilderness, and the poor and the rich, the nobles and the serfs, can only wait in despair for death to come. Even now, the shape of this world is still not optimistic. The regions that have been saved are still a small fraction of what Europe as a whole has. In the east, in Denmark, Hungary and Bohemia, the terrible plague continued to rage. Even in Britain and France, not every town and town where the plague was extinguished in time. Thousands of believers in the Lord are still struggling in despair and sickness, waiting for deliverance from God Almighty......"

Standing in front of the high platform of the banquet hall, the first honorary headmaster of Hogwarts House, His Majesty Pope Clement VI, coughed slightly, following the arrival in Rome and Avignon, today's third New Year's address - with the help of the magical [random door], the medieval magnates temporarily possessed the miraculous ability to move quickly, but also invisibly, their workload increased a lot.

“…… But it was also a miraculous year, a glorious year, a great year, when our world was plunged into darkness and ruin, the Supreme God finally heard the cries of the devout believers for help, and sent holy angels to save us, not only to heal our sick bodies, but also to purify and sublimate our souls as an unprecedented great grace, and God even generously bestowed divine power on mortals, It is these magical spells that you have mastered, which means that an era of miracles is coming......

The past year has been unfortunate and memorable, for the omnipotent God has not only tested the world with the great plague, weeded out those who are too cowardly or misbehaved, but also given us the courage, wisdom and talent necessary to overcome the calamities of the world, and you must be careful to use the powers of God and use them as much as possible in the service of the Lord, instead of only seeking personal gain, and satisfying your desires with the power of God, which is a great sin of blasphemy, When you die, you must go to Hell ......"

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Finally, after the Pope's lengthy speech emphasizing the importance of the church and faith, the fifth graduating class of Hogwarts House, who had been waiting a little impatiently, lined up on the stage one by one, and took the cat ear card and toy cat tail representing the graduation certificate from Doraemon's hand, and happily put it on his body - of course, this cat tail was hung on the belt, not inserted ♂ into the hip seam, otherwise it would be fine in the summer, but once it was winter, These guys' butts are going to freeze into ice lumps because they can't wear pants

Next, the band, which had already been ready, began to play cheerful music with lute, flute, and snare drums. Tables made of large oak planks were brought in by the servants, and the tables were covered with linen tablecloths, which were rarely covered with lighten lamps, and the feast was lit not by dim torches or oil lamps, but by the students who performed the "light technique" in turns...... The reflection of metal cutlery and plates is very pleasing to the eye. The wine in wooden barrels and the home-brewed mead in stoneware urns are also very rustic.

But these medieval British dishes on the table made Wang Qiu, an "angel", look straight at him, and his appetite disappeared in an instant - modern people who are familiar with European cuisine know that Northern Europeans rely on potatoes for food, and Southern Europeans rely on tomatoes for food, and they simply can't live without these two things. And Britain is a sad country known for its abundance of potatoes and. Since he was a child, Wang Qiu felt that the British people's imagination in food was extremely lacking, because from British dramas and British classics, they seemed to eat all the following every day: boiled potatoes with beef, boiled potatoes with mutton, boiled potatoes with pork, roast beef potatoes, roast mutton potatoes, roast pork potatoes, beef potato soup, mutton potato soup, pork potato soup......

The only world-class dish in Britain seems to be grilled fish with chips...... It's the stuff that was written in middle school English textbooks.

After Wang Qiu got older, he saw the legendary British famous dishes "Stargazing Pie" (countless dead fish heads stuck on the cake and looking up at the starry sky), "Chocolate Roasted Eggplant", "Goat's Milk Boiled Orange", "Jelly Boiled Pineapple" and other dark dishes that could not be seen and the taste could not be said, and the status of British cuisine in Wang Qiu's mind further rose from "ordinary" to "terrifying and scary".

So, before American specialties such as potatoes, pineapples, and chocolates came to Europe, were the British recipes a little more normal?

At least, Wang Qiu was still looking forward to this New Year's thank-you banquet prepared by the Hogwarts students - but it was only after these dishes were served that Wang Qiu realized infinitely despair that as early as the distant Middle Ages, the British had already distorted the technology tree in terms of cooking, and turned into a country of dark cuisine that was extremely strange in the eyes of modern people, both Scots and English

Brown bread that is hard enough to be stoned to death is not mentioned for a moment - in fact, even the white bread of the Middle Ages was as hard as the modern French baguette. Even the main dish placed on the banquet also made Wang Qiu feel unbearable to look at directly.

First of all, to be clear, the Europeans of the Middle Ages ate almost everything, and many Europeans who lived in a privileged life in later generations no longer disdained and even found cruel and disgusting things, such as water offal, and the poor people of the Middle Ages who were hungry and red-eyed also ate them. For example, Haggis, the "national dish" served by Scottish students as the highlight at the moment, is made by filling the stomach pouch of sheep with haggis...... What's worse is that the rough-and-done Europeans are not as willing to spend too much work on cooking internal organs as the Chinese, and washing the large intestine and cutting the waist flower is too troublesome for them, so they only know what container to chop and stuff, or throw it into a large pot to stew, so that people can see a lot of dirty things from it at a glance, which is really unappetizing.

So, looking at the greasy and greasy sheep stomach pouch filled with haggis on the plate, as well as the strange smell of offal soup in the small pot, as a Jiangnan person who never got tired of eating, Wang Qiu was stunned for a long time with a spoon, but he didn't dare to send it to his mouth, and finally had to cheapen a few saliva inferior servants.

Medieval Scottish cuisine was so unpalatable, and England cuisine didn't seem to be much better—first the famous "stargazing pie", where a group of dead fish poked their heads on the cake and stared at Wang Qiu. Moreover, the fish in the cake were still not fresh fish, but stinky salted fish, so stinky that Wang Qiu thought it was from a Swedish stinky canned herring, so he had to cover his nose and order the servants to immediately bring it down and give alms to the poor...... On top of that, the imaginative chefs of medieval England dug into the idea of the "stargazing pie": not only the fish head, but also the whole crab and lobster, were poked on the hot pie crust

In short, Wang Qiu was almost stunned to look at the hideous crab tongs and lobster tongs poking out of the pie crust, completely unable to understand the thinking of medieval English chefs - although China also has snacks such as crab meat and lion's head, but it is also made into the dish after the crab meat is peeled out, how can the whole crab and lobster not even peel the shell, just as the filling? Do you have a grudge against the teeth of your diners, or do you want their lips and cheeks to be poked out by crab pincers?

But when he looked around in astonishment to see how the others enjoyed the dish, he was even more shocked to see that most of the boys, with the exception of some of the girls, actually picked up the crab and lobster pies, clattered, spit out a few pieces of broken shells, and swallowed the whole shrimp and crab with the dough cake - well, the diamond teeth of medieval Europeans, which were fully tempered every day by black bread comparable to stone, really amazed modern people like me who are delicate and fragile

And then, the chefs of England have gone out of their way to present a bigger "surprise" to the "angels......

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