Ministry of Magic,

Department of Occult Affairs,

Located on the ninth floor of the Ministry of Magic headquarters, due to its remote location and the high level of secrecy of the business involved, it is rarely visited on weekdays, and most of the time it is shrouded in dead silence.

tonight

In the director's office, there was a deep and deep "tick" sound, which had lasted for several hours.

The sound came from a large old-fashioned grandfather clock, which a gray-haired old man sat in a Morris chair covered in fine Utrecht velvet, which was being dismantled and repaired.

In mid-air, a roll of leather floated, revealing various tools neatly arranged:

Rows of screwdrivers, needles and tweezers for clockwork are inserted in separate leather pockets.

There were also large and small, delicate screws and gears that floated in a row behind the roll of leather.

Otavi Arcus sat across the table, quietly watching Corvinus Gaunt fiddle with the grandfather clock.

He had been here for a while, but he knew that his master did not like to be disturbed while he was working, so he just waited silently.

After a long wait, Arkus listened to the slow, regular ticking sound, as if his heart had slowed down, and he shifted his gaze to the entire office.

Speaking of offices, it's more like a luxuriously decorated library in the Renaissance style:

Tall ashwood bookshelves line the walls, and the partitions are neatly arranged with hand-copied magic books bound in papyrus, parchment, and calf.

Many of them are solitary books, so the towering bookshelves are loaded with heavy history.

On the dark green marble walls, inlaid with blue-green copper oil lamps carved with serpentine ornaments, pale yellow flames, jumping and flickering, dispel the darkness, illuminate the magnificent tapestries hanging on the walls:

The above depicts the famous battles of the eighteenth century in the Goblin Rebellion, the War of the Giants, and the Wars of the Wizards.

Archus looked at those battles, and he was born in the eighteenth century, and he happened to have experienced them firsthand, and knew those years...... What a splendor and magnificence.

But with the passage of time, they have all become history, and all that remains are these cold paintings, and the half-page of the history of magic that is sketched with only a few brushstrokes.

It's really embarrassing.

Arcus looked away, and was suddenly drawn to a mural on one wall:

A man spread out his limbs and lay naked on the ground.

Four little people were lying on top of him, one of them was beating his crotch with a stick, a four-legged little man was looking at the lit grass, not knowing what he was looking at, and a little man with a thief's eyebrow was clasping his jewel-like eyes.

The little man, who was a little bigger, with a weapon in his hand, was cutting off most of the man's head, and most of it had been cut off......

Arcus narrowed his eyes as he stared at the simple, rugged mural that he remembered the last time he had visited, it didn't exist.

"I found this mural deep underground in the Upper Barnton Giant Tribe." The old man's voice sounded suddenly.

Archus turned his head to look at Corvinus Gaunt and said in surprise, "You have found the lost giant city?" ”

After the apocalyptic apocalypse 10,000 years ago, wizards, centaurs, elves, and giants were freed and began to inhabit and multiply around the world.

In this land of England, there was a brilliant kingdom of giants, and a luxurious royal capital - the city of giants was built.

With the decline of the giant civilization, the kingdom fell, and the royal capital also disappeared in the long river of history.

For thousands of years, historians of magic, archaeologists, tomb robbers, goblins, and ...... They are all struggling to find the ruins of the royal capital, trying to get the massive treasures left behind by the giants.

But the exact location of the Giant City has never been known, and Upper Barnton, England, is one of the places of suspicion.

"I did find the Giant City." Gaunt raised his finger, and two gears flew towards the floor clock, and he said calmly:

"I also opened the Winter Palace and saw the bones of Andar VI, the last king of the Giants."

Hearing this, Akus's breathing suddenly became short, and he couldn't hide his excitement and asked:

"And did you find that legendary weapon?"

Wizards, centaurs, elves, and giants formed an alliance to fight the ancient wizards, eventually creating a weapon to dismember their bodies.

Legend has it that the mighty weapon was taken away by the giants and hid in the Giant City.

Archus had possessed the Elder Wand and knew it was terrifying, and he was eager to see a weapon that was said to be a hundred times more powerful than the Elder Wand.

"It's a pity." Gaunt pinpointed the gears in the grandfather clock, shook his head, and said, "I've searched the Giant City, but I haven't found that weapon. ”

"How so?" Akus's face was full of disappointment, and he muttered, "Isn't it in the hands of giants?" ”

He suddenly remembered something and asked in a low voice, "Could it be taken away by the wizard?" Isn't it rumored that Gifford Olledon has gotten a powerful weapon? ”

Gifford Auleton was a famous 15th-century giant hunter who single-handedly slain the giant Hangis of Upper Barnton and protected the nearby wizarding village of Fertile Grounds.

The sorcerers of the Fertile Plains regarded him as a hero and erected a statue of him, which has remained to this day.

And the real purpose of Gifford Åledun's visit to the Fertile Soil Plains was to find the ruins of the Giants.

"The weapon is not in the hands of Gifford Olletown." Gaunt didn't look up and said, "Do you remember Elois Mintab?" ”

Arcus pondered for a long time before he found the memory of the name in the corners of his mind.

"The Silent Man who used the time turner to travel back to the fifteenth century more than a hundred years ago?"

"Yes." Gaunt bowed his head lightly, "I sent Elois back to the fifteenth century, to find Gifford Oledon.

The news she brought me confirmed that the weapon was not in his possession. ”

With deep eyes, Arcus looked at Corvinus Gaunt.

He remembered that Eloise used a time turner, and when she returned from the fifteenth century to 1899, her body had suddenly increased by five centuries, and she had lived only a few hours before she died.

Corvinus Gaunt buried an innocent life in order to confirm a piece of news!

Of course, Akus is a dark wizard, not a pure and immaculate little white rabbit, and he has long been accustomed to this kind of thing, and even did it himself.

But now that his identity is different, and Acus, as a servant of Corvinus Gaunt, has become the innocent life that may be "buried" at any time, it is inevitable that the rabbit and the fox will be sad and disgusted with this kind of thing.

After a long silence, Akus asked tentatively:

"Master, can you just use the time turner and go back thousands of years to when the Giant City fell? Wouldn't it be easier to find out the whereabouts of that weapon in this way? ”

"Do you think I don't want to?" Gaunt looked up and looked into Arkus's eyes with his black pupils, and he said faintly, "I just can't do it." ”

"Isn't the magic enough?" Akus asked, a little confused.

"Magic?" Gaunt smiled disdainfully as he gently pulled open the drawer on the table.

Archus looked intently and saw a drawer filled with blood-red stones, large and small.

It wasn't any ordinary stone, it was all ...... Philosopher's Stone!

Gaunt took out a stone the size of a pigeon's egg from a drawer, held it high in front of his eyes, admiring the subtle lines of the Philosopher's Stone.

The stone is slightly transparent, and the inner lines are delicate, faintly like silk, and there are bright red fine dots, like peach petals that have been frozen.

From a distance, the stone resembles a glittering clot of blood.

"If you don't have magic, just put a few more Philosopher's Stones in the Time Converter." Gaunt played with the philosopher's stone, and said in an old voice:

"If one is not enough, ten pieces, and if ten pieces are not enough, a hundred pieces...... Magic is the simplest and easiest problem to solve. ”

The corners of Akus's mouth twitched, this kind of thing that only Corvinus Gaunt and Nicol Lemay could say in the world.

After all, no one else can make a Philosopher's Stone at all!

But the two of them do have the capital to say, not to mention how many philosopher's stones Nicol Lemay, who has lived for six hundred years, have made, Gaunt alone can take out a drawer of philosopher's stones, as if he didn't need money.

"In that case, is there any more problem?" Akus asked.

"It's too much." Gaunt waved his wand, and a golden river appeared in the air.

"You can compare time to a long river that never stops, and we are at the bottom of the river......"

The old man tapped lightly, and two silver lights appeared at the end of the river, and he continued:

"Using a time turner to go back in time is like taking a boat upstream, and the further back you go, the faster the river flows, the harder it is to go back.

"And that's not the tricky one." Chief Gunt sighed and said, "The most tricky thing is that there are many reefs in this long river of time, which do not allow you to go ashore at a certain point in time. ”

"Reef?"

"I have sent many silent people back to the time of the fall of the Giants, but they have all failed. But in the future, hundreds of years in the future, it can be successful. Gaunt said.

"So, I call it a reef...... As for why that happened, I don't know. ”

Akus hesitated, "Then there is no way to solve it?" ”

"So far." Gaunt lowered his head again and placed the philosopher's stone in a row of gears.

He picked up his wand again, waved it quickly, and began to use the Hour Reversal Charm, encapsulating it in the enchanted grandfather clock.

A pale beam of moonlight suddenly poured down from the wide celestial window of the dome and shone on the grandfather's clock.

Soon, the pendulum was filled with a churning, sparkling stream of air that shone as bright as a diamond.

The philosopher's stone, emitting a red glow, kept urging the air currents to stir.

Gaunt waved his wand, and an egg appeared in his hand, which he threw into the flickering airstream.

When it rose in the grandfather clock, it cracked and a hummingbird emerged and went straight to the top, but as the air fell, the bird's feathers were stained and wet again until it landed at the very bottom of the glass cover, where it was again locked in the egg.

Gaunt experimented several times, then leaned back in his chair and smiled:

"I've finally fixed the broken clock, let's go...... Send it back to the Hall of Time. ”

The old man stood up and walked towards a wooden door, and Arcus quickly picked up the grandfather clock and followed him closely.

The two soon came to an old, gray wooden door, which was cracked and looked ordinary.

Gaunt pushed the door open and entered a huge room.

It was as tall as a church, lined with towering shelves with small dusty glass balls, and nothing else.

Countless candlesticks were embedded in the shelves at regular intervals, and dim light shot out from them, and the flames were blue, and the small glass balls shone faintly in these rays.

Gaunt walked along the shelf, and he suddenly asked, "How is Tom Riddle?" ”

"Voldemort didn't trust me, nor did he believe that his great-great-grandfather was still alive." "After I told him what I was going to do, he got into a fight with me. ”

"How strong is he?"

"We didn't fight to the end." "But he's really strong. ”

"Tom's talent for magic is really good, he's the best generation of the Gaunt family after me." Gaunt said expressionlessly:

"It's a pity that it was stained with Muggle blood, which led to an obscure and impure bloodline."

The old man walked slowly forward, and when he came to the 97th row of shelves, he suddenly stopped and stared at a dirty glass ball on the shelf.

Archus looked up and saw the yellowed label beneath the glass bulb on the shelf, with a date about fifteen years ago in elaborate lettering, followed by:

.. W.B.D．

The Dark Lord and Harry Potter

"This is the prophecy that Trelawney made to Tom, and he will want this prophecy ball." Gaunt said.

"You tell him that if you want the prophecy orb, you can trade the tree of Ilvermorny."

Akus bowed his gray-haired head respectfully: "Yes, master! ”

He didn't know why Gaunt wanted the tree, but since his master had told him, he did it.

Gaunt asked, "Have you found Isaac Newton's bones?" ”

"Nope." Arcus shook his head, "Westminster Abbey has completely collapsed and is in ruins, and I will have a hard time finding his bones. ”

"Back then, Newton asked the wizard of the Trelawney family to divinate him, and calculated that he would have a catastrophe in three hundred years, but he didn't expect to be here." Gaunt laughed.

"You know him well?" Akus couldn't help but wonder.

"Well, I used a time turner to travel back to Newton's time and learn alchemy from him." Gaunt sighed:

"He promised to teach me alchemy, and in exchange for keeping his body safe.

Ottavi, you use this clock of time to go back a month and get his bones out of Westminster Abbey. ”

"Yes, master." Arcus picked up the grandfather-to-ceiling clock, fiddled with the hour hand on it, and with a ticking sound, his figure disappeared into thin air.

Gaunt reached out and slowly picked up the prophecy orb that only Potter and Voldemort could touch, and he used his cuffs to wipe off the dust on it little by little, and put it back on the shelf.

……

……