Gryffindor! Gryffindor! Azkaban! Gryffindor!

If it's some kind of lyric or slogan, that's fine. But it may not be so pleasant to watch the people around you being stamped and dropped into different drop-off points like parcels on a conveyor belt.

Incidentally, the part that mixed in seemed to be just a little joke on the Mad Hatter, and Neville, who was faceless, eventually sat down at the Gryffindor table with a kind applause.

Neil is well aware that King's Cross Phantom Wall, Chocolate Frog and the Sorting House have their own legitimacy, and that his dissatisfaction is largely not due to genuine indignation, but to a sense of disparity - after all, this is a very different world from his hometown and the mountain gate, and people tend to be more anxious when faced with such situations.

Mount Kunlun is a great place to cultivate yourself (at least until you've been gnawed by snow maggots), but it's not very livable. While scavenging from the snow and fighting against the demon beasts from the secret realm, most of the sect members have a serious and simple character.

- Yes, yes, calm down friend, I said "secret realm" and "demon beast", you can't say that what you haven't seen doesn't exist, right? What about Pomlock, Fire Crab, Fried Snails, Hungarian Tree Wasps, and Scimitar Snorkels? Besides, what do you think the Yankees bought Alaska for? Skiing?

Okay, back to the point.

The harsh environment makes all resources must be inclined to survival, especially in the case of the decay of the sect, the culture and technology that are not productive or too cost-effective can only be abandoned...... So you see, when the elders heard that across the strait across the continent, people from a country were squandering their time and energy on the magic that could make people grow donkey ears, and it was not surprising that they would have such expressions.

Neil is not as resistant to this plaything people as the rest of his peers. He likes the abundance of material life, likes to joke, and likes to appreciate art - as long as it is not a work of postmodernism. With such a nature, Neil is not worried about the prospect of integrating into his new environment, but he really disagrees with the fact that only a hat determines one's future.

……

So you see, I don't mean to have any bad opinion of you per se, but the blind worship of artefacts by mankind is likely to have serious consequences, a lesson that the ancients have repeatedly emphasized to us through language and writing...... You know Pygmalion, right? No, I'm referring to that mythical story. Of course, George Bernard Shaw was a brilliant playwright and the most outstanding of all the people I have ever met with a ridiculous style, and Audrey Hepburn was an impeccable beauty, but the main themes expressed in the play and film, like the term 'Pygmalion effect' coined by psychologists, have completely departed from the original—"

"Stop, Mr. Wan." The hat on his head interrupted, and the face of the folded mimic looked full of bitterness, "Okay, calm down, I already understand your point." ”

There was an eerie cold scene on the way to the sorting ceremony. The Sorting Hat did not shout the name of the house as usual, but folded itself in half and whispered to the students wearing the hats, shaking it sharply from side to side from side to side from time to time, and it seemed that the discussion was very intense.

The students in the auditorium watched with curiosity at first, but as time went on, some began to get impatient. It's not unusual for older students that the Sorting Hat requires thoughtfulness when dealing with some students, but the thought process usually takes more than five minutes — and now it's three times as long.

"What's going on?" Harry leaned into Ron's ear and whispered.

"I don't know. Fred and George said they had never heard of such a situation, but they didn't know anything either. Ron shrugged, "And that's Neil, and I wouldn't be surprised if he was talking to the Sorting Hat about Muggle literature." ”

Hermione gave him a look of disgust, and was about to protest against the disdain he had shown when talking about so-called "Muggle literature", when he heard a loud abdominal sound coming from his stomach, so loud that everyone outside the four or five seats next to him was surprised to find the source.

Ron's face flushed.

According to the procedure, the dinner would not begin until after the sorting ceremony, and the long table in front of the group was still empty of cups and dishes.

"Are you hungry?" Harry asked with a snicker. Hermione whispered "It's rude" and turned her back on her face, but judging by her slightly trembling shoulders, the process of holding back a smile was not smooth.

Ron nodded, his eyes fixed on the tablecloth and didn't dare to lift it, for fear that someone else would associate the voice with him.

Thanks to Harry's generosity, he had eaten a lot of stuff on the train, but somehow it felt like he hadn't eaten a grain of rice all day.

"I don't know what's going on...... Anything unusual happened after I fell asleep in the car, right? ”

The image of the cup of dark green liquid that seemed to be boiling continuously flashed through Harry's mind, and he shook his head unchanged.

"No, nothing."

……

"Ah, I'll understand when I say that." The Sorting Hat shook up and down as if nodding, "I'm just a hat, Mr. Wan, who was created to fulfill the mission of identifying students, and I don't know anything else, so I can't tell if your concerns are right or wrong." ”

It paused, then continued.

"But in any case, it's logical that you're resistant to the sorting system at Hogwarts because of this consideration, and it explains your unusual hostility to me very well - I've always been curious, and often students are afraid of me, but no one has ever been as agitated as you are, trying to mentally attack me by imagining in my head that I'm married to a Panamanian hat, and then my wife is cheating on me with an Arabic turban."

Neil smiled noncommittally. The main purpose of filling the brain with out-of-the-box thoughts is not to retaliate against the hat, but to distract it so that the deeper thoughts of the more important ones are not read. But such intentions obviously cannot be explained to the other side, on the contrary, in order to consolidate secrecy, his offensive needs to go further.

The Sorting Hat's act of sorting Neville into Gryffindor was a little comforting to Neal - at least the's current level of intelligence was worthy of the trust people placed in it. Rather than simply throwing people with similar personalities into the same circle, the Sorting House needs to consider how the environment will affect their development.

But none of this is a reason for him to reconcile with the hat.

"Alright, the confusion is finally solved, now let me think about where to send you bad boy. Well, the pedigree is a bit too mottled, but the noble part of it doesn't necessarily satisfy Slytherin's needs...... Of course, Gryffindor is best suited for mischievous troublemakers, but you seem to be more ...... when dealing with problems."

The Sorting Hat smiled slyly, as if enjoying the pleasure of using its power to play tricks on the other, but its little hobby seemed to be about to be put on hold.

"Speaking of cleverness, Rowena Ravenclaw's mind is often mistaken for – hey, wait, stop imagining me having a wig set pregnant with a child! Oh my God, where did you learn this...... No, no, no, no, no, seriously, don't do this, I thought the misunderstanding between us had been cleared up, didn't it!? ”

Under the gaze of all the teachers and students of the school, the Sorting Hat, which had been whispering to the new students for a long time, suddenly straightened the hat barrel and shouted with all his strength in a bell-like voice.

"Alright! All right! I give up! I give up! Stop those pantyhose! Ravenclaw! I recommend him to Ravenclaw! So take me from this heinous head! I can't take it anymore! ”

Not only the students, but also the professors were taken aback by this rare situation that is rare in a century. Professor Felius Flitwick, who was standing next to the low stool, turned his head anxiously and cast an inquiring glance at the headmaster of the professorship, and when he saw that the other man did not say anything, he grabbed the brim of his hat and forcibly removed it from Neil's head. The hat, which had no attachments, instantly lost its vitality and reverted back to its lifeless, tattered appearance.

Flitwick carefully checked it with his sorting hat in his hand. An ancient and complex magical item like this can be tricky to repair if something goes wrong, especially since it's still on the important mission of being a new house year by year. Truth be told, it's almost impossible to see anything with the naked eye, but in comparison, interfering with it with a spell could lead to even more dire consequences - after all, the Sorting Hat was in an unusual state and had to be cautious.

And when it comes to anomalies, you can't fail to focus on the biggest suspects......

"Yes, Professor?"

He cast a skeptical glance at Neil, who was still sitting on the low stool, but the latter took it with a kind and sincere, even a faint smile.

Flitwick frowned in displeasure. He didn't notice any signs of magic on the other side, and suspecting students without evidence was not what a teacher should be. What's more, the other party will enter his own academy after that.

"Nothing, Mr. Wan." He pretended to smile lightly, "You can go to the classmates, the table with the blue flag on your head is - as the head of Ravenclaw, I sincerely welcome you to join." ”

"Thank you very much, Professor."

Neil stood up and bowed deeply to him.

"I'm in the process of applying for permission from your country's Ministry of Magic for a small business, and if you need anything to increase height, grow hair, and get rid of armpit odor, please do not hesitate to ask for it."

The sound was heard far away in the auditorium, which had been silenced by the movement of the Sorting Hat.