The verdant willow branches swayed with the cool wind of the night, the bright moonlight hit the sparkling lake, and except for the first floor of the school hospital, the dimly lit Hogwarts Castle once again exuded a cheerful and peaceful atmosphere, and the dark clouds that hung over the castle in the early night had cleared away.

Dumbledore and Amosta walked side by side by the lake, neither of them in a hurry to speak, but quietly enjoying the rare peace at the moment.

"The matter of the Chamber of Secrets has been settled, Headmaster Dumbledore, I'm afraid I'm going to leave soon."

Five minutes later, Amosta stopped under a willow tree with a crooked neck, facing the rippling waters of the lake, savoring the complex emotions in his chest.

"Don't you think about it, Amosta?"

Dumbledore didn't seem surprised, but there was still obvious regret on his old countenance, and he said sincerely

"In my opinion, you are a very competent professor, you get along well with this school, the young wizards like you, and I don't want to lose you as a good teacher if I can."

Amosta smiled and didn't speak, believing that Dumbledore should be able to guess his choice.

Dumbledore looked more tired than at any other time this semester, he didn't continue the subject, the long life had given him the wisdom to not lose to anyone, what could be changed and what could not be changed, Dumbledore saw better than anyone else.

"So--"

Dumbledore pulled the tattered diary out of his pocket, he had brought it out of the chamber, and in the moonlight, a drop of water flew into the air with undulating waves and landed on the diary with clear water stains.

"I think you must have recognized what this thing is, Amosta?"

"Oh, Headmaster Dumbledore, you may be looking down on me a bit, I don't know anything about Horcruxes."

Amosta winked playfully at the wry-smiling Dumbledore, it was not so easy to hide something in front of a Dumbledore who had a lot of experience in his life and was also a master of the Horcruxes, Amosta just used a joking method to express that he didn't want to talk about Horcruxes in depth.

"Let it be so."

Dumbledore put the journal back in his pocket, he took a deep breath, and looked at the edge of the endless forest, the dimly lit cabin,

"There's one thing, I'm afraid you can't pretend you don't know, Amosta--"

Dumbledore's tone became slightly solemn,

"I want you to give me back that basilisk in the vault."

Whoa!

The swift wind carried the waves against the shore of the lake, and at the same time, causing Amosta's neatly combed gray hair to flutter, and he reached out to hold the top of his head, and sighed heavily at the sound of the raging wind.

Dumbledore knew he hadn't killed the basilisk, of course, but a clumsy lie couldn't deceive Dumbledore, and Amosta even suspected that the great Headmaster's distinctive gaze beside him had 'seen' the basilisk lying in his arms.

Amosta said this in the Chamber of Secrets just to tell Dumbledore that he wanted to keep the basilisk, and he thought that he had settled the matter of the Chamber of Secrets, and Dumbledore should not refuse this 'insignificant' request.

"I hope you'll be considerate of my troubles, Amosta,"

The 'stubborn' Amosta made Dumbledore feel helpless,

"Hagrid is now imprisoned in Azkaban, and I must prove to the Ministry of Magic that it was not the old spider named Aragog that Hagrid raised fifty years ago and is now attacking the young wizards, and that this journal has been destroyed...

Also, I don't think Voldemort's Horcrux is a good place to be shown as evidence, and that basilisk is a strong proof of that..."

Amosta's expression darkened, and to be honest, he hadn't taken Hagrid into account.

The situation was a bit tricky, Hagrid was Dumbledore's number one loyal henchman, and Amosta knew that Dumbledore would never let Hagrid be imprisoned in Azkaban.

But what would happen to his mission if he handed over the basilisk, did he spend months using a very precious voodoo doll to fend off Voldemort's curse on the Defence Against the Dark Arts professor, only to be in vain?

No, it's absolutely impossible.

Dumbledore read Amosta's silence as he continued,

"This basilisk needs to be handed over to the Ministry of Magic... The two attacks on the little wizards last semester, Cornelius ordered the Daily Prophet to remain silent..."

Ho!

Amosta laughed, still not speaking, but he was already thinking about what he would do if the situation was really out of control.

Amosta wouldn't be arrogant enough to think he could defeat Dumbledore, but after so many years of eating and preparing for Hogwarts since he entered Hogwarts, he would be too cowardly if he couldn't even run away from Dumbledore.

Even, from the moment he took over this task and decided to enter Hogwarts, Amosta had already foreseen the current embarrassing situation.

Amosta stared at the rising lake with gloomy eyes, skimming the school's large iron gate with the rest of his gaze, he had already planned that he would leave the Hogwarts campus as fast as he could, and then fly away through the apparition.

The tacit understanding between Dumbledore and Cornelius Fudge has nothing to do with him, and as for Hagrid, he does feel a little sorry, but he believes that Dumbledore can handle this, but he really can't, and after handing over the task to Kakus Foley, he will go to Azkaban by himself.

It's just that he didn't have the opportunity to say goodbye to Professor Snape, Hermione, and Harry, and he did feel a little regretful.

The endless lake water hit the riverbank, Dumbledore shook the crystal droplets that fluttered on his silver beard, and his expression, which had already sensed the hostility emanating from Amosta, looked even more helpless, and he frowned slightly, as if he was also thinking about how to solve the contradiction in front of him.

"Amosta..."

After a while, Dumbledore's expression, which seemed to have decided something, became happy again, he softly called out Amosta's name, took out a money bag from his bosom and handed it to Amosta, this money bag did not match the money Dumbledore allocated to Amosta at the beginning of the semester, it seemed to be more like a personal item.

"What do you mean, Headmaster Dumbledore?"

Amosta narrowed his eyes, looked away from the purse, and looked directly into Dumbledore's smiling eyes,

"Because you can't award me a special contribution medal, so, you changed it to a gold galleon as a reward?"

"Not really, Amosta,"

Dumbledore's beard, which was so different from the rest of the world, reflected the white moonlight, as if his whole being was radiating light, and he blinked his blue eyes playfully as Amosta had done before.

"Actually, I didn't plan to talk about it--"

Under Amosta's puzzled gaze, Dumbledore said in a brisk tone,

"It's not a special contribution bonus, Mr. Viper, it's the reward for your commissioned mission--"









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