Chapter 1418: Thoroughly Rotten
Chapter 1418: Thoroughly Rotten
"Eager to stir up trouble as soon as he returns to Britain. That guy Tom is as annoying as ever." Albert muttered to himself as he put down the communication bookmark.
"Meow!"
Tom the cat meowed in protest.
He wasn't annoying at all.
"I wasn't talking about you." Albert reached out and ruffled Tom's head.
"Who's Tom?" Katrina, who had just put the charcoal-blackened pears into cold water to thaw, suddenly looked up and asked.
"The name of the mysterious person."
"The mysterious person's name?" Katrina paused, realizing who Albert was talking about, then looked suspiciously at her sister, who obviously already knew about it.
"Tom Riddle. This was the mysterious person's original name. Of course, he later changed his name." Albert shared these unknown secrets as if telling a story to the two sisters.
"Tom Riddle was originally the name of the mysterious person's father. However, the elder Tom Riddle was a Muggle, and the noble Slytherin descendant, the mysterious person, naturally couldn't accept sharing a name with a Muggle."
"So he changed his name." Katrina was quite astonished and had never expected there to be such a story.
"Yes, it is said that while still a student, Riddle, upon learning about his lineage, found and eliminated his father's family, who had abandoned his mother, and conveniently let his uncle take the fall."
"You seem to know a lot about it." Isabelle was surprised that Albert had investigated the mysterious person's secrets so thoroughly.
"Dumbledore's investigation. He later shared this part of the secret with me." Albert shifted the blame to Dumbledore, and indeed, it was Dumbledore who had done the investigation, so it wasn't exactly passing the buck.
"The one who knows you best is your enemy."
Isabelle, however, was not surprised.
This was indeed something only Dumbledore would do.
"Did Dumbledore tell you all this to get your help in dealing with the mysterious person?"
"No, it was to get me to lend a hand." Albert explained to the sisters, "Probably worried that if Harry accidentally messed up, there would be someone to clean up the mess. Otherwise, you might think that Dumbledore would leave part of his inheritance to me, and everything would already be marked with a price."
"Dumbledore's inheritance?"
Katrina blinked her curious big eyes at Albert. She was indeed curious about what valuable thing Dumbledore had left Albert to hire him to help with the aftermath.
Indeed, in Katrina's view, it was a form of hiring, just presented in a different way.
"Lots of books and notes."
Isabelle had also seen those books, but she wasn't very interested. She didn't crave knowledge like Albert, and she knew she didn't have the energy to delve into those magics.
In this regard, Albert always seemed to have boundless energy and an incredible efficiency for mastering them.
It made Isabelle doubt her own allure.
"They want you to help them deal with the mysterious person."
Isabelle gathered her thoughts and asked about the previous matter.
"It seems the mysterious person plans to bring his lackeys..."
"Lackeys?" Katrina found Albert's choice of words quite interesting.
"Yeah, lackeys, those Death Eaters and Dark Wizards. That bunch of scumbags seems to want to slaughter an entire Muggle village and turn all the residents into Inferi. They want to stop the mysterious person's atrocity, so they're asking me for help."
"They really trust you. It must be a matter of life and death for them to think of you!" Katrina's tone sounded somewhat sarcastic.
"You're missing the point."
"Am I?"
"Don't you find all this familiar?" Albert reminded them, "The same plot, the same tricks, and the same group of clueless people."
"I remember you had a similar feeling back then. By the way, aren't you going to check the new content on the communication bookmark?" Isabelle reminded him, "There might be some new messages."
Ignoring the text that appeared on the communication bookmark, Albert couldn't help but quip, "Actually, I'm just curious. Where does the Phoenix Society get all that sympathy?
"It's as if you don't have a compassionate bone in your body." Isabelle knew what Albert was getting at, but she couldn't resist teasing him.
"Maybe it's because they're living too comfortably that they like to stir up trouble." Katrina suddenly interjected.
"That doesn't sound like something you'd say," Albert said, looking at Katrina on the sofa with a mix of surprise and agreement.
"No, those are your exact words," Katrina said with a smile.
"Oh, that's why it sounded so familiar," Albert said, not paying much mind to the sisters' banter. He brought up an incident from a while back when Fred and George had come to him with a complaint.
"Not long ago, Sirius Black captured a Death Eater who was disguising himself as Black and tried to claim the bounty on his own head," Albert explained.
"So, that incident wasn't a plot by the Ministry and the Death Eaters? You're right, that was strange. No matter what, a Death Eater wouldn't deliberately do something so foolish," Isabelle said, eyeing Albert up and down. "Did you put them up to it?"
"Both sides were running low on funds, so naturally, they had to find a way to raise money. And what's more interesting than using the Death Eaters' own money to take them down?" Albert admitted, "There were quite a few people in the Order who opposed this at first."
"Why?" Katrina asked.
"To ensure the plan wasn't exposed, we had to take out the Death Eater after he consumed the Polyjuice Potion. Perhaps the members of the Order felt that this was too cruel. You know, many people can't bring themselves to kill, even if the actual deed is done by another controlled Death Eater," Albert explained.
The sisters were surprised by Albert's method, which was indeed a bit ruthless. However, they acknowledged that these were times of war, and taking out the enemy was better than being taken out themselves.
Moreover, such an act would surely be satisfying for those who opposed the Death Eaters.
"In the end, Sirius didn't get all the bounty money, but he still managed to get a substantial amount of galleons, which helped improve their food situation. After that, they dropped the matter and didn't bring it up again," Albert finished, then suddenly asked, "Am I being hypocritical and sanctimonious?"
"You're one to talk about hypocrisy," Isabelle said with a smile.
Katrina picked up the frozen pear from the table, which had been thawing in cold water, and took a bite, only to find her teeth numbing from the cold.
"It looks like they want to drag you into their mess!" Isabelle frowned as she finished reading the message on the communication bookmark.
"It's normal," Albert shrugged. "They dream of defeating the mysterious person."
"If they plan to save the Muggles in that village, will you help them?" Isabelle asked suddenly, knowing full well that the Gryffindors were a reckless bunch, and acting on their own was par for the course.
"No, and I won't stop them if they want to go," Albert shook his head. "Otherwise, they'll get the idea that Albert will always come to our rescue, and this kind of reckless behavior will only repeat itself."
"Don't you care if they get themselves killed?" Katrina was a little taken aback by Albert's cold attitude, but then again, he had said something like this before...
"For them, maybe it's about time one or two of them died so that the rest can get their heads straight. Continuous victory is good for morale, but it can also lead to problems like inflated egos and a loss of self-awareness," Albert explained.
"Actually, you're ignoring one thing: you're the reason their confidence is through the roof. They believe you can defeat the mysterious person," Isabelle pointed out.
"Yes, maybe I can, but it would be meaningless," Albert said, making a shushing gesture as if to indicate that he didn't want to discuss this further.
"If you don't want to talk about it, then don't," Katrina said, picking up the frozen black pear. "How do you eat this? It's too icy; my teeth are going numb."
"You should probably rub it with your hands first to soften it, then suck the juice out, or just spoon it out," Albert suggested.
"Sucking on it slowly... Did you come up with this eating method?" Katrina asked, unable to understand this peculiar way of eating.
(End of Chapter)
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