Chapter 146: Practical Lesson (Part 2) - Nine-Grid Puzzle
Chapter 146: Practical Lesson (Part 2) - Nine-Grid Puzzle
A flush crept across Penelope's cheeks, while Percy stood nearby, grinning like a fool.
The Gryffindors were cheering and jeering, while a few Ravenclaws glared at Percy as if he had stolen some precious treasure. A few girls muttered among themselves.
"Wood, what is this?" a Gryffindor student asked, pointing to the skeletal imp that was wobbling and struggling to get back up. It was anything but terrifying.
"Professor Hep's 'surprise,'" Wood said, a bit dejectedly. He had been thoroughly spooked just a moment ago.
The freckled wizard beside him added, "They have no offensive capabilities, except their appearance can be a bit startling..."
As he spoke, a Ravenclaw girl noticed a pale hand bone caressing her shoe and let out an exaggerated scream. "Aaaaah!" Wood stepped forward and crushed the bone with his foot. He shrugged and said to the others, "See, it's just this kind of thing."
Then he looked at the girl. "You're standing a bit too close to the edge. That area hasn't been cleared yet."
The girl blushed and thanked him.
"Besides these comical skeletal imps, did anyone find anything else?" someone asked.
"Tombstone", Percy said, trying to sound calm. "The tombstones have runic script on them, and I think that's an important clue."
Someone suggested, "Why don't we start by deciphering the runic script here?"
"Good idea!"
A dozen young wizards dispersed, each taking responsibility for two or three tombstones. They pulled out parchment from their bags and copied down the runic script.
During this time, the skeletal imps buried in the ground sensed the presence of intruders and tried to scare them by reaching out from the earth. But this time, the students were prepared and easily avoided their attacks. A few of the more daring ones even let the skeletal imps crawl out, allowing them to scratch their thighs with their thin bones while they continued to copy the runic script from the tombstones.
Every one or two minutes, a bright red spark would rise from a distance.
Percy, Penelope, and the others finished their tasks early. They compared the text they had deciphered and the patterns on the tombstones.
"Look at this—"
Penelope pointed to the numbers on two adjacent black stone tombstones. "These two are next to each other in sequence. The first one says, 'The visitor found the Safe Room protected by four magical barriers.' The second one says, 'There is a large amount of shade to the south.'"
She said excitedly, "The shade corresponds to the group of tombstones we are in. If we head north, we should find the Safe Room!"
"Penelope, you're always so clever", Percy praised her.
Penelope hummed. "It seems Professor Hep has broken a complete story into pieces and placed them on each tombstone. Our job is to put them back together."
"Hey, everyone! Don't forget to copy the tombstone numbers; they're very important", Percy called out, turning around.
Finally, a green spark appeared in the air in the distance.
"We need to return the way we came. Have you all finished copying?" After receiving affirmative responses, they hurried back.
This time, it took them about two minutes to return to their starting point.
The wizard who had stayed behind looked a bit pale. "You're finally back. I kept feeling someone breathing down my neck the whole time..."
"Thanks for holding down the fort, Dilys."
Half a minute later, the Slytherin and Hufflepuff students returned. The Slytherin prefect said arrogantly, "We found the Safe Room. If time hadn't been limited, we would have already cracked the magic on it..."
"We also made important discoveries", Percy argued.
"But those don't matter, do they?"
Percy's face turned red, and he was about to say something when Penelope quickly pulled him back. Percy angrily said, "Just listen to what he's saying!"
Wood called over a Hufflepuff student. "Grover, what happened?"
Grover lowered his voice. "We found the Safe Room in about three minutes, but it was blocked by a spell on the wall."
"What kind of spell?"
"A puzzle!" Grover said. "The Slytherin students were just staring at each other, completely clueless about how to solve it."
So the group moved to the Safe Room—
It was a slightly misshapen square hut, painted a dark brown, looking like a large stone from a distance. It was easy to overlook, but the most critical thing was that the hut had no door.
The young wizards from Gryffindor and Ravenclaw gathered around, and on each of the four walls, there was a nine-grid puzzle, with the last position empty.
"Just tap it with your wand, like this, and the square will move", Grover explained to the others. "Each square has a Runic Script, and it looks like we need to arrange them in the correct order to form a sentence."
"That doesn't sound too hard, only eight Runic Scripts, right?" Percy said.
"Not exactly, Percy. Take a look yourself", the Hufflepuff student said.
Percy examined the runes closely and suddenly realized he didn't recognize any of them...
For a moment, he was dazed. Who am I? Where am I? There are Runic Scripts I don't recognize?
One would be understandable, but all eight?
Wood muttered, "It's just a guess, right? Look at this word; I bet it has something to do with 'light.'"
The academic whizzes in the group caught on. "Exactly, the difficulty is beyond our current abilities. The professor wants us to identify and deduce the meanings."
Understanding the true purpose of the puzzle, the students looked at each other. "Should each house take one wall?"
Percy glanced at the Slytherin prefect. "Sounds good."
Twenty minutes passed...
The young wizards, covered in dirt, gathered together. "No way! This is too hard!"
"Let's work together, Geoffrey", Penelope said calmly, looking at the Slytherin prefect. "This is what the professor intended."
The Slytherin prefect mumbled something inaudible, and everyone took it as a silent agreement.
Students from the four houses sat under a nine-grid puzzle, looking at the Runic Scripts, and began to discuss enthusiastically—
"Does the first word look a bit like Peorth?" one wizard asked.
"I think it's more like Wyn; see the protruding angles on its edges?"
"Hold on, I think I've seen a similar Runic Script somewhere", a Hufflepuff witch said sharply. "It was in a reference book for fourth year, and I happen to have my notes with me."
"Found it!" She quickly flipped through her notes and then looked up, dramatically announcing, "This word is quite ancient; it stands for 'wisdom.'"
Although they had only solved one-eighth of the first nine-grid puzzle, they couldn't help but feel excited.
With a similar approach, the eight Runic Scripts were deciphered one by one—
Penelope counted on her fingers. "Wisdom, excellence and unparalleled, equivalence and similarity, extremity and utmost, exaggeration, abundance or richness, possession or containment, and gathering or collection."
She looked up. "What does that make you think of?"
(End of Chapter)
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