Harry Potter and the Great Old Ones

Chapter 470 Split
At Thiera's suggestion, Hathaway Romanoff led almost all of the Slytherins to surrender to Dolores Umbridge the next day, forming a student censorship team.

"Why?" Hathaway Romanov asked discontentedly when she received Tiera's order. "Why do I have to surrender to that old toad?"

“That way you can openly torture your students,” Tierra said calmly.

“Okay, I’ll go,” Hathaway Romanov said immediately, full of enthusiasm.

Some things don't need to be explained in detail; Tierra just needs to start, and the rest can be left to the darker side of human nature.

In conclusion, Umbridge has become somewhat wiser and has finally stopped trying to influence all students with educational decrees, instead trying to influence only those students who are willing to be influenced.

After all, an unenforceable decree is no different from a piece of waste paper.

Having grasped this point, Umbridge, drawing inferences from similar cases, struck while the iron was hot and issued several other educational decrees—

Education Order No. 28

Members of the Hogwarts Discipline Team are exempt from prosecution for violating other educational orders.

Education Order No. 29

Members of the Hogwarts Discipline Team have the authority to add or deduct points for the House Cup.

Education Order No. 30

Members of the Hogwarts Discipline Team are not required to attend Muggle Studies or History of Magic classes.

Just as Tyrell initially used Dumbledore's power to sideline Umbridge, Umbridge was also trying to use the power from the Ministry of Magic to win over some students—

The effects of these educational orders far exceeded Umbridge's expectations.

The Slytherin students who defected with Hathaway Romanoff were all handpicked by Tyella. Besides the racially prejudiced clique of Draco Malfoy, Crabbe, Goyle, and Pansy Parkinson, there were also the Caro siblings, the two Flint cousins, the only son of the Nott family, the three Rozier sisters, and other Slytherin students who were not pure-bloods but whose parents or brothers held positions within the Death Eaters, totaling twenty-seven people.

Of course, nearly half of these families hold significant positions within the British Ministry of Magic.

The leader of them was even a Romanov girl who held considerable influence in the Russian magical world.

Umbridge looked at the children with a kind smile, as if she were looking at her supporters when she ran for Minister of Magic.

Regarding Umbridge's thoughts, Tiera could only say—

You're thinking about peaches.

Under the dual pressure of the escaped Death Eaters and the disciplinary squad, everyone in Dumbledore's Army trained even harder.

Initially, everyone had some reservations about the math problems Hermione brought, but as the discipline team made things difficult for them time and time again, those reservations gradually disappeared.

After all, Slytherin and his ilk, to put it nicely, were "score slaves" with a sense of collective honor; to put it bluntly, they were just like the foolish young masters and misses of feudal landlord families, who bullied men and women and provoked trouble whenever they had a little power.

Therefore, in the face of Umbridge's newly issued educational decree, Tierra, with Dumbledore's authority, granted it all permission, even granting the disciplinary inspection team the power to add or deduct points.

This led Draco Malfoy to quickly add points to his own house and find excuses to deduct points from other houses. Slytherin's points have now skyrocketed, leaving Ravenclaw more than a hundred points ahead. This naturally delighted the young Slytherin wizards, but conversely, it further exacerbated the divisions within Hogwarts among the students—

Slytherin House and the other houses were already in a state of near-hatred and tension, and if it weren't for Dumbledore's constant suppression, the two sides would probably have already fought each other openly.

Even so, the Weasley twins' prank candies sold out several times.

Because of the disciplinary inspection team's power to deduct points, the other Hogwarts houses became even more actively involved in Tyrell's Muggle Studies and History of Magic classes, further uniting around Dumbledore, after all—

Dumbledore's two courses are the only two courses that can add up to 50 points.

Basically, as long as students actively answer questions in class and complete their papers and presentations diligently, each class and each college can add more than 150 points to the college cup.

However, these points are usually deducted back by the disciplinary inspection team very quickly.

With Hermione's guidance, who had already grasped the situation, Dumbledore's army, knowing that winning the House Cup this year was hopeless, devoted more time to studying and practicing Defense Against the Dark Arts.

However, no one in Dumbledore's army made as much progress as Neville, and the news that the murderer who killed his parents had escaped caused a strange and even frightening change in him.

He never mentioned seeing Harry and the others in St. Mungo's ward, and seeing this, Harry and the others kept quiet as well.

Of course, Neville never mentioned Bellatrix and his gang's escape. In fact, he hardly said a word while Dumbledore was active, just buried himself in practicing every spell Harry taught him, his face tense, indifferent to injuries and accidents, practicing harder than anyone else in the room.

Several times, even in the middle of the night, when Harry got up to go to the bathroom, he would see the light on Neville's bedside table still on, with Neville sitting on the bed, head down, calculating the test questions Hermione had bought.

His progress was frighteningly fast; when Harry taught a magic spell that could reflect minor spells back at enemies, only Hermione learned it before Neville.

Perhaps because there were so many worries and things to do, January at Hogwarts went by terribly fast.

February has arrived before we knew it, bringing with it warmer and more humid weather.

After February arrived, Harry's life suddenly became unbearable—

He started dreaming again.

To be precise, Harry started seeing strange images again and experiencing emotions that weren't his own—

Those were images of experiments Harry couldn't understand, seemingly involving the brewing of some kind of potion, accompanied by intermittent bursts of ecstatic joy—

Whatever experiments Voldemort was conducting, he was clearly close to or had already succeeded.

Harry had already drunk the Christmas gift Tyrell had given him and was trying to make some himself or have Hermione help him brew some.

But it has never been successful.

……

“Heh heh…” Tyra, who was conducting an experiment that day, suddenly looked up. “Voldemort is ready to create another Horcrux.”

(End of this chapter)