Who let this Dementor into Hogwarts!

Chapter 198 Don’t send students to me for extra meals!

"Let's change to a more cheerful topic," Dumbledore continued. "I am delighted that two new teachers will be joining our staff this term."

"First, there's Professor Lupin, who has kindly agreed to fill the Defence Against the Dark Arts vacancy."

The applause was sparse because Lupin certainly didn't look like a professor - he just exuded poverty.

"But he should be more useful than Quirrell and Lockhart," Ron guessed. "He gave us chocolate on the train, and that cold feeling of having my happiness sucked away by the Dementors disappeared all at once. By the way, why does that feeling always seem so familiar to me..."

Because I sucked on little Ron in first grade.

Of course, Cohen knew what Ron meant by "familiar". When Cohen first discovered that he could absorb emotions in the first grade, he tried it out on Ron - the effect was remarkable, so he compensated Ron with a new set of wizard chess for Christmas. Ron thanked Cohen for this for several weeks.

"I don't know, but I've certainly never been frightened to death before," said Harry glumly.

"Being affected greatly doesn't mean you're weak or timid," Cohen explained. "It just means the source of your negative emotions is more terrifying. Others might just have nightmares about failing a test or spiders crawling on their bed, but your nightmares are about your parents dying right in front of you. It's easy to tell which is more dizzying."

"Is that so..." Harry was somewhat comforted - when the Dementors approached, he did hear the woman's screams and saw the terrifying green light, which were the scenes when Voldemort killed his parents.

"As for our second new teacher," Dumbledore said to the students after the sparse applause had died down, "I regret to inform you that our Care of Magical Creatures teacher, Professor Kettleburn, retired at the end of last term in order to have more time to enjoy his old age. However, his successor is none other than Rubeus Hagrid! He has agreed to take on this teaching position in addition to his duties as gamekeeper."

"No wonder there's a book that bites people on our reading list!" Ron thought of the inexplicable "Monster Book of Monsters" that they had to buy this year.

"When I was in first grade, I heard an old clerk at Flourish and Blotts complain about this book - he cursed the store manager, 'This thing will become a Hogwarts textbook and they will have to stock thousands of copies, and the owner will have to manage all the books alone - because by then the clerks will have resigned long ago,'" Cohen recalled. "It seems that his curse really worked..."

"I'm not sure whether the purpose of this book is for us to read its contents or for it to bite our heads off." Hermione shook her head. "I hope Hagrid can come up with a reasonable solution - but it's a good thing that Hagrid is a professor, isn't it?"

"I bet he'll use Norbert as a teaching aid someday," Cohen shook his head. "'You've never seen this!'"

"That's it," said Ron pessimistically.

However, after the banquet, they happily went to the teachers' seats to express their congratulations to Hagrid. Hagrid was so excited that he couldn't even speak clearly and buried his face in his napkin.

Back in the dormitory, they all went to bed early. After a whole day of riding in the car and encountering Dementors, Harry and Ron were already exhausted.

But Cohen couldn't fall asleep, not because of Lupin or Sirius, who had escaped and had a misunderstanding and hostility towards Cohen, but because...

There's a fucking Dementor right outside their dormitory window!
"Bang! Bang!"

It knocked on the window.

Fortunately, it was raining heavily outside, and Harry, Ron and Seamus, who were sleeping soundly, subconsciously thought that it was the sound of raindrops hitting the window.

[What!?] Cohen's soul drifted outside, materializing into the form of a Dementor, engaging in a mental negotiation with its fellow creature that had drifted outside the dormitory building.

Although all Dementors look the same and currently have no names, Cohen can still clearly feel that this is the first Dementor he encountered in the car.

Oddly enough, this Dementor had a soul strength label underneath its robes.

[You're very hungry... We want to send you some delicious food...]

The Dementor pulled out from his large black robe... a prisoner in tattered clothes. There was a black brand on the prisoner's arm, the mark of a Death Eater.

Now I know where the soul strength label comes from...

What is this? A love lunch box brought from Azkaban to Hogwarts?

[No, keep it for yourself. I'll find some around here if I want to eat it.]

Cohen stuffed the unconscious prisoner back under his cloak.

[A wizard won't let us in...] The Dementor said to Cohen, [There's plenty of food here, but you'll be beaten if you come in...]

If you touch Dumbledore's students, how can you not be beaten by Dumbledore?

Cohen took great pains to explain to the Dementor that "Cohen will not be beaten here", "Cohen has other food", "He will not really force himself to live on hunger", and "This castle is not a prison to trap Cohen, he can leave at any time".

And he seriously warned it not to "capture a student as a gift" in order to feed itself.

After confirming that Cohen was indeed living comfortably here, it floated away into the rain and returned to the group of Dementors wandering around the outermost part of the castle grounds.
-
On the second day of school, the weather finally cleared up a bit.

They had a new schedule in their third year, and Cohen didn't choose many elective courses - his free time was already limited, and choosing something like "Muggle Studies" was a bit of a waste of time.

Cohen only took the Care of Magical Creatures and Divination classes. One class was because of Hagrid, and the other was because of the divination ability that Cohen had inexplicably displayed last Christmas - he did see images of the future in the crystal ball, and they were extremely clear, which was most likely inherited from the long-horned water snake in the back half of the Chimera.

Professor Trelawney may indeed be of little help intellectually - but her uncontrollable yet extremely accurate third eye is of great research interest.

At breakfast, they all exchanged schedules to see which classes they had chosen.

"Hermione, your timetable is messed up!" Ron said with a frown. He was holding Hermione's timetable in his hand. "According to this timetable, you have to take ten classes a day!"

Hermione snatched the timetable and pulled her collar to hide the thin gold chain hanging around her neck.

(End of this chapter)