Hogwarts: This professor is too Muggle.

Chapter 43 Snape's Position
Montage, the word originated from French, means organization and splicing.

When different fragments of an image are pieced together, they often produce meanings that the individual fragments did not have when they existed alone.

Montage is a technique of selecting different fragments as material, organizing and splicing them according to the narrator's specific conception, guiding the audience's thinking through hints, and connecting the independent fragments into a related story.

In the Muggle Studies professor's office, bits and pieces of memory were extracted, placed into glass bottles, and labeled. Special silver-white clouds floated, with a faint fluorescence, revealing several scattered images.

—A professor wearing a purple scarf and dressed strangely hurried through the corridor, looking furtive;

——A professor dressed in strange clothes is tidying up a haystack, next to which is a sleeping troll;
—An ugly and strong giant monster wandered in the corridor, dragging white marks on the ground with its thick wooden stick;
—The freshman in a magic robe leaps out to imprison the troll, his gesture heroic;
——The troll lay on the ground, and the professor wearing a purple turban leaned against the wall and sobbed.

Melvin planned to find time to purchase a batch of test tube racks, organize the glass bottles containing memories, and then go through them in order. He was very satisfied with the success of his work.

Several fragments are vaguely pieced together to form a fairly coherent story.

"The plot is there, but the main line is not complete."

Melvin put away the glass bottle and quartz mirror, opened the drawer and took out the notebook, picked up the pen, filled it with ink, and began to write and draw on the paper.

The night gradually deepened.

Several desk lamps illuminated the desk, and ink carried his thoughts, leaving traces on the paper. Because it was a draft, erasures and deletions were inevitable, and Melvin was too lazy to use magic to clean the ink marks.

There was an edit in the middle of the paper: the first half of "Home Alone" was crossed out and replaced with "School ALone."

Home Alone?

New students stay on campus.

……

Friday, September 11st.

Despite the Halloween dinner last night, there is no Halloween holiday at Hogwarts, so classes will be held as usual today.

The two grades that Melvin taught for the exam had completed their first round of review and officially started the second round of review. The students in the advanced class were very self-disciplined, and they could go to Hogsmeade to relax this weekend. The young wizards only complained symbolically and then plunged into a more intensive review plan.

"Dumbledore ultimately decided not to report what happened last night to the board of directors.

"No one will be fired or dismissed because of an accident.

"But this hurtful troll cannot remain on campus any longer, Professor Quirrell. Please deal with it as soon as possible. It's almost the weekend. Sell it or entrust it to a friend. Don't put it off until next week."

Vice Principal McGonagall gave a stern instruction with an extremely serious expression.

Quirrell nodded hurriedly and stammered as he promised Professor McGonagall that he would deal with the troll. He now looked haggard and thin, but edema filled that part. Compared to when school started three months ago, he looked much more gloomy.

Snape next to him was even more gloomy than him, and probably because of the bite on his left leg, he looked a little irritable.

Last night in the Great Hall, Quirrell pretended to be unconscious after publicly announcing that the troll had escaped. Snape judged that this might be his way of diverting attention and suspected that other wizards were cooperating with him to steal the Philosopher's Stone, so he hurried to the corridor on the fourth floor and almost gave Fluffy a snack.

The three-headed dog didn't have venom glands, but the wound was stained with Fluffy's saliva, making ordinary healing magic ineffective; the only option was to apply medicine periodically and wait for the wound to heal slowly. When the professors learned that Snape had been bitten on the leg by Fluffy, they all expressed their understanding, believing that Snape had gone to the fourth floor to protect the Philosopher's Stone.

As the object of defense, Quirrell has very complicated feelings towards Snape.

At the beginning of the school year, Snape kept staring at him, and he thought Snape was Dumbledore's man.

After learning about Snape's experience and combining it with his actions, Quirrell conducted a careful analysis and found that this was not the case.

This former core member of the Death Eaters has been lurking in Hogwarts for a long time. He seems to have submitted to Dumbledore, but in fact he often ignores the headmaster's instructions, saying one thing on the surface and doing another in secret.

Take Potter, for example. The entire wizarding world knew Dumbledore loved and protected him. He had Potter's parents buried next to the Dumbledore family tomb, and for years he had hidden him away from the prying eyes of Dark wizards, meticulously protecting his safety. He even had his gamekeeper personally pick him up when he started school...

Snape targeted Potter directly in the first class of the new semester and wanted to expel him directly.

If Snape wasn't Dumbledore's man, why did he care so much about the Philosopher's Stone?

That's right, he also wants to steal the Philosopher's Stone!
Quirrell's eyes silently swept over his injured leg, looking it up and down, becoming more and more certain of his guess.

Snape didn't know that the Dark Lord was possessing him, and he thought of himself as a competitor who also coveted the Philosopher's Stone, so he had been targeting him... Unfortunately, the Dark Lord was too cautious, and even his former core Death Eaters were unwilling to believe him, otherwise they would have joined forces to plan to steal the Philosopher's Stone.

"..."

Melvin looked at Quirrell's changing expression and decided to cut out this fragment of memory. It was obvious that the dark wizard with ulterior motives was plotting something bad.

Half an hour later, lunch time was over and the owl postman arrived on time. There were many letters and parcels from students, and several owls landed in the guest of honor seats.

Melvin took the envelope handed to him by the owl, cut two pieces of beef ribs to feed the postman, and then began to open the letter to check.

Dear Professor Lewinter:
I don't know how you're doing at school, but my experience making the enlarged mirror wasn't going well.

You can't imagine the difficulties involved in making a larger mirror. I thought it was easy to melt a small piece of quartz, but as the size increased, the difficulty multiplied. I can't even remember how many times I failed. But when I think of your beautiful vision, I feel that failure is nothing.

The difficulty of crafting was nothing; procuring the materials was even more arduous. Because the raw materials were scarce and the demand for Shadow Mirrors was so high, the potion vendors in Diagon Alley and Knockturn Alley even raised their prices in unison. I was forced to borrow some of my family's funds to complete the purchase. These people have no professional ethics, and I strongly condemn this.

But don't worry, I've overcome all the difficulties and I'm more ethical than those material dealers. The goods you ordered have been produced and will be delivered at the usual place on Saturday.

Your reliable and sincere partner, Wright."

"..."

Melvin read it silently twice before he could make out the words between the lines. The whole letter was filled with the words "Pay the balance".

Wright probably consulted Borgin before writing this letter. It seems that the cost of the large-scale shadow mirror is higher than expected, otherwise Monk Stanley, who pursues technology, would not be forced into this state.

The owl postman couldn't understand the wizard's expression and didn't know why the wizard was worried. He swallowed the beef ribs on the plate, flapped his wings and patted his belly, making a satisfied gurgling sound, then took off leisurely. The other owls also slowly left.

For a few seconds, the entire auditorium was filled with the sound of an owl's wings flapping.

(End of this chapter)