After HP shared the dream, Lao Fu was conquered by me

"GRYFFINDOR!" cried the Hat.

Dennis Creevey's face lit up with delight, and he took off his hat and put it back on the stool, then hurried over to sit with his brother, while Harry joined the other Gryffindors in applauding.

"Colin, I fell in the lake!" he shrieked, flopping down on an empty seat. "It was wonderful! Something in the water grabbed me and pushed me back into the boat!"

"Cool!" said Colin, sharing his brother's excitement. "Maybe it's a giant squid, Dennis!"

"Wow!" Dennis exclaimed. He had just been thrown into a stormy, unfathomable lake and then pushed out by a huge lake monster. He felt that this was an experience that no one could even dream of.

"Dennis! Dennis! See that boy over there? The one with the black hair and glasses? See him? Do you know who he is, Dennis?" Harry looked away and stared hard at the Sorting Hat. Now it was Emma Dobbs's turn.

The sorting ceremony continued, and the new students, both men and women, walked towards the three-legged stools one by one with varying degrees of fear on their faces. The line was slowly shrinking, and Professor McGonagall had finished reading the names on the list that began with the L switch.

"Oh, come on," Ron moaned, rubbing his belly with his hands.

"Look, Ron, the Sorting ceremony is much more important than eating," said Nearly Headless Nick. At this time, Laura Madeley was sorted into Hufflepuff.

"You're dead, of course you'd say that," Ron retorted.

"I hope the new Gryffindors this year are all excellent," said Nearly Headless Nick, as Natalie MacDonald joined the Gryffindor table, and Nick applauded enthusiastically. "We wouldn't want to break our winning streak, would we?"

Gryffindor has won the House Cup for three years in a row.

"Graham Pritchard!"

"Slytherin!"

"Ola Quirk!"

"Ravenclaw!"

Finally, with the cry that Kevin Whitby was sorted into Hufflepuff, the sorting ceremony ended. Professor McGonagall picked up the sorting hat and stool and took them away.

"It's about time," said Ron, picking up his knife and fork and gazing longingly at the golden plate in front of him.

Professor Dumbledore stood up, looked at all the students with a smile, opened his arms and made a welcoming gesture.

"I have only two words for you," he said, his rich voice echoing through the hall. "Eat!"

"Yes, yes!" cried Harry and Ron, as the empty plates suddenly and magically filled with food.

Nearly Headless Nick watched miserably as Harry, Ron, and Hermione loaded their plates with food.

"Ah, that's better," Ron mumbled through a mouthful of mashed potatoes.

"You know, you're lucky the party tonight almost got ruined," said Nearly Headless Nick. "There was a mess in the kitchen earlier."

"Why? What's going on?" Harry asked, mumbling, with a large piece of steak in his mouth.

"It's Peeves, of course," said Nick, shaking his head so that it wobbled dangerously—he quickly pulled his ruff up a little to protect his neck. "There's been this whole quarrel again, you know. He wants to come to the party—well, it's out of the question, you know how he is, totally out of character, throwing food everywhere he sees it. We called a council of the ghosts—the Fat Friar was for giving him the chance—but the Bloody Baron was dead set against it. I think it was perfectly sensible of him to do so."

The Bloody Baron is the ghost of Slytherin House, a thin, silent figure covered in silver bloodstains. He is the only one at Hogwarts who can truly keep Peeves in check.

"No wonder, we thought Peeves was mad about something," said Ron glumly. "What was he doing in the kitchen?"

"Oh, the same old story," Nick said, shrugging. "Massive mayhem. Pots and pans scattered everywhere, the whole kitchen flooded with soup. The house-elves were terrified—"

Clang.

Hermione knocked over her tall golden goblet, and pumpkin juice continued to spill onto the tablecloth, staining the white linen with an orange stain several feet long, but Hermione ignored it.

"There are house-elves here too?" she asked, staring at Nick with horror. "In Hogwarts?"

"Of course," said Nearly Headless Nick, somewhat surprised by her reaction. "I doubt there's a house in Britain with more house-elves than this one. Over a hundred of them."

"I haven't seen any!" said Hermione.

"Oh, they rarely leave the kitchen during the day, do they?" Nick said. "Come out at night to clean up... to tend to the stove and things like that... I mean, you're not supposed to see them, are you? The mark of a good house-elf is that you don't even know they're there, right?"

Hermione glared at him.

"But do they get paid?" she asked. "Do they get vacations? And—do they get sick leave, benefits, everything?"

Nick chuckled so hard that his ruff tilted and his head tumbled down, dangling there by an inch or two of dead skin and muscle still attached to his belly.

"Sick leave and allowance?" he said, lifting his head back onto his neck and securing it with the ruff. "House-elves don't need sick leave and allowance!"

Hermione looked down at the barely touched food on her plate before placing her knife and fork on it and pushing it away.

"Oh, give me a break," said Ron, accidentally spraying some Yorkshire pudding crumbs onto Harry. "Ouch - I'm sorry, Harry -" he swallowed hard, "you'd starve yourself to death before you could get sick leave for them!"

"Slave labor," Hermione said, her breathing becoming very heavy. "That's how this meal comes from. Slave labor."

She refused to eat another bite.

The rain continued to pound against the tall, dark windows. Another crack of thunder rattled the panes, and a flash of lightning flashed across the gloomy ceiling, illuminating the golden plate. The remnants of the first course disappeared from the plate, and in the blink of an eye, it was filled with dessert again.

"Treacle pie, Hermione!" Ron said, deliberately putting the delicious pie in front of Hermione. "Plum pudding, look! And chocolate cake!"

Hermione glared at him, and that look reminded him of Professor McGonagall, and Ron immediately restrained himself.

Finally, when the dessert had been cleared and the last crumbs had vanished from the plates, leaving them sparkling clean, Albus Dumbledore rose again. The hum of voices in the hall suddenly ceased, and only the patter of wind and rain could be heard.