HP: I beat the otome game at Hogwarts

"Goodnight, Lyra." Cedric Diggory, despite being bumped away by Fred, still politely said goodnight, clearly not bothered.

"Goodnight, Cedric," Lyra said with an apologetic smile.

Seeing that the Weasley twins had defeated Hufflepuff's most popular handsome guy, the boys who were eager to sleep next to Lyra White "coincidentally" stopped their advances.

"Damn redhead...that wretched watchdog..." The platinum-haired young master, who had been secretly watching the black-haired girl, cursed under his breath. Although the two Weasleys had chased away some boys who were eyeing the black-haired girl, he was still very dissatisfied with the two of them acting as the black-haired girl's guardians.

"Everyone, get into your sleeping bags!" Percy began to assume the duties of the male student council president, and this time no one stood up to challenge him.

Percy shouted, "Quick, everyone be quiet! Lights out in ten minutes!"

Draco Malfoy's muttered curses at the Weasley twins were so low that they overlapped with Percy Weasley's voice, and none of the Slytherins around heard them, except for Theodore Nott, who reached for his sleeping bag at the same time as the youngest of the Platinum twins.

Theodore Nott dragged his sleeping bag to a corner expressionlessly. He heard it but pretended not to. What was so strange about Malfoy cursing Weasley? Since the first year, all of Slytherin had gotten used to it.

*

For the next few days, the whole school talked about Blake.

The accounts of how Blake broke into the castle are becoming increasingly fantastical, completely ignoring the castle's formidable defenses and various anti-intrusion spells.

Some rumors say that Blake transformed into a bat and disguised himself as a Halloween bat swarm before flying into the castle; others say that Blake disguised himself as a Dementor and entered the castle openly; the most popular theory is that Blake can transform into a flowering bush, and every bush in the castle could be a clone of Blake.

Lyra suspected that these outrageous rumors all originated from Hufflepuff.

“That’s utter nonsense,” Hermione said, rubbing her forehead in exasperation at the table. “Am I the only one who’s not afraid of the hassle of reading ‘Hogwarts: A History’?”

“Very likely,” Ron interjected.

“There’s no way you could just sneak into Hogwarts by stealth, disguise, or anything like that. Besides, the castle is protected against Apparition, so you can’t fly in,” Hermione explained to the people around her once again.

But Neville still seemed convinced that Black was a bush in disguise, and he began to avoid every bush he could see, needlessly adding obstacles to his already difficult journey.

But on Neville's list of worries, the number one thing was that the portrait of the guard at the entrance to the lounge had been changed.

The portrait of the Fat Lady, which originally stood at the entrance to the Gryffindor common room, was severely damaged when Black forced his way into the Gryffindor Tower. The portrait of the Fat Lady had to be removed from the wall and replaced with a portrait of a knight and a pony.

But all the Gryffindors were very unhappy about this, because Sir Cadogan spent all his time figuring out new passwords, changing them at least twice a day. Many people were locked out by him, with forgetful Neville being the one locked out the most.

“He’s really gone mad,” Ron asked Percy, exasperated. “Can’t we just get a different portrait?”

“No one was willing to do the portrait; they were all terrified by what happened to the Fat Lady,” Percy said. “Sir Cadogan was the only one who stepped forward.”

Lyra was also quite troubled. Ever since Sirius Black broke into the castle, all the teachers had started taking turns patrolling the entire castle, just like the dark days when the basilisk appeared in the castle last year.

Although she wasn't under the same close surveillance of the professors as Harry, it wasn't possible for her to slip out of the castle at this crucial moment—but she still had a big, furry baby crying for food in the Forbidden Forest!

Not being able to sneak out of the castle means she can't feed the big, fluffy dog ​​on time; not being able to feed it on time means the big dog she secretly wants to adopt might leave and wander off to other places.

Wouldn't that mean the fluffy plush toy I've already got is going to fly away?

Lyra felt she couldn't just sit and wait to die, so she told Fred and George about how she had been secretly feeding the big black dog since the start of the school year.

"So, this is what you've been doing behind our backs all this time—"

"You deceived your two poor, good friends—"

The twins hugged each other and cried, as if their ten-year savings had been stolen.

"Stop acting, hurry up and think of a way to help me sneak into the Forbidden Forest." Leila impatiently separated the two with a licorice stick.

"It's not that there's no way—"

"It just means we might get points deducted—"

Leila immediately recalled the twins' usual trick: one would create chaos, while the other would take advantage of the confusion. However, success came with the risk of losing points, but—

“Anyway, there aren’t any gems left to collect,” Lyra said optimistically. “The best part is, the other houses are in the same boat as ours—”

*

With the twins drawing attention and acting as lookouts, Leila was able to sneak into the Forbidden Forest alone every day to feed the fluffy creatures.

And there was another cat in the feeding team: Hermione's ginger cat.

“Here, this is Knight’s favorite pan-fried cod and fried chicken leg.” Lyra first offered it to the big dog, then to the cat. “This is Crookshan’s favorite grilled fish balls and smoked sausage.”

"Have you been waiting a long time?" Lyra looked at the big black dog eating eagerly and couldn't help but feel sorry for it. "It's not easy to sneak out of the castle lately. Sirius Black, the fugitive from Azkaban, broke into the castle. The professors are very concerned about security. There are patrols day and night, and students are not allowed to go out alone."

“I really want to know how Black got into the castle through the Dementors. He must have some secret method,” Lyra muttered as she brushed the large black dog. “Black even tore up the portrait of the gatekeeper of Gryffindor Tower, forcing us to accept Sir Cadogan. He was probably too lonely when he was the portrait—”

Lyra crumpled the loose hairs she combed out into a ball and set it aside. "Sir Kadogan changes his password eight times a day, can you imagine? Once I forgot my potion thesis and rushed back to my dorm to get it, but Sir Kadogan changed his password at the last minute and stopped me at the door!"

"Professor Snape almost boiled me into a potion on the spot! And Neville, he had to write all the passwords down on a piece of paper, otherwise he wouldn't have been able to get into the common room—"