Chapter 346 [Laughing and Crying] Fudge

"Then where did Harley go?"

Faced with Fudge's helpless struggle, Professor Dumbledore pressed forward step by step and raised a question that was of greatest concern to everyone present.

"An hour ago, we stopped the game and searched the entire maze. The other warriors have been found, but only Harley disappeared."

"At the same time, the trophy of the Six-wizard competition also disappeared. Before that, we all witnessed through magic that Harley was about to touch the trophy of the Six-wizard competition."

"Besides, we also conducted a joint investigation, and there were traces of magic in the maze that could only be left after more than five hundred door keys were activated at the same time."

"Obviously, this is an abnormal phenomenon. Has the Ministry of Magic prepared more than 500 door keys in advance? Will the Ministry of Magic provide more than 500 door keys at one time? I don't believe that the Ministry of Magic will do such an extraordinary thing."

"So, where did Harry go? I still stick to my previous point. Voldemort came back and took the opportunity to take Harry away with the portkey."

"After all, he has a grudge against Harley, and he needs to prove his strength in front of the newly gathered Death Eaters and regain their confidence in him."

"If you disagree, please give a reasonable explanation."

Fudge's face suddenly became even more ugly, and his fear of the name Voldemort was temporarily put aside.

He scratched his head hard, not knowing how to answer. After all, this is indeed a problem that Fudge cannot get around.

Now Harry Potter has disappeared, plus the traces of magic left behind by the large number of portkeys.

This all proves that there was an accident in the Six-wizard Tournament, and it is very likely that it was an extremely bad accident.

Umbridge on the side saw the troubled look in Fudge's eyes, rolled her eyes, and immediately had an idea.

She took a step forward at the right time, lay in Fudge's ear, and said to Fudge in her sweet and greasy voice:

"Dear Minister Fudge, I believe that the disappearance of Miss Harry Potter must be related to Barty Crouch."

"Crouch must have prepared these tricks in advance when he led the team to set up the portkey, and set up a special portkey for Harry Potter."

"I even suspect that he prepared a dark wizard on the other side of the portkey to murder Harry Potter."

"Yes, that's right, that's it." Fudge's eyes lit up, and he secretly cursed himself for why his mind suddenly stopped thinking before.

I clearly have a scapegoat, why not just use this scapegoat to the end? Anyway, he is heavy enough to carry any big pot!

"The disappearance of Harry Potter is also Barty Crouch's conspiracy! It's Barty Crouch's fault!"

"The Minister is wise," Umbridge picked up the conversation at the right time, and tried her best to praise Fudge, "and our Ministry of Magic's response was also very timely."

"Director Burns has issued orders to Director Scrimgeour and made a series of decisions."

"At this time, the Auror Office has probably taken action and sent people to search Crouch's house. At the same time, they are searching for Harry Potter as much as possible across the UK."

Fudge kept nodding his head and continued to argue with Dumbledore, while glancing at Umbridge without trace.

He naturally knew that Umbridge had no good intentions either.

She seemed to be saying that Amelia Burns had already responded, but in fact she was giving Burns eye drops——

Umbridge secretly accused Burns of making unauthorized decisions and mobilizing Aurors without asking Fudge for instructions.

But Fudge can understand this. After all, she just wants to give herself a chance to climb to the position of Director of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement.

After all, how could the position of Director of the Department of International Magical Cooperation be as good as the Director of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement, who is known as the reserve minister of the Ministry of Magic?

Moreover, Umbridge's words did speak to Fudge's heart, and he did need to be wary of Amelia Burns and Rufus Scrimgeour.

Why did Fudge have an unprecedented direct conflict with Professor Dumbledore?

On the surface, the cause of this conflict is simply Fudge's unwillingness to believe the return of the mysterious man said by Professor Dumbledore.

But in Fudge's mind, he had figured out a lot of the content and finally made a judgment - this was an extremely serious political incident.

Professor Dumbledore believed that his actions were responsible for the entire wizarding world and did not involve any personal interests, but simply stated the facts.

But Fudge did not believe in Dumbledore's character, and seriously suspected that Dumbledore wanted to use the false news of "Voldemort's return" to bring panic to the wizarding world and destroy the peaceful scene he had carefully created.

And when this peace is broken, Fudge's power will be greatly restricted.

If public opinion is extremely bad, the wizarding world may even force Fudge out of the position of Minister of Magic because it needs a tough Minister of Magic, and let Professor Dumbledore personally serve as Minister of Magic.

From this point of view, everything is clear and clear.

Dumbledore's purpose is to compete with himself in the power of the Ministry of Magic, or even to seize his own rights. He is an enemy that absolutely needs to be defeated!

Of course, Burns and Scrimgeour are also targets that he needs to be wary of. After all, these two people have very tough styles and are likely to be sought after by the ignorant people in the magic world.

In addition, both of them are members of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement and members of pure-blood families.

In a sense, the resistance they faced when they wanted to serve as Ministers of Magic was even smaller than Dumbledore's.

The two are still useful to Fudge. Fudge needs the support of the two, so he won't fall out, but he must be on guard.

In order to prevent all this from happening, Fudge strengthened his belief——

Everything is Crouch's conspiracy! Oh, by the way, there’s also Dumbledore’s trick!

And you must stick to your own ideas and never waver!

…………

The argument continued, and Fudge's tone became increasingly vicious, even beginning to question whether Dumbledore was crazy.

Suddenly, the door to the principal's office was pushed open.

Harley walked in quickly, still holding the trophy of the Six-wizard competition in her hand.

"Forget it, Professor, you don't have to persuade Fudge anymore." As soon as she entered the principal's office, Harry said to Professor Dumbledore,

"The prejudice in people's hearts is like a big mountain. When this mountain is completely formed, no matter how hard you try, you can't move it away."

"After all, this mountain has separated what this person wants to see and what he doesn't want to see, and blocked everything he doesn't want to see."

"If you want to break his comfort zone and make him face his most troublesome problems, how can you do it?"

"By the way, your argument was so loud that I heard it outside the principal's office."

"Harry!" Professor McGonagall's voice was full of surprise. She immediately rushed forward and carefully inspected Harry's whole body.

"Where were you transported by the Portkey? We tried to find you, but were distracted by the magical traces left by too many Portkeys."

"I'm worried about you..."

After discovering that there were no injuries on Harry's body, Professor McGonagall patted her chest and let out a sigh of relief.

"Fortunately, you were not harmed in any way, otherwise I would really blame myself in my heart for the rest of my life..."

"Merlin, I didn't find out in advance that there was something wrong with the trophy of the Six-wizard Tournament!"

Behind the principal's desk, Professor Snape calmly lowered his eyelids, concentrating all his inner worries.

He was going to see that person soon, and he didn't know if any of the bodyguards and senior officials brought by Fudge in the office at this time had any of that person's subordinates.

So now he needs to continue to maintain his indifference and not show too obvious signs.

However, his chest still visibly rose and fell a few times, and he obviously breathed a sigh of relief.

"Welcome back, Harry." Professor Dumbledore also looked at Harry with indifference in his eyes.

"It's great to have you back."

Judging from his expression alone, Professor Dumbledore looked very cold, and his attitude at this time did not even resemble that of a professor.

But this is normal. After all, Professor Dumbledore is still very confident in Harley's strength.

According to Dumbledore's judgment, even if Voldemort has now regained full strength and summoned a large number of Death Eaters who are still living normally in the wizarding world to besiege him, he will never be able to keep Harry.

Even if Harley showed the magical animal Animagus in the form of Medusa that she used that day, it would be normal for her to kill a large number of Death Eaters.

Instead of worrying about her, he should worry about the mental health of his former student Tom!

Fudge was obviously looking forward to Harley's return. He was even very excited, and his voice trembled with excitement:

There seems to be a kind of honeyed confidence that makes Fudge firmly believe that underage wizards like Harry will be superstitious about the authority of the Ministry of Magic and stand firmly on the side of the Ministry of Magic:

"Harry, it's great, it's great... You're finally back... Oh, I sent a lot of Aurors to find you!"

"You probably don't know that Dumbledore has gone crazy. He insists that the mysterious man has returned and claims that you were captured by him."

"So please be sure to tell us what happened tonight and prove to Dumbledore that you were just trapped by Barty Crouch's machinations..."

Before Fudge could finish his words, he was forcibly choked back into his mouth.

Because Harley spread her hands and said a sentence completely different from what he expected:

"I'm very sorry, Minister Fudge. Headmaster Dumbledore told the truth."

"The trophy of the Six Wizards Tournament was indeed transformed into a portkey, and the other end of the portkey is connected to the grave of Voldemort's father..."

Harley told a deleted story as quickly as possible. As for the final ending, Voldemort had not fully recovered to his peak, so he was forced to flee in panic.

"…After dealing with some of the Death Eaters who failed to escape, I used the portkey to return to where I left."

"Speaking of which, I was looking for you in the maze when I first came back, but I didn't expect you all to have returned to the auditorium."

"So I came right here and didn't stop anywhere else."

After Harley finished telling what happened to her, she looked at Fudge with a smile on her face.

"Dear Minister, this is the full story of what happened, nothing hidden."

Fudge took two steps back, swayed and almost fell.

Fortunately, Umbridge had quick eyes and quick hands and stuffed a chair under him, giving his fat body a point of support.

"You are definitely lying to me... You are all lying to me," Fudge kept repeating this sentence, his dull eyes gradually became firmer, and his voice became louder,

"That's right! You are just working together to deceive me! Use despicable lies to deceive me!"

"Your purpose is to destroy the peaceful situation that I have worked so hard to maintain, and to drive me out of the position of Minister, so that you can become the Minister of Magic!"

"I'm so sorry, dear Minister." Harry still whispered softly and waved her wand gently.

Originally, this room was already full of people, but the wall suddenly pushed aside, forcibly adding an open space to the room.

And more than a dozen ice sculptures exuding cold air appeared in this open space, and each ice sculpture was lifelike.

"Walton McNeil! Goyle! Crabbe! Nott!" Fudge was stunned for a moment before blurting out several names.

These surnames are all the purest pure-blood surnames in the magical world, and these statues seem to be exactly the statues of the heads of those families.

"No, these are not statues!" Fudge stepped forward and took a closer look, but suddenly he was so frightened that he took a few steps back.

"Harry Potter...you have frozen these wizards who are well-known and respected in the entire wizarding world!"

"They are indeed quite respected." Harley's voice was extremely sincere, without any hint of yin and yang.

"It's a pity that they didn't respect themselves very much and chose to kneel at Voldemort's feet and kiss Voldemort's robes and toes."

"It's just so prestigious and respected."

Harley clapped twice, and the applause was extremely harsh in the office.

The wizards brought by Fudge couldn't help but smile, but for the sake of their own future, they suppressed their smiles.

Professor McGonagall still had a straight face, while Professor Snape stared at the ground.

Only the old principals on the wall laughed loudly without any scruples, and at the same time pointed their fingers or wands at Fudge's nose, laughing so hard.

After all, they had had enough of this idiot Fudge before, and they had already wanted to curse him.

But Professor Dumbledore used the authority of the principal to interfere with them, preventing them from speaking freely.

Now that they have a chance to vent their emotions, these old principals couldn't be happier.

…

...(End of chapter)