Chapter 433 Trial

The world seemed to suddenly become very quiet. In the darkness and the fading heat, the whistling wind and the crackling of firewood gradually faded away. Roberts felt that his body was constantly moving.

His mind uncontrollably recalled the events of the past few months, recalling those mysterious people in strange clothes, recalling the group of mysterious masked people who suddenly broke into his home, and the guns prepared for self-defense in his home were stolen. With one finger of the slender wooden stick, the gunpowder and trigger all lost their usefulness... His wife, his children, and himself were all shrouded in an invisible mysterious force, hanging in the air, humiliated in every way.

Roberts felt that his mind was in chaos, and countless memories were stuffed into his mind again, causing his temples to twitch and his brain to swell and ache.

And all the vague memories turned into the last warning in my ears.

"Please close your eyes..."

The choking smoke gradually faded away, and the purgatory-like sneers had long since disappeared. I felt myself being gently put down, with soft but thorny bushes beneath me, far away from the fire and the crowd... I should be saved. Come on.

His vision was still dark, and Roberts was in a daze, listening to the sounds around him.

"Just put them here..."

"We have to go back quickly, Mrs. Weasley is still waiting for us."

"Yes... they are out of danger. The Aurors from the Ministry of Magic will take care of it."

Everything quieted down, and the two young voices of a man and a woman disappeared. They must have gone away. They were sent by God to save themselves...Roberts thought absentmindedly.

…

When Loren and Hermione returned to the woods, the skull and python mark were still hanging high in the air, emitting a permeating green light, lighting up the entire area like a terrifying neon sign, and the woods echoed with waves. A burst of screams.

From the edge of the woods near the clearing, Harry's confused voice came out:

"Did you hear the sound? Someone is chanting the Reappearance of Corpse Bones..."

Mrs. Weasley whispered anxiously: "Harry, we have to get out of here, go quickly...where are Loren and Hermione? Did any of you see them!"

Hearing Molly's call, Hermione immediately took Loren's hand and ran out of the bushes, shouting crisply: "Mrs. Weasley, we are here!"

"Oh, dear..." Molly's voice was trembling as she hugged the two of them into her arms and hugged them hard, as if she wanted to rub them into her body.

A warm current flowed through his heart. Loren quietly raised his head and saw the pale face of the middle-aged witch, whose face was full of panic, anxiety... and secret fear.

For Mrs. Weasley, who had experienced the First Wizarding War, that mark meant pain and death.

Hermione replied in a muffled voice: "I'm sorry, Mrs. Weasley, the path in the woods is too dark, and we were pushed forward by the crowd."

"It's okay, it's okay..." Molly breathed a sigh of relief and came to her senses at the same time, and hurriedly pulled a few people towards an open space with a lot of people.

Ginny looked at her mother's panicked face in surprise and couldn't help but ask, "What's going on?"

"That's the Dark Mark, dear..." Molly said in a deep voice, "The symbol of the mysterious man!"

Harry and Ron's eyes widened: "Voldemort's——"

"Honey, let's go!"

They began to cross the open space, and after taking a few hurried steps, they heard a series of pops that opened the space, and about twenty wizards descended from the sky, surrounding them.

Before they could react, they heard twenty voices shouting at the same time: "[Fainted]"

Then there was a series of dazzling flashes, strong air currents blew across the open space, and streaks of burning red light shot out from the tip of the wand.

In the flash of lightning, Molly could only protect Ginny and fall to the ground. Just when she was worried about the other children, she found that their reactions were not slow at all.

George and Fred hurriedly threw themselves down to avoid the curses, while Loren, Hermione, Harry and Ron squatted with their legs bent, avoiding most of the curses while using the Iron Armor Curse to intercept a few that could not be avoided, leaving some Yu Li looked to the opposite side warily.

The glowing red magic intertwined above their heads and hit the surrounding tree trunks, turning into little red shimmers.

"Stop!" Arthur squeezed out of the queue in horror, shouting with a trembling voice, "Stop! That's my wife and children!"

Arthur walked toward them with staggering steps: "Molly! Harry... Oh, Merlin, are you all okay?"

"Get out of the way, Arthur."

Barty Crouch and other wizards came closer, his expression was serious and tense, and his voice was cold and emotionless, "Which of you did this?"

"I do not know what you're talking about!"

Molly protected the children behind her like an old hen and glared at Crouch angrily.

Loren looked expressionlessly at the trial of the wizards, without saying a word... The way they hesitated in front of the parade of wizards just now was still in front of his eyes.

Crouch frowned, and his sharp eyes swept over them: "Which of you conjured the Dark Mark?"

"we do not have!"

"Don't lie, ma'am!" Crouch didn't put down his wand, staring at them with eyes that were almost out of his sockets. "You were found at a crime scene!"

"Barty," Bagman couldn't hide his fatigue on his face, but he still managed to keep his spirits up and said, "They are still children, and Molly is Arthur's wife. There is no way they..."

"Yes!" Arthur said quickly. He asked anxiously, "Molly, have you seen where this mark comes from?"

Molly glanced at Crouch coldly, and pointed to the woods behind her: "There was someone behind the tree over there just now, and he recited the spell of "Reappearance of Bones." "

"Great!" Amos Diggory, who had a short brown beard, shouted happily, "Our scarier masters must have gotten into these bushes... We have a good chance of catching them..."

He raised his wand and strode across the clearing and into the back of the woods. Soon there was a cry: "It's done! Caught! There's someone here! Unconscious! Ouch, my God..."

"You caught someone?" Crouch shouted, completely in a tone of disbelief, "Who? Who is it?"

…

Half a minute later, Crouch watched as Diggory placed his house elf at his feet, a chill running through his bones, making him stiff with the cold.

"It's impossible, impossible, impossible!"

He murmured in disbelief and walked around Digory, striding towards the woods.

"It's no use, Mr. Crouch," Diggory shouted after him, "there's no one else there."

But Crouch ignored his words and walked straight into the bushes, rummaging through them and making the leaves rustle.

Digory scratched his beard and looked down at Twinkle's unconscious figure: "It's a bit embarrassing... Barty Crouch's house elf... I mean..."

The onlookers from the Ministry of Magic looked at the house elf lying on the ground, then quietly looked at the swaying bushes in front of them, and fell into deep silence.

"Stop talking nonsense, Amos," Arthur whispered, "Do you really think it was an elf who did it? The Dark Mark is a wizard's symbol and requires a wand."

"Yeah, she has a wand."

"What?"

"Here, you see," Mr. Diggory raised a wand, "what she is holding... This first violates the third clause of the "Code of Wand Use": No non-human creature is allowed to carry or Use the wand..."

Mr. Crouch came back empty-handed, his face was horribly pale, his hands and mustache were twitching, looking at the people watching, his lips pressed together tightly, and he said word by word: "My house elf Someone cast a coma spell."

"I found her holding one in her hand. If you will, Mr. Crouch, I think we should hear how she defended herself." Digory looked at the unconscious house elf on the ground, and then looked at Looking at his expression, he slowly stretched out his wand.

"[Recover quickly]"

Her slender fingers trembled, and she opened her bell-like brown eyes. She blinked hard, her expression blank. Under the silent gazes of the wizards, she sat up tremblingly.

She saw Crouch's leather shoes, and then she slowly and tremblingly raised her gaze to his face, then slowly cast her gaze to the night sky above.

The light and shadow of green skulls and pythons came into view. Winky took a breath of air and looked at the people surrounding the clearing with confused eyes. Two tears suddenly fell down, and the house elf began to sob.

"Elf!" Digory stared at her and asked sternly, "Do you know who I am? I am a member of the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures!"

Winky began to rock back and forth on the ground, her breaths punctuated by violent sobs. This is what a house elf looks like when it's frightened by disobedience.

"You also saw it, little goblin. Just now, someone conjured the Dark Mark here. A moment later, we discovered you, just under the mark! Please give us an explanation!"

"I, I, I don't, sir!" Winky gasped hard, as if she had severe asthma, "I don't know how to change, sir!"

"You were found with a wand in your hand!" growled Mr. Diggory, waving the wand in Winky's face.

"That's Bertha's wand." Crouch said suddenly. Seeing everyone looking at him, he explained, "Bertha left her magic wand in the box when she was watching the game. When the chaos just happened, I Let her go back to the gym and be on standby.”

The wizards at the Ministry of Magic fell silent. Bertha Jorkins lost her wand, which was only natural.

Arthur nodded thoughtfully: "Bertha was indeed sitting with the house elf at that time."

"So..." Digory's eyes turned to Twinkle, who was curled up at his feet, and his eyes became cold. "Little goblin, you were the one who discovered this wand, right?"

"I didn't do magic with it, sir!" Sparkle shrieked, tears running down the sides of her squashed, bulbous nose in rivulets. "I...I...I just picked it up." Get up, sir! I didn't conjure the Dark Mark, sir, I don't know how!"

The sight of her sobbing so hard that she almost fainted was heart-wrenching to watch. Loren held Hermione's hand and felt the girl's grip getting harder and harder, and a faint squeezing pain entered his mind.

He looked up at the mark of the dark devil still hanging in the sky. The huge python was slithering through the skull's eye sockets and mouth holes, and the miserable green light shone down, making everyone's faces turn green.

He seemed to see a scene of poisonous snakes devouring a corpse:

In the wilderness where cold corpses are scattered, the pale skin is gradually losing its temperature. The poisonous snake crawls out of the grass and gnaws at the corpse that has not yet rotted. Its fangs scratch the skin and muscles, and the snake head is close to the wound, and the blood is slowed down. Suck slowly...

Looking back, the sea of ​​​​fire in the camp has stopped expanding, but the ignited area is still surging with waves of fire. Another group of wizards from the Ministry of Magic headed by Fudge are transporting the petrified Veela and wizards.

The interrogation of the house elf Sparkle nearby was not over yet.

Digory of the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures of the Ministry of Magic was full of majesty when facing the house elves:

"You picked it up thinking you could have some fun with it, didn't you?"

The way Winky was crying reminded Harry of Dobby. After a moment of silence, Harry defended himself: "It's not her. That voice is definitely not that of an elf."

Ron immediately agreed: "Yeah, that's a human voice."

Digory didn't seem to care about the testimony of the two young wizards. He took a deep look at Crouch and said, "Okay, there is a simple way to discover the last spell cast by the wand..."

He pointed his wand at Bertha Jorkins's wand and said: "[Pre-Flashback Curse]"

The wizards watching all around suddenly took a breath of cold air, and saw a very terrifying skeleton spitting out snake letters emerging from the place where the two wands met. It seemed to be made of thick gray smoke, which was not as good as the top of the head. The mark of the dark devil is clear.

After waving away the gray smoke, Digory looked at Twinkle at his feet with a cruelly proud expression. "What do you mean? You were caught red-handed, little goblin!"

"It's not me!" Winky screamed, her whole body shaking violently, her eyes rolling in horror, "It's not me, it's not me, I don't know how! I'm a good elf, I didn't fiddle with the wand, I don't know how to do!"

"Amos..." Arthur patted his shoulder, "Think about it... wizards who can cast that spell are very rare... Where did she learn it?"

"Perhaps Diggory is implying," Crouch said with cold anger dripping from every syllable, "that I am regularly teaching my servants the Dark Mark?"

Everyone fell silent, and the scene suddenly became depressing.

"Mr. Crouch...no...absolutely not..."

"I'm sure you remember that throughout my long career there has been much evidence of my consistent disgust and hatred of the dark arts, and all those who play with them, don't you?"

"Mr. Crouch, I, I never hinted that you were involved in this matter!" Digory stammered, as if he was frightened.

"..."

Loren felt that he looked very much like a house elf now, except that the judge became Barty Crouch, a big shot that he could not afford to offend.