Hogwarts: Don't call me the Staff Maker

Chapter 44 Snowball Fight

Garian and Lila didn't stay in the common room for long; they prepared to leave after about half an hour.

They didn't even go to the Hogwarts Christmas party together.

"We've arranged to meet Pomona at Three Brooms," Lila said with an expectant look. "I can't wait... for Ms. Rosmerta's special pumpkin blossom mead."

Looking at her and her hurried departure from the Gryffindor common room, Celen couldn't help but seriously consider something she had just said.

"...I came to visit a friend, and I thought I'd drop by to see you too."

Xilun has reason to suspect that this is likely the truth.

After Galian and Lila left, Siron went to the Great Hall with the others.

"Your parents are really something," Fred said, walking over to Celen. "How did they get in?"

"Probably through Professor Sprout," Celen said.

Siron wasn't surprised that they knew Headmaster Hufflepuff.

There aren't many wizards in Britain who study magical plants, and even fewer who have published professional papers on them. Since there are so few of them, they are certainly not strangers to each other.

However, a hint of disappointment flashed across Fred's face after hearing Celen's answer.

He initially thought the two had come in through the secret passages of Hogsmeade.

Parents of students broke the rules and sneaked into the castle. How familiar this style is! It's exactly the same as theirs.

And they just happened to have a magical map that clearly marked several secret passages leading from Hogsmeade into the castle.

So when Fred and George saw the two adult wizards in the common room earlier, they even wondered if they might be the mapmakers—two of Bigfoot, Prongs, Moonface, and Wormtail.

They discussed it in hushed tones for a long time, trying to reasonably assign those nicknames to the two of them.

Unexpectedly, they turned out to be a law-abiding group who had entered through the main gate.

I was quite disappointed... Well, at least the air-dried bubble pod balls were still quite fun.

As the group entered the auditorium, they were immediately enveloped by the rich aroma of roasted chicken. Even though few students were staying on campus for the holiday, various delicious roasted meats, fried potatoes, and tasty sausages were still piled up like small mountains.

Every few steps from the dining table, you'll see piles of wizard-themed gift packs, which can contain all sorts of interesting trinkets. If you're lucky, you might even find the latest flying broomstick.

Of course, the existence of flying brooms is just a legend; no one has ever actually ridden one.

Xilun casually opened a few items and found a quill pen that wouldn't produce ink, a brooch, a pack of sparkly balloons, three biting coasters, and... a dried pufferfish?

Xilun didn't understand why there would be such a thing inside the colorful firecracker packets.

Cat treats?

He tried tapping the table with the dried fish, and it made a loud thud, just like Hagrid's rock crust cake.

Well, it's not entirely useless; at least if you throw it, it can smash someone's head open and give them a big bump.

The Christmas feast began, and all the students, regardless of their college, sat together at one table. Xilun wasn't very interested in roast turkey, a holiday-only food, but the roast meat sandwiches and rum-soaked jam pudding were quite good.

In the afternoon, Fred suggested that everyone go outside to have a snowball fight. Harry and Ron were the first to respond. Percy, the oldest, thought it was childish and was initially unwilling to participate, but he was half-dragged and half-pushed out of the castle by the twins.

After watching Hagrid and several professors leave the school, Xiren thought for a moment and then joined them.

The group played in the snow all afternoon without using any magic. They were having a great time, but by the time they ran back to the common room, panting, their clothes were soaked, and they had to huddle by the fire to keep warm.

"Wait, where's Siron?" Harry, who was playing wizard chess with Ron, looked around and suddenly realized that one of them seemed to be missing.

"I don't know." Fred looked around as well.

Was he there this afternoon too?

"Yes, he was!" Ron said confidently, rubbing his shoulder. "I remember it clearly, there were stones mixed in with the snowballs he threw!"

He was probably the only one who got injured during the snowball fight. He was almost hit on the head by a flying snowball, but luckily he slipped and the snowball landed on his shoulder.

"Shillon definitely didn't do it on purpose," Harry said quietly, but his tone was very certain.

How did you know?

"Because I actually made that snowball." Harry suddenly felt guilty, then quickly explained, "You never mentioned it, so I thought it was okay, but I really didn't know there would be stones there."

Ron stared at him for a while, then sighed softly, "Never mind, it's alright."

"If you're talking about that freshman, he went to find the gamekeeper," Percy suddenly said.

"You know?"

“I saw it,” Percy said. “About an hour ago, after the professors came back from Hogsmeade, I saw him go and say a few words to the game keeper, and then they left together.”

"The gamekeeper... is Hagrid," Harry said.

"Yes, Rubeus Hagrid, that's the name." Percy nodded.

"Strange, what does he want with Hagrid?"

"What else could it be? It must be related to wand making; he likes that," Ron said confidently.

"But it's Christmas today," Fred said, puzzled. "Everyone wants to have fun all day."

“Sirlen wouldn’t,” Ron said. “He’s obsessed with making wands, he doesn’t even take weekends or holidays off. I rarely see him outside the dorms on weekends.”

Fred and George exchanged a glance.

Does making a wand really require this much work? Don't you even get a holiday?

They thought of the book "The Guide to Making and Using Wands" that they had borrowed from the library a while ago, but for some reason, they suddenly didn't feel like reading it anymore.

……

To be fair, Ron was right this time. Siron was indeed making wands, but he didn't find it hard at all.

In the cabin by the Forbidden Forest, Hagrid sat by the fire, sipping hot tea, while watching Siren sit there fiddling with a white "rope" about the thickness of a finger.

Hagrid pursed his lips tightly.

Every time he sees this scene, he feels genuinely amazed.

Just a month ago, this "rope" was a bone that was two feet long and as thick as a bowl.

Over the past month, he has watched the giant spine gradually transform into its current form.

How exactly did Celen manage to do that?

Hagrid had asked this question more than once, and Siron hadn't hidden it from him, telling him that this was the key step in turning the material into the core of the staff, called the Staff Core Fusion Charm. But Hagrid didn't understand, even though he had seen the whole process with his own eyes.

He had always thought that making a wand was simply about figuring out how to put unicorn tail hair into a rounded wooden stick.