The Wizarding World’s Greatest Invention

Everyone’s cheers pulled Adam’s attention away from the House-elves and back to reality.

Seeing Harry, who had caught the Golden Snitch, fall from the sky into the muddy ground, Adam suddenly remembered something and hurried after the crowd onto the pitch.

Was it finally coming? The Wizarding World’s greatest invention in the second year—even across all seven books—

Mixed in among the Gryffindors surrounding Harry, Adam watched with satisfaction as Gilderoy Lockhart squeezed through the crowd with an excited expression:

"Leave it to me—don’t worry, I have plenty of experience dealing with this sort of thing!"

"No—wait… don’t! Let me go to the Hospital Wing—"

Ignoring the noise around him, Adam carefully observed Lockhart, watching the path of his wand while memorizing every syllable he chanted.

As the spell took effect, Harry’s arm drooped bonelessly like a rubber-hose cartoon character—every bone in his entire arm had been removed.

Deboning Curse!

With a spell like this, who needed techniques for deboning an entire chicken or fish?

Now this was magic improving everyday life!

He wondered whether it could remove fruit pits, too…

"Haha—!"

The spell had gone wrong, but Lockhart still wore a triumphant smile as he stood up awkwardly.

"Sometimes—yes—this does occasionally happen… but the broken bones are fine now! Aren’t they? All right, Harry, off to the Hospital Wing…"

Lockhart did not dare meet Harry’s furious, resentful eyes. Instead, he looked at the friends gathered around him.

"Mr. Weasley, Miss Granger, please accompany Harry there."

Although they were furious at Lockhart’s actions, Harry’s safety was clearly more important right now. After glaring at Lockhart, the two hurriedly helped Harry up and made their way to the Hospital Wing with practiced ease.

"Argh!"

Amid the chaos, someone stepped hard on Lockhart’s foot.

With the star of the match leaving early, the remaining handshakes and other formalities were wrapped up hastily. Adam bade farewell to his friends once more and headed alone to an abandoned classroom.

As a House-elf, Dobby appeared and disappeared unpredictably and had no fixed range of activity. To find him, Adam had no choice but to use some special methods.

For example… divination.

There were many ways to divine with the Clow Cards, such as using the Dream Card to have prophetic dreams, using The Water Card for water divination, or using the Tree Card to summon yarrow for fortune-telling. However, the first method was uncontrollable, while the latter required a certain professional foundation.

The divination method best suited to Adam was to directly use the Clow Cards—after all, Clow Cards, which incorporated Tarot Cards, were themselves tools that could be used for divination.

"Shuffle the cards with your left hand, then divide the deck into three piles and combine them again… Remember, you can only shuffle Clow Cards with your left hand."

Kero and Suppi sat at two corners of the table, explaining the specific divination procedure to Adam.

"After shuffling, draw ten cards according to your preference and arrange them in a 3×3 diamond formation."

"Place the first card at the opposite corner, the second at the corner facing you, the third at the lower left, and the fourth at the lower right…"

Following the instructions of the two of them, Adam arranged the Clow Cards and closed his eyes.

"Clow Cards created by Clow Reed, please answer my question and tell me where the House-elf Dobby is…"

Magic slowly flowed through the Clow Cards before him. Adam opened his eyes and turned over the card at the top of the spread.

Suppi said solemnly:

"It is The Earth."

The first card was a clue, indicating that the target’s location was related to the ground… Honestly, it was rather useless. After all, he was looking for a location; The Earth could at most tell him that Dobby was neither in the sky nor underwater.

Next came the three Clow Cards in the middle row of the spread. These three cards pointed to the specific subject of the divination.

Adam turned them over one by one from left to right.

"Bubble Card, Sweet Card, Little Card…?"

Kero tilted his head. What kind of place was that?

"Dobby is hiding in the Hogwarts kitchen?"

Putting those three Clow Cards together, Adam could scarcely think of any answer besides the Hogwarts kitchen.

That seemed to be enough, but Adam still completed the process and turned over the Clow Card at the lower-right corner of the spread, closest to his hand—this card pointed to the divination target’s next objective.

"Shield Card… protection? Or the Chosen One? Either interpretation makes sense."

Since Adam already knew a fair amount about Dobby, interpreting the divination results went very smoothly. He put away the Clow Cards and immediately set out for the kitchen, the place at Hogwarts Adam knew best besides the dormitories and the Hufflepuff common room.

"Mr. Reed, is there anything I can help you with?"

The moment he entered the kitchen, a passing House-elf greeted Adam familiarly.

"Bru, I would like to know whether an outside House-elf has appeared in the kitchen recently."

Closing the door behind him, Adam casually scanned the surroundings while quietly asking the House-elf named Bru.

Bru lowered his voice as well.

"An outside House-elf? Yes, Mr. Reed, a House-elf has indeed come to Hogwarts. Its little master is currently studying at Hogwarts."

Bru looked somewhat displeased, as though he felt this questioned their ability to work. However, that was not the main source of his dissatisfaction.

"That fellow is terribly lazy. Ever since coming to Hogwarts, he has barely helped his little master clean up at all. His master ought to…"

"All right, Bru. I know you have always been the most diligent among them."

Adam stopped Bru’s complaints. Hearing Adam’s praise, Bru proudly raised his head, and Adam took the opportunity to continue asking:

"Where is that House-elf now?"

"Um, he went out briefly just now and has only recently returned. He should be resting over by the oak barrels…"

At that, the Wand of Darkness in Adam’s hand struck the floor. An enormous magic circle enveloped the entire kitchen, and a somewhat illusory great lock slowly faded into the air.

"Mr. Reed?"

Bru looked at Adam in confusion.

"Take me to the oak barrel where he is."

"Certainly."

Though he did not know what Adam was doing, Bru still chose to trust the student who had gained control of the entire kitchen and all the House-elves several times.

The House-elves of Hogwarts all lived in oak barrels. Most of them were from recent years, bearing the logos of Butterbeer and Three Broomsticks Pub. Dobby’s barrel, however, had been squeezed into a corner. It was an old barrel, with rust creeping even over the iron hoops around it.

Adam walked over to the barrel and heard a faint snoring sound coming from inside. Casting the spell on the Bludger earlier had probably been quite a burden on Dobby as well.

"Lazy fellows only deserve oak barrels like this! Just look at him—he is still sleeping at a time like this!"

Bru indignantly explained on Adam’s behalf.

Without responding to Bru, Adam extended his hand toward the oak barrel. A magic circle formed in his palm in the blink of an eye.

The sealing magic cast over the entire kitchen contracted around the oak barrel. Then the barrel rose into the air and floated over to Adam’s side.

"Mr. Reed, where are you taking him?"

Unable to help himself, Bru asked.

Adam glanced at Dobby, who was still deeply asleep inside the oak barrel beside him, and smiled faintly.

"I have a few things I need to ask him."