Chapter 526: Scruples with exploding tails

You could tell that Ron hated Malfoy terribly, and what had just happened was really over the top.

Ron had been in a bad mood lately because of his series of unpleasant experiences. Ivan, Harry and Hermione had to comfort him. Malfoy was punished anyway. He had been turned into a ferret, thrown up in the air to fall over and over again, and he was not a little irritated.

Not surprisingly, Malfoy was on his best behavior, at least for now.

When the four of them returned to the Great Dining Hall for dinner, the topic turned to Moody's first Defense Against the Dark Arts class.

Harry, Ron and Hermione asked Ivan about what had happened in the class. They had heard something.

Ivan told them everything, except that Moody was fake and the memories he had seen in his mind.

"That's great!" Harry exclaimed, "It's an Imperius Curse!"

"The Imperius Curse?!" Ron's face went extraordinarily pale; he had particularly bad memories of this curse.

"How could he use the Imperius Curse on you?" said Hermione sharply. "This isn't allowed; do you have...?"

"Don't worry, I figured out his Curse, he probably didn't think it would be that strong," said Ivan in a relaxed tone.

"How did you do it?" asked Harry hurriedly.

"Resisting the Imperius Curse requires strong willpower, or the Occlumency I taught you." Ivan explained, "This magic can prevent your mind from being invaded by any outside force. Not only the Imperius Curse, but also any other dark spiritual magic, like the dreams you've been having lately."

"Occlumency is too difficult, is there an easier way?" Harry said.

"An easier way?!" Ivan thought for a moment, "If your magic is stronger than the caster's and you have great willpower, then his spell won't work on you, and can even be reversed."

"But then improving magic is even harder than learning Occlumency..." Harry said.

"Harry, our attention should not be focused on this. It is an unforgivable curse. Professor Moody should never use this curse on a young wizard," Hermione said. "If the Ministry of Magic knows about it, Moody and Dumbledore would be in big trouble!"

"Yeah, probably!" said Ron absently, as if he was still thinking about the ways Ivan had just mentioned to resist the Imperius Curse. "But Dumbledore's always done things his own way, hasn't he? And Moody's been getting into trouble for years, I think. He attacks first and asks questions later.... Look at his dustbins. Nonsense..."

"And Professor Moody has a good point. It's better to resist dark magic in class than to face it for the first time outside against a Dark wizard, isn't it?" said Harry. "He's teaching us how to stand up to real Dark wizards."

Hermione said nothing. It was obvious that she couldn't help but agree with this.

Although Moody's approach made her uncomfortable, she had to admit that she was starting to look forward to it.

A few minutes later, they sat down at the Gryffindor table, there weren't many people in the Great Dining Hall.

Seeing the delicious food, Ron's bad mood had calmed down a bit. The four of them began to eat lamb chops and potatoes.

Hermione swallowed the food and ate quickly, and Ivan, Harry and Ron looked at her in amazement.

"Hey, Hermione, is this the new stance on elven rights?" Ron couldn't help but ask, "Are you going to make yourself puke instead?"

"No," Hermione said, with as much dignity as she could muster with her mouth bulging with buds. "I just want to get to the library."

"What?" said Ron in disbelief. "Hermione, it's our first day back! We don't even have homework yet!"

Hermione shrugged and continued to gobble down her food as if she hadn't eaten in days.

Then she jumped up, said, "See you at dinner!" and set off at full speed.

Behind her, Ivan, Harry and Ron looked at her in surprise.

"Ivan, do you know what she's going to do?" asked Harry.

"No, I don't. She might want to write an article for 'Hogwarts Magic', about protecting the rights of house elves" Said Ivan.

"She seems to be very concerned about this issue, and really wants to save enslaved house elves." Harry nodded. "She doesn't have classes in the afternoon and will probably stay in the library the whole time. By the way, Ivan, what's your afternoon class?"

"Care of Magical Creatures with Hagrid. I have no idea what magical animals he'll be teaching us" Ivan said.

"Let's just finish, it's going to be absolutely thrilling, I promise," said Harry, "You'll know it when you see it!".

"Yes, a bunch of pets that can burn, sting and bite at the same time!" Ron nodded. "Hermione thinks they could be useful, like dragons, although they look fierce, Dragon's Blood is incredibly magical."

A few minutes later, Harry and Ron returned to the Common Room to grab their copies of Unmasking the Future.

They had Professor Trelawney's Divination class in the afternoon and needed to learn how the planets worked.

Ivan, meanwhile, walked out of the castle and followed the lawn slowly descending towards Hagrid's hut on the edge of the Forbidden Forest.

He kept thinking about Caresius and the monster, and who Barty Crouch Jr. would pretend to be.

Ivan arrived at Hagrid's hut and, just as he was approaching it, he heard a series of small explosions that woke him up.

Before he understood what was happening, a huge black creature pounced on him.

It was Hagrid's huge Great Dane, Fang, who whimpered, threw Ivan down on the grass and licked his face.

"Come on, Fang..." Ivan struggled to his feet.

He led him to the side of the hut, where Hagrid was busy in front of a pile of rattling boxes.

Inside was a very strange rattling noise, and the small explosions Ivan had just heard.

"There you are, Ivan!" said Hagrid cheerfully. "Come and have a look at these Escregutos with exploding tails. Harry really liked them."

Immediately, Ivan knew what Ron meant by a group of pets that could burn, sting and bite people.

They were a large group of Escregutes with exploding tails that looked like deformed, shell-less lobsters, horribly pale and slimy looking, with legs sticking out in very odd places and no visible head.

There were a hundred of them in each box, each about six inches long, crawling over each other, blindly bumping against the sides of the boxes. They gave off a potent odor of rotting fish.

Occasionally, sparks would fly from the end of a Screguto, and with a little phut, it would propel itself forward several inches.

Disgusting, these things were the most horrible abominations..... Well, they were nowhere near as bad as the one Ivan had seen in Caresius' memories....