Chapter 90: Thestrals, the Whomping Willow, and Self-study in the Library!

Seeing that the fire dragon was fine, Hagrid was relieved. After leaving the dragon shed with Dudley, Hagrid turned around and went alone to the outer area of the Forbidden Forest.

There, he raised some Thestrals. Unlike the privately - raised Acromantula, it was reasonable and compliant to raise Thestrals for Hogwarts.

On some relatively grand and traditional public occasions, the teachers and students of Hogwarts would occasionally use a rather outdated means of transportation: the Thestral - drawn carriage.

However, Hagrid hadn't encountered an occasion to use the Thestral - drawn carriage for a long time.

Dudley watched from afar as four tall, thin horses as black as ink with long wings, harnessed to a carriage frame, pulled a huge flatbed cart and soared out of the Forbidden Forest.

Hagrid was wearing goggles over his eyes. Grabbing the reins with his big hands, he sat on the flatbed cart, looking extremely happy.

In just a few breaths, this unique flat - bed cart pulled by Thestrals became a tiny black dot in the distant sky.

This shows that the flying speed of Thestrals is extremely fast, and their strength is incredibly great. Even with the heavy Hagrid on board, they could still speed like this.

Dudley silently withdrew his gaze and turned to leave.

He wasn't surprised that he could see Thestrals because he had witnessed death.

Not counting his own death experience in his past life, just in this lifetime.

A month ago, he and Harry, along with Voldemort, had caused Quirrell's death.

Although it sounded a bit strange, it wasn't wrong.

Dudley strolled outside Hogwarts Castle. Instead of rushing to the library to meet Harry, he followed the guidance of the general consciousness of Hogwarts and went alone to the place where another strange creature was located.

After another quarter of an hour, Dudley saw a thick and lush willow tree, which was the purpose of his trip.

As soon as Dudley got close, the big willow tree suddenly 'came to life' and started thrashing about... No, it was wildly waving its branches. Each tough willow branch, when whipped by the Whomping Willow, made a sonic boom at the tip, creating quite a commotion.

Dudley had expected this. He immediately threw the Smelting stick in his hand, and it turned into a mouse in mid - air.

The mouse nimbly dodged the Whomping Willow's attacks, slipped through the willow's branch defenses, and pressed its two little paws directly on a large bump on the trunk of the Whomping Willow.

This bump was the Whomping Willow's weak point. Once touched, it temporarily lost its ability to move and calmed down.

Seizing the opportunity, Dudley turned the mouse - shaped stick back into a long saw. He controlled the saw to fly into the air and, following the principle of cutting some parts while leaving others, harvested over a hundred thick willow branches and several trunk branches as thick as a bowl.

As always, he stuffed them all into his Personal Space.

Then he left contentedly.

Now that there was nothing else to do, it was time to hunker down and study in the library.

There was a secret passage in the Whomping Willow that led directly to the Shrieking Shack in Hogsmeade. This was a protective measure that Dumbledore had set up specifically for the werewolf wizard Lupin, so that Lupin could directly reach the Shrieking Shack on the full - moon night to get through his period of transformation.

However, this facility was of little use now.

The willow branches with magical properties from the Whomping Willow could be harvested and used by Dudley.

Dudley returned to Hogwarts Castle and headed straight for the library on the second floor. Along the way, he encountered other students and received looks of respect, resistance, or resentment from them.

Some honest students from Hufflepuff even bowed slightly to Dudley and addressed him as Teaching Assistant Dursley.

However, some senior Slytherin students, upon seeing Dudley from afar, imitated his way of walking with a wand and laughed mockingly at him. Dudley merely raised his hand slightly, and they scattered in all directions at once.

Then... they suddenly bumped into an air wall that Dudley had created with transfiguration in front of them. They got their heads full of bumps and had house points deducted by Dudley.

Dudley wasn't angry at all. He just shook his head helplessly. Why did these poor kids have to do this?

They still didn't know him well. Without irresistible obstacles, Dudley would never hesitate to get his revenge.

However, this situation also gave Dudley a clearer understanding of the current situation of the students at Hogwarts.

It was extremely difficult for him to implement educational reforms, especially when he had so many other things to deal with. He could only take it step by step.

Dudley kept walking and soon entered the library on the second floor. He smelled the strong aroma of ink and saw a large collection of magical books.

There were nearly a thousand bookshelves here, with tens of thousands of books and documents of all kinds. It was the place with the largest collection of books in the entire wizarding world of Britain and the most important source of knowledge for creating generations of powerful white wizards and black wizards.

The method of Voldemort's Horcruxes, the ancient magic of Love Protection of Aunt Lily, and Dumbledore's profound magical knowledge all originated from here.

Dudley had long been extremely yearning for this place, but Haste makes waste. Although he was excited inside, he could tell what was more important. He directly asked the librarian, Madam Pince, about the location of the bookshelves where books related to alchemy and wand - making were stored.

Currently, the most important thing in his mind was neither to find and kill Voldemort's main soul nor to implement educational reforms at Hogwarts, but to find a way to perfectly separate Voldemort's soul fragment without harming the Horcruxes themselves.

Other things were just done incidentally while accomplishing this.

Of course, Dudley also hoped that during the process of promoting other things, he could find more inspirations on separating the soul fragments from the Horcruxes without causing any harm.

Now, in the field of magic, Dudley's strongest skill was spell - casting proficiency, and his second - strongest skills were alchemy and wand - making. He wanted to fully utilize his strengths and first try out the ideas he had come up with.

After getting some preliminary results, he would discuss them with Dumbledore and compare their progress.

Dudley carried a large stack of books on alchemy and wand - making to the reading area and sat down with Harry, Hermione, and Ron.

Among the three, Hermione was the most concentrated in reading. Harry was a bit less focused. As for Ron, he was scratching his head and couldn't concentrate at all. If his friends weren't around, he wouldn't even be able to sit still.

Dudley didn't disturb them. He put down the books, picked up one, and started to read it page by page carefully. The first one he read was a basic theoretical book on alchemy.

The alchemical knowledge obtained from fusing The Philosopher's Stone was too advanced and one-sided, only covering content related to the refining of The Philosopher's Stone. If he wanted to truly master alchemy, he still needed to make up for his lack of basic knowledge.

In contrast, with wand-making, although he only knew a few advanced targeted material processing techniques, he had a good grasp of the basic principles of wand-making. Even if he tried to make a wand right away, there was a high chance of success, though he couldn't guarantee the quality and power of the finished product.

Harry and his two friends naturally noticed Dudley's arrival. Seeing that Dudley didn't seem to want to talk and the library required silence, they didn't say a word either.

Time passed by minute by minute.

When Ron was so fidgety and restless that he could hardly stand it any longer, he finally heard the bell ringing from the Great Hall, indicating that lunch was served.

Lunch at Hogwarts started at twelve o'clock and lasted until two o'clock in the afternoon. As long as students went to the Great Hall during this period, they could have the lunch prepared by the house-elves. The students could decide their own dining time according to their schedules.

Ron immediately gave Harry and Hermione a pleading look, signaling that he'd had enough of reading and it was time to go for some chicken legs!

It was the first day of school and there was no exam pressure. Did they really have to study this hard on the first day of school?

He couldn't understand it at all.