Chapter 257: Nine Fire Dragons
The Saturday before the Triwizard Tournament began was Hogsmeade Day at Hogwarts.
As in the previous school year, students in their third year or above, with the signature of their guardian, could go to Hogsmeade Village.
Except that this year, the students from Beauxbatons and Durmstrang were also going together.
After the start of school, Hogsmeade, which had been joined by many Diagon Alley merchants, had already been visited by Ethan with Fleur and the others.
So he wasn't so expectant of this trip, and as usual, he took Cassandra and the others out on a date and shopping.
It was just that when he was at the Three Broomsticks Pub, Hagrid told him to go to his place at twelve o'clock at night.
Ethan, who had read the original book, naturally knew what this was; Hagrid was going to leak the exam questions in advance.
Although it wasn't a clear question, he could also know who he should face.
Ludo had already revealed the original project, which was the same as in the original book: to snatch the golden egg guarded by the fire dragon, all of which were mother dragons that had just laid eggs and were still in the incubation period.
However, after the day the champions were selected, Ludo told Ethan that the project had been changed a bit, but he couldn't say the specifics, which was under Moody's request and a magic contract was signed.
Therefore, Ethan wasn't quite sure what the specific project was.
However, Ethan didn't pay too much attention to these.
After all, no matter what the project was, it didn't put any pressure on Ethan; let alone a fire dragon.
Even if it was changed, and all the fire dragons in Romania were brought over, Ethan could make them hand over the eggs obediently with just a bit of pressure.
It was just Hagrid's good intentions that Ethan couldn't refuse.
At night, close to twelve o'clock, Ethan turned into a shadow by the window of the Ravenclaw Tower and disappeared on the spot.
He directly used Shadow Stealth, and walked along the outer wall of Ravenclaw Tower, outside of which was the Forbidden Forest.
It was much more convenient to go directly to the Forbidden Forest or to Hagrid's place.
When he passed the brightly lit Beauxbatons carriage and came to the entrance of Hagrid's hut, Ethan happened to see Harry knocking on the door, of course, Harry was wearing an invisibility cloak.
For Ethan, this invisibility cloak was useless at all.
He didn't know why it was listed as one of the Deathly Hallows; not to mention that powerful wizards could see it directly, wizards with good intuition could also sense it, and even Moody's mechanical eye could see through it, it really wasn't impressive.
Without exposing Harry, Ethan directly turned into a shadow and came to Harry's side before dispelling it.
Harry, sensing someone beside him, obviously stiffened a bit.
Seeing that it was Ethan, he breathed a sigh of relief and took off the invisibility cloak.
As for Ron, Ethan didn't see him.
It seemed that after Harry and Ron broke up, Hagrid didn't have much contact with Ron; he just didn't know if Hagrid knew what Ron had done.
"Ethan, Hagrid asked you to come too?"
Until now, Harry still didn't know why Hagrid had asked him to come, and thought he had something to say to him.
"Yes, I met Hagrid at the Three Broomsticks Pub, and he asked me to come."
"Then do you know what's the matter?"
He was asked to come over at twelve o'clock in the middle of the night, Harry really couldn't guess why.
If there was anything to say, couldn't it be said during the day?
"It should be related to the Triwizard Tournament!"
"Hagrid, as the Professor of Care of Magical Creatures at Hogwarts, probably knows something, which is why he called us over in the middle of the night."
Just as Ethan and Harry were discussing at the door, Hagrid also came out of the house.
After looking around to make sure there were no problems, he said to the two of them:
"Come in!"
Ethan remembered that Hagrid took Harry to the site of fostering fire dragons in the original book, so this link is gone?
"I already know the first project, it's fire dragons."
"On Tuesday, the Romanian fire dragon reserve staff have already brought them over, Charlie is also in there, I am responsible for providing them with food, so I know these things."
"After you go back, you can't tell anyone!"
Hagrid carefully told Ethan and Harry.
He wasn't too worried about Ethan, there was absolutely no problem dealing with fire dragons; after all, whether it was his own Norbert or Ethan's own Onyxia, they were more than the dragons that came over now.
As long as Ethan paid attention in advance, he would definitely be able to get a good result by then.
It was just Harry who was more worrying.
Hagrid, who had raised fire dragons, knew how much damage an adult fire dragon could cause, which was unmatched by most XXX-level magical creatures.
Sometimes, when Norbert was upset, he couldn't do anything about it at all.
Not to mention Harry, a little wizard, who was facing fire dragons that were hatching eggs, which were even more aggressive.
"Fire dragons?"
Ethan didn't say anything yet, but Harry's eyes widened all of a sudden.
During this time, as the Triwizard Tournament approached, Harry became more and more afraid, especially after Sirius Black specially collected information and introduced him to the past Triwizard Tournaments.
This made him think every day, what would he face?
Harry always felt that it was like a terrible behemoth, entrenched in front of him, blocking his path.
His heart had never been so nervous and anxious as it was now.
Even the Quidditch match, when he was about to face the Slytherin team, he had never been like this.
Not to mention, Voldemort, who might be hiding somewhere in the dark.
Now that he knew he was going to face fire dragons, Harry's heart sank to the bottom.
Back then, he and Ron often went to see Norbert, who was raised by Hagrid; he was quite cute when he was a child, but when he was three months old, he couldn't beat it.
Later, after Norbert became an adult, he had seen him twice; with that size, Harry really didn't know what magic he could use to affect it.
On the contrary, he was afraid that if the other party spit a mouthful of fire, he would be gone.
Ethan glanced at Harry and found that he was trembling all over.
This shouldn't be the case!
In the original book, Harry didn't seem to be so afraid.
After thinking for a while, Ethan knew the reason.
In the original book, Harry faced a three-headed dog in the first grade, and he also faced it here.
In second year, I faced the giant spider Aragog and battled the Basilisk head-on. Although I had the help of a phoenix, I still managed to kill the Basilisk.
The Basilisk is no less formidable than a Class XXXXX dragon.
In third year, I fainted from the Dementors' presence, but later I overcame my fear and used the Patronus Charm to drive away a large group of Dementors.
But here, it seems I've only faced a three-headed dog, and even then, I was the one being chased. I haven't even overcome the fear of Dementors.
Now, suddenly learning that I have to fight a dragon, it would be strange if I weren't afraid.
"Dragons, there are nine of them!"
Hagrid confirmed again, while also revealing another piece of information.
"Nine?"
Harry was completely stunned. The news just kept getting worse and worse.
One dragon could devour me, and now there are nine?
"That's right, nine. The specific details haven't been told to me, but there are nine at the camp. Just the dragon tamers and support staff number over a hundred people."
"They are the Australian Opaleye, the Chinese Fireball, the Welsh Green, the Hebridean Black, the Hungarian Horntail, the Norwegian Ridgeback, the Peruvian Vipertooth, the Romanian Longhorn, and the Ukrainian Ironbelly. All of them are mothers who have just laid eggs."
"Except for the Swedish Short-Snout, there is one of each breed, and they are all mothers who have just laid eggs. This wasn't easy. Charlie told me that three of them were specially transferred from other dragon sanctuaries."
Hagrid was quite excited when he said this.
Although he raised a dragon himself and clearly understood how difficult it was to raise one, his love for dragons remained unchanged.
Especially the chance to see nine different breeds of dragons at once.
During this time, when he wasn't teaching, Hagrid spent a considerable amount of time at the temporary dragon breeding camp.
"All of them are dragons that have just laid eggs. The competition probably involves dragon eggs, otherwise they wouldn't go to the trouble of finding dragons like these."
"Snatching a golden egg under the dragons' noses, that's probably the type of task it will be."
Ethan decided to reveal some information, otherwise Harry might really fall at the first hurdle. His experience is severely lacking at this point!
It seems that this is no different from the original story, except that the four dragons have been replaced by nine.
"I don't know about that, but what Ethan said is possible. He's very knowledgeable about dragons, Harry. You can ask him if you don't understand anything."
Hagrid shook his head. Asking him to think was a bit too much for him.
"Ethan, do you know how to deal with dragons?"
Hearing Hagrid say this, Harry immediately placed his hopes on Ethan...
"My methods definitely aren't suitable for you. In such a short amount of time, for you to be able to suppress a dragon is basically impossible."
Ethan either uses direct pressure to control them, or he uses brute force. This is something that, apart from Dumbledore, other students and professors at Hogwarts would find difficult to achieve.
It's easy for professors to repel dragons, but defeating or killing these flying behemoths is still somewhat difficult.
In any case, more than half of the dragon species require twenty skilled wizards to subdue them.
Seeing Harry's disappointment, Ethan changed his tone:
"There are still some clever methods. Your flying talent is good. The speed of a rocket crossbow is something dragons can't keep up with. As long as you can learn the Summoning Charm before the competition, you can directly summon a pre-prepared rocket crossbow on the field, and naturally you can use the speed advantage of the rocket crossbow to deal with the dragon."
"I don't know if you'll be able to complete the competition's objective, but your safety will be guaranteed."
"Of course, the premise is that you need to understand the characteristics of these dragons. Each type of dragon has its own advantages. Some are poisonous, some are large and slow, some are fast, and some breathe fire far..."
"Hagrid should have books here that introduce dragons."
Hearing Ethan's idea, Harry's eyes lit up. This was indeed possible!
Fighting a dragon with his own strength was definitely not going to work. But if he was riding a flying broomstick, that would be a different story.
Harry was very confident in his flying skills.
But the first task of the Triwizard Tournament is on Tuesday. In such a short amount of time, can he master the Summoning Charm?
He also has to remember the characteristics of all the dragons. It seems like there isn't enough time.
And Ron, should he tell him about this task?
Ron letting Peter go made Harry somewhat unforgiving, but after all, they had been friends for so long.
If Ron faced a dragon unprepared, Harry felt that Ron would be swallowed alive.
Even himself, if he didn't prepare in advance, he would probably get weak in the knees.
Not to mention Ron's courage, and in terms of strength, Ron wasn't stronger than him. He suffered from that dark magic back then, but if he prepared, it definitely wouldn't be like that.
"I'll go look. I bought books on this topic before."
Hagrid scratched his head and got up to walk towards the storage cabinet in the back. He bought these books a long time ago. He flipped through them when he was raising Norbert, but he hasn't touched them in years. Hopefully, he can find them!
Afterwards, Ethan introduced Harry to a few small tricks for dealing with dragons.
Such as how to hide in the dragon's blind spot, using a powerful Flash Charm, which can temporarily make the dragon lose its sight for seconds, but the duration is relatively short, and so on.
By the time Ethan and Harry came out of Hagrid's hut, it was almost one o'clock.
The Beauxbatons carriage in the distance was still brightly lit.
Harry put on his Invisibility Cloak, hugged a book about dragons, and disappeared into the night.
Ethan stared at the Beauxbatons carriage.
In the original story, Fleur seemed to be facing the Welsh Green.
This type of dragon is small and relatively docile, usually avoiding humans and preying on sheep or something.
