Chapter 175: Chap.172 - The old bee acts

As expected, the following days were the least friendly for Rigel.

If Rigel had been a Slytherin, it would hardly have affected him, Slytherins are full of children of Death Eaters after all. Unfortunately, Rigel wasn’t one.

The Ravenclaws avoided him, the Hufflepuffs were afraid of him, the Gryffindors treated him like a circus animal they hadn’t yet decided was dangerous, and the Slytherins seemed to find it all incredibly amusing, they looked at Rigel with mocking smiles and made jokes when he passed by, clearly raising their voices so he could hear.

The professors sympathized, well, most of them. McGonagall, who had previously wanted to talk to Rigel about sportsmanship, gave up on that idea, instead, she asked him more questions in class and helped him with small things, clearly worried about him and trying to take care of him in her own way.

Flitwick followed suit, and Sprout looked at him with considerable pity, she even gave him cookies and cake more than once, patting him on the head.

Snape seemed to be in a great mood during this time, and although he didn’t speak to him, his humor was evident.

Quirrell and Binns ignored him, as always, and Hagrid even looked guilty when he saw him.

Rigel felt Dumbledore’s gaze lingering during this time, but the man remained silent.

The positive side was that whether it was the Quidditch players or their roommates, they were still acting normally, or at least trying to.

Harry, surprisingly, spoke to him that evening and in the end, although their relationship was no longer as close, he seemed to forgive him, although Rigel felt that the fault wasn’t really his after all, at least apart from the part about not telling him.

Dean still looked the same, but Seamus seemed to look at him with some caution, so in the end, the large group ended up fragmenting without knowing what happened after that.

Harry and Ron formed one group, Seamus and Dean formed another, and Rigel stayed with Neville and Hermione.

Although Neville had far more reason to be angry with Rigel, the fact was that he was a kind boy and his forgiveness wasn’t just empty words, but completely genuine.

Because of this event, Rigel also ended up discovering that despite his initial prejudices about Hermione, it became clear that the little girl had a quality that was difficult to find: loyalty.

Even the little girls who used to like Rigel seemed afraid of him now, none of his fangirls stayed, only Hermione. Although he knew it was due to the environment she grew up in, it didn’t change the fact that Hermione preferred to stay with him and be the target of ‘public criticism’ rather than just walk away and avoid it.

Well, Rigel could ‘adopt’ the little girl just as he ‘adopted’ Neville.

Regarding the Quidditch players, the twins were the same, they hadn’t changed at all. Rigel could even sense that they had grown closer afterward, almost as if they wanted to comfort him through it. This led them to seek out Rigel more often to have fun together, and Jack loved it.

Despite seeming like nothing more than two annoying idiots, the twins are undoubtedly very smart, whether in terms of IQ or EQ. Rigel was their friend, that was what mattered to them.

Wood cared about Quidditch more than anything else, and even though Rigel was an avowed Death Eater, Rigel believed Wood wouldn’t care in the slightest if it meant winning the Quidditch Cup.

Katie and Angelina, on the other hand, were hesitant at first, but as the training days went on, the awkwardness faded.

Fortunately, no one confronted Rigel about it, so Rigel could simply wait for the next Quidditch match to pass. It wasn’t all bad, he found himself truly satisfied with the quiet atmosphere around him.

Whether it was Neville, Dean, Hermione, or the twins, this event showed Rigel who could truly be called a friend, for a moment, Rigel even wanted to thank Rita for it… after stomping on her a few times, of course.

Even so, although their relationship had diminished, Rigel still paid attention to Harry, it was at this point that he realized something was wrong.

Shouldn’t those little boys have been looking for Nicholas Flamel? How come they were still acting like normal children?

After that, he did some research and even asked Hermione about Harry’s ‘hexing broom’, as if she had any clues. The little girl had many theories, such as a dark wizard among the spectators trying to kill Harry, or perhaps someone tampering with Harry’s broom before the game, but none of them pointed to Snape!

Rigel quickly realized the problem and was once again speechless.

He just wanted to keep the damn plot on track! Why was that so difficult?!

No, he couldn’t let it go on like this. Harry found out about Nicholas Flamel from Hagrid after talking about Snape trying to kill him at the Quidditch match. Now Rigel had even heard Ron suggest that it had been Rigel’s doing as well, leaving him truly speechless.

If Ron weren’t just a spoiled brat, he’d like to show him how a pirate dealt with slanderers.

Rigel considered having Calypso infiltrate Hogwarts and find a student to bewitch, a simple memory alteration and a compulsion to tell Harry that she saw Snape casting a hex on him could put the plot back on track, however, he discarded that idea.

No chance. If it weren’t for Dumbledore, he could do it, but with that old man surrounding Harry, who knows if he wouldn’t follow the trail and invade the memories of his chosen target only to realize they were fabricated memories.

Calypso was already very good at it, but she hadn’t reached the point of building a perfect memory, even the best wizards focused on mental magic left traces. For a wizard of Dumbledore’s caliber? That would only make him suspicious, and if that suspicion reached Rigel, who knows what that old bee would do?

So he abandoned that plan, although the chance of Dumbledore actually following the trail was minimal, he wouldn’t bet on it.

After thinking about it for a few days, he was already thinking about how to send an anonymous letter that couldn’t be traced, but he eventually discovered that Harry and Ron had actually found out about Nicholas Flamel!

Confused, he used wind magic to listen to their conversation and roughly understand what had happened.

It was Hagrid who let the cat out of the bag again. At first, Rigel thought it was fate acting up once more, but he soon came to another conclusion: there was something he had forgotten, Dumbledore wanted Harry to find out about the stone!

From the beginning, it was all a setup, whether it was to make the ‘snake’ jump out or to train Harry, neither deviated from Dumbledore’s plans, so while Rigel was concerned about how to let Harry follow the plot, there was someone even more worried than him.

Although Dumbledore didn’t know the plot, he had already planned the event around Harry. Letting Hagrid talk too much may even have been something Dumbledore orchestrated, he knew Hagrid well enough to know he was terrible at keeping secrets, and he also knew how to get Hagrid to talk. He just needed to let Harry follow the lead and go question Hagrid.

Thus, he caused Harry, who was heading out for a nighttime excursion, to stumble upon Snape and Quirrell arguing in the corridors in the middle of the night and end up overhearing too much.

Thinking that Snape was threatening Quirrell to get past the three-headed dog, Harry told Ron, and the pair went to talk to Hagrid about it. In the end, Hagrid didn’t disappoint Dumbledore, he said exactly what he should have said, and now the two boys were back on track.

Rigel was speechless. He didn’t know Dumbledore’s full plan, but he knew the man had a way of guiding anyone to do things he wanted, it seemed forced, but at the same time, it seemed like it was the person’s own decision.

Dumbledore was able to do this because he had an accurate perception of people’s nature, the more Dumbledore knew about you, the easier it was for him to manipulate you, the kind of manipulation that left no openings for you.

If Dumbledore had been the Dark Lord instead of Grindelwald, Rigel was certain he would have fared much, much better, perhaps he would already be the leader of the entire wizarding world. Rigel couldn’t say whether the death of his sister, Ariana, had been a bad thing.

For Albus, it was a tragedy, but for the wizarding world, it was the change that led the would-be Dark Lord to the side of light, although perhaps precisely because of his lack of control, Dumbledore seems to have strong manipulative tendencies.

It’s hard to say, but since Harry got back on track, Rigel didn’t need to worry about it anymore, which was a good thing.