Harry Potter: Magic and Guns

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*****
Grindelwald’s actions carried a hint of punishment.

Ordinarily, Percy, in such a pitiful state, should have been sent to the school hospital for immediate treatment, rather than being put on display as a spectacle for everyone to gawk at.

This illustrates one of the differences between Grindelwald and Dumbledore. Dumbledore, in most cases, would bear all burdens himself. Even after his death, his plans would guide others step by step, ensuring his goals were met without fail.

Grindelwald, on the other hand, was a true leader. In addition to possessing strength and intellect comparable to Dumbledore’s, he excelled at utilizing every resource at his disposal. Unlike Dumbledore, who believed in the power of the individual, Grindelwald understood that one person’s strength is limited, no matter how formidable they are. He placed a greater emphasis on the collective.

He could have easily quashed today’s incident by leading the professors to handle the matter personally. But what would be the point of that?

Since the students had already witnessed and participated in this event, it was better to involve them directly rather than allow them to gossip in secret. At least this way, they could learn something useful and curb some of their dangerous curiosity.

These children, bursting with energy like baboons in mating season, had an uncanny ability to throw themselves into trouble. If they were simply suppressed, the threshold to the fourth floor would be trampled to pieces—a far worse outcome.

“Ravenclaw students, fourth year and above, step forward.”

After casting a Levitation Charm to suspend Percy midair, Grindelwald called out calmly.

“As members of the Tactical Intelligence Academy, I trust you have all studied your subjects diligently. Ravenclaw, famed for both wisdom and knowledge—I expect you not to disappoint me today.”

“Each year’s prefect will lead. Fourth-year students will watch and learn, while those in fifth year and above will begin constructing a tactical simulation, rebuilding the virtual battlefield.”

“This time, we will not use Legilimency for the reconstruction. That method is too limited and susceptible to deception. Instead, you will use deductive reasoning based on the available clues to reconstruct the events.”

Grindelwald glanced at the Ravenclaw students who had stepped forward. Seeing the confusion in their eyes, he sighed with a hint of exasperation.

“Hogwarts has fallen behind the times, hasn’t it?”

“I was once a man full of prejudice. I believed wizards were inherently superior, that Muggles were beneath us, and that they should be ruled by wizards.”

“It was Albus, your headmaster, who dissuaded me and stopped my madness.”

“And he wasn’t wrong. Time has proven this truth. Muggles are not what I once thought. They are, like us, humans—though lacking magic, they possess intellect equal to ours.”

“In fact, because of their vast numbers, there are far more true geniuses among Muggles than among wizards.”

“Before coming to Hogwarts, I thought Albus would have brought those brilliant ideas here. After all, his regard for Muggles is a thousand times better than mine ever was. He read their books and absorbed their knowledge.”

“But to my surprise, decades later, when I finally came to Hogwarts…”

Grindelwald shook his head. “This is no longer the ignorant era of centuries past. Yet Hogwarts, clinging to so-called traditions, will one day be crushed beneath the wheels of history.”

“Come to Durmstrang!”

Grindelwald offered a faint smile. “There, you will witness the magic of a new era, as well as the education that will shape it.”

His words caused several professors to twitch in irritation. His blatant recruitment was shockingly direct, but given that he was Gellert Grindelwald, none dared confront him.

Even combined, all of Hogwarts' professors probably wouldn’t be enough to take him on. In a world where individual power reigns supreme, one person overcoming an entire army is a conceivable miracle.

“Since you haven’t been taught this, I’ll lead the reconstruction. First, we need to set the stage for our criminal profiling.”

Grindelwald raised his Browning M1935. A jet-black phoenix shot from its barrel, transforming into smoke with a loud bang. The smoke coalesced into a half-transparent black room within the Great Hall. The room, shattered almost to ruins, was littered with debris, blood, and chunks of flesh.

More than half of the students gasped, covering their mouths or jumping three feet in the air in an attempt to flee from the grisly sight. The hourglasses hanging in the hall revealed that several students were crying, overwhelmed by the horrifying scene.

The points for all four houses had already plunged into the negatives, with Gryffindor faring the worst. Their points had been deducted so severely that they were now deep in debt.

“This is the room at the end of the fourth-floor corridor where the incident took place. If you still have the strength to hold your wands, begin constructing the magical projections of the involved parties and the three-headed dog.”

The Ravenclaw students, pale-faced, had heard Grindelwald’s instructions. They had studied this in their specialized courses, but their minds were now blank with fear. Only a handful managed to move, and their poorly coordinated magical projections were inaccurate and prone to interference.

“You are the worst batch of students I’ve ever encountered. If you were at Durmstrang—”

Grindelwald waved his hand dismissively, irritated. “Not one of you is competent.”

“We’ll reverse-engineer the scene from here. It’s clear that this room suffered a violent explosion. As Professor Snape has already informed you, the cause was a highly concentrated Type IV explosive potion, known as C4.”

“Now, who can tell me where the initial blast point was?”

Under Grindelwald’s cold gaze, the trembling students forced themselves to focus on the grisly scene. They pointed to a crater untouched by blood and gore—the explosion's origin.

“Based on the blast point, simulate the explosion and reconstruct the event. Surely, you can manage that, can’t you?”

A Ravenclaw prefect nodded slightly, taking a deep breath before leaning over to whisper with a few others nearby.

Soon after, about ten wizards raised their wands, their tips releasing white threads of light. After a brief calculation, they had constructed a model of the explosive fireball.

“Based on the depth of the blast point and the marks on the surrounding walls, we estimate that about ten grams of C4 were used in this explosion, equivalent to roughly 2.5 times the power of a Strong Explosion Charm. From the current evidence, we can deduce the following useful information.”

The Ravenclaw students, now regaining their composure after overcoming their fear, began to logically organize their thoughts.

“First, we can rule out that this particular C4 was a top-tier variant meant to increase explosive power. Instead, it was designed to amplify magical penetration, aimed at overcoming high-resistance targets—like the three-headed dog before us.”

“As a common treasure guardian for ancient Egyptian wizards, the three-headed dog possesses extremely high magical resistance. Ordinary spells would not be effective against it. The attacker must have been aware of its presence in advance and specifically brought this item to deal with it.”

“Secondly, based on the damage to the scene, we can deduce the three-headed dog’s position during the explosion. The dog, which should have been deeper inside the room, was near the entrance at the moment of the blast. The damage to the wall near the door was caused by the dog's body slamming into it, rather than by the explosion alone.”

“From this, we can reconstruct the scene—”

As the Ravenclaw students worked together to adjust and refine their simulation, a projection of Fluffy, the three-headed dog, appeared inside the room. The dog, initially standing at the far end, was depicted rushing forward, then slamming its side into the wall. It broke through the thick wall using its body, not its head. This odd behavior was based on the physical evidence at the scene, though it defied conventional logic, representing a faithful reconstruction of the event.

The explosion occurred just after Fluffy's side hit the wall, pushing it out of the room and leaving a trail of flesh and organs strewn across the floor—a gruesome carpet leading away from the room. Fluffy’s path was now clear, as the dog had fled to the Great Hall.

“As for Percy…”

The Ravenclaw leader shook his head slightly. “We can’t currently reconstruct Percy’s position during the incident. The explosion destroyed too much evidence. Apologies, Professor Grindelwald, we’ve let you down.”

“Good enough for now,” Grindelwald nodded slightly. “It seems there are a few in Ravenclaw who can think.”

“You focused on the most observable clue, the three-headed dog, which is fine, but you were too fixated on the physical evidence. What we should focus on are the clues provided by the individuals involved.”

“In this case, the clues Percy Weasley gives us.”

“First, we need to analyze his injuries. This is why I didn’t allow the professors to fully heal him.”

“Currently, Percy’s injuries fall into two distinct categories. The first category is the crushing damage caused by the C4 explosion. His lower body injuries stem directly from the blast, and we can clearly see that the explosion point was lower than his feet.”

Grindelwald gestured toward the limp figure of Percy, whose legs were completely gone. His left leg was severed at the ankle, while his right leg had lost nearly half of the calf. As the injuries rose higher, the severity of the blast damage diminished, with the defining line at his waist. There, a clear set of bite marks was visible, almost cutting him in half.

The difference between his upper and lower body was stark. Compared to his tattered lower half, his upper body—above the bite marks—was almost untouched, with even his clothing mostly intact.

“At the moment of the explosion, the three-headed dog bit down on his upper body. These bite marks are intermittent, which means the dog bit him twice, in the same spot but with varying force. The first bite only fractured a few ribs, while the second bite nearly tore him in half.”

“From the bite marks and the dog's injuries, we can deduce that the middle head grabbed Percy. When the explosion occurred, the dog tried to pull him away from the blast, but the shockwave and impact caused the teeth to clamp down again, resulting in the second injury.”

“The three-headed dog’s unusual sideways posture was because it knew that if its hind legs were blown off, it wouldn’t be able to escape. It had no choice but to expose its softer side. This posture also helped protect the middle head from the full impact of the explosion.”

“Now that we have enough clues, let’s reconstruct the entire scene.”

The blood-soaked ruins instantly transformed into a fully intact room. Fluffy, the three-headed dog, lay napping in the center. As Percy pushed open the door, Fluffy opened its eyes and gave a low, warning growl.

But the intruder paid no attention and walked forward, pulling out a bottle containing a high-energy explosive potion. He stepped into Fluffy’s attack range, which was also the explosion’s epicenter, and let the bottle fall.

At that moment, Fluffy lunged forward, biting down on Percy’s upper body and slamming into the wall. The explosion tore apart Percy’s exposed lower body and shattered the left side of Fluffy’s abdomen. With Percy’s ragdoll-like body in its jaws, the wounded dog struggled to stand and then bolted out of the simulation zone in an instant.

“But why... why did Fluffy react so quickly?”

“It’s almost like someone told it what was about to happen.”

A student immediately sensed something off and questioned Grindelwald. The reconstruction seemed logical, but some aspects were puzzling.

“That’s something you’ll have to ask Professor Snape. What’s the formula for a high-energy explosive potion?”

“Is it volcanic crystal?”

A seventh-year Ravenclaw student raised his hand—one of Snape’s elite class members.

“Yes, but it has another name.” Grindelwald nodded, at least satisfied with their foundational knowledge.

“Abyssal sulfur crystal,” the same student added. “No wonder Fluffy reacted so strongly. It’s their least favorite smell. Unlike its underworld counterparts, surface-dwelling three-headed dogs aren’t tied to the name of hell. They’re sworn enemies.”

“Exactly. That’s why Fluffy sensed the danger instantly. Animals, compared to humans, have a kind of premonition, a heightened awareness of certain threats.”

“Even though this three-headed dog has never encountered its nemesis, the Hellhound, its bloodline remembers.”

“But why?” Another student raised their hand. “Why would Percy carry something so dangerous? It’s basically a suicidal act.”

“Because someone needed him to.”

Grindelwald narrowed his eyes slightly, his tone calm but piercing.

“And as for who that person is...” He gave a cold, cruel smile and looked around at the students. “That’s your assignment.”

“Investigate. Since someone has already challenged Hogwarts, let’s see who hides deeper: them, or us.”

“Albus won’t allow you to take on such dangerous tasks, but I will. The shame of being trampled on can only be erased by your own actions.”

With those final words, Grindelwald turned and left, strolling away at his own pace.

(End of chapter)