Hogwarts: Don't call me the Staff Maker

Chapter 42 Christmas

Harry always felt that he knew enough about magic and wizards.

From the owl that could deliver messages, to Hagrid appearing at the seaside cottage, to Diagon Alley, Platform 9¾, Hogwarts... Harry became increasingly calm, believing that he was gradually becoming familiar with everything in the wizarding world.

But now he suddenly felt that he knew nothing about magic, and didn't even recognize a wand.

"That's clearly a baseball bat, isn't it?" Harry looked at Ron blankly after Hillen left the common room.

In a daze, he recalled what Celen had told him yesterday afternoon... "There's still a two and a half foot wand that's not finished, but it's available for pre-order."

So this is it?

Harry felt that Sherren wouldn't joke about something like this, and he tried to connect the words "foot" and "wand," but he couldn't.

"I bet Celen was just joking with us," Ron said.

Unlike Harry, he knew more about magic, and many of his understandings had already become established common sense.

In his view, wands should look exactly like the ones they use now, with the only difference being their length. Because everyone around him does it this way, without exception.

So Ron never believed from the beginning that the two-foot-long baseball bat was some kind of magic wand, and just thought that Celen was playing a trick on them.

"Want to play Wizard's Chess?" Ron asked after finishing the last bite of his roasted mushroom.

"Ah, okay," Harry said, feeling his head was spinning and needing to do something else to distract himself.

"But Ron, I've never played Wizard's Chess before."

"It's okay, I can teach you, it's very simple." Ron took out a tattered old chessboard and demonstrated to Harry how to make the pieces move.

It's like Muggle chess, but the pieces are alive and have their own ideas, which is very interesting. It gives you the feeling of commanding an army in battle.

Harry quickly became addicted to the game, but he wasn't good at it and always lost to Ron. Eventually, even the Queen on his side couldn't stand it anymore and swung her cane, giving Harry a hard whack on the finger.

"Ouch..."

Harry's fingers immediately turned bright red, and he cried out in pain, but the Queen was still cursing him incessantly.

"Foolish, idiot, empty-headed mountain troll!"

This is probably the downside of Wizard Chess; the pieces are just too temperamental.

Meanwhile, Siren had already arrived at Hagrid's cabin.

He knocked on the door, but didn't hear Hagrid's familiar loud voice.

"Is nobody home?" After waiting a while longer, there was still no movement from the cabin, so he realized that Hagrid was indeed not home.

They probably went to Hogsmeade for drinks.

Hagrid did have a habit of going to Hogsmeade for a drink on weekdays, as did many of the professors. Today was the first day of school holiday, and it was snowing, making it a rare and auspicious day, so Hagrid naturally wouldn't miss it.

Xilun will have made a wasted trip, braving the snow to come here and then braving the snow to walk back to the castle.

He had originally planned to finish making the wand today, but now he'll have to wait until tomorrow.

Siren did not choose to use the unlocking charm to get in directly, even though it was a trivial matter that he could easily solve with a wave of his hand, and even if Hagrid knew, he wouldn't mind, but he still did not do so.

The Christmas holidays have just begun, so he's not in a hurry.

It was afternoon by then.

"Of course I'm anxious!" Harry paced back and forth in his dormitory in Siren, glancing out the window every few seconds.

"Tomorrow is Christmas, and I haven't prepared anything. If Hedwig doesn't come back, I'll just have to give Ron a bag of Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Beans."

"That's good too," Celen said. "But where did you get your Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Beans? Did you have an upperclassman bring them from Hogsmeade?"

"No, I bought it on the train," Harry said.

"A train?" Siren asked in surprise, "The Hogwarts Express?"

"Yes." Harry nodded.

"You still haven't finished the candy you bought for the start of the school year?"

"Because I don't like shoe polish-flavored candy, I haven't eaten it since."

"You're really good to Ron," Siron clicked his tongue.

"Of course... oh, no." Harry nodded instinctively, then quickly corrected himself, "I didn't intend to give him Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Beans as a Christmas present, I wanted to give him a wand!"

"I know, you don't need to explain to me." Celen waved his hand. "But there's nothing I can do if Hedwig can't come back. You know, the wand shop doesn't do much business except for the few days when school starts."

"You can't expect my grandfather to just sit there all day, sitting in an empty shop doing absolutely nothing, can you?"

"No, that's not what I meant at all." Harry quickly shook his head. "I'm just a little anxious. Ron really wants a wand of his own."

"Don't worry," Celen said. "Tomorrow is Christmas, there's still time. You should trust Hedwig."

It seems we can only trust Hedwig now.

Harry waited until very late, tossing and turning in bed unable to sleep. All he wanted now was for Hedwig to come back before tomorrow morning, to give Ron a surprise, and then they could have a big meal and a good time.

Harry waited until dawn, but Hedwig still hadn't returned. He was too tired, his consciousness began to fade, and he drifted off to sleep.

The next day, Christmas arrived as scheduled.

Xilun didn't get up too early, and didn't get out of bed until nine o'clock to start unpacking a pile of packages placed at the foot of the bed.

There were quite a few gifts. Xilun roughly counted them; there were more than a dozen in total, double the number from last year.

He first focused his attention on the largest paper package.

The thick kraft paper, the rough packaging, and the flamboyant handwriting—Xilun didn't even need to look at the name; he knew it was a gift from Hagrid.

There were many things inside, but the most eye-catching was a small clump of long, silver unicorn tail hair, each hair over fifteen inches long, belonging to the highest grade of unicorn tail hair.

Xiren estimated that even his grandfather, Garrick Ollivander, probably had never seen so many high-end items at once.

I wonder how long Hagrid searched in the Forbidden Forest before he finally collected this one.

In addition, there were two dark legs stuffed inside the brown paper package.

Hagrid had given this thing to Siron before; it was the leg of an eight-eyed giant spider, but this one was clearly longer than the previous one, at least ten feet long when fully extended.

No wonder the packaging is so big... it wouldn't fit if it were smaller.

However, with one leg already ten feet long, it's hard to imagine how big this thing must have been when it was alive.

As Xiren continued rummaging through the things underneath, he suddenly heard Ron's incoherent screams coming from not far away next door.

"Oh my god! A wand! Harry, you actually gave me a new wand... I'm so happy... Is it really for me... This is the best Christmas present I've ever received!"