Volume 6: Summer at Spider's End Alley Chapter 430 The Dursleys
Jon stared at the Daily Prophet and said thoughtfully.
"Did Snape leave this for us to see?"
Lily had put the newspaper away and continued searching the room.
"Whether he did it on purpose or not, it doesn't matter."
Jon nodded. These things in the newspaper were indeed not a big problem. They were just some clumsy political tactics used by Voldemort to appease the British wizarding community after his defeat in the Triwizard Tournament.
Compared with the previous him, this one is not even a little bit worse.
However, Voldemort's prestige is still there, so even if he does nothing, Britain will not be in chaos, unless he himself is unwilling to be lonely and insists on carrying out some bloodbath.
They checked every room in Snape's house quickly enough, but found nothing strange anywhere.
Just as Lily began to use Apparition to scan various places in the room starting from the bedroom, a series of sonic booms suddenly sounded in the living room!
Jon and Lily reacted quickly. The invisibility cloak was in Jon's hand. Without hesitation, they put the cloak on themselves and hid in a secluded corner together.
Just as their figures were hidden, a series of footsteps came from the living room.
He was a wizard with a face as long as a horse. He pushed open the door which was already half-open and glanced at the empty bedroom. After finding nothing, he turned around and complained to someone .
"So what exactly are we here for? Didn't the Aurors come here to search three days ago? There's nothing here except some useless potions. Why are they asking us to come here specially now? What are they doing?"
A cold female voice responded to him.
"Now that we are here, you are asking me. You and I received the mission from Batty together. Why didn't you ask clearly in front of him?"
The long-faced wizard turned and returned to the living room.
"You know that Crouch has been acting strange since the game. He has never shown a good face to anyone. He doesn't even pretend. Who dares to ask more questions?"
"Since you don't have the guts, then stop talking and start looking now. Once we have searched the entire house, we can go back and report."
John and Lily looked at each other under the invisibility cloak . Among these people in the British wizarding world, Aurors are basically all mixed-bloods, and no one dares to call little Barty by his name directly. The two people who came to Snape's house were obviously "thugs" with a higher status than the Aurors, which means they can only be Death Eaters!
Lily quickly turned her attention back to the living room. Their location was very clever, as they could just see the fireplace through the open bedroom door.
The two of them complained while searching the room that had already been thoroughly searched by Jon and Lily but found nothing. Finally, a witch in a black leather jacket suddenly stared at the fireplace that was still full of ashes!
"Come here! Selwyn, look at this!"
The long-faced wizard named Selwyn soon came to the witch's side, and they saw the ashes in the fireplace together.
This is the easiest problem to find. When Jon and the others came here, the ashes were not yet completely cold, and now they still retain residual heat, which is obviously left over from recent times.
And for those logs in the fireplace that were half-burned and then extinguished, it was easy to tell how long it took them to cool down.
“Someone was here today!”
The expression on Selwyn's face became solemn. He looked around with caution and suspicion, then raised the wand that he had been holding in his hand in front of him.
John also held his wand under the invisibility cloak. Just when he was about to take action and wanted to deal with the two Death Eaters before they reported the abnormalities here, Lily suddenly grabbed his arm holding the wand.
Jon looked up and Lily shook her head at him, obviously signaling him not to act rashly.
Soon the two Death Eaters checked the entire house again. They did not find Lily and John, but they did not let their guard down.
"Go back first and bring the people from the Transportation Department over here. Have them check if there are any signs of Floo powder being used in this fireplace recently. If there are any, where is it?"
After hearing this, Lily withdrew her hand that was holding John, and then stretched out her own hand, the hand holding the wand.
Just as the wizard named Selwyn was about to use Apparition to leave the room, a fallen chair under his feet suddenly turned into a rope as thick as a baby's fist and tied his feet!
Because it was not a lethal spell, the Armor Curse on Selwyn showed no signs of being triggered, and he was directly tied up and fell to the ground!
The witch in the leather jacket also reacted quickly, but Lily's silent casting made it impossible for her to identify the direction of the enemy.
It was not until a spell was uttered that she was able to instantly lock onto the target, but when she looked over, only green filled her vision!
"Avada Kedavra."
After being hit by the killing curse, the witch no longer had any chance of survival. With a terrified expression on her face, she fell straight to the ground.
Selwyn, who had been tied up with the ropes of Transfiguration, raised his upper body from the ground with a ferocious expression and pointed the wand in the direction where Jon and Lily had already lifted their invisibility cloaks.
"Avada Kedavra!"
The green light flashed in the room again, but unlike the leather jacket witch before, Jon had already made anticipated preparations for such a counterattack. While he tore off his invisibility cloak, he also raised a broken wooden board like a table top in front of him. Selwyn's killing curse hit the board, leaving only a charred hole, and there was no way to cause more damage.
After blocking the killing curse, Jon immediately dropped the wooden board in his hand, and rushed to Selwyn in one step. He stretched out his left hand with the ring on it, and the universal antidote that had been activated instantly wiped out the Armor Curse that had been on his body. At the same time, the tip of the wand in his right hand began to shine with red light!
The next moment, the petrification spell hit Selwyn, who was struggling desperately and trying to wave his wand to fight back at Jon. His body immediately became stiff, with only his vicious eyes staring at Jon.
Lily also came over at this time. She pointed her wand at Selwyn's head, and soon silver memories were forcibly pulled out of the Death Eater's mind!
Selwyn obviously began to resist violently, but not everyone can master the magic of Occlumency, especially under Voldemort. One must either learn it to the level of weaving false memories like Jon and Slughorn, so that people cannot find out that the person whose memory is being spied on has learned Occlumency, or not learn it at all.
Otherwise, if one day their master suddenly wants to check their memories but is blocked by Occlumency, he will become wary of their intention to learn this magic.
Wisps of memory were drawn out, and at the same time Lily glanced at the body of the leather jacket witch and spoke calmly to Jon.
"You should use the Death Curse sparingly, and only use it as a necessary measure. Even if you can control the anger in your heart, this level of black magic will still affect you subtly, and it will be difficult for you as the person involved to detect it. "
She had already extracted all the memories she needed, and while speaking, she also tapped a piece of teacup fragment beside her with the wand in her hand.
"If you want to kill someone, there are many ways to do it There is no need to use magic with side effects."
The next second after she finished speaking, the teacup fragment turned into a short blade under the effect of transformation!
Selwyn's bloodshot eyes were filled with fear, and then the short blade fell from mid-air and pierced straight into his chest!
Blood spurted out!
Jon couldn't help but twitch his eyes. He was not sure whether the killing curse had a subtle influence on his consciousness, but seeing the bloody scene before him, it would be difficult for ordinary people not to be affected.
After dealing with the two Death Eaters, Lily didn't want to stay here any longer. She took John and left Snape's house.
Only after they had completely walked out of Spider's Tail Alley did Jon ask in confusion.
"Why don't we just capture them? If the British Ministry of Magic reacts quickly, they will be aware of their deaths in two hours at most. By then, we can send people to investigate and track down the source of the Floo powder. Then we can find Knockturn Alley based on this, and maybe we can get information that Snape has fled back to England."
"It's impossible for Death Eaters to have their memories altered so easily without being discovered." Lily explained to Jon softly, "They have special screening within them, just like the Order of the Phoenix. Every time someone returns from a mission, their memory integrity is checked, and they are also tested under the Imperius Curse. This test may not be 100% accurate, but if a problem is found, it will not go wrong. So it's useless for us to catch them. When they came to Snape's house, it was destined that the British Ministry of Magic would discover Snape's whereabouts."
Jon stroked his chin and nodded.
"Doesn't this mean that if they continue to follow the clues to Knockturn Alley, as long as they find that the potion shop owner has a problem with his memory, we will be discovered as well?"
Lily said calmly.
"So since we're going to be discovered sooner or later, why not just kill these two people right here? At least we've saved two lives."
Jon nodded in agreement. Lily was more decisive and ruthless than he had imagined.
Instead of Apparating away from the city, they followed the dirty, smelly river and analyzed the situation.
"These two Death Eaters suddenly came to search at this time. Could this coincidence be related to Snape? Did he deliberately leak some information to the British Ministry of Magic, and then let them block us here?"
Lily shook her head.
"From the conversation between the two Death Eaters, we can tell that the person who gave them the order was Barty Crouch. If it was really Snape who leaked the information to the Ministry of Magic, he would not have looked for this person. The second location information he told us said that Voldemort would sooner or later discover his importance. The purpose of the two Death Eaters coming here just now is not without coincidence."
Jon turned and glanced at Lily.
"So what do we do now? Professor, do you have any clues about Snape?"
Lily didn't say anything at first. She just looked quietly at the gray building, not knowing what she was thinking.
It was not until a long time later that she spoke again.
"Now that we're back in England, Jon, would you be willing to do me a favor?"
…
"Dudley! Come on, your mom has made some delicious sausages and steak!"
Vernon, whose neck was about to submerge his chin, shouted loudly towards the stairs.
Soon, a series of loud "bang bang" sounds came from the second floor, as if something heavy was rolling on the wooden floor.
A boy who looked very similar to Vernon and was equally fat stared at the dining table with his small eyes wide open as he walked downstairs.
"I told you, I need physical strength!" He shouted in dissatisfaction, "Roasted pork elbow! I told my mother that I must eat it so that I can defeat my opponent in the most heroic posture in the boxing match! Instead of these usual steaks and sausages!"
In stark contrast to the father and son, the skinny Penny brought the salad from the kitchen to the dining table and comforted her son.
"Don't worry, honey. I've prepared everything. We can have delicious roasted pork elbows tonight. Let's fill our stomachs with these for lunch."
Dudley sat down at the dining table reluctantly. He looked in a bad mood. He held the fork in his hand and poked the steak with disgust.
Just then, the Dursleys' doorbell suddenly rang.
"Open the door! Darlings, I still have work to do!"
Vernon looked up at his son and happened to meet those little eyes. He could only put down the knife and fork in his hand, stand up and walk towards the door, muttering.
"Okay, okay, let me see who is here to interrupt this wonderful lunch time."
Dudley watched Vernon's movements as he forked over the untouched sausage from his father's plate and bit off half of it in one bite, all the while looking towards the door.
Vernon opened the door. He didn't see anyone at first. After he looked down, he saw a boy with a smile on his face and bright blond hair waving at him.
"Hello, sir, is this the Dursleys' house?"
