The Mightiest Badger at Hogwarts

A large group of Wizengamot members wearing purple robes like Old Barty had already gathered in the Tenth Courtroom.

However, after Link and Old Barty pushed open the door and walked in, the congressmen who were still talking and laughing suddenly became quiet and stared at the two.

In the deepest part of the courtroom, surrounded by a group of congressmen, Fudge's eyes looked particularly fiery.

And he obviously knew who was really in charge between Link and Old Barty, so unlike others, his eyes were on Link from beginning to end.

"Ah, my dear little Link!"

Fudge was the first to speak. As he spoke, he came over and hugged Link, "It's a pity that your good friend Harry Potter has committed such a heinous crime. You must be very anxious, right?"

"Actually, no." Link patted his clothes in disgust and said, "Harry is completely innocent. Those so-called accusations are just meaningless accusations by some incompetent and shameless people."

As soon as these words came out, Fudge was obviously stunned.

After reacting, he forced out a smile, came closer and lowered his voice and said:

"You don't think you can win, do you? It's just you and my defeated general? This is my territory! You guys only deserve to be pushed into the mud!"

"Nice short sentence,"

This time it was Old Barty who spoke. He imitated Fudge's tone just now and said, "'This is my territory!' Maybe I should tell the reporter of the Daily Prophet this famous quote you said, Mr. Minister, later." Listen, so that the people can understand how their elected ministers treat the Ministry of Magic, an institution that originally belongs to the people, as their own private property."

"Ah!"

Hearing this, Fudge snorted coldly and turned around and returned to the trial seat.

What he meant was obvious.

He was only willing to negotiate with Link on an equal footing. As for Old Barty, the agent of the Foley family, he was not even qualified to ask him to reply.

The atmosphere in the courtroom became more solemn and serious.

After a while, whispers reappeared in the courtroom, and a group of congressmen broke away from the crowd and faced Link and Old Barty.

They all had flattering smiles on their faces, and they eagerly came over to try to get closer to Link and Old Barty.

Surrounded by them, Link and Old Barty were welcomed into the upper left corner of the courtroom.

If you look down from the ceiling of the courtroom at this time, you will find that the Wizengamot MPs invited to participate in the trial have actually been automatically divided into three factions.

Among them, the group of people gathered around Link and Old Barty is naturally the Old Barty faction.

Opposite of them is the group of Fudge faction with grandma and Fudge on the other side.

As for the group of congressmen in the center who were chatting and laughing as if they were attending a senior citizen event, they were absolutely neutral.

It is worth mentioning that the group of people gathered around Fudge are generally older.

Most of these people are today's vested interest groups. They have been fattened by Fudge, the Minister of Magic, for many years. They belong to the old-school official class within the Ministry of Magic.

In contrast, the councilors around Link and Old Barty are relatively young.

Of course, there are only a limited number of young people. Those who can become members of the Wizengamot are at least 50 or [-] years old.

Most of them have sufficient abilities, but lack strong backgrounds. Within the Ministry of Magic, their status is that of 'young comrades who still need to be trained'. They are suppressed by the old-school officials and old men, and there is little hope.

These people are obviously the main targets that Old Batty had previously attracted with the support of the Foley family.

Now that they met Link, the real sponsor, each of them behaved extremely flatteringly, some even to the point of being disgusting, in order to get more benefits and support from Link.

But even though they acted so disgusting, Link didn't mean to despise them at all.

Even in Link's view, each of them is a hero with ability and courage!

You must know that in the current situation, joining Link and Old Barty's camp requires taking risks.

This is a real gamble!

Won.

Naturally, he will follow old Barty and the Foley family to ascend to heaven.

But if you lose.

Then their careers and even physical lives will be completely over.

In addition, their extremely flattering behavior towards Link at this moment also proves that they are actually extremely ferocious wolves.

Although they are now nominally supporters of Old Barty, they are actually showing their obedience and ability to Link every moment.

If there is a suitable opportunity, they will definitely come forward without hesitation and replace old Batty as the new agent of the Foley family.

Link and Barty knew all of this and were happy to see it happen.

Among them, Link wants to rely on these 'hungry wolves' to warn and restrict Old Barty.

Old Barty simply relied on them to reassure Link.

As for being replaced by those 'hungry wolves', old Batty is not worried.

His decades of experience and experience in officialdom are far beyond what those guys can easily defeat.

"It's almost time."

After chatting with the 'young' councilors for a while, Old Barty whispered in Link's ear, and at the same time opened a silver pocket watch with scratches on the case and raised it to Link.

The hands above showed that it was only five minutes before the eight o'clock hour for the court session.

As soon as this was said, the councilors who had gathered around Link and Old Barty all fell silent.

Link naturally knew what they were worried about, and said expressionlessly:

"Just put your mind back and nothing will go wrong."

Old Batty nodded, but did not close the pocket watch. Instead, he held it in his hand and glanced at it every once in a while.

Other congressmen are in a similar situation.

But as time passed, the hands of the pocket watch slowly reached eight o'clock, but Harry Potter, the person on trial in today's trial, still did not appear.

Many of the old men and women in the neutral faction have become dissatisfied.

Unlike the others, they simply came to participate in a trial. Instead of arriving early, Harry Potter's behavior of arriving late was clearly a sign of contempt for the Wizengamot Council.

Fudge and even the group of supporters around him raised the corners of their mouths slightly.

Fudge himself stared at Link and Old Barty with pride.

Although his method of temporarily advancing the trial time was crude, it was very effective.

Although according to regulations, Harry must be late for more than 15 minutes before he can announce that Harry has given up his defense, but as things have developed now, even if Harry arrives within 15 minutes, he can no longer restore the favor of the neutral faction members.

And these congressmen will have the right to vote at the end of the subsequent trial!

"Huh!~"

Sighing softly, Old Barty closed his pocket watch.

Most of the councilors around him had very indifferent expressions, far less solicitous than they had been to Link just now.

This is normal.

These congressmen were optimistic about old Batty and Link, so they were willing to come over to help stand in line and even vote.

But as a result, Harry was late before the real trial even started?

The occurrence of such outrageous things made them also doubt the abilities of Link and Old Barty.

Link paid no attention to the changes in these people and kept his eyes fixed on the door of the courtroom. He had never expected the character of these politicians. These people were all guys who gave out umbrellas in sunny days and took them away in rainy days. The best of human society - the dregs.

"Bam—"

There was a loud noise and the door opened.

Panting and sweating profusely, Harry stumbled into the courtroom.

His appearance caused the whispers that originally lingered in the courtroom to disappear again, and everyone's eyes focused on him.

This condescending and intensive gaze obviously put huge pressure on Harry. He had just come in and before he could even take a few breaths, his whole body became stiff and his breathing slowed down a lot.

Fudge looked very disappointed. He shook his head inconspicuously, and then said angrily:

"you are late."

"I'm sorry," Harry said nervously, "I, I didn't know the time had changed."

"That's not the Wizengamot's fault. We sent an owl to inform you this morning."

Fudge said confidently, but obviously he also knew that he could not continue to dwell on this issue in case the centrist legislators knew his dirty tricks, so he quickly said, "Okay, sit down quickly."

Fudge pointed to the trial chair in the center of the courtroom.

Harry was a little afraid of that chair, which was directly related to the thick chains hanging from the handles of the chair.

Harry sat up shakily.

Fortunately, although those magic chains twisted a few times, they did not directly tie Harry up like a felon.

However, this happy mood only existed for Harry for a moment, and was immediately destroyed by the gazes of dozens of Wizengamot members.

Harry could clearly see the expressions of every member of Congress on the steps in front of him. Some of their eyes were sparkling with curiosity, while others had angry looks on their faces, but most of them were indifferent and serious.

It is this group of people who will later decide his future fate.

This intense tension made Harry feel dizzy and nauseous.

At this moment, Harry accidentally spotted a familiar face.

It's Link!

Link actually sneaked into the group of senators and was still blinking at him!

Harry was so excited that he almost screamed.

Nothing could be more inspiring than meeting Link on such an occasion!

"Very well, the defendant is finally here, let's get started." Fudge shouted towards Harry on the chair, "Are you ready?"

"Yes, sir."

A familiar voice sounded, and Harry was surprised to find that the person who answered was actually one of Ron's brothers, Percy Weasley.

Right now, he was sitting on a seat in the front row, holding a quill and looking at the parchment in front of him intently. No matter how Harry winked, he had no expression on his face, as if he didn't know Harry at all.

"The trial on August 4th," Fudge announced loudly, and Percy hurriedly started taking notes, "the trial will be held on Harry Potter, who lives at [-] Privet Drive, Little Whinging, Surrey, for violating the "Confinement of Underage Wizards" The Reasonable Restraint Act and the International Statute of Magical Secrecy.”

"Interrogators: Minister of Magic Cornelius Fudge, Director of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement Amelia Bones, Senior Undersecretary Dolores Umbridge. Trial Recorder: Percy Weiss Lai——"

"The defense witness," Fudge's voice suddenly paused, "Albus Dumbledore."

As soon as he finished speaking, the door to the trial room opened again, and Dumbledore, wearing a blue and black robe, walked in slowly.

Harry seemed to realize something and suddenly turned his head to look at Dumbledore. Almost all the MPs present were doing the same thing.

Under the gaze of everyone, Dumbledore walked to Harry's side, raised his head and looked at the towering Fudge.

Due to the light from the torch, Fudge couldn't actually see Dumbledore's eyes clearly through the reflective half-moon lenses.

But Fudge, who was being watched by Dumbledore, still felt heart palpitations for no reason.

The reaction of the MPs on the terrace seats was also quite violent.

There’s no end to how depressed the Fudge faction members are.

As for the council members on Link's side, they all smiled happily and did not hide their happy emotions.

They were still wondering why Link dared to reassure them.

The sentiment is that Link already knew that Dumbledore would personally go out and defend Harry Potter.

What kind of lawsuit is this? Just let Harry Potter win!

You must know that although Dumbledore doesn't take care of things very much, his prestige in the Wizengamot Council is epic.

Didn't you see that there were even two old witches in the neutral faction waving to welcome Dumbledore?

"Ah, Dumbledore." Fudge said in a panic, "Yes, uh, so you received our letter and knew that the time and location of the interrogation had been changed?"

"Actually, I didn't receive it," Dumbledore said calmly. "I made a lucky mistake and came to the Ministry of Magic three hours early, so it didn't cause any hindrance."

As Dumbledore spoke, he glanced back and forth in the courtroom, seemingly looking for something.

After discovering that there were no extra chairs on the field, he waved his wand and conjured a floral sofa chair next to Harry, and sat on it.

Of course, he also spotted Link while looking around the courtroom.

However, their eyes only touched each other for a moment and then quickly separated.

Dumbledore acted just like Percy had just faced Harry's gaze.

"Okay, okay then..."

Fudge, who had seen all this, rummaged through the documents on the desktop and made meaningless sounds.

Finally, he pulled out a piece of parchment from the pile of documents, which was actually not many, and read loudly:

“The defendant is now charged with the following crimes:

The defendant had previously received a written warning from the Ministry of Magic for similar accusations. This time, he committed the crime intentionally and knowingly, fully knowing that his behavior was illegal. At 23:13 pm on August [-], in a Muggle community , cast a Patronus Charm in the presence of a Muggle, which violated Section [-] of the Reasonable Restraint of Minors Act of [-], and No. [-] of the International Confederation of Wizards' Statute of Secrecy. strip. "