The Admiral of Hogwarts

After the Enterprise made its assessment, the ship girls immediately went down to the bottom of the muddy pit to search. Fortunately, it was winter, so the smell at the bottom of the muddy pit was still somewhat acceptable.

Only a few minutes later, the ship girls who had entered the bottom of the pit to search discovered some valuable clues in the mud. "I remember you guys should have mastered magic already, why don't you use magic to dig?"

Watching the ship girls jump directly into the pit and use their hands to dig out all kinds of items, Hugo asked Intrepid, who was holding a frozen lump of mud, with some puzzlement.

In fact, he had initially planned to go into the mud pit with the ship girls to dig for things, because he felt that his attitude of watching the ship girls work was not in line with the education he had received.

However, after discovering that he really couldn't dig through the ice that was as hard as a rock, he could only stand on the edge of the pit, feeling quite depressed, and watch the girls working enthusiastically below.

"As I said before, safety first." As the temporary commander of the ship girls, Enterprise answered Hugo's question. "If we use magic here, I'm worried that it might attract the attention of the Swedish and Norwegian Ministries of Magic."

"At least from the point that the Trace can sense magic nationwide, we have every reason to suspect that the Ministries of Magic of various countries have built a magical surveillance network in their countries that is not very sensitive but has a wide coverage."

"The Ministries of Magic of various countries may not pay much attention to casting spells in most areas, but it's hard to say for these key monitoring areas. Therefore, for safety reasons, I think our current pure physical means of excavation is more appropriate."

"And to be honest, the efficiency of our manual excavation is not much worse than using magic." After Enterprise finished speaking, Intrepid waved the lump of black ice in her hand and said. "And we have now discovered things far beyond our previous expectations."

Twenty minutes later, the ship girls finished searching the mud pit and collected various items that could fill a gasoline桶, and then they began to use small chisels, drills, or climbing tools to remove the dirty ice that wrapped the items.

Soon, a large pile of things was cleaned out. Some were obviously thrown in by ordinary people who didn't know magic, such as various daily items and weapons from the Middle Ages to the present, some of which should still have the value of certain cultural relics. However, about 1/5 of the things were identified because these things could clearly show traces left by the magical world.

"These things are the main suspects." Pointing to the pile of things that could be identified as belonging to the magical world, Intrepid said to Hugo. "According to my appraisal, these things should have been thrown into that pool 50 years ago. If there are no accidents, these things should have a direct connection with the incident that year."

"What do you see from here?" Hugo asked with some puzzlement. Because he saw that the things in front of him contained bones, metal fragments, broken gold jewelry, and even broken wooden sticks, looking like a pile of old garbage. Basically, he couldn't see where it was related to wizards and the magical world.

"Details, my Admiral, the key is details." Intrepid said, taking out a piece of half a cow's shoulder blade and pointing to the missing part. "If you look closely, you will find that the missing part of the cow's shoulder blade was bitten off directly."

"It's nothing for a cow to be bitten to death by a beast—wait, there shouldn't be any cows in this place." After being reminded by Intrepid, Hugo quickly saw the problem with the cow's shoulder blade.

"And the tooth marks on it are also wrong, they don't look like ordinary beasts." After taking the bone that had just been washed clean by the ship girl, Hugo quickly saw the problem.

"It looks a bit familiar—wait, this tooth mark seems to have been bitten out by a large human."

"Yes, in addition to this large tooth mark, other things found at the scene also point to this point." Intrepid said, pointing to the large pile of things that had just been discarded on the side like garbage.

"Everything is one size larger, and it looks like it was used by giants or trolls, such large humanoid creatures."

"That makes sense." Hugo snapped his fingers. "My grandfather's father said that he saw things like small mountains moving by this lake, and if it's these giant creatures, everything can be explained."

"Obviously, some well-equipped giant humanoid creatures appeared by this lake back then, and then probably died here." Looking at the large muddy pool in front of him, Hugo roughly guessed what might have happened here.

"And we think that the ones active here back then should be trolls rather than giants." Enterprise said, kicking the bones next to her with her foot. "

These bones have traces of being cut with sharp weapons or left by teeth, proving that these things should be the food of those giant creatures back then, but all the bones found at the scene are raw, without any traces of being cooked. This doesn't seem like something giants would do."

"Yes, you're right." Recalling some books about trolls and giants that he had seen before, Hugo immediately understood the reason why Enterprise made this judgment.

"Although giants are barbaric, they have become accustomed to using fire. At the same time, they basically eat cooked food when they eat, but trolls generally eat raw food like beasts. At least, these well-equipped giants must eat cooked food."

"But why would a group of fully armed trolls appear in this desolate place?" Looking at the pile of things on the ground, Hugo showed a thoughtful expression. "And why would they die here in a battle?"

After confirming the specific identities of the creatures who died here, just now Hugo they checked the information on all the valuable fragments on the spot.

From the fragments of weapons and equipment on the ground, the people present, through careful inspection, found that these broken metals were almost all fragments of various weapons and equipment made for these trolls, with various traces of damage on them.

"If you pay attention, you will find that the gaps in these fragments have different scars left on them, some of which have molten edges due to high-temperature flames, while others have been directly cut open by some extremely powerful force."

After carefully examining each item, Intrepid obtained more information from the fragments. "This is obviously caused by magic, otherwise, it is impossible to leave such traces on these items mixed with trace amounts of magical metal."

"You know, trolls have very poor ability to make weapons themselves, and leather aprons and big-headed sticks are already the limit. Therefore, these equipment on them must have been created by people similar to wizards or fairies, in the magical definition."

"So the group of fully armed trolls here back then should have been mercenaries of a large force. Considering that this set of equipment is not cheap and that these fragments we found come from at least eleven or twelve different sets of equipment, I think there are only a handful of forces that can do this in the last hundred years."

"Yes, there are not many people and forces who can spend a lot of money to arm trolls." Hugo nodded.