Hogwarts, i am Dementor

Chapter 470 469: Beyond the Veil

They followed the corridor to a door at the end. When Harry opened the black door, the scene he'd envisioned from his dream wasn't there.

There were no rows of shelves filled with crystal balls, just a large, circular room with twelve nearly identical black doors.

The moment they entered, the door behind them suddenly shut. Then, with a rumbling sound, the circular wall began to spin—bluring the doors into a solid wall.

Once they were thoroughly disoriented, the doors stopped spinning, and they could no longer tell which one was the entrance.

"I'd guess this is so we don't just walk out..." Hermione said. "This place thinks we're intruders..."

"Don't worry, I've already written a letter to Edward," Cohan said. "And if you want to get out, just go through this one."

With that, Cohan pointed to the door behind them.

He knew because the Chimera hadn't come in; it was still on the other side of the door, and Cohan could see its three souls through the wood.

"Maybe we should try them one by one," Harry said. "Sirius has to be behind one of these doors—but not the exit."

"If we go into one, we should probably make a mark first," Hermione said cautiously. "It's likely to start spinning again when we get back here."

They chose a door and used a spell to carve a glowing "X" on it.

Then, Harry, impatient, pulled them all inside.

The first room was dimly lit. A few lamps hung from the ceiling by golden chains, but they weren't very bright, making the room even darker than the outside.

Besides the hanging lamps, there were other "glowing things."

Many luminous brains floated in fish tanks on a long table, their eerie glow illuminating the deep green liquid within.

"Ah, my favorite brains," Cohan said. "Now I know where the person who sent me a little brain for a pet stole them from."

"Let's get out of here..." Harry said, feeling uneasy. "Let's try another room."

Cohan was tempted to take them all, but Hermione thought it was too dangerous, both for Cohan and for the wizarding world.

"Everyone will love brains one day," Cohan said, shaking his head.

After leaving the brain room, the circular chamber started spinning again. They chose another door.

This door, however, was tightly locked, and even the Alohomora spell couldn't open it.

"Is this it?" Ron asked nervously.

"No," Cohan said, frowning. "This is the room where the Department of Mysteries studies 'Love.'"

"You know that?" Hermione asked, surprised.

"Because there's a person behind the door," Cohan said. "A living person, not Sirius, and not Voldemort."

[Soul Strength: 50]

It had the shape of a person. Someone was locked in there.

"Let's go," Cohan said. "We have a job to do. I'll ask about this room later..."

The person inside couldn't be a normal wizard, but why would they be locked in the Department of Mysteries?

After they left, the room began to spin, and the order of the doors was shuffled again. Luckily, they had marked them, so it didn't matter too much.

Harry pushed open another door, and Hermione quickly marked it with an "X" as well.

This room was very different from the one with the brains.

It was much larger and more crowded—because it was filled with stepped stone benches.

It was rectangular, with a sunken middle, like a giant stone pit.

In the center of the pit was an archway that looked out of place, with a tattered black veil hanging over it.

There were no candles here; their only light came from their own wands.

Cohan was a little surprised he didn't see the scene he'd foreseen in his prophecy. If it didn't appear now, that meant it was about to.

"Who's there?" Harry suddenly looked at the archway.

"Harry, what did you hear?" Hermione grabbed Harry's arm, as he seemed to want to walk toward the strange archway.

"Someone's voice, behind the veil," Harry said.

"That's incorrect," Cohan said, looking at the archway with great interest. "Those voices aren't people. They're what's left of people's resentment and anger after they died, along with a huge crowd of ghosts. I have a feeling there's another world behind this door."

A doorway to another dimension. You walk through it and you're reborn in a new world. That's how Cohan got here.

"We need to leave," Hermione said, pulling Harry back. "Harry, don't go near there—"

"But what is that, anyway?" Harry asked, confused. "I really heard a person's voice. Sirius?"

Harry took a step closer.

"Harry, there's nothing behind the veil," Hermione said, her voice trembling. "Let's just go."

"That archway is an execution stand," Cohan said. "You walk through it, and you die."

This room was an execution chamber.

After hearing Cohan's blunt explanation, Harry shivered and immediately backed away as if to get away from something.

"Capital punishment was abolished a long time ago, otherwise, this place wouldn't have been moved to the Department of Mysteries," Cohan said. "No one ever comes here anymore."

After leaving the room, Hermione marked this door as well.

Love, Death, Thought...

The Department of Mysteries truly was researching some of the deepest fundamentals of magic.

With three marked doors, they were getting closer and closer to the right one.

When Harry pushed open the next door, he suddenly cried out, "This is it!"

The room was filled with all kinds of clocks, from grandfather clocks to travel clocks, all ticking endlessly. At the far end of the room was a huge crystal bell jar.

"This way," Harry said, hurrying them to the end of the room. "There's a door behind it—the room from my dream is inside—"

"There are Time-Turners here," Cohan's gaze was caught by the dozens upon dozens of Time-Turners hanging on the wall.

"Cohan, if you steal one, I'm sure Mr. Norton will be very angry," Hermione said strictly. "Time isn't a toy. Messing with it is incredibly dangerous."

"Alright, alright."

He didn't have anything in his past he needed to fix anyway.

Finally, they went around the jar, where a bird's egg was going through a continuous loop of "hatching—growing—aging—shrinking—turning back into an egg."

Harry was right; there was a door behind it.

They went in and saw the rows of shelves filled with prophecy globes that Harry had described.

"Where are we going?" Cohan asked.

"Row ninety-seven," Harry said nervously. "Sirius is right there."