“Additionally, I personally commissioned Mr. Costa to inquire about your eyewitness accounts, as well as those of the Witch at Honeydukes and Angelina.”
“Your statements have all been recorded. Bringing them here, they can all serve as witnesses, and combined with my appraisal report, they can fully confirm Mr. Costa’s deduction…”
“Wait!” Daphne interrupted Dumbledore, “What deduction? Why don’t I know about it?”
Dumbledore nodded to Weilan. Weilan, receiving the instruction, recounted the deduction from the letter to Daphne once more.
Finally, Dumbledore clearly told her:
“Daphne, although you cannot escape the identity of a Champion, with this evidence, it can be shown that you were framed and forced to become a Champion.”
“You still need to participate in the tasks, but as long as you are willing to publicly admit this matter, we will have sufficient reason to negotiate with Ministry of Magic officials to find out who wanted to harm you.”
“This signed parchment, along with its appraisal report, and your three statements, we already have ample evidence to present to Mr. Bagman, to make him admit that you were framed…”
“No one has ever framed me!” Daphne stood up abruptly, a fine sheen of sweat covering her fair forehead, “I never made those statements, this is all made up by Costa!”
“Costa is slandering me, his purpose is, is…”
Daphne’s trembling hand pointed at Weilan, but she could not speak further. Because Weilan was glaring fiercely at her.
“Daphne.” Dumbledore was still trying to persuade her, explaining the reasoning to her carefully, “These tasks are very dangerous for students your age.”
“And someone deliberately wants you to participate in the Triwizard Tournament, and we cannot guarantee that this person will not do anything to target you during the tasks…”
Daphne completely erupted, screaming with all her might:
“Ensuring the safety of the tasks is your responsibility! Why should you deny the legitimacy of my Champion status because of this?!”
Her angry roar was so sharp and piercing that both Weilan and Dumbledore froze simultaneously.
Weilan saw that the dozing Principal portraits on the office wall had all been startled awake.
“Black.” He heard Principal Dippet’s portrait muttering, “Is this the elegant etiquette of a Slytherin student that you are so proud of?”
However, Daphne, consumed by anger, did not care what the portraits said; her gaze was entirely fixed on the two parchments in the center of the desk.
A moment later, in a fit of rage, she grabbed the two parchments and, to Weilan’s astonishment, cast a Flame Charm, reducing them to ashes.
Dumbledore frowned, watching all of this unfold. He did not utter any spell to try and save the two parchments.
“How foolish——”
Weilan heard Principal Black’s portrait sigh.
“Daphne, neither I nor Mr. Costa can save you now.” Dumbledore gazed at the small pile of ashes on the carpet, “Your will is so firm, no matter how much more evidence we find, we cannot save you.”
He lowered his eyes and waved his left hand at Daphne:
“Go quickly, child, you should prepare for tomorrow’s The Daily Prophet interview.”
Daphne stood up from the chair, said nothing, and turned to leave.
She slammed the door shut, making a loud noise, and was met with the collective disapproving gazes of the Principal portraits.
“I apologize for startling you, Weilan.”
After Daphne left, Dumbledore pointed his wand at the dust left by the burned parchment on the carpet and cast a Cleaning Charm:
“Scourgify.”
The carpet returned to its clean and tidy state.
“This is the commission I promised you.”
Dumbledore counted out 8 Galleons and handed them to Weilan.
After counting them, Weilan put the Galleons back into his pocket, and with great decorum, he asked no further questions and exited the office.
He walked down the spiral staircase from the office door, past the gargoyle, and headed towards Gryffindor Tower.
“I must tell Hermione and Ron, and my other friends—to stay as far away from Daphne Greengrass as possible.”
He thought this as he walked. Because he had already formed a clear assessment of this girl—
“She is a complete idiot, and she is going to die soon.”
…
“Oh, actually, you don’t need to specially tell us about this.”
In the Gryffindor common room, Ron, while exercising his creative ability to conjure things out of thin air for his Divination homework, replied to Weilan:
“Daphne is already one of those Slytherin students who look down on us the most.”
“We don’t need to stay away from her; she’ll actively avoid us from afar.”
Ron was very satisfied as he wrote down his last divination result in his homework book: that he would be hit on the head by an owl falling from the sky next Tuesday.
Then he closed his homework book, pleased with his finished work.
“But, although I didn’t ask Professor Dumbledore.”
After Weilan and Ron split the commission, Weilan pulled out his Arithmancy homework book:
“I’m still quite curious, what was the mastermind’s reason for insisting on making Daphne a Champion?”
Ron put the commission into his money pouch, walked to the cage, took out some ham, and began feeding the piglet:
“Heh heh, if you’re really curious. Do you want to ask Professor Trelawney for a divination?”
Ron said this in a joking tone. But Weilan actually began to consider the feasibility of divination.
However, it wasn’t to ask Professor Trelawney for a divination, but for Weilan to perform the divination himself.
It’s just that if he used 【Seer】, Weilan might need to put some thought into designing the divination questions.
He needed to come up with a possible guess related to himself, and then have the divination provide a “yes” or “no” answer.
After Weilan finished the Arithmancy homework assigned by Professor Viktor, he kept pondering this matter, so much so that his progress in deciphering Runes was terrible.
It wasn’t until morning that Weilan had a breakthrough in his thinking.
The owls delivered the new day’s The Daily Prophet, and this time, the front-page headline was finally not about the serial murder case.
The news that the Triwizard Tournament Champions would be interviewed by Rita Skeeter today occupied the top spot.
“This isn’t normal, is it? It’s not like the interview results are ready; logically, they wouldn’t let those reporters stop spreading rumors about the Aurors’ incompetence…”
Weilan was already quite familiar with the usual conduct of these reporters.
When he turned to the second page of the newspaper, in a small column at the bottom right, the report printed in small font answered Weilan’s confusion.
“Oh, because the Aurors actually caught the killer this time.”
The small print roughly explained that in the latest serial murder case, the pure-blood Wizard victim died at the hands of his personal maid.
The maid was addicted to magic powder and killed her master in a hallucination.
“I thought I was slaughtering a pig in a hallucination, just like I used to help the adults do in the countryside when I was little.”
“Later, someone wanted to eat the pig’s head, so I chopped off the pig’s head and gave it to him.”
“I’m truly sorry, this was not my intention…”
The maid admitted these things herself and pointed out her weapon—a boning knife.
At the same time, her footprints were found at the scene, and the testimonies of other maids could also corroborate her crime.
With both human and material evidence, it could be confirmed that the killer was indeed this maid.
However, she only admitted to killing her master, refusing to admit that the previous four cases were also her doing.
Furthermore, she had no impression of the broken diadem at the crime scene.
Many things remained shrouded in mist, but the Aurors consistently insisted that The Daily Prophet reporters publish the truth discovered so far about this matter, exactly as it was, in the newspaper.