Chapter 48: Sherlock Walking Alone

Amidst the chaos, Harry and Ron closely followed Percy.

Despite usually complaining about him endlessly, in moments of crisis, Percy still took good care of his younger brothers.

"Don't worry, as long as you follow my instructions, you won't need to be afraid of any troll! Now stay right behind me... Hey, hey, make way in front, I'm a prefect!"

Truth be told, as a prefect, Percy was truly conscientious.

However, on their way back to the Gryffindor tower, they encountered crowds of people hurrying in different directions.

While laboring through a cluster of bewildered Hufflepuff students, even though Percy declared his prefect status, Harry and Ron still failed to keep up with him.

Ron instantly grew anxious.

At that very moment, Harry abruptly grabbed Ron's arm.

Having spent a long time in Sherlock's company, Harry had been influenced by him, and his divergent thinking skills had greatly improved.

He pulled back Ron, who was trying to push his way to Percy's side, and said with a solemn expression:

"I just remembered—Granger."

Ron had not yet realized the gravity of the situation and asked with a puzzled look, "Granger? What about her?"

Harry looked straight into Ron's eyes and said word by word:

"She... doesn't know about the troll yet."

Ron's face instantly turned pale.

"Damn it, Sherlock..."

To this day, whenever they encountered problems they could not solve on their own, both Harry and Ron's first reaction was to seek help from Sherlock.

However...

Ron found that he could no longer find him.

"Sherlock? Sherlock! Where is Sherlock?!"

The two of them looked around everywhere, only to realize that at this crucial moment, Sherlock had actually vanished!

Harry instantly recalled the sequence of events.

A moment later, he remembered that ever since Quirrell had appeared, he hadn't seen Sherlock at all.

No wonder he felt like something was missing the entire way here.

He hadn't been among the Gryffindor first-years following Percy just now!

"Damn it, he must have gone to find Granger alone!" Ron said with certainty.

Harry nodded as well.

There weren't many people in the school whose first names Sherlock would use directly.

Let alone first names, Sherlock couldn't even remember some people's surnames—or rather, he simply couldn't be bothered to remember them.

After all, according to his theory that his brain was a hard drive, useless knowledge did not need to be stored.

For the first time making a decision without Sherlock, Harry and Ron felt both nervous and excited.

The traits belonging to Gryffindor deep within their hearts stirred them both into restless anticipation.

"What do you say, are we going?"

"Let's go, go, go, go!"

"Careful, don't let Percy see us."

"Sherlock is really unfaithful. Is he afraid we'll drag him down?"

The two crouched down, grumbling while blending into the crowd of Hufflepuffs as they crossed paths.

After slipping through an empty side corridor, the two picked up their pace and headed straight for the dungeons.

Just as they turned a corner, a foul stench hit them squarely in the face.

How should they put it?

If forced to describe it, it smelled like a mixture of Ron's socks that hadn't been washed in a month and a public restroom that hadn't been cleaned in ages.

Perhaps with a few special flavors of Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Beans thrown in for good measure.

Both of their facial muscles twitched as they held their breath as much as possible.

Otherwise, even if they didn't pass out on the spot, they were afraid they would vomit directly.

When the two cautiously poked their heads out on tiptoe, they were instantly stunned by the scene before them.

...

When Quirrell appeared in the Great Hall and announced the news about the troll, Sherlock immediately furrowed his brow, realizing that the situation was far from simple.

As it turned out, they had Professor McGonagall to thank.

To honor his promise to her, he had attended the Defense Against the Dark Arts classes for the past two weeks, so he had become much more familiar with Professor Quirrell.

Ever since he first heard the stories about Quirrell—specifically the one where his personality allegedly changed drastically after encountering a vampire—Sherlock had a gut feeling that the tale was somewhat fabricated.

At the time, Harry had raised questions, but due to a lack of sufficient conditions, Sherlock had not pursued the deduction further.

However.

As he stopped skipping Defense Against the Dark Arts classes, Quirrell's words and actions were observed by him one by one.

This man had problems!

If this were the Muggle world, he would certainly investigate the matter down to the smallest detail.

But in the wizarding world, he could not.

First, although Quirrell appeared thoroughly unreliable, he was, after all, an adult wizard.

If Sherlock's deductions were correct, his strength was by no means lacking.

Acting rashly was definitely unwise.

Sherlock would never let foolishness replace courage.

Second was time.

For Sherlock, time was always in short supply.

Every professor at Hogwarts had secrets; until Quirrell displayed a direct threat, his affairs could be put on the back burner.

Until today.

When he saw Quirrell stumbling in, Sherlock took less than a second to deduce the cause and effect.

He immediately took action.

As long as he acted quickly enough, he could figure out the ins and outs of the matter all at once.

And incidentally rescue Hermione.

Subsequent developments proceeded precisely as he had anticipated.

His arrival time at the dungeons was even ahead of the troll.

Though it was barely half a minute faster than the beast.

Yet that brief span of time was already enough for him to drag Hermione out before she could be cornered by the troll in the girls' restroom.

Literally "dragged" out.

Hermione was almost incapable of speech by then.

Her limbs were weak and her entire body went limp; she could only walk because Sherlock was dragging her along.

This was entirely within reason.

No matter how strong-willed she usually was, she was still only an eleven-year-old girl.

Having stayed and cried in the restroom for a good portion of the day, she was already both starved and exhausted.

At that moment, catching a sudden glimpse of such a colossal monster, her mind had long since gone blank.

After all, looking at illustrations and descriptions in books was a completely different concept from seeing a troll with one's own eyes.

Not to mention that the troll standing before her was a full twelve feet tall, towering a head taller than Hagrid the half-giant.

Yet even though Hagrid was huge, his appearance remained that of a normal human.

This creature was entirely different.

At a glance, its entire body seemed to be composed of massive piles of mud and gravel.

Its skin was a dull, grayish granite color, smeared in multiple places with withered leaves and sludge.

Its limbs were grotesquely disproportionate, its legs short and thick like two tree stumps.

Yet its arms appeared excessively long, and the thick wooden club it clutched in its hand dragged along the ground.

Its tiny head was tucked into its neck, barely visible unless one looked closely.

Of course, the most prominent feature remained that overpowering stench.

If such a creature appeared in a video game, it might seem somewhat comical.

Once it manifested in reality, however, the terror of colossal entities reached its absolute maximum.

As an eleven-year-old girl, even as a witch, losing her ability to act when confronting a troll face-to-face was hardly surprising.

As for Sherlock, his psychological resilience naturally surpassed ordinary people's, and coupled with his early mental preparation, he remained unexpectedly calm at that moment.