Chapter 130: Fudge Arrives at School (Part 1)
If it was an ordinary letter, Minister of Magic Cornelius Fudge would have glanced at it and thrown it into the trash can.
After all, hundreds of letters were sent to the Ministry of Magic every day, and nearly half of them were addressed to him by name.
Among these half of the letters, most were written by angry wizards, scolding the Ministry of Magic for its lack of action on Sirius's escape from prison; and the rest were boring complaints, such as goblins gathering to invade the garden again, the goblins in Gringotts having a poor service attitude, illegal correspondence courses specifically defrauding Squibs of their money, etc.
Don't these wizards have any valuable letters to send us?
Fudge, who often felt that reading these letters was a waste of life, thought so.
But a few letters today were particularly different.
Although they were not signed, key words such as "Hogwarts" and "Dementors" touched his heart and were related to the troubles in his mind, prompting him to continue reading.
The writer of the letter pointed out in a very serious tone that a group of illegal forces were secretly brewing in Hogwarts. Their leader was a Slytherin student named Jade Jane, who first attacked the Dementors on the train, preventing them from performing their duties; she then repeatedly obstructed their law enforcement and even called on the prefects to drive away the guards sent by the Ministry of Magic. In summary, the student's behavior is extremely suspicious and it is highly likely that he is in collusion with the criminal Black to hinder the Ministry of Magic from catching the criminal.
It can be said that his heart is despicable and cannot be tolerated by heaven and earth.
I hope Minister Fudge can see clearly and investigate this matter as soon as possible to make Hogwarts a clean place again.
On normal days, Fudge would have sneered at this.
After all, this letter is really ridiculous——
Who dares to attack the Dementors actively? Who dares to approach them?
Even he, the Minister of Magic, doesn't want to communicate with them!
But things are different now. Since Sirius escaped from prison, there has been no news of him. Even if the Ministry of Magic sent a large number of Dementors and Aurors, it is difficult to track him down.
As the months passed, public doubts about the Ministry of Magic grew louder and louder. The Lockhart case had already caused dissatisfaction among some people, and Sirius's prison escape further reduced the credibility of the Ministry of Magic.
Whenever he visited Hogsmeade and other places, he would receive complaints from shop owners, such as Dementors searching the shops again and scaring away customers, which made him extremely embarrassed.
In order to quell public anger, the most urgent thing was to capture Sirius as quickly as possible.
But the criminal was not caught, and instead a bad news came from Hogwarts, which made Fudge even more anxious -
Dementors broke their agreement not to enter school grounds and rushed onto the Quidditch pitch, attempting to attack students.
Because of this, he had another argument with Dumbledore. The headmaster's protest came very quickly, and after the vicious incident, he strongly demanded that he remove the Dementors and send some experienced Aurors.
Fudge was very troubled. After all, Aurors were a scarce profession and he had already sent them out to track Sirius.
Although there was a shortage of manpower, he had thought about recruiting and training more Aurors, but hiring them would cost money.
In comparison, the free Dementors are more cost-effective.
Besides, he would rather have the Dementors search the castle thoroughly -
After all, what happened on Halloween Eve at Hogwarts proved that Sirius was most likely still in school.
This led to a stalemate between him and Dumbledore.
Deep in his heart, there had long been a voice dissatisfied with Dumbledore that kept influencing his brain.
After he got the position of Minister of Magic, he had no confidence in his own abilities and had to seek help from Dumbledore from time to time. He also successfully gained a foothold in the Ministry of Magic with the other party's reputation and help.
But over time, a seed of doubt took root in his heart.
Dumbledore is too controlling, and there are always so many opinions that disagree with him, like a lingering shadow...
He stretched out his hand so far, perhaps he wanted to usurp his position as minister...
The Dementors incident was undoubtedly a fuse that caused the dissatisfaction in his mind to burst out.
This anonymous letter was like a pillow delivered to him when he was sleepy, and it was exactly what he wanted.
Who knows whether Dumbledore was instructing Jade Jane to interfere with official duties?
Is he protesting against the Ministry of Magic, protesting against his decision as the minister to send Dementors to guard the school?
After all, she is Dumbledore's adopted child!
Regardless of the truth, the presence of a few letters that caught the other child doing wrong was enough for him to have a good excuse to attack Dumbledore so that he could achieve his goal of having the Dementors thoroughly investigate the school.
......
In the principal's office.
"Albus, I'm sorry." Fudge crossed his fingers, lowered his eyebrows, and looked a little regretful. "Unfortunately, I have received some letters. They protested against the misconduct of your student Jade Jane and strongly demanded that the school expel her as soon as possible."
Dumbledore's face turned gloomy when he heard this. His expression had never been so bad, and Fudge felt frightened when he saw it.
Little did he know that a raging rage had already burned in the other party's heart.
And I sincerely hope that Lockhart can enjoy his old age in Azkaban.
The word "expulsion" undoubtedly touched Dumbledore's sore spot.
"Uh..." Fudge wiped the sweat from his head under the pressure of this powerful wizard and continued to stand firm, "Assaulting Dementors, obstructing the Ministry of Magic, obstructing public service... These are all very serious charges."
The doors and windows of the headmaster's office suddenly slammed shut, but Dumbledore didn't even move a finger.
This made Fudge turn his head and body uneasily, and his mind inexplicably and automatically planned an escape route.
Dumbledore's voice seemed to be frozen with ice, and his blue eyes stared at him sharply:
"I think the so-called anonymous letter cannot be used as evidence to slander my students."
"If a little wizard can attack Dementors, then it would be unreasonable for the Ministry of Magic to use them as guards in Azkaban."
This reply can be said to have shifted the focus to the Ministry of Magic's use of Dementors.
After all, using Dementors as jailers has long been a controversial topic in the wizarding world, and there is considerable opposition among wizards.
Fudge did not respond. He lowered his eyelids, touched his smooth forehead, and changed the subject:
"But we have evidence - the fact that the Dementors reported that they were being attacked in the school."
"We have reason to believe that they entered the stadium because they had been attacked by Miss Jane beforehand."
Dumbledore's face darkened even more, and he immediately understood the subtext.
The Dementors answered to the Ministry of Magic, and he couldn't possibly call them in for a confrontation right then and there.
—which meant that Fudge could make up whatever they said.
This was obviously a deliberate excuse to put pressure on him so that he would allow the Dementors to enter the castle to search!
"Cornelly, I'm sorry I can't agree with this." Dumbledore insisted, "Why don't we go ask her? The child is in the Potions class now."
Seeing him stand up, Fudge asked curiously:
"Albus...are we going to go find her ourselves?"
He got a positive answer.
This is totally unreasonable. With their status, they should not go to the students in person...
Fudge was right.
If it were an ordinary day, Dumbledore would never let him go in person.
But now he just wanted this man who wanted to expel his child to climb seven or eight more flights of stairs, preferably until he fainted from exhaustion!
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