…
Cohen blasted open a corner of the cave entrance—not to bury the troll inside, but simply to make a commotion and lure it out.
Although the troll was stupid, it wasn't deaf.
The noise Cohen made sounded like other trolls were attacking its home.
Could it tolerate this? It had just learned to swing its club.
With a snap, it stormed out of the cave and slammed into Cohen's box.
"Done." Cohen closed the box and clapped his hands in satisfaction.
Luckily, he had reinforced it with a spell, otherwise the troll would have definitely broken the box by banging on it.
Following the Earl, who was now completely cleansed by a cleaning spell, back to the castle, it was nearly mid-afternoon. He
was going to miss class, so Cohen decided to go to the Forbidden Forest again—the spiders should have hatched quite a few more spiderlings, and before Cohen killed half of them, they definitely had unhatched spider eggs.
If there were small ones… then don't blame Cohen for killing the old ones.
"You've Got a Way to Die"
"Why are you here again!"
Deep in the Forbidden Forest, Aragog smelled a familiar scent, his angry voice mingling with the clanging of his giant claws—perhaps this was the kind of "gritting teeth" a spider could muster.
Cohen had once again sneaked in—the path was now littered with the overturned corpses of giant spiders.
If souls had weight, Cohen would be bulging with hunger by now.
"Mosag and I just..."
"Still going strong, impressive, impressive. I see your colony is multiplying quite quickly, no problem." Cohen looked at the swarm of small spiders behind Aragog, enough to support another small tribe—the other creatures in the Forbidden Forest wouldn't allow them to expand without limit, "I'm doing this for your own good—"
"Good my ass!" Aragog roared, "We..."
It wanted to threaten Cohen, but felt it had no leverage whatsoever—they didn't even know what Cohen was.
After all, Dementors had never entered the Forbidden Forest; Dumbledore forbade those things to approach the school—except for Cohen.
"See you next time—"
Cohen greeted. His soul integrity had reached 20%, and unsurprisingly, he was now facing another bottleneck.
The sky outside the Forbidden Forest was slowly darkening, and Cohen spiraled upwards, skimming the treetops towards the castle.
For some reason, while centaurs used to occasionally neigh at him as if trying to scare him away, he hadn't heard any centaurs for the past two weeks.
He even encountered one centaur once, but it simply watched him drift towards the territory of the eight-eyed giant spiders without making a move.
It seemed the centaurs had tacitly approved of Cohen killing spiders here…
Upon reaching the edge of the Forbidden Forest, Cohen saw Hogwarts Castle brightly lit under the night sky.
"Hehehe…"
Cohen rubbed his hands together and shook the suitcase in his hand.
Choosing an empty underground classroom, Cohen took the troll out of the suitcase.
It was a little dazed when it first appeared, but after seeing Cohen, this living creature, only one thought popped into its tiny head—
kill this living thing.
After the troll let out a low growl, Cohen dashed out of the classroom, slammed the door shut, and cast a locking spell.
Who told Dumbledore not to let Cohen see the crucial part of that alchemy manual! He was going to wreak havoc on the school and fulfill the dream he hadn't achieved in his past life.
Anyway, in the end, the blame would fall on Quirrell; Cohen was coerced by Quirrell…
[Ding! Sin Value +200]
[Note: Your evil led you to abandon this school; you have lost your noble morals and conscience.]
"These things can't be eaten anyway."
Cohen was quite dissatisfied with the system's evaluation. If goodwill points could be exchanged for soul fragments, Cohen's focus would likely shift slightly towards doing good deeds.
This system just doesn't want people to have a good ending!
Moreover, Cohen felt he was acting with great discretion and reason.
Everything he did was to protect the goodness of this world!
If he didn't become stronger, how could he defeat Voldemort and become the second—how could he protect his family?
Could goodwill points do that? Could they?
"Cohen?!" Quirrell's voice rang out from the doorway of the next classroom, "Why aren't you in the Great Hall…"
"Quirok?!" Cohen's eyes widened as he looked at Quirrell, whose movements were almost identical to his own, and Quirrell also had an empty suitcase.
Only Quirrell would keep his tools; Cohen destroyed the suitcase the moment the troll appeared.
"Are wizards only allowed to use suitcases to carry living things? Newt does too, Crouch does too…" Cohen grumbled.
"Why are you here?" Quirrell even forgot to pretend to stutter.
"Bringing trolls in, huh? Didn't we agree on that last weekend?" Cohen said matter-of-factly.
"I thought you meant for me to go find trolls—never mind—"
Before Quirrell could finish speaking, two trolls from adjacent classrooms simultaneously smashed down the doors of the two underground classrooms.
"Hurry up!"
Quirrell grabbed Cohen and dragged him away, and the two jogged towards the auditorium—they weren't worried about being caught, because trolls moved very slowly, especially in the winding, complex, and multi-layered space of a castle, where they couldn't run at all.
"You go eat first, then I'll go to the auditorium to report the news, and we'll go to the fourth-floor corridor while the teachers are away." Quirrell explained the plan to Cohen during the jog, "The Dark Lord is pressing hard…but don't give yourself away."
"Don't worry, I won't give myself away—"
Cohen promised.
They parted ways at the main entrance of the auditorium, and Cohen slipped back into the auditorium through a side door—thankfully he had brought his backpack, so it would look like he had just returned from studying.
"Cohen! Where have you been? We haven't seen you all afternoon!" After Cohen squeezed onto the Gryffindor table, Ron, with food stuffed in his mouth, asked indistinctly.
"I went to ask Professor Quirrell some questions. I already studied the Herbs class this afternoon, so I didn't think it was a waste of time." Cohen shrugged, stuffed his bag under the stool, and pretended to eat a few bites.
He felt like two pairs of eyes were watching him from the faculty section.
Dumbledore probably already noticed, and perhaps the other pair was Snape—he'd been watching Quirrell, and now that Cohen was close to Quirrell, he was definitely watching Cohen too.
But the favored always have nothing to fear.
"Troll!"
Ten minutes later, Quirrell suddenly burst into the Great Hall.
His large scarf was askew on his head, and his face was full of terror.
Everyone in the Great Hall stopped talking and stared at him.
Quirrell walked to Professor Dumbledore's chair, leaned back on the table, and panted,
"Two trolls—fighting in the underground classroom—thinking you knew."
Is this what a veteran actor is like?
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(End of Chapter)