Those victims' families ultimately still left.
At the same time, leaving Hogwarts together with them were their sons' corpses and a humanitarian aid from Hogwarts.
This aid, named as assistance but actually compensation, was not much, but it was what Professor McGonagall had done her utmost to fight for.
Because in the magical world, there actually is no such thing as humanitarian compensation, theoretically, if these families wanted compensation, they would have to wait until the culprit was caught and brought to justice.
And with the families gone, Link and the other students were still under soft confinement in the Great Hall.
For a full three days, aside from using the toilet and changing clothes or washing, Link and the others ate and lived all inside the Great Hall. Even classes were cancelled by Professor McGonagall.
This made everyone fully understand the seriousness of this incident.
However, understanding was one thing, but the long soft confinement and the still uncaught culprit caused the atmosphere among the students to become more and more depressing.
Take John as an example.
During the first two days of the soft confinement, he was still cheerfully playing wizard chess with others to pass the time.
But by the third day, his entire mood suddenly turned gloomy, and he began lying in the corner, endlessly spacing out.
Don't even mention wizard chess, sometimes even when Link and Cedric called him, he would take a long time to react and reply.
Situations like his appeared in many other students as well. Link figured that if this continued, the students' mental states would collapse collectively.
But this obviously wasn't something Link should be worrying about. Compared to that, Link felt he should be more concerned about Cedric.
That guy, ever since the families came, had been looking at Link with a strange expression, as if he wanted to say something, but didn't dare.
Finally, on the morning of the fourth day, Link couldn't take it anymore.
He forcefully cut the sausage on his plate in half, then turned his head to look at Cedric, who was sneakily watching him, and said, "What the hell is wrong with you? Why do you keep looking at me with that weird expression?"
Hearing this, Cedric was startled and instinctively turned his gaze away, not daring to meet Link's eyes.
After hesitating a while, he finally gritted his teeth and said, "Link, you can speak Chinese, right? I heard you say 'Tian something' earlier."
"When I was young, I learned some Gulan language and picked up a bit alongside. So what?" Link answered with a straight face, making up nonsense.
"Uh… then can you teach me?" Cedric said somewhat excitedly, "Not much, just some daily conversation is enough."
"Looks like you really are sick. And not mildly."
"I'm not sick! I really want to learn!"
"Then tell me why."
As soon as this was said, Cedric was instantly tongue-tied, but finally leaned close to Link's ear and said in a low voice,
"Because I've fallen for a Chinese girl. She…"
Before Cedric could finish his sentence, Link suddenly raised his head, glanced at Cedric, then looked in the direction of Ravenclaw, and finally said with certainty, "Cho Chang!"
"Shhh!"
Cedric quickly reached out to cover Link's mouth, constantly looking around. Only after confirming that no one noticed them did he finally breathe a little easier, then put on a fake fierce face and said, "Don't say it out loud!"
Link quickly nodded upon seeing this, but the look in his eyes at Cedric was amused.
Cho Chang was the Seeker for the Ravenclaw Quidditch team, and also the only Chinese girl at Hogwarts, so Link was able to guess instantly.
Moreover, in the original story, Cho Chang was indeed Cedric's girlfriend. Unfortunately, later…
"Tsk tsk."
Clicking his tongue, Link patted Cedric's shoulder with a complicated expression and said, "Don't worry, bro. I'll definitely make sure you marry Cho Chang!"
"You… What are you talking about!" Cedric blushed bright red at Link's words and almost fell off his chair.
And just then, a large group of owls flew in from outside the entrance hall.
They circled in the air above the Great Hall, occasionally dropping letters, newspapers, feathers, and unspeakable things.
Link immediately protected his food tray, shielding it from those "air-dropped bombs."
The others, on the other hand, were excitedly waving to the owls, hoping to receive mail. Even the semi-zombie-like John was no exception.
They had no choice, Professor McGonagall had completely sealed Hogwarts, and the letters and newspapers delivered by owls every morning were basically their only source of outside information.
Smack!
A bundle of Daily Prophet newspapers tied with twine fell right in front of Link.
Link opened the newspaper, and immediately saw that on the front page of the Daily Prophet, there was a group photo of the victims' families.
Beneath these photos, there was also a bolded and enlarged headline that read, [Chamber Reopened! Murder Case at Hogwarts Results in Four Student Deaths! Victims' Families Suspect the School of Intentionally Covering for the Culprit!]
Reading further down, it was a detailed account of this death incident. Of course, it had been heavily embellished.
Link wasn't surprised at all by this, after all, it was the media. Clicks and attention were what mattered most to them.
Adding some "rhetorical flair" for the sake of traffic was completely normal.
And this incident was so serious, trying to keep it secret was pure fantasy.
But what really caught Link's attention was a written interview at the bottom.
In order to obtain the truth, our reporter used special means to interview a Hogwarts student. The following is the full content of the interview.
[Q: As a noble-born and outstanding pure-blood student, what is your view on this incident?]
[A: The Chamber does exist! The Heir of Slytherin also exists! This murder case was done under the Heir's order to that monster!]
[Q: Then who do you think is most likely to be the Heir?]
[A: Link Flamel! Without a doubt! Link Flamel is a Parselmouth, and a pure-blood. At school, he repeatedly bullies Professor Lockhart, and often bullies other students!]
[Most recently, he even used a dark spell he invented himself to attack a classmate!]
[Most importantly, when he was young, he was attacked by a group of masked wizards after a banquet, severely injured and almost died!]
[After that attack, his personality changed drastically! I've seen him many times torturing animals with cruel methods!]
[One time he even almost killed a young wizard who was playing with him! I will never forget that scene, he laughed as he tore the boy's mouth open with his hands, saying he wanted to make the boy happier.]
[Then he bit off the boy's ear, and chewed and chewed... I swear, that was the most terrifying scene I've ever witnessed in my life!]
[Link Flamel! He is not human! He's a madman! A beast! A demon wearing human skin!]
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