HP: DnD Chapter 35

Chapter 35: Too Many Choices

"Do you think I’m stupid, Damien?" Ron asked, his voice heavy with defeat as he trailed behind the group.

"Uh, no?" Damien was confused. "Why would you say that?"

"I mean, I went through an entire match of chess just to barely win and escape last time. And now you did what took me an hour in just five minutes."

"Ron," Hermione said, her voice full of sympathy. "We all thought that was the only way out of the room."

"Yeah, Ron," Harry added, trying to cheer him up. "We all followed the same rules. It’s nothing to feel bad about."

Damien felt a twinge of guilt, but he thought it was best to stay silent.

So, he walked next to them in silence for several minutes.

Curiosity eventually got the best of him. "Is there another challenge after this, Hermione?"

She paused to think. "There should have been."

‘Should have been,’ Damien noted, ‘but it wasn’t.’

"The challenge probably got removed since the last time we were here. It was a potion-based test, and those potions were likely consumed." Hermione seemed to recall the challenge all too well, and she secretly hoped it never came back.

"Does that mean there are no more challenges?" Ron asked. "Because the last time we were here, this was the last one."

Harry nodded. "I guess we have to move on."

Unlike the last time, when they were searching for a specific item, this time they were looking for a place. And that had led them to far more options than they'd anticipated.

"Hogwarts is truly magical, isn’t it?" Damien mused. "How many of you think the professors know all the secret rooms in the school?"

"The headmaster should know, right?" Hermione asked, assuming that someone who had served the longest would have a proper map of the school.

But Damien wasn’t convinced. "Maybe," he replied. "But the school is centuries older than the headmaster."

"So, how do we proceed?" Hermione asked, drawing attention to their dilemma.

The problem was simple: too many options.

A long corridor, multiple doors, each leading to another section, another room, or who knew what else.

"Do you have a spell for this?" Hermione asked, turning to Damien. He thought for a moment, but unfortunately, nothing came to mind.

‘Do I have anything in my list of abilities?’ he wondered.

"Looks like we’ll each have to take a door and hope at least one of us is right," he suggested, realizing it was the only option they had.

"Wouldn’t it be safer to travel in groups?" Harry proposed. It was a good suggestion, especially for a horror situation, but this wasn’t one of those.

"Too many doors, too few people, Harry," Damien said. "If we want to spend the entire night guessing, we can do that."

Harry fell silent, slightly embarrassed.

"Alright then, where should we go?" Ron asked, clearly ready to move forward.

"I’ll take the first door," Hermione volunteered.

"Then I’ll take the second," Damien said, eager to see what was behind it.

"Third for me," Harry said, leaving Ron with the fourth, unless he wanted to choose another door.

"Okay," Ron sighed. "Fourth it is."

And so, the doors were divided, each person heading to a different one.

Damien hoped that the doors led to something useful—maybe a new room or an escape route. He wasn’t thrilled about the possibility of an empty room, but if it led outside, at least it might provide some answers.

Unfortunately, the worst-case scenario came true.

"This is…" Damien’s face soured. "A storeroom."

And it wasn’t even a useful storeroom. A proper storehouse should have potions, magical books, and equipment. This one was filled with nothing but old clothes and broken wands. He spent a few minutes searching, hoping to find something of value, but all he found were smelly, discarded garments.

Annoyed and disappointed, he walked back out. He noticed that Harry hadn’t found anything useful either, and the fifth door was already closed.

‘So, Harry didn’t find anything good either,’ he thought.

Seeing that the fifth door was occupied, he made his way toward the sixth. This time, it opened into a long corridor.

At least it wasn’t an empty room, which was a small relief.

Hands in his pockets, he walked down the candle-lit hallway.

The corridor had an upward slope.

‘So, which floor am I heading to?’ he wondered. ‘But it’s remarkable that just four witches and wizards could design and create something this grand.’

Though many had come after them, adding their own touches, the basic structure of Hogwarts, including all the major rooms and places, had been designed by the four founders. Damien couldn’t help but marvel at the sheer scale of their accomplishment.

‘But how am I supposed to find the diadem in a place like this?’

Lost in his thoughts, he didn’t realize he’d made his way to the seventh floor.

“The diadem is essentially a tiara—ridiculously small for something so significant. How am I supposed to find it in this massive place?” Damien muttered to himself as he wandered, eventually coming upon an open area. “And would you look at that—it’s the seventh floor.”

He couldn’t help but admire how a seemingly unremarkable corridor had led him to an entirely new floor.

‘Must be some kind of magic keeping most people from noticing it,’ he thought, still walking back and forth, hoping to spot something useful.

‘Will the diadem be hidden in a room no one can easily find, or will it be right in front of us, in plain sight?’

He kept walking aimlessly, not wanting to turn around and retrace his steps so quickly. “What kind of powers does the diadem grant, anyway?”

Leaning against the railing for a moment, Damien considered, ‘If it boosts intelligence and wisdom, would that work as a stat increase, or as a multiplier?’

There were so many questions swirling in his mind, and practically no answers in sight. After circling the area twice, he figured he would give himself another five minutes before moving on. The school’s architecture, at least, was fascinating.

Yet, as his thoughts continued to circle the diadem, something unexpected happened.

The wall—one that had seemed completely ordinary—suddenly shifted, revealing a dark, pitch-black room beyond.

“Err… This was unexpected,” Damien muttered, momentarily stunned by the wall’s transformation into a magical pathway. “Guess I shouldn’t be surprised. It is a school of magic.”

…

…

[Minutes Earlier — Hogwarts]

“A toilet? Seriously?” Harry could hardly contain his frustration. Of all the disappointments in recent memory, this was near the top of the list. “An entire corridor leading to a toilet?”

The absurdity of the architecture had him shaking his head.

“Why not just have the toilet inside the room instead of this entire alleyway?”

With a scowl on his face, he walked out, only to see the other three doors still open and unexplored.

“So, they found something,” Harry muttered, assuming that the others must have stumbled upon something interesting, given that they hadn’t come out right away.

He debated whether to wait for them or explore another door. “Even if they find the chamber, it wouldn't hurt to take a look around a bit more. Maybe there are rooms with interesting things inside.”

With that thought, Harry walked through the fifth door. He wasn’t particularly excited, but curiosity pushed him forward. “Hopefully not another toilet,” he sighed, slipping his hand into his pocket and casting “Lumos!”

This new corridor was darker than the others, barely lit by the light from the doorway. No candles flickered in sight to guide him. It was long too, which suggested it led to another section—perhaps even another floor.

And Harry was right. After several minutes of walking, he found himself on a higher floor. Not the highest, but certainly a level up from where he’d started.

“Isn’t this the way to the library?” he mused, amused to find himself almost exactly where Filch often roamed, especially at this hour.

“I should head back,” Harry decided, disappointed. He hadn’t found anything exciting, but at least now he knew of another passage that could come in handy if he needed to escape.

However, just as he turned to leave, a flash of light caught his eye, stopping him in his tracks.

He didn’t react immediately, careful not to give away his position in case it was Filch. But he didn’t turn around either—his curiosity was piqued.

“Who’s there?” Harry wondered, guessing it might not be Filch after all. He hadn’t heard the loud, shuffling footsteps Filch was known for.

Intrigued, Harry made the mistake of moving toward the source of the light.

And it was a mistake.

“Ugh!”

Without the light from his wand, Harry hadn’t noticed the hooded figure brushing past him. The figure’s shoulder slammed into Harry’s as it moved with startling speed.

“W-Who?” Harry gasped, spinning around, but the figure was already gone, swallowed by the darkness.

“Lumos!”

Finally, he cast the spell to illuminate his surroundings, only to find an empty, silent wooden walkway. He frowned, scanning the area—and then froze.

“M-Mrs. Norris?”

And at that moment, he heard the voice he most feared.

“Potter…” Filch’s voice hissed as both their eyes fell to the floor near Harry’s feet.

There, in the hallway, lay Mrs. Norris—petrified, frozen in place, her eyes wide in horror.

“How dare you cast a Petrification spell on Mrs. Norris!” Filch snarled.

Mrs. Norris, Filch’s beloved cat, had been nothing but a source of trouble for Harry, and now, he found himself caught in the worst possible situation.

“You will pay for this!”

And with that, Harry realized the full extent of his misfortune—he was most likely going to be suspended, all thanks to crossing paths with the troublesome cat.