"Hey, Hagrid! I knew you'd be here!"
Kasenhis greeted, spotting Hagrid fertilizing his pumpkins.
"Professor Kasen! How's teaching? Are the little wizards giving you trouble?" Hagrid straightened up, waving cheerfully.
"Not at all. Honestly, the students who take my alchemy class are quite well-behaved. By the way, are you free today?"
"So... honestly, we should've just had drinks at your place. This place is filthy."
At the Hog's Head Inn, Kasenhis frowned, wiping the counter repeatedly with a handkerchief. As for his glass, he had brought his own.
"Don't mind the details. Drinking here has a certain charm, and we can drink to our hearts' content without worrying about trouble. The owner of this place is a terrifyingly skilled wizard. No one dares mess with him," Hagrid reassured.
"Fine, fine. After a few drinks, I'll forget about it anyway." Kasenhis poured whiskey into his cup, clinked glasses with Hagrid, and took a hearty swig.
"Huh? Doesn't feel like last time's woozy sensation. Looks like I've improved quite a bit in terms of alcohol tolerance," Kasenhis mutterd.
"Of course! Usually, I don't even get warmed up before the others are flat on the floor. You're the only one who can hold their own against me. Though, didn't you say last time, 'If I drink again, I'm a dog'?" Hagrid scratched his head.
"Oh... Did I say that?"
Hagrid's eyes darted around. "No, you didn't. Must've been my mistake!"
"Now that's more like it!" Kasenhis clinked his glass with Hagrid again. This time, however, he was beginning to feel the telltale signs of dizziness.
Gradually, he lost count of how many bottles of whiskey were on their table. Of course, it wasn't just whiskey; an assortment of distilled spirits like vodka, gin, brandy, and tequila cluttered the table between them.
Naturally, the floor around them was cluttered too.
A figure in a black cloak, their face obscured, carefully chose where to step before finally settling into a seat.
"Mind if I join you for a drink?" the hooded person asked in a low voice.
"Very.. hic!.. much so, hic" Kasenhis replied, shaking his head.
"Well then, how about a wager? I've got something worth betting—take a look at this big guy! A dragon egg I won off someone else!"
At the mention of a dragon egg, Hagrid, who had been dozing off in a stupor, suddenly perked up. Though not completely, he was much more alert.
"What do you want to bet on?" Hagrid yelled in excitement.
"Well, I actually know who you are, Hagrid—the gamekeeper of Hogwarts. I've heard you have a great deal of expertise with magical creatures. Coincidentally, I've got a three-headed dog, but it's far too excitable. I want to know how to calm it down. If your advice works, this dragon egg is yours," the cloaked figure proposed. Thɪs chapter is updatᴇd by 𝙣𝙤𝙫𝙚𝙡⁂𝔣𝔦𝔯𝔢⁂𝘯𝘦𝘵
"That's easy. Three-headed dogs love music. Just play some soothing tunes, and it'll settle down, maybe even fall asleep. I'd recommend a harp—they seem especially fond of that kind of music," Hagrid said eagerly.
Kasenhis leaned against his bottle, watching the cloaked figure. For some reason, something felt off about them.
But the alcohol clouding his brain made it hard to pinpoint what exactly was wrong.
Kasenhis poured himself another glass of whiskey, gulping it down. Meanwhile, the cloaked figure handed the dragon egg to Hagrid and then turned their attention to Kasenhis, who was visibly tipsy and barely coherent.
"Professor Kasenhis," the figure began in a soft, measured tone, "you've been making waves recently. I've heard about some of your remarkable alchemical creations using that red stone you crafted?"
Kasenhis hiccupped and pondered for a moment. Right, he had indeed used redstone to make Snape an upgraded alchemical stove.
"Yeah, hic.. that's true. What about hic.. it?"
"Don't get me wrong. This is just a small request," the figure continued smoothly. "Based on the Redstone theory you taught in the fourth-year class, I attempted to create a small device myself. But I seem to have made a mistake in wiring, and now I can't tell which switch is the correct one. What should I do?"
"Where'd you get redstone from..?" Kasenhis asked, squinting at the figure.
"A fourth-year student gave it to me," the figure explained. "They said it was an alchemical creation from their professor and that I should treasure it."
"Ah, I see. Hehe~ Well, just cut the main redstone circuit and reconnect it to a redstone block. Hic.. Problem solved," Kasenhis replied.
"Haven't you studied runes?~ The logic is pretty much the same," Kasenhis said with a shrug, his tone intoxicated.
But, isn't this situation a little suspicious?
As his muddled brain started piecing things together, Kasenhis realized who this cloaked figure probably was.
If it had just been a question about the three-headed dog, maybe it could have been a coincidence, he thought.
But of all the things, the figure just had to also ask about redstone. A three-headed dog plus redstone? There was no way Kasenhis believed in such coincidences. The conclusion was clear: this cloaked person was almost certainly Quirrell.
Well, that worked out perfectly!
Dumbledore had asked him to subtly reveal the method for bypassing the piston door to Quirrell. Kasenhis had been pondering how to deliver that information. And now, as if by fate, the opportunity presented itself.
"Thank you both. Oh, and Hagrid, here's the dragon egg for you," said the cloaked man—Quirrell—leaving the dragon egg on the table before departing the Hog's Head Inn.
"Haha, Professor Kasen! Who would've thought we'd get such a big surprise while just having a drink? A dragon egg! Haha!" Hagrid chuckled, cradling the egg in his massive arms.
Then he turned to see Kasenhis still pouring drink after drink into himself, and his laughter faded.
"Am I... overdoing it a bit?"
"Ah, my bad, my bad. Come on, cheers!"
"That'll be 29 Galleons and 6 Sickles. Tell you what, I'll round it up—make it 30 Galleons even," said the goat-bearded old bartender in an utterly indifferent tone.
Kasenhis froze mid-motion, hand reaching for his coin pouch, stunned by the sheer audacity of rounding up.
Still, he didn't protest.
After all, he and Hagrid had spent the entire night passed out in the inn, monopolizing a table until morning. They had indeed disrupted the bar's business.
And despite spending an entire night in the bustling, crowded tavern, neither Kasenhis nor Hagrid had lost anything—not the dragon egg, nor their Galleons.
With security measures this thorough, tipping an extra Galleon hardly seemed unreasonable.
"Thirty Galleons. Care to count them?" Kasenhis laid out thirty Galleons neatly on the counter.
"No need," the old bartender replied, scooping up the coins in one fluid motion before retreating to his spot behind the bar, where he resumed cleaning a filthy glass with an equally filthy rag.