The skeleton glead a cold, hard bluish-white under the moonlight, at first glance, it seed like an artfully crafted piece, with each bone eerily pristine.
Luna’s breath caught slightly, and she instinctively stepped back half a step, her fingers unconsciously clutching her scarf, her slightly protruding eyes looking even more surprised.
"Oh..." the girl softly exclaid, "This is really unusual... I an, I never thought I’d see this at school..."
Rolf’s face turned pale, his Adam’s apple bobbed up and down, and he barely managed to speak:
"Do you think this might... might be part of the maze’s decoration?"
Vid did not answer, Luna gave him a peculiar look: "Maze decoration?"
"I heard... that in so Muggle schools, they have specins of human skeletons like this, so I thought..." Rolf stamred out an excuse he didn’t even believe himself.
"Then it should be hanging in so hidden corner of the maze, ready to jump out and give soone a scare. Not buried under the bushes outside."
Vid, having seen scenes far more terrifying than this, calmly said, waving his magic wand.
Rolf then saw a silvery-white thing erge from the tip of Vid’s wand, flicker montarily, and disappear.
"Guardian God..."
He whispered in admiration, finally allowing himself to beco barely calm.
"But isn’t this... isn’t this bone quite strange?"
Rolf said, "No clothes, no flesh, not even a trace of blood... If it had been buried for a long ti, the bones are... eerily clean and intact."
Though he had never seen a human corpse before, it wasn’t his first ti seeing animal bones. In his grandfather Rolf’s mysterious space, there were always so mischievous fantastic beasts that would bury bones in the ground to hide them, planning to eat them later.
When the bones were dug up again, they would appear cracked or have holes, look dirty, and sotis even change color.
Yet the skeleton before them was polished like a piece of art.
"Doesn’t look like it was cleaned by so creature."
Vid said, moving the soil around the skeleton aside, levitating it in the air.
The bones bore no fine tooth marks left from animals or insects gnawing at them.
"And they are neatly arranged, at least indicating that when buried, the body was still intact. And it hasn’t been too long... maybe even just a day or two."
Vid placed the remains back in the pit, pondered for a mont, then turned to the two and said, "You two, go back to the castle."
Luna bit her lip and shook her head, "No, we discovered this together... if soone asks, we can share the explanation together, which makes things clearer."
"That’s right." Rolf nodded firmly, "We... we three can testify for each other... if there is danger afterward, we won’t let you face it alone."
Seeing their determined expressions, Vid thought for a mont and did not insist on driving them away, only saying, "It’s not exactly dangerous..."
His gaze fell on the pale skeleton, "Whoever did this, I think they surely have more important goals than wasting efforts on a few students who found the skeleton."
"Whoever it is, they don’t know?" Luna looked downwards, pitifully at the bones, "Could this person... be a student of the school?"
"I think not." Vid said, "From what I observed earlier, its molars are quite worn out, and there are signs of bone spurs in the knee joints and lumbar vertebrae, suggesting it’s an elderly person."
"I had no idea you had such... unique and profound knowledge of skeletons, Vid Gray."
A sarcastic voice ca from not far away, "I didn’t know there was a class at Hogwarts that taught this sort of knowledge, perhaps Mr. Gray would be generous enough to enlighten ?"
Everyone turned around to see Snape striding over, cloak billowing, his thin lips curling, his deep voice carrying its usual sarcasm:
"Or... were you spying when soone buried the skeleton?"
Luna’s eyes widened, staring at Professor Snape, utterly shocked that a professor could make such an irresponsible conjecture.
Rolf imdiately wore a furious and incredulous expression, loudly exclaid, "How’s that possible? Vid would never do such a thing!"
Vid glanced back, seeing that Professor Snape was simply walking exceptionally quickly, and behind him, besides Dumbledore, there were actually several other figures—
Professor Moody, Professor McGonagall, Karkaroff, and Headmaster Adesso from Uagadou.
Professor McGonagall’s sharp gaze imdiately focused on the skeleton; Professor Moody, disregarding his wooden leg, knelt directly beside the skeleton to examine it.
Karkaroff and Adesso, however, rely glanced at the bones in the pit, wore thoughtful expressions, and then looked with interest at the three young wizards, their gaze fixed on Vid.
"I have only read a few anatomy books and have so basic common knowledge." Vid calmly said, giving a slight bow, "Good evening, professors."
Dumbledore nodded, his long silver beard glinting faintly in the moonlight, and the other professors also nodded gently in response.
Snape snorted, "Dumbledore, it seems Hogwarts’ library no longer satisfies students’ thirst for knowledge. They’re even seeking this kind of Muggle knowledge!"
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