"Ken?"
Fleur and Krum were both a little startled. They sized up Avada, who looked outwardly relaxed and unconcerned.
"What is it?"
"Well…"
Avada pointed at his room with a deliberately troubled expression.
"There seems to be something wrong with the faucet in my room, and I don't have my wand right now. I might not be able to handle it on my own…"
As he spoke, he casually raised his arm a little—the badge Dumbledore had made was still attached there.
"…All right."
Fleur and Krum exchanged a glance, then, like Avada, did their best to put on relaxed or disdainful expressions, as though they really were just helping with some trivial everyday matter—mixed with a bit of contempt for how Ken could not even manage something this small on his own.
"We'll help you."
"Much appreciated."
Avada twitched the corner of his mouth, opened the door, and stepped aside to let Fleur and Krum enter first. Then he followed them into the room himself and closed the door behind him.
And so, with a crisp click of the lock, once the door completely sealed off the space inside from the outside, all the expressions the three champions had been deliberately maintaining vanished in an instant.
"I've confirmed it. What Crouch and Dumbledore said was true—the badges really don't monitor us while we're inside our rooms."
Avada first checked Fleur's and Krum's badges, confirming that even when they were inside someone else's room, the monitoring function would still automatically shut off. Only then did he continue.
"The investigation team is lying. Ludo Bagman's cause of death was not goblins at all. That goblin dagger was probably just there to throw people off. His real cause of death was most likely the Killing Curse."
"As expected."
Krum nodded, not particularly surprised.
"I observed the crime scene. Even though I was too far away to see clearly, it was still obvious that Bagman hadn't resisted before his death—he hadn't even realized death was coming. If it was the Killing Curse, that would make sense."
"But why the Killing Curse?"
Fleur frowned. Evidently, she too had already investigated Bagman's death scene.
"There should have been quite a few students outside at the time. If it was the Killing Curse, the killer would have had to speak the incantation, and someone would have heard it. I always thought it should have been something like a Full Body-Bind Curse first, to immobilize him, and then a dagger used to stab him. That could also have created the current result…"
"It was the Killing Curse, or some other spell that works on exactly the same principle."
Avada spoke with absolute certainty.
"I have a special talent similar to yours. I can see certain things ordinary people can't. I've also seen what creatures killed by the Killing Curse look like before… trust me, I'm not mistaken about this."
"Then how do you explain the incantation?"
"That's the part I've been puzzled by all along—but that's not the main point. The main point is that those so-called 'investigators from Britain' are very suspicious right now…"
He instinctively glanced toward the door, then motioned for Krum and Fleur to sit farther inside. His voice dropped lower on its own.
"You may not know this, but the revival of this Triwizard Tournament was itself a conspiracy—a conspiracy aimed at Dumbledore. He told me so personally, and the reason I joined the tournament was at his invitation, to protect the Hogwarts students. He originally told me that he alone could handle everything, but right now, that clearly doesn't seem to be the case…"
"There's something like that?"
Both Fleur and Krum were startled.
"The ones behind the conspiracy are Britain's extremist pure-blood supremacists."
Avada continued, "If you've paid attention to what Dumbledore did a few years ago, then this situation shouldn't surprise you in the slightest. And according to the intelligence Dumbledore received, this conspiracy might even directly cost him his life. So now that you know that, what do you think of those 'investigators from Britain'?"
"It isn't difficult to confirm whether someone died from the Killing Curse. All you need to do is examine the corpse's remaining vitality. Even we can do that now, so there's no reason a professional investigation team wouldn't check it. And if they knew Bagman died from the Killing Curse, they would never have suspected goblins first!"
"…I see."
Fleur nodded seriously.
"If that's the case, then it would explain why, despite this being a tournament held at Durmstrang, they still invited two British men to serve as judges, even going so far as to break with tournament tradition."
"And our current headmaster is originally from Britain as well."
Krum nodded and added that. But then dissatisfaction and doubt crept into his tone.
"But if Dumbledore already knew from the beginning that all of this was a conspiracy, then why didn't he stop it from happening in the first place? Why let Ludo Bagman die, and let you, me, and the others—those of us at the center of this competition—be placed in danger?"
"That's exactly why I'm telling you all this now."
Avada explained helplessly, "At first, both Dumbledore and I believed that with his power and intelligence, perfectly dismantling a conspiracy like this would be no problem at all. So the rest of us only needed to enjoy the surface calm, while Dumbledore handled the hidden crisis in the dark. But Bagman's death told me that Dumbledore probably isn't quite that all-powerful. And after the incident, he didn't show any sign at all that 'everything is still according to plan,' nor did he leave me any hint. That can only mean the way things have developed has gone beyond even Dumbledore's expectations."
"What's more, the three of us are obviously among the ones being targeted. That much is clear from the overly convenient suspicions hanging over us. That's why I need you to know the truth—so that, at the very least, you'll have a better chance of protecting yourselves in the crisis to come. And if you're willing…"
"You want us to cooperate with you and actively uncover the truth?"
Fleur lifted her chin slightly.
"I have no desire to get dragged into your British people's messy power struggles. I only came here to compete on behalf of Beauxbatons."
"But it seems we don't really have a choice."
Krum glanced at Fleur.
"Ken is right. We're very likely targets as well. A judge suddenly dies, and he just happens to have ties to all three of us. Even Ken, who originally had nothing to do with him, was placed in the most suspicious possible position. And right now, we don't have our wands, and we're being watched…"
"I seem to recall that Durmstrang is supposed to be your territory."
Fleur looked at Krum in surprise.
"Don't tell me you have so little faith in your own school?"
"You don't know Karkaroff."
Krum ignored the slight provocation hidden in Fleur's words and said seriously, "He himself came from Britain, and supposedly he has some dirty background. And the way he usually conducts himself is completely different from what you've seen these past few days. Quite a few people even call him the worst headmaster in Durmstrang's history… If he really is turning a blind eye to Durmstrang's crisis—or even has a hand in it himself—then frankly, I wouldn't be surprised in the slightest."
"We're all tied to the same rope now."
(End of Chapter)