Hilke had supervised Fedetick for nearly ten years; even within the German Ministry of Magic, it would be difficult to find a Wizard who understood the habits of this straw man better than she did.
"Nightmares are one way it restores its power, best used in crowded environments. This behaviour doesn't cause any immediate visible effects on people, but it subtly drains their vitality, and problems will arise if it continues for a long time."
Professor McGonagall frowned deeply.
"It's currently hiding inside Hogwarts. Is there a way to find it?"
Hilke said with a serious expression.
"That is one of its objectives. Restoring its power this way is secondary; what it truly hopes for is that we actively search for it. Only in an environment suitable for it can its abilities be fully utilised, giving it a chance for revenge. In that case, it definitely won't hide somewhere we can't find it; rather, it will expose itself to let us know."
Her words caused the Professors in the Common Room to fall into contemplation.
Soon, Sherlock looked up at Professor McGonagall and asked.
"Were Harry and the other two the first ones to have nightmares?"
"Yes. On Friday night, Harry, Ron, and Hermione all had the same nightmare together. Initially, they didn't pay much attention to it, but only after the same problem appeared in the entire dormitory where the three of them slept on the following night did Harry and the others come to me."
"Then let's call Harry and the others over first. As the source of the spread, they might have come into contact with something related to the straw man."
Soon, with the help of the portraits in the Common Room, Harry and his two companions, who had just finished lunch and left the Great Hall, were summoned to the Common Room.
Facing a group of Professors, they were visibly nervous.
Sprout gently reassured them with a few kind words, and Flitwick, worried they hadn't eaten enough lunch, gave each of them a small cream cake.
The person responsible for questioning them this time was naturally Sherlock. He didn't show an overly harsh or serious expression; he questioned them as if it were a normal Q&A session in class.
"On that Friday, did you encounter anything strange? Or see anything unusual?"
The three of them exchanged glances, and finally, Harry spoke up to answer.
"After Potions Class, just as we were about to go upstairs around the corner of the staircase, I felt like something was watching us from the empty classroom nearby. But when we went in, we didn't find anything. After having the nightmare that night, we suspected that there might be something wrong with that spot, so we checked it again, but still found nothing."
Sherlock keenly sensed that this clue was important, and he asked the question again emphatically.
"Are you certain there was absolutely nothing in that classroom?"
Harry pondered for a moment, then suddenly seemed to recall something and said.
"On the desk right in the middle of the classroom! We found a piece of straw. Ron, Hermione, and I all thought it might have been blown in by the wind from outside, so we ignored it and threw it away."
The atmosphere in the Common Room instantly fell silent. Not only Sherlock, but the other Professors also realised that the piece of straw Harry mentioned must be suspicious.
"Where did you throw it?"
Harry remembered the location very clearly.
"Right in the rubbish bin of that empty classroom!"
Sherlock stood up from his chair, nodded towards Professor McGonagall, and then patted Harry's shoulder.
"Reporting this to a Professor promptly—you did very well, Harry. If you had tried to hide it and solve it yourselves, waiting a couple of days to speak up, the consequences would have been very troublesome."
Harry was embarrassed by Sherlock's praise; he couldn't help but feel that such praise was actually scolding him for having been reckless in the past.
Though he had indeed been reckless.
After learning the exact location of the classroom, Harry and the trio were sent back. They had classes in the afternoon, and there was nothing they could do to help by tagging along.
The only ones going to inspect the classroom were Sherlock, Hilke, and Professor McGonagall. The other Professors also had classes in the afternoon. Although the Gryffindor students hadn't slept well the previous night, Hogwarts was not yet at the point of cancelling classes entirely.
The classroom Harry and his friends mentioned was not hard to find; it was right next to the staircase entrance on the basement level of the Castle.
This was a Charms classroom that had been abandoned for a long time. It seemed that no students or teachers had held classes there for decades, and even Professor McGonagall had no recollection of it.
They pushed the door open and walked in, first inspecting the entire classroom. Hilke, who was blindfolded, was ironically the one who could see things most clearly.
"It stayed here, and for a period of time."
Aside from Hilke, who could sense its presence using her strange feeling, Sherlock and Professor McGonagall found nothing else.
However, they quickly located the rubbish bin in the classroom, but the piece of straw Harry said he threw there was gone.
"The House-elves clean the regularly used classrooms every evening, but empty classrooms are cleaned once a week. It's highly likely that this classroom has already been tidied up by them."
Professor McGonagall said thoughtfully while looking at the empty rubbish bin.
They did not linger in the empty classroom and went straight to the Hogwarts kitchen, which was also the House-elves' headquarters.
The entrance to the kitchen is located on the corridor leading to the Hufflepuff Common Room entrance. If you tickle the pear on the Fruit Still Life Painting hanging on the corridor wall, a doorknob will appear, and the kitchen door can be opened.
There are many House-elves responsible for the catering and hygiene of the entire Hogwarts, serving the Castle. They moved back and forth in the kitchen, which was as large as the Great Hall, and there appeared to be hundreds of them.
Seeing Professor McGonagall walk in with Sherlock and Hilke, all the House-elves stopped their work. Each one nervously clutched the rags wrapped around their bodies, watching them with those large, utterly uncute eyes.
One House-elf stepped forward to greet them.
"Excuse me, Professor McGonagall, is there something you wish for us to do in the kitchen?"
Professor McGonagall looked at the House-elf, who was indistinguishable from the others and whose gender was hard to determine, and easily called out his name.
"Abby, I need to know who was responsible for cleaning the basement-level classrooms recently?"
As soon as she finished her question, almost all the House-elves turned their gaze in one direction.