She wasn't the kind of girl who would hide and cry.
Malfoy had crossed her line.
She was going to fight back.
Hermione forced herself to calm down.
She spread out a fresh piece of parchment, took out her favorite quill, and unscrewed the ink bottle.
A cold fire burned in her eyes.
She was going to draft a logically rigorous, well-cited, and unassailable legal rebuttal.
She would cite Article 7 of Chapter 3 of the Basic Wizarding Law regarding the definition of defamation, list the exemption clauses for companion creatures in the Dangerous Magical Creatures Management and Control Act, and sue Lucius Malfoy and The Daily Prophet together in the Wizengamot until their reputations were ruined!
The tip of the quill, already dipped in ink, was about to touch the parchment.
Just then, Lia's hand gently pressed down on her wrist.
Hermione looked up and met Lia's blue eyes, which were as calm as a deep pool.
Lia had appeared beside her at some point.
She didn't look at the newspaper, only watched Hermione quietly.
She shook her head.
"Hermione," Lia's voice was soft, yet it reached Hermione's ears clearly, "it's useless."
"What are you saying? Lia, let go!" Hermione tried to pull away. This near-'Doxxing' method had almost caused Hermione to lose her mind.
"I'm going to sue him! Sue him until he can no longer set foot in the wizarding world!"
Lia continued to shake her head, her blue eyes showing no ripples of emotion.
"Hermione, Lucius Malfoy isn't afraid of the law."
Lia's gaze moved slowly from Hermione's angry face to the newspaper on the table, filled with malicious words.
"Laws are rules you humans use to maintain order, but rules are only effective for those who follow them. Lucius is one of the people who makes the rules.
No matter how perfectly your rebuttal is written or how precise your citations are, once it reaches the Wizengamot, he will use Galleons and power to turn it into a pile of scrap paper."
Her words, like a precise scalpel, sliced open the hypocritical shell of the world of fairness and justice that Hermione had always believed in.
"He only fears two things."
Lia's voice grew even calmer, carrying an insight into human weakness derived from the depths of Tom Riddle's memories.
"He fears a power greater than his own."
"And he fears his temperamental master."
Hermione was stunned.
She looked at Lia, at that face which still held a trace of childishness, yet spoke such cold and realistic words.
This was no longer simple imitation, but complete understanding and application.
"What... what do you want to do?" Hermione's voice held a dependency she hadn't even noticed herself.
Faced with a dead end where conventional means failed, the unconventional thinking Lia displayed had actually become her only hope.
Lia let go of Hermione's wrist.
She didn't answer directly, but calmly stated a fact, one enough to make any Wizard's skin crawl.
"I know what happened to him after his recent failure at the Department of Mysteries."
Lia's tone was casual, as if she were talking about a trivial matter.
"He knelt on the ground like a dog. Voldemort didn't kill him; instead, he used Crucio on him, over and over again. I can'smell' that memory, right there in the echoes of his soul.
That bone-deep pain, that fear of death, and the humble desire to make amends at any cost just to survive."
Hermione's heart clenched.
Through Lia's calm narration, she seemed to see that proud, arrogant pure-blood noble struggling in pain and wailing for mercy at the Dark Lord's feet.
This was Lia's power.
What she gained from the Horcrux wasn't just knowledge and power, but also Voldemort's most private memories—the bloodiest secrets of his inner circle.
"He's like a hound now, desperate to prove his worth to his master." Lia's lips curled into a mocking arc.
"He needs a contribution significant enough to offset the punishment for his failure, to keep his status and the lives of his whole family."
Lia's finger tapped lightly on the name "Malfoy" printed in the newspaper.
"He is secretly looking for something—something his master wants back very, very much."
Lia paused, fishing the key name out of that vast and chaotic sea of memories.
Then, she threw her head up and stared straight into Hermione's eyes.
"Ravenclaw's diadem."
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