Hogwarts: Even Voldemort Can't Stop Me From Studying

Chapter 1100: Chapter 187: Belonging

Abigail stared at Braun, her eyes wide with shock, and instinctively blurted out:

"You... when did you come down? How come I didn’t see you?"

After saying this, she unconsciously glanced toward the especially noisy entrance of the building, as if subconsciously fearing soldiers might be chasing after them.

In response to her words, Braun showed an expression of even greater surprise than Abigail, tinged with a touch of incredulous absurdity.

He looked Abigail up and down, as if meeting her for the first time.

"What... what’s the matter?"

Abigail was baffled, even doubting whether she had accidentally put on the wrong clothes.

But she wasn’t the kind of wizard completely ignorant of the Muggle World, so she couldn’t have made such a basic mistake.

Braun checked the nearby bystanders, then leaned toward Abigail and spoke in a low, genuinely puzzled voice:

"Miss Abigail, forgive my bluntness... are you really a wizard? How could you ask such a... um, lacking in common sense question?"

He spread his hands, saying, "In a place that’s surrounded, alarms blaring, and Muggle troops storming in, should I really just stride through the front door, waving goodbye to them?"

"Of course, after ’coming down’, I used a somewhat less conspicuous manner to sneak over."

He seemed worried that Abigail wouldn’t understand, and even demonstrated a "walking" gesture with two fingers.

Abigail was rendered speechless by his seemingly patronizing behavior, and her face darkened immediately.

However, at the same time, Braun’s explanation also quietly dispelled a vague, bizarre suspicion she had deep down.

After all, no matter how smart and lifelike a poppet might be, it couldn’t Apparate like a wizard.

Abigail breathed a sigh of relief inwardly, and after putting some distance between themselves and the ordinary people, she asked Braun:

"What did you do up there? You caused such a big commotion."

Braun didn’t answer right away. He followed Abigail’s gaze, looking into the distance at the Watergate Building, which had descended into chaotic uproar from its previous quiet luxury.

The piercing alarm sounds, flashing police lights, and even the faint chatter of people could be heard.

He squinted, a sarcastic smile openly playing at the corners of his mouth.

"Listen to that sound!"

Braun spoke in a light-hearted tone, as if enjoying an amusing drama.

"I bet those dignified, eloquent politicians and the affluent on the upper floors are now running around in their robes like frightened goblins in the hallway."

"And those guys..."

His gaze swept over the figures of the soldiers, his smile growing deeper with a touch of malicious amusement:

"Rushing over aggressively, only to end up with nothing but putting out fires... the feeling of coming up empty-handed must be quite interesting."

Abigail rolled her eyes silently, not voicing her retort.

After going through this ordeal, she suddenly realized her inner sadness, repression, and hatred seemed to have burned down too, the embers still there, but not constantly scorching her heart as before.

And while Braun was lightly mocking with his words, a starkly different, more peaceful, and pure feeling flowed quietly deep within him.

He reminisced, fondly and immensely.

He reminisced about the moment just now in the penthouse, fleeting yet immensely fulfilling—

The master and siblings were all around, sharing a silent understanding where there was no need for guard, pretension, or concealment. Even though not on their own turf, the presence of the lively feeling of "home" was everywhere.

That feeling was belonging, significance, the grounding sense of one’s "existence" being anchored. Far more important and real than the current chaos and uproar he had a hand in inciting.

Yet he hid this strand of thought under his nonchalant mask. Braun turned away, no longer looking at that chaos, and said with a smiling demeanor:

"Let’s go."

"Where to?" Abigail followed and asked.

"To rest! It’s been a whole day, aren’t you tired?" Braun said helplessly.

"And then?" Abigail insisted on asking.

"And then? Naturally, to kill someone."

"Who’s the target?"

"I have a list of Prometheus members, including a few who are leisurely out of town... Of course, more importantly, to see what useful intel Miss Wrightford can bring us after a night’s passed..."

...

"Cash and equivalents, moving through multiple offshore accounts and shell companies, the total currently adds up to this figure."

Vito wrote a long string of numbers on a small blackboard, and Victor, sitting next to him, felt he couldn’t even count how many digits there were for a moment.

"Real estate is primarily concentrated on the East Coast and several foreign tax havens, here are the lists and ownership documents." Vera handed over a stack of documents.

"Most importantly—"

Riddle took the conversation, pointing to another pile of encrypted files: "is the ’network’ and ’leverage’ they’ve accumulated over the years—"

"Covering non-public influence maps in seventeen major cities of the United States, secret transaction evidence of over fifty current congressmen and government officials, complex gray equity structure files of nine multinational companies... even including the real control chains and fund flows of three small private military contractors."

"I checked the records and found that in their network, more than half were controlled via phone and email. The core members of Prometheus have high social status and seldom personally handle sensitive contacts."

"We’re rich, Master!" Victor couldn’t contain his excitement, his eyes bright, "I really didn’t expect that just one Wrightford could unearth so much treasure! If we could get to others on the list too..."

"Calm down, Victor."

Riddle said, "Wrightford’s role within the organization is special, combining financial facilitation, political lobbying, and ’vault’ functions, which allowed her to amass such a scale of wealth and secrets. As for others—aside from the deeply hidden mastermind—it’s likely hard to achieve the same ’bountiful’ returns."

"I know, but you don’t have to be a buzzkill, Riddle!" Victor complained, then turned to Vid, still excitedly asking, "Master, how should we handle these?"

"Such vast wealth going idle is a shame, but the circulation and handling require a lot of time..."

Vito said while glancing at the young man sitting on the sofa by the fireplace.

For anyone else, getting such a windfall could directly mean financial freedom, doing as they please from then on. Those with a bit of ambition would make managing this wealth their life’s focus.

But all the poppets knew that what Vid valued was never these things.

For him, finding a rare Magic Book was more appealing than having billions.

Vid didn’t speak immediately. He pondered for a moment, his fingers lightly tapping on the armrest of the sofa.

"How about letting Mr. Old Gray manage it?" Vera softly suggested, "He has company management experience and is familiar with various rules of Muggle Society..."

Vid, upon hearing this, gently shook his head, a slightly helpless yet warm smile appearing on his lips.

"That won’t do, Vera, you’ll scare him! Besides, for most people, having wealth that far exceeds their control capacity isn’t luck, but rather a disaster!"

He leaned back slightly, his gray eyes sweeping over each of the poppets in the room awaiting orders—Vito, Vera, Riddle, Victor... as well as Vilan and Vine (Braun) who weren’t present.

Vid’s gaze revealed contemplation, followed by a gradually clear decision.

He slowly said, "Victor, I remember you and Vilan mentioned wanting to develop some of your own people?"

"Y-yeah..."

Victor stuttered, suddenly realizing something, his eyes widening abruptly.

If he were not a poppet, he would now hear his heart suddenly start beating furiously, like a drum.

The other poppets also opened their mouths, their eye corners involuntarily twitching slightly.

Then, they heard Vid say, "What if I entrust this wealth to you all to manage, how about that?"

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