The two of them left the ward and returned to the British Ministry of Magic. Seeing that Ivan was deep in thought and not saying a word, Pierce could not help but ask.
"Do you think the information Miss Delacour gave you was reliable, Sir Harls?"
There was nothing particularly suspicious in Fleur's earlier statement, and she was nearly disfigured in order to obtain this information, but Pierce, being the cautious man he was, remained suspicious.
Because once it was confirmed that Fleur was telling the truth, they would have to face a war with France, and that was no joke…
"I think she's telling the truth!" Ivan said, nodding. He had used Legilimency on Fleur when they were talking, and she had not been lying.
Of course, this was only a preliminary assessment. Aside from protecting Fleur at St Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries, he also had another goal in mind, which was to use the subsequent examination as an excuse to ensure that she was not under the influence of the Imperius Curse or had her memory altered.
Ivan would not have been so suspicious of his old acquaintance if he could help it, but facing Grindelwald's cunning adversary, they had to be extremely cautious …
Fleur was the Auror of France, and her presence at the French Ministry of Magic did not rule out the possibility that the Aurors were being controlled.
The injury and disfigurement may have been a ruse to lure him inside the French Ministry of Magic and set a trap for him.
All kinds of conspiracy theories flashed through Ivan's mind, but he managed to calm down, as he knew Fleur could be trusted.
"So what do we do next, move against the French Ministry of Magic immediately?" Pierce asked.
Ivan hesitated. There was no way he was going to let Grindelwald take control of France so easily and gain a base of operations, so it was only a matter of time before he did something about it.
However, Ivan was not stupid enough to charge into the French Ministry of Magic without any information, and even if they had more men, they would most likely be killed there.
Their encounter with the North American Magical Congress was a lesson learned. Over a hundred North American Aurors, working together with the protective enchantments in the Capitol Building, were able to completely suppress Grindelwald. If not for the fact that the Ministry of Mysteries had been sabotaged and blown up in advance, causing the protective measures to slip up, Grindelwald would most likely have been captured.
With this in mind, Ivan instructed Peenga to infiltrate the French Ministry of Magic, as he needed to know how much control Grindelwald had over the Ministry.
It wasn't hard to see from what had happened to Fleur and the others that some of the lower-class Aurors might not have known that the higher-ups were under control.
In addition, Ivan told Pierce to tell the Regulators to increase security around the Muggle heads of state, particularly the French Ministry of Magic, and to involve the Aurors of the International Confederation of Wizards in the protection of the President of France.
Pierce wrote down Ivan's instructions, then seemed to think of something and continued, "President Harls, the new British Prime Minister is probably unaware of the existence of the wizarding community. Should we inform him?"
Given the need for additional manpower, the Muggle Prime Minister was unlikely to be kept in the dark any longer.
In fact, as the highest ruler of Britain, he had the right to know about the existence of the wizarding world, but the new ruler had no background, so Buckingham Palace did not inform him about it for three months.
This piqued Ivan's interest, and he suggested meeting the Prime Minister himself.
After defeating Grindelwald, he would have to speak to the Muggle heads of state, and Ivan would like to confirm the Prime Minister's opinion of wizards.
… .
Inside the Prime Minister's office, 10 Downing Street, Westminster, England
Prime Minister Harker, who had been in office for three months, was sitting in his chair examining documents.
This information was secretly delivered to him by MI6 a few days ago. It contained information on the unusual events that had taken place across the continent over the past year or so.
For example, more than half a year ago, a giant six-winged bird was seen flying over the city of Paris, and two coffins were seen floating nearby.
However, after a secret investigation by secret agents, it was revealed that the pictures were all man-made. The six-winged bird flying over Paris was actually a kite with a broken string. In fact, the whole thing was created by a kite factory to attract attention.
Harker had never been particularly interested in such urban myths, but he was more interested in the recent terrorist attacks in Europe and North America!
The fact that there were over a hundred cases per year, spread across Europe, made Prime Minister Hark faintly aware of the unusualness, and his keen political sense warned him that something was amiss!
Such frequent attacks could no longer be explained by the sudden decision of a terrorist group to carry out a full-scale retaliation against Europe. It was not as if the various secret services, intelligence services, police, and customs authorities were blind…
The only saving grace for Harker was the fact that the British Isles were an exception, allowing him to sit idly and watch the others make fools of themselves.
However, Harkes could not understand how the British were spared, and attributed it to their "good" diplomatic reputation in the past — although he did not believe it himself, there seemed no other explanation…
After reading through the documents, Harker casually wrote down an advice for MI6 to strengthen their internal checks on Britain, in case any dangerous people sneaked into the country. He then picked up the phone to call his personal secretary-general over for a discussion.
However, just as he was about to put the call through, Harker paused, unsure if he should do so.
This was because he had recently discovered that his private secretary was perhaps a little off her head. Ever since she returned from one of her vacations, she had become a different person. Every time she reported to him in person, she did not take it to heart and would sometimes say strange things that others would not understand.
Had it not been for the repeated checks by MI6 to confirm that there was nothing wrong with the other party, he would have assumed that the Secretary-General was a spy planted by the North American Central Intelligence Agency or the Russian Federal Security Service — though even now he could not rule out the possibility…