Theft!
And leaving traps in the storage room while at it!!!
Snape swore that if he could catch the potion thief, he would hang them by their limbs from the ceiling of the Potions classroom.
He had already narrowed down the suspects to a certain group—those mischievous Gryffindors!
Snape, a master in Potions, could deduce the thief's intentions based on the missing ingredients.
For instance, if African tree snake skin were missing, the culprit was likely trying to brew Polyjuice Potion. However, this time, a bit of every ingredient was missing! According to his calculations, each type of ingredient was reduced by roughly the same proportion—about a third.
Clearly, the thief wasn't stealing to brew a specific potion. This was a blatant act of provocation!
Someone had leisurely removed a third of every ingredient from his storeroom, as if treating it like their own kitchen.
Snape considered his reputation within the school. He was quite unfriendly, scary, and gloomy—*ehm* the fact remains that every student is somewhat afraid of him.
So this act required extraordinary nerve, boldness, and foolishness, traits synonymous with Gryffindor students. And only those Gryffindors, with their uncontainable energy and troll-like mind, could pull off such a daring prank.
Moreover, this wasn't just any Gryffindor—it had to be those troublemakers…
"Ug.. wow, I suddenly felt cold.."
"Yeah, me too.."
Fred and George Weasley, feeling a sudden and inexplicable chill, shivered as they sensed a wave of malicious intent directed their way.
After Snape suppressed his anger and shared his experience with Professor McGonagall, she was taken aback.
"Every single potion ingredient was stolen by exactly one-third?"
"Yes, indeed. From unicorn stomach stones to ordinary ox bezoars, every item is precisely one-third gone, and now I wonder who might be the culprit?" Snape responded, a cold smile playing on his lips.
Professor McGonagall was at a loss for words.
Just hearing the description of the problem, she knew this had to be the work of someone from Gryffindor!
The sheer brazenness of the act suggested an utter disregard for Severus Snape's authority—as if the thief were raiding their own mother's refrigerator.
"By the way, Professor Minerva McGonagall, do you have any ideas?" Snape inquired icily.
Professor McGonagall broke into a sweat.
So, shortly after lunch that day, as Fred and George were about to leave the Great Hall, arms slung around each other, looking for some fun, they found themselves cornered by Professor McGonagall.
"You two, what were you doing during dinner last night?" she demanded, her gaze stern and unyielding.
"Uh, Professor, we were eating in the Great Hall," Fred answered truthfully, utterly confused.
"Very well, and what were you doing before dinner?"
Fred and George didn't even need to look at each other before they responded in unison, claiming they had been playing wizard chess in the common room.
Snape appeared, holding a small vial.
"Ehm, Minerva, this is my newly formulated Veritaserum. Just one drop—"
Fred and George: "?!"
They had only set a dungbomb outside Filch's office door. This reaction seemed a bit extreme, didn't it? They had done similar things before, so why were the two professors reacting so intensely today?
Not wanting to challenge Snape's potion-making skills with their own bodies, they obediently confessed their actions before dinner. Under Professor McGonagall's intense questioning, they also recounted their entire day's activities.
"Oh~ So you two were on night walks every day, and the ones who threw those dung booms in his office... truly an act from the Gryffindor house, or is it not Menerva?"
After hearing Fred and George's "confession," Snape's scoffed but the frown in his heart deepened.
It wasn't that the twins were lying; the problem was that Snape realized they were telling the truth.
"It's.. Ugh... Fred! George! You two, very well, very well indeed!" Professor McGonagall was fuming, her face flushed with anger from their confession.
"Twenty points from Gryffindor. Mr. Fred, Mr. George, you'll be spending the rest of your Christmas holiday in detention," she declared, sentencing the twins.
...
As the twins left, dejected, Professor McGonagall felt slightly better. At least Fred and George's suspicion had been cleared.
Excluding those two troublemakers, McGonagall couldn't think of anyone else in her house who had the nerve and audacity to play such a prank on a professor.
Stealing from Snape's potions storeroom, of all places!
"It's possible that the person who killed the troll or led it into the castle did this for profit," she suggested.
Snape agreed with her on this point.
He had already contacted several potion shop owners he was acquainted with. If those rare potion ingredients appeared on the market, he would make sure the culprit spent some time in Azkaban.
The potion shop owners had to give him some respect; after all, Severus Snape was a master potion maker, capable of creating highly complex potions, and had a favorable position in the society of the pureblood families as the head of the Slytherin House which had their children.
"Cheer up, look on the bright side, you still have two-thirds left," McGonagall said, her posture straightening with newfound confidence now that her students were cleared of suspicion. She even felt bold enough to tease Snape a little.
Snape's face darkened so much it was almost as if he had been cheated by his wife—not that he had one.
Late at night, as Snape meticulously organized and counted his remaining collection in a mood of bitter resentment, he suddenly noticed a very shallow snake-shaped relief at the bottom of a shelf he had never paid attention to before.
'Was this always here?' Snape thought back but found no memory of such a detail. He had never bothered to examine the bottom of his storage shelves—who would?
He gently stroked the small snake relief, and something magical happened: his storage shelf "grew" an additional layer.
Snape, having taken precautions, cautiously opened the newly appeared drawer at the very bottom. Inside, he found several small boxes, their surfaces shiny and new, as if they had just been placed there yesterday.
He opened the boxes, each containing seeds. The inside of the lids was inscribed in Latin, detailing the names and uses of the seeds.
Snape's breath grew heavy. It seemed like he was having an orgasm.
The boxes contained seeds of extremely rare or long-extinct magical plants!
This was very likely a treasure trove left from the era of Salazar Slytherin!
Suddenly, Snape wasn't as distressed about the stolen potion ingredients.
In the Slytherin first-year dormitory, Rhys was happily inventorying his "harvest" in the empty room.
"Mutual exchange fosters mutual progress!" he thought with a smile.
"Look at these African tree snake skins, sitting idle in your cabinet. Better for me to put them to use. And my seeds, they're of little use to me, but they might be invaluable to you."
As for certain mechanisms in the school, Rhys thought it might be beneficial to remove the "Parseltongue required" restrictions, making them accessible to everyone.
For the two Potions Masters of Slytherin, today had been a day of great gain!
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