In the Harry Potter Without Harry Potter

Chapter 347: The evening of the third day

"How many golden snitches have you got?"

Diane asked as she held her bag up to Jon, showing him the golden snitches inside.

"I caught a total of 86 in the last three days, actually it should have been more, but it's all that damn Lestrange's fault, the bag fell to the ground when I was duelling with him and a dozen flew away, otherwise I would have caught over 100."

Her haul had been bountiful enough, over thirty of them had been contributed by that Antipodean Opaleye she had encountered in the first place, and it was true that Diane had been lucky enough that the dragon was not only mild-tempered but also had enough golden snitches flying around it.

Jon had no intention of hiding anything from her either, the two were already on the same side and in the end it was the same no matter who got the ultimate victory.

"193, originally, according to the plan, the number would actually have been 200 by now, but that last Swedish Short-Snout Dragon was not a good deal, only a dozen golden snitches were circling around it, so I now have to go and find the last Dragon to make it whole."

Diane's eyes widened as she looked at Jon's bag full of golden snitches.

She had thought that Jon's haul would be richer than hers, but she hadn't expected it to be this plentiful, the gap was more than twice as high.

She then looked at Jon's bag and then at her own, and without hesitation, she handed Jon all those golden snitches she had got directly.

"No need to go back to the last one, 193 plus 86, 279 golden snitches are already more than half of the entire number in the Forbidden Forest, there is no way Emil will overtake you; Then let's go back to the edge of the Forbidden Forest now and go straight out when the time is up, then the first place in this tournament task will definitely be yours!"

The girl showed no half-hearted hesitation in making such a decision and clearly had no hint of reluctance.

She obviously knew What the bigger picture is, individual achievements didn't matter at all, both of them represented this one camp now, and if this had been Emil and Draco, they would have ended up giving all the golden snitches they had collected to one person as well, as a way to ensure absolute superiority in numbers, after all, the rules of this tournament didn't say that no cooperation is allowed.

But Jon looked at her instead, not bothering to take the bag full of golden snitches, and smiled, shaking his head.

"I know it's only sensible and prudent to accept your gains, but either way, you still call me Professor, don't you? Even though I haven't taught you anything, I can't take away the fruits of a student's labour without paying for it; and don't distrust my abilities, I've already set my sights on the last dragon, and I now have three or four hours to spare before the end of the tournament task, which is perfectly adequate."

It was clear that Jon was still a forehead shorter than Diane, but the words were compelling enough.

Diane eventually didn't insist any further, she put her raised hand holding the bag back down, and afterwards still went on to ask.

"So, Professor do you need me to come over with you?"

Jon didn't answer her question at first but thought for a moment.

"I suggest you to go straight to the entrance of the forbidden forest now and wait, wait until the time comes when the first task can be ended by choice, then immediately get the first score for leaving the forbidden forest, then even if the number of golden snitches that Lestrange gets afterwards is going to exceed yours, the first one to leave the forbidden forest will have forty points, Malfoy has already been eliminated, counting the number of golden snitches, at worst you can get thirty points, so in total you will have seventy points, in this way, Lestrange will have eighty points if he comes second in all, fifty points plus thirty points, and you will be only ten points below him, which is perfectly acceptable."

The specific rules set out to determine how much of an advantage the four champions will have at the end of the three tasks of this Triwizard Tournament are not based on the overall 1st place ranking, but by adding up the scores of the three tasks.

So it's true that the more scores you earn the better, but it's not true that those who are behind have no chance at all.

If it's only a ten-point gap, then that can easily be made up in the second task, and even if it's not made up in the end, it won't open up too much of a gap on the third task.

So it was in Diane's best interests to give up on going on to catch the golden snitches in favour of taking first place to finish in the time rankings.

There are only 500 golden snitches available in the Forbidden Forest, so if he gets more than 200 and Diane has 86, then even if Emile finds and catches all the rest, it's still impossible for him to overtake Jon.

So as long as he caught the golden snitches around the next dragon, that would be seventy points, and without Draco, the twenty points in the time ranking would definitely be available, adding up to ninety points.

So Jon was in no hurry to finish the tournament at the earliest possible time.

After hearing Jon's analysis, Diane didn't hesitate much, even if Jon and Dumbledore had never said so, but she had always seen herself as Jon's support in this Triwizard Tournament.

Perhaps before Diane might have had some of the pride that came with being a Rosier and might have wanted to prove that Durmstrang students are no worse than the other two wizarding schools in Europe by taking the title herself, but after learning about Jon's exploits, the sensible girl no longer had any semblance of wanting to be in the limelight.

Even if she is still just a student, she knows very well what this Triwizard Tournament means for the whole of Witching Horizon, and it is not some casual child's play.

So, at this point in time when the sun was about to set, Jon and Diane parted ways again.

Diane would go straight back to the entrance to the Forbidden Forest as he had suggested and bide her time, grabbing first place for finishing the tournament in time, while Jon would go to the last dragon that he had planned to go to, to catch enough golden snitches to ensure that he would definitely get first place in the score.

The last dragon was also one that Jon had carefully selected, and it is also an Antipodean Opaleye, which is generally docile and lazy, does not include humans in its recipes, and usually eats either sheep or Australian kangaroos.

So if nothing goes wrong, he could even finish this whole tournament before eight o'clock.

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