Regarding who they should approach to inquire about the Chamber, Harry, Hermione, and Ron engaged in heated discussion.
Finally, Hermione offered a relatively reasonable suggestion.
"I think we should try Professor Binns first.
If that doesn't work, then we'll approach Professor Dumbledore.
What do you think, Sherlock?"
"A good choice."
Sherlock closed the thick, heavy history book and turned to say. "Watson, I'll have to trouble you once more."
Hermione was puzzled. "Sherlock, what do you mean?"
"Have Watson return the book to Gemma."
"What? But we haven't read it yet!"
"No need to read it. As Sherlock just said, this book probably doesn't contain the Chamber legend—right, Harry?"
"You can't say that. Sherlock also mentioned a second possibility—maybe the others just haven't read that far yet!"
"No, Harry, this time Ron is correct. This book indeed contains no information about the Chamber."
"See, I told you!"
"But—Sherlock, why are you so certain? You couldn't have finished reading this book already, could you?"
As Harry said this, he found it somewhat amusing himself.
What was he saying? From when Sherlock got the book until now, it had only been about an hour.
But to his surprise, Sherlock nodded. "Yes, I've finished reading this book."
"What did you say?"
The three friends, who had been arguing back and forth, looked at Sherlock in unison, all with shocked expressions.
Although Sherlock had indeed been rapidly flipping through the book since Watson brought it, the question was. could he really remember all the content by flipping through so quickly?
"You seem very surprised?"
Seeing his three friends' astonished expressions, Sherlock showed an obvious smile.
He pointed to his head with his finger. "I remember telling you before that for me, the brain is like an empty attic.
When I need to, I can stuff things into it, and when necessary, take them out again.
What I just did was exactly that—I stuffed all the book's contents inside, then discovered there wasn't anything we needed."
Although they had heard about Sherlock's memory palace theory more than once, the three friends were still amazed.
The skeptical Ron even took the book and found several passages to test him.
Each time, within three seconds, Sherlock could recite the content.
Ron looked at Sherlock with admiration.
"Sherlock, this time I'm truly impressed!
I used to think only Hermione could devour textbooks, but you can too—ouch!"
Midway through his words, Ron suddenly looked at Hermione in pain.
"Ow, what are you doing?!"
After stepping hard on Ron's foot, Hermione ignored him and turned to Sherlock with confusion.
"Sherlock, why don't you usually use this method to read?"
"I always do."
"Ah? Always?"
"Yes—oh, I understand what you mean. Actually, this method has limitations—I can't achieve true photographic memory."
Sherlock lightly tapped the thick book with his slender fingers, slowly explaining.
"Even my memory palace cannot violate objective laws; it still follows the Ebbinghaus forgetting curve."
"What curve?"
"Einstein?"
"It's the Ebbinghaus forgetting curve."
Hermione sighed somewhat helplessly and explained. "When information enters the brain, forgetting begins immediately. The rate of forgetting follows a pattern of being fast initially then slow over time, particularly in the short period right after learning, when forgetting is fastest. This is the famous Ebbinghaus forgetting curve."
"Famous? Why don't I know anything about it?"
"It's common knowledge, my friend."
"Only common knowledge for you! And Hermione too—hey, this time I'm complimenting you, don't step on me again!"
"Actually, my understanding of the magical world isn't comprehensive enough, so there are parts of this book I still can't fully comprehend.
In such cases, I can only forcibly move them into my memory palace.
After about three days, I'll forget these parts.
If I want to permanently store them in my memory palace, I need to follow the Ebbinghaus forgetting curve—repeatedly reading and reinforcing the memory.
But that's obviously unnecessary now. I only needed to know whether this book contains legends about the Chamber.
The answer is. no."
Shock.
Nothing but shock.
"But shouldn't there still be considerable content in this book that would be useful to us? Wouldn't it be a pity to just forget it?"
After a moment, Hermione was the first to recover from the shock and posed this question.
"Hermione, you've spotted the key point."
Sherlock smiled at Hermione.
"The content I found useful has been specially categorized and placed in a separate location in my memory palace, with extended storage time.
As for other content I deemed useless, I've already selectively forgotten it."
This time it wasn't shock.
Harry, Hermione, and Ron all looked at Sherlock with envy.
The ability to freely choose what to remember and forget—how could one describe such a capability?
It was simply too overpowered!
However, they didn't know that for the current Sherlock, the memory palace wasn't yet in its complete form.
Someday, this attic would evolve into a true mind palace.
But that's a story for another time.
Hermione was a person of action, so in that afternoon's History of Magic class, she raised her hand and asked Professor Binns about the Chamber.
The results were mixed.
The good news was that as a teacher who had been teaching History of Magic since the school's founding, Professor Binns indeed knew about Hogwarts' Chamber legend.
The bad news was that Binns disliked myths and legends; he only acknowledged facts—reliable, verifiable facts.
A thousand years ago, after Hogwarts' four founders successfully established the school, they searched everywhere for young people showing signs of magic, bringing them to the castle for proper training.
Initially, their relationship was very harmonious.
But as time passed, disagreements gradually arose among them.
The rift between Salazar Slytherin, founder of Slytherin House, and the other three grew increasingly wide, because Salazar Slytherin wanted Hogwarts to be more selective in student admission.
His core belief was that magical education should be limited to pure-blood wizarding families.
He refused to accept Muggle-born children, believing such students were untrustworthy.
The other three naturally disagreed with this view.
Gryffindor valued courage, Ravenclaw prized wisdom, Hufflepuff treasured loyalty—but these were all human character traits and qualities, having nothing to do with bloodline.
As they say, those with different paths cannot work together, and the rift between them grew worse.
Finally, Salazar Slytherin and his best friend, Godric Gryffindor, had a fierce argument over this issue.
After that argument, Salazar Slytherin left the school and never returned.
For Professor Binns, only the above content constituted facts—true, reliable, documented historical content.
As for any secrets Slytherin might have created when leaving Hogwarts, that was pure nonsense.
However, since Hermione had asked, how could she give up so easily?
Under her persistent questioning, Professor Binns finally revealed the Chamber legend.
The legendary Chamber was built by Salazar Slytherin himself, and he placed a special creature inside it.
Before leaving the school, Salazar Slytherin sealed the Chamber so no one could open it, until his true heir came to the school and could open the Chamber, releasing the terrible thing inside.
As for why the Chamber should be opened and the monster released, it was naturally to purify the school and eliminate all those unworthy of learning magic.
These people "unworthy of learning magic" naturally referred to non-pure-blood wizards, "those who oppose the heir."
Although reluctantly telling everyone about the Chamber rumors, Professor Binns repeatedly emphasized that this was a legend without any evidence, a ridiculous story.
When the entire class stopped paying attention to the lesson and instead became absorbed in this ethereal legend, asking him to say more on the topic, Professor Binns became very annoyed and forcibly returned the discussion to the 1692 International Statute of Wizarding Secrecy.
With his intervention, everyone returned to the usual drowsy state of History of Magic classes.
"Sherlock, what do you think?"
As soon as class ended, Ron asked eagerly.
Sherlock smiled and shook his head.
"History is written by the victors, Ron. What Professor Binns considers 'true, reliable, documented historical content' isn't necessarily all true, and vice versa."
"You mean the Chamber really exists?"
"Since there are such rumors and legends, this matter is not without foundation."
"Good heavens!"
"Merlin's beard!"
Harry and Ron looked at Sherlock in amazement.
Sherlock's meaning was clear. the Chamber really existed!
Only Hermione kept her head down without speaking, as if pondering some problem.
After a moment, she suddenly looked up.
"Sherlock, you didn't just reach this conclusion from Professor Binns' description, did you? You probably already knew something before this incident, right?"
"Obviously, Hermione."
Sherlock's gray eyes narrowed slightly, his fingertips lightly tapping the desk as he spoke in a relaxed manner.
"Let me connect the clues—first, when Professor Dumbledore faced the petrified Mrs. Norris, he showed no surprise but precisely identified the existence of Mandrake Draught. This indicates he wasn't encountering such an incident for the first time; he already had knowledge of the petrification mechanism and its cure."
At this point, Sherlock stood up and walked to the window, sunlight outlining his silhouette.
"Professor McGonagall's rare anger when Professor Snape questioned Harry could be explained by her love of Quidditch, but she maintained telling silence when Dumbledore mentioned the Chamber.
The abnormal attitudes of these two senior Hogwarts educators reveal they share a piece of unrecorded school history—some real threat beyond textbook legends once befell Hogwarts."
Sherlock turned to face the three, his speech growing faster.
"More crucially, when Professor Binns mentioned the Chamber, though dismissing it as nonsense, his narrative details matched highly with the writing on the wall.
Before this, most people at the school didn't know about this matter.
Even if someone borrowed the Chamber legend to commit crimes rather than truly opening it, the answer is already emerging—Hogwarts' Chamber of Secrets does indeed exist."
At this point, Sherlock suddenly stopped, his gaze becoming sharp.
"The real mystery is—who has inherited Slytherin's will, and who will unveil this dark page of Hogwarts history?"
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