Just a week ago, the twins had walked through this passage, but now it felt somewhat unfamiliar. The once dirty and cluttered tunnel had been ed up signifitly, with stoiles id on the floor.

  At the entrao the Shrieking Shack, the previously broken wooden door had been repaired. o it, a wooden sign had been pnted, reading: Beware of the vicious dog inside. Do not approach.

  "The 'vicious dog' written here wouldn't happen to be yarlon, would it?" Fred asked uainly. Garlon was the only dog-reted creature associated with Eda.

  "..."

  "Puhahah~ there is no way..." Gee ughed.

  "..." Eda didn't reply.

  "Merlin's beard! Other than Percy's rat, I've never seen that Labrador bite anything!" Gee excimed, vihat Eda's brain must have gone haywire to think Garlon could guard a house.

  Eda had thought long and hard about what to write on the sign. Her initial idea was: If you don't want to lose your life due to an act, do er.

  In the end, she abahat idea. This pce was more or less going to be her home, and having such a creepy warning at the door felt like she was living somewhere truly dangerous.

  "There really isn't another option besides Garlon," Eda said, sounding a bit helpless. "I'd love to get a three-headed dog, but I'd have to be able to pull that off first. It's not like I've had the luck of running into a drunken Greek who just happens to be carrying a Cerberus puppy."

  Garloainly wasn't capable of guarding a house. He was far too non-aggressive. Despite now being much rger than Mrs. Norris, he still wasn't a match for that troublesome cat.

  At least Garlon wasn't like those silly sled dogs; otherwise, there'd stantly be an expensive renovation project waiting for Eda.

  Eda reached out and pushed open the wooden door.

  Uhe dim and eerie atmosphere from st time, the room was now bathed in sunlight, and the unpleasant smells were gone. She turo the twins and said, "Fred, Gee, wele home."

  As they stepped ihe twins were left speechless with surprise.

  Everything in the room had ged. The chaotic mess was now and orderly. The thick yer of dust c the floor was gone, and the peeling aper had beely reattached to the walls. Most of the old, broken furniture had been repced, the piano had been repaired, and there was even a guitar pced beside it.

  The Shrieking Shao longer bore the slightest resembo a haunted, gloomy pce. The , sunlit room felt more like a warm and inviting home. If the twins hadn't been here before, they might have assumed that the Shrieking Shack had always been this way.

  From the window, they could see Hogwarts on one side and the snow-covered Hogsmeade oher. Pointing at the window, Gee asked with , "The wooden boards are gone. Won't someoiething unusual here?"

  "They won't," Eda replied, standing by the window to expin. "The sunlight streaming into the room is real, but the wooden boards c the windows haven't been removed. Winnie and I set this up together—we just nullified the boards' inal funaking them uo block sunlight."

  The wooden boards now acted like one-way mirrors. Sunlight could pass through, and those inside could see the outside clearly. However, from the outside, no one could see in—they would only see the wooden boards.

  Unless a powerful wizard forcibly broke the spell, no one would ever discover the true state of the Shrieking Shack.

  "Wihe house-elf who's always bringing you back?" Fred asked. "She wouldn't go ahe professors about all this, would she?"

  If the professors found out, all the effort Eda had put ihe past week would be for nothing. However, the likelihood of that happening was slim. While Eda wasn't Winnie's master, her were any of the professors. The only one who could truly be called her master seemed to be Headmaster Dumbledore. But with over a hundred house-elves at Hogwarts, Dumbledore was uo waste his time chatting with Winnie.

  "I'm not doing anything bad here," Eda replied, uned. "On the trary, I've debuhe rumors of the Shrieking Shack being haunted. Dumbledore should give me a Special tribution Award for this!"

  The twins didn't uand why Eda was so fixated on this award. From the moment she learned about the Special tribution Award, it had bee her obsession.

  Without Winnie, Eda might have long since abandoned her pn to renovate the old shack. The speed at which the Shrieking Shack had been tidied up was rgely thanks to Winnie.

  Whenever Eda came here with her, the diligent little house-elf would always take the initiative to do the work, leaving Eda feeling more like she was getting in the way. Once Winnie firmed that the pce was truly "," she even began ing alo night to tinue w. Wiireless efforts left Eda feeling a bit guilty.

  The room had inally been filled with damaged furniture. Eda and Winnie had repaired what they could, but some pieces were sohey weren't worth fixing. Winnie had taken those unusable pieces away and disposed of them. As a result, the Shrieking Shaow felt somewhat empty.

  The house-elf Winnie even patted her chest and assured Eda that she would take care of repg the missing furniture.

  She expihat there was a room in the castle where many pieces of furniture were stored. Some of them could be taken from the room; aside from being a bit old, they were perfectly fine.

  Other house-elves often took furniture from that room, so it was no big deal for Eda to borrow some for now. If necessary, she could always returer.

  Thanks to the help of the house-elf, most of the issues were resolved. The Shrieking Shaow forcibly cimed by Eda, could be sidered her first private retreat in this world—a secret base just for her.

  "This pce is ours now. Should we give it a new name?" Fred suggested, after taking a stroll around the house. He was thhly satisfied with it—a pce that belonged exclusively to the three of them. Any lingeriment he'd felt earlier had long since vanished.

  "Good idea. We 't keep calling it the Shrieking Shack. That makes it too easy for someoo figure out this secret," Gee agreed enthusiastically. "Let's think of a name only the three of us will know!"

  Eda, lounging on the sofa with her head tilted, said, "Do you two have any good ideas? Fred, yht it up. You go first!"

  Fred stroked the faint fuzz on his as he paced the room. It was such a relief not to stir up any dust. Meanwhile, Eda leaned zily against the back of the sofa, also p a suitable name—ohat ideally incorporated all three of their names.

  "We found this pce thanks to the Marauder's Map," Fred finally said after thinking for a while. "I think we should pay tribute to the freat Marauders! Let's call it the House of Dominators. From now on, we'll be the Dominators!"

  At first, Eda admired the Marauders for their magical prowess. Later, what impressed her even more was their boundless creativity. Without such imaginative minds, how could they have discovered so ma passages?

  Especially the one hiddeh the Whomping Willow. No normal person would dare approach the ferocious tree, let alone discover a hidden tunnel beh it.

  So paying tribute to the Marauders wasn't a bad idea. Eda didn't mind the title of "Dominators" that Fred proposed, but naming the pce House of Dominators felt a little odd to her.

  Even so, Eda pulled out her wand and wrote the name in glowing red letters that floated in midair. Theuro Gee, curious about the result of his deliberations.

  "My idea is simir to Fred's, but I was thinking of House of Outws," Gee said, gng at Eda to hear what she had e up with.

  Good grief—"Dominators" and "Outws." The twins' suggestions sounded so aggressive and far from anything cozy or homely. Eda waved her wand again, writing Gee's suggestion in the air as well.

  Although there were only three of them to vote, Eda believed that rituals and a sense of ceremony were essential in life.

  Finally, she waved her wand one more time, and the glowing red letters transformed into a single new word—her choice for the name.

  pared to the twins' suggestions, Eda's pick had zero bativeness. It practically radiated love and peace.

  _________

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