Adams walked into the elevator and closed the door of the phone booth. Amidst the smell of burritos and magical perfume, he tucked the newspaper under his arm and skillfully picked up the receiver.
"..." There was no sound from the receiver.
Leaving the coffee on the phone temporarily, Adams fiddled with the number dial for a while. '624 … 4 … 2'. The dial was a little oily. Adams waited for the dial to return to its original position before wiping his fingers on his clothes and taking a sip of the coffee.
Leisurely and comfortable.
A sweet female voice came from the receiver. To be precise, it came from behind the receiver, as if there was a sweet-looking witch hiding in the wall of the phone booth.
"Welcome to the Ministry of Magic. Due to the maintenance of the fireplace, under special circumstances, we will send you directly to the hall on the eighth floor of the basement. Due to time constraints, we will activate the express elevator mode. Please forgive us."
Express elevator mode?
Adams had never heard of this mode.
"It's okay, ma'am, I understand..."
Before Adams could finish, he felt the floor of the phone booth begin to descend, and the sound of dirt rubbing against each other rang in his ears.
It doesn't seem to be very fast?
It doesn't feel any different from usual...
Adams thought. Suddenly, he felt something wrong under his feet, as if he had stepped on dragon dung. He looked down and found that his feet had sunk into the ground, and he couldn't move.
“？”
Almost instantly, a sense of weightlessness surrounded him.
"Ahhhhhh!"
The wizard who thought he was mature screamed, his neatly combed hair all stood up, and in his nervousness, he crushed the coffee in his hand.
His mind went blank, and the coffee almost flew into his nostrils.
Perhaps for a long time, he wouldn't want to experience the express elevator mode of the Ministry of Magic.
The wind blew his face out of shape, like a new magical creature. He didn't have time to take out his wand to do anything. He could only use all his strength to clamp down on the rustling muggle newspaper that hadn't been blown away yet.
Adams closed his eyes.
He didn't know how much time had passed, maybe a dozen seconds, maybe a few years.
Ding. When Adams heard the sound, his legs trembled and he almost fell to the ground. His only thought was to cast a Forgetting Spell on himself to forget this terrible elevator time.
"It's all right, thank goodness no one saw," he said, touching his hair and his tear-streaked face. "No one saw," was the only thing Adams was thankful for.
In the darkness, Adams was about to use Clean Up to clean himself up.
"Creak." The magnificent door in front of him opened to both sides.
A curvaceous figure stood against the light at the door. "Oh!
Mr. Adams!
Good morning, "said a pleasant voice.
"You look fine," the female voice praised him.
Adams Bockibi, a magical zoologist, had become the director of the Abnormal Creatures Office at a young age. His teacher, Newt Scamander, was a giant in the field of magical zoology research. Although he did not show himself often, his position was unshakable.
The position of director of the Department of Magical Creatures Management and Control was very likely to fall on Mr. Bockibi's head in the near future.
The future director, the pillar of the magic world, the student of a giant, the young Mr. Bockibi, who was surrounded by many halos, only wanted to transform into a cute invisible beast and disappear into the narrow elevator with embarrassment.
"Uh …" Adams did not know what to say. "Good morning, Miss Lisana …"
Perhaps sensing Adams's awkwardness, the secretary, Miss Lisana, comforted him considerately, "Don't take it to heart. You're already in good shape. Just now, Mr. Arthur's whole burrito was stuck on his face, and he almost suffocated —"
"He's now applying for work-related injury leave and compensation," Lisana paused for a moment. "If you want to apply for it, I can prepare a document immediately!"
"There's no need for that!" Adams waved his magic wand and finally returned to his decent appearance.
Lisana smiled. "That's great, Mr. Adams. We now have a document about the 'house elf' that needs your signature. The elevator is ready, please follow me."
"Uh … that … Miss Lisana …" Adams was a little hesitant. "It's not the express mode elevator, right?"
"Of course not, Mr. Adams," Lisana reached out and waved her hand in front of him, trying to disperse the unpleasant smell of coffee and burrito in the air. "We'll take the ordinary elevator."
Adams finally mustered up the courage to step out of the elevator door.
"The Ministry of Magic wishes you a pleasant day," the mechanical female voice sounded. Accompanied by the sound, the elevator door closed. After a while, another painful scream came from the elevator door.
A new victim.
Adams shook his head and followed Lisana to the internal elevator of the Ministry of Magic on the other side of the hall.
The dark wooden floor, the extremely spectacular hall, and the peacock blue sky were flashing with various dark golden symbols. Those were the ancient Nigerian language. Magical zoologists did not need to learn the ancient Nigerian language, and they did not need to speak the ancient Nigerian language to communicate with magical animals. Therefore, Adams could not understand it.
However, Lisana, the secretary, flipped her long black hair and looked up carefully at the words in the sky. "We have to speed up, Mr. Adams."
She came to this conclusion.
"Yes, of course," Adams looked away from the Ministry of Magic colleague who was vomiting in a bucket. Seeing that someone was in a worse situation than him made him feel better.
Adams despised his own thoughts as he followed Lisana hurriedly through the 'Magic Brothers Fountain' in the middle of the hall.
Other than being the main hall, the eighth floor of the Ministry of Magic also served as the reception area for foreign wizards, as well as the Ministry of Magic's public relations department. A group of witty and observant wizard employees were stationed here.
Usually, Adams would pass by hundreds of wizards here, politely smile at least a dozen times, and respond to greetings from all sides. However, today was different. His colleagues were vomiting in a bucket, so of course, they would not be polite to him.
"Let's go this way." Lisana led Adams to a passageway and passed through the few employees.
An employee who was holding a large pile of documents nodded at Adams while vomiting in a bucket floating in the air. "Good morning, Mr. Adams."
"Good morning." Adams nodded in greeting and cast a sympathetic look at him.
"This way, please." At the end of the passage was a golden gate. Lisana placed her wand in an inconspicuous groove on the wall, and a robotic female voice sounded. "Secretary Lisana Quirrell, welcome to the direct elevator. Destination: B4, Magical Creatures Management and Control Department."
The golden gate and the elevator door opened at the same time.
Adams and Lisana entered together, and the elevator door closed. The small and luxurious elevator was silent, and neither of them spoke.
Lisana smiled and stood at the upper right corner of the elevator, while Adams stood at the lower left corner of the elevator, diagonally apart.
'Click, click, click.' The sound of metal chains was heard. It was the sound of the elevator slowly climbing up.
Adams opened the muggle newspaper, his eyes drifting, hoping to focus on one or two news articles, but he could not do it.
The golden number on the right side of the elevator door changed slowly, '7', '6' …
Adams could not stand the silence. He felt that Lisana was recalling how he looked when he came down from the elevator.
"Miss Lisana!"
Adams suddenly made up his mind to start a conversation, but he soon regretted it, because he saw that Lisana was shocked by the sudden voice.
"!" Lisana clutched her chest and turned around in panic. "What … What's wrong, Mr. Adams?"
Mr. Adams? "Her pretty face still had a frightened expression on it.
Adams panicked. He did not want to scare Lisana, but only wanted to start a conversation naturally. He raised the muggle newspaper in a panic and pointed at the picture of the black dog. "Uh!
Miss Lisana!
Have you seen such a magical animal? "
Using magical animals to start a conversation was one of the things Adams learned from his teacher.