Prof. Sky Alton

Hi Ainsley! Don't worry, we're always very glad to have serpentine visitors stop by. I hope you have fun here in The Den.

Welcome to The Den, Emrys!

Can you believe it's already October? If you can drag yourself away from the Gryfftoberfest fun, there are plenty of point earning opportunities for the taking. The house cup race is shaping up to be another thrilling one so let's make sure we're a contender this year! First up, the triumphant return of Hufflepuff's newspaper, the Wizarding times. They're taking things back to where it all started with a theme of 'Privet Drive - Beginnings, Memories, Growing up'. There's 50 points to be earned from regular submissions to the paper and another 40 if you do the fun WT Challenges. Head over to the Great Hall on the main HOL forum for details! Deadline: 15th October new projects! The Library department are reuniting long lost friends and exploring the unknown. The Art Department are inviting you to design your own villain's lair and show off your organisational skills. There's a maximum of 70 points up for grabs across all 4 projects! Deadline: 31st October. Remember that the SerpenTimes and Paw Print are still eagerly awaiting your submissions too. the ST is open until the 15th of October and the Paw Print until the 23rd. Newspapers are an excellent way to earn points and to show off your skills so make sure to get your paws wet by giving them a try. Happy Gryfftoberfest, lions!

The show was a runaway success! Professor Decibel couldn't be more delighted. I've just got to walk her down to the gates to catch the Night Bus back to WADA (you wouldn't believe how many trunks she brought with her....) She's asked me to pass on her warmest regards and congratulations to all 'the dazzling young stars we discovered during this month of comedy, tragedy and musicality' (I think that was it, anyway...). Thank you to every last one of you who took part and made the stage a magical place. All rubies should have been awarded now but in all the Gryfftoberfest excitement, I may have messed up my calculations a little. If you think anything's missing, do let me know! Lastly, I need to thank my co-star, Adaleine, for her creativity and helpfulness during the whole production. Thanks, Ada! Now, I really must catch Professor Decibel up with these trunks before she has one of her deva moments...

Thank goodness you’re all here! I was just making my way to Gryffindor tower to make sure everything was ready for the start of Gryfftoberfest when someone told me the terrible news. The Fat Lady has gone missing! She just walked out of her frame a few hours ago and nobody has seen her since. I’ve sent people all over the castle to try to find her and ask her to come back but no luck yet. We need everyone, staff and student alike, to join the search party! I need to stay here and guard the portrait hole. We’ve managed to prop it open to let people come and go but we can’t have it like this for long. It’s a terrible security risk! I don’t know what we’re going to do if we don’t find the Fat Lady soon though. We might have to cancel the entire celebration. Gryfftoberfest without our stalwart door guardian is unthinkable! If you’d like to help us, you’ll need to search the castle and interview certain residents who might have some information about the Fat Lady that could help us solve the mystery of her whereabouts. Beware though, they’ll probably ask for your help with certain tasks in return. The technicalities: Your job is to venture from area to area, gathering clues and the passwords you’ll need to advance to the next one. You’ll advance by completing a particular task in each of the subforums (the password tasks will all be pinned to the top of the list), set by one of the castle residents. They will then message you the password for your next stop. There will be an extra task or tasks in each area that you can choose to do for extra rubies. You can always retrace your steps and do those later, once you’ve solved the mystery. Sir Nick is in the subforum called ‘The Common Room’. He has your first password but he also has some games and other fun to try to keep the Gryfftoberfest spirit alive. If you need a break from searching, you can head back there for a well earned break. There are 320 rubies up for grabs across all the tasks, including Sir Nick’s games in the Common Room. You’ll earn a bonus of 30 rubies if you complete all the tasks available. That’s a total of 350 in all. Everyone who successfully solves the mystery and finds the Fat Lady will earn the shiny Gryfftoberfest Award. You’ll also find a matching roleplay over in our Roleplay section. The fat Ladies good friend Violet is going to lead a thorough search of the 7th floor and she needs all the help she can get. Plus, there’s another possible 20 rubies up for grabs over there! Please remember not to spoil the mystery for anyone else if you complete it first. If you have a question about one of the clues, ask a staff member, rather than asking it publicly. If you can’t complete a task for accessibility reasons, please do reach out to one of us and we’ll gladly provide an alternative that suits you. All tasks are due at the end of Gryfftoberfest, on October 31st at 11:59 PM HOL-time. Help us save the celebration and find the Fat Lady! Head over to The Common Room forum and speak to Sir Nick to get started.

If you have any general questions about Gryfftoberfest, please ask them here and we'll get back to you ASAP. If your question is about a specific task or clue, please ask a staff member via a private message to avoid giving away any details to anyone else.

You arrive in the 7th floor corridor that leads to Gryffindor tower to find it in uproar. The Fat Lady has gone missing! She’s just walked out of her frame without explanation, right before the party to open the Gryfftoberfest celebrations. Everyone is being asked to join the search. The air is alive with speculation about what might have lead her to disappear and what might happen if she can’t be located. A very distressed looking portrait arrives, ringing her hands and appealing for people to follow her and conduct a thorough search of the portraits on the 7th floor. The Situation: Organise yourselves into searching parties and accompany The Fat Ladies good friend, Violet, on a thorough search of the 7th floor. Look for the Fat Lady in every single portrait you can find and see if you can find any clues to what’s gone on as well. Locations: You may search anywhere on the 7th floor of Hogwarts Castle (you may create rooms, though please describe them well so others can keep up and don’t make them too outlandish.). Try to move slowly enough that people can keep track of where you are at any one time. Note: You may not roleplay actually finding the Fat Lady as her location is the key to solving the broader Gryfftoberfest mystery. Please head on over to the Gryfftoberfest forum for more details on that. Make sure you've read the guidelines before jumping in. Have fun!

I'm delighted to announce that this years winner is.... (drum roll) ' 'Mischief (will be) managed!' by Maxim Trevelyan of Ravenclaw. Congratulations Maxim! In second place we have 'Roaring royalty' by our own Iverian Gnash and in third 'Where there's a wand, there's a way' by Prof. Tarma Black of Hufflepuff. Very well done both! Thank you for all those wonderful motto suggestions. Here's to a Gryfftoberfest full of mischief!

Sky ponders this for a second. "Don't take on more than you can handle. At the same time though, don't be afraid to try things out. Your first year is the time to discover what you enjoy and what you have a flare for. Don't worry if you're not good at everything, nobody is." She smiles slightly, "I melted a cauldron once, so it's safe to say I'll never teach potions."

"This is my first year," Sky explains, "I only graduated from Hogwarts a few months ago. It's strange, it feels simultaneously like yesterday and forever ago. Prof. Will Lestrange and I were students together." She taps her fingers absently on the handle of her wand. "It's intensely odd seeing all this from a professor's point of view now." She cranes her neck, trying to make sure that a boy at the Ravenclaw table isn't hiding an ever-bashing boomerang under his copy of the Daily Prophet. "I chose what I teach, though obviously only a certain number of core subjects are vacant at any one time. I teach some additional classes on literature and stuff like that, those I created myself and the headmaster kindly let me teach them." She returns her attention fully to Arkadia. "I help out around the Library as well. There's no rest for the wicked, I guess."

"That's certainly true," Sky says, stowing her wand back in her robes, the floor now spotless again. She reaches up to smoothe her hair and let's out a long, steadying breath. Breakfast has already been far more eventful than she could have imagined "Are you looking forward to class? Or is that a silly question." Man, she only graduated last year but already she's sounding so boring and out of touch. She better raise her game if she doesn't want everyone nodding off in her first lesson.

"It certainly doesn't fit the impression of cool and collected competence that I was going for for the first morning back," Sky agrees, smiling broadly at the helpful first year. She begins to clean off her robes while using her wand to tidy up the mess on the floor. "I think they get a bit disorientated with all the people and distraction, poor things," she adds, nodding to the bedraggled owl.

Sky calls goodbye to Maxim as he leaves. She hands out the last few Gryffindor time tables and begins to hurry towards the staff table. Maybe she'll finally get a coffee now... if Tarma's not drunk the lot. She smiles and waves to new and familiar faces alike as she makes her way through the room. She's just passing the hufflepuff table when an owl crash lands in a huge bowl of cornflakes, spraying them everywhere. She gives a very un-dignified squeak of surprise, recovers herself and then rolls up the sleeves of her robes to deal with the mess.

You have just over 12 hours before the curtain goes down at 11:59 PM HOL-time tonight. Make sure you get all those last minute tasks turned in!

Gill the firecrab is a toasty creature

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The 30th and final question: What does a person known as a swing do in a production?

Question 29: What is the purpose behind opera glasses?

Get those mottoes in! You have just over 24 hours before the deadline. Don't miss out on your chance to put your stamp on this years Gryfftoberfest :~D

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Glad to have you here, Septima! I'm also a writer :D

Apologies' for the lateness of this question Question 23: What is the name of the male protagonist from the ballet Swan Lake?

It's almost time for the curtain to go up! Only there's one problem, Professor Decibel is in a terrible state. She's lost her clipboard of notes and is now panicking that not everything has been seen to. We need to help remind her of all the preparations that have been done, who oversaw them and when they happened so she doesn't swoon on us just before show time. To help avert this final crisis so the show can go on, solve the following logic puzzle: 5 Gryffindor staff members were each assigned different areas to help out in (including costumes). Figure out what they were assigned to, how long they worked on it for (one of which was 4 hours), and what day they finished on (Monday through Friday). Adaleine, the person who did lighting, the person who took 6 hours, the person who took 8 hours, and the person who finished on Wednesday are all different people. Ivey spent 2 hours less on her assignment then Dario, who finished on Tuesday. Lorainia designed the set, but not on a Monday. The person who finished on a Monday took 2 hours. Either Adaleine or Sky took 5 hours. The one who didn’t was assigned props. Ivey finished the day after Sky, and the day before Lorainia. Either the person who finished on Tuesday or the person who finished on Thursday was assigned sound. Please send your solution to Adaleine Shuster in a PM titled 'Magical Theatricals - Logic puzzle' by 11:59 PM HOL-time on September 30th. You'll earn 15 rubies. Puzzle by Ada

Oh no! The entire orchestra is going on strike because someone disarranged their instruments! Prof. Decibel will be very, very upset if she finds out. We need to move everybody’s instruments back to where they were as soon as we can before she finds out. Link to larger image: https://i.postimg.cc/L6JxN81z/Sudoku.png Send your completed sudoku to Adaleine Shuster in a PM titled Magical Theatricals- Sudoku by 30th September at 11:59 pm HOL time, and get 15 rubies when you do. Post by Ada, puzzle by Ivey.