Moscow, Bolshevik Iron Fist Tavern.

The old fireplace in the corner of the kitchen suddenly flared with green flames. This was one of the Tianming Corporation's secret strongholds. A few minutes earlier, the fireplace had automatically activated, connecting to the Hyperion hundreds of miles away.

Although the Russian magical world had declined, it didn't mean that it had become a gray area beyond the jurisdiction of magical governments.

In fact, due to the weakness of the local Ministry of Magic, the International Confederation of Wizards had a stronger ability to intervene and control this land than in the British and American magical worlds. Any signs of behavior that might expose the magical world would be detected almost immediately—after all, there had been more than one malicious incident of deliberately violating the Statute of Secrecy here.

To protect the safety of the liaison point, Tianming Corporation employees rarely lingered in this bar.

In most cases, this bar served the native wizards living in this city, as well as a small number of foreign wizards visiting as tourists, or humanoid magical creatures such as vampires, baba yagas, and Veela.

But today, this dormant fireplace was fully activated.

The old, mottled brick shell shed its dullness, and hundreds of magical runes rotated around the fireplace. Blue-white pillars of fire, like the breath of a fire dragon, spewed out from the fireplace, and dozens of grim-faced wizards arrived via the Floo Network.

These wizards were not the wrinkled old saints one might imagine.

In fact, a large portion of them were young wizards of a similar age to Gilderoy Lockhart. Their clothes and appearances were not much different from the elite Aurors of the Ministry of Magic: high-collared gray windbreakers, clean white shirts, and the latest fashionable top hats. The only difference was the strange badge pinned to their chests.

It was an unfamiliar emblem that had never appeared in the magical world. It seemed to be three arrows pointing towards an inner circle, with three slightly smaller, incomprehensible words printed next to the pattern: Secure, Contain, Protect.

The pillar of fire from the fireplace lasted for nearly two minutes, and the number of wizards arriving in the room reached about thirty.

This was a very large number in the magical world. If large wizarding gatherings such as the Quidditch World Cup were not considered, this number was about the same as the total number of Aurors in an ordinary department of the Ministry of Magic.

As the Tianming Corporation's person in charge of maintaining this safe house, Azak Essone frowned and silently watched this unfamiliar wizard force. He didn't understand the origins of these people. The only order he had received was to open the fireplace, connect it to the Hyperion, and ensure that this group of wizards would not be discovered by the local Ministry of Magic during their arrival.

On the other hand, these wizards showed no sign of wanting to explain anything to Azak Essone.

As the fireplace closed again, these wizards simply counted their numbers and then used Apparition to leave the room, as if they were magical puppets, without any extra information or communication throughout the entire process.

"I wonder what Grindelwald is planning again. So many young wizards, are they Miss's direct line... Is he planning to attack the Russian Ministry of Magic and wipe out all of the International Confederation of Wizards' strongholds in Russia in passing?"

Azak Essone muttered to himself, subconsciously clenching his sweaty palms.

Compared to the arrogant and foolish younger generation of Death Eaters from more than a decade ago, the sense of oppression brought by these young wizards was on a completely different level. Azak Essone felt as if he was looking at a tightly meshed metal gear mechanism.

What made him most uneasy was the ordinary-looking man standing at the front of the group.

Although this man was just standing there silently, in Azak Essone's magical feedback perception, that place was like a long-suppressed volcano, containing endless heat and power—in all the years before, situations like this had not been very common, only slightly weaker than Gellert Grindelwald.

……

Outside St. Petersburg, in a long-abandoned house.

Judging from the clean magical photo frame in the living room, this place once belonged to a wizard's residence, but it was suddenly abandoned for some reason. The repeating magical photograph showed a neat row of more than a dozen people.

On the far left of the photo, a young man with a thin face, freckles, and a distinctly British appearance, wearing an old blue coat, was constantly being pulled back into the line by the wizards next to him—except for him, everyone in the photo was Russian.

The team of wizards that had disappeared from the Bolshevik Iron Fist Tavern appeared in the living room of the house.

"Without realizing it… so many years have passed? Sorry, I'm late…"

The strange wizard who made Azak Essone feel uneasy raised his right hand and gently stroked the young version of himself in the photo—at that time, he was still a naive and simple Magizoologist, but now…

Newt Scamander sighed softly, suppressed his messy thoughts, and looked at the surrounding crowd.

These were all members of the Gringotts Wizarding Bank, carefully selected and assessed to form the "Team Zero Uncursers."

Or, more precisely, this was the secret organization created by Illyana to protect the world without being known to the outside world: the SCP Foundation (Special Containment Procedures Foundation).

Whether it was the Tianming Corporation, the Gringotts goblins, or even those "Quibbler" employees from Mr. Lovegood's house, most of these people were under Dumbledore's intentional or unintentional surveillance and attention. Even if Illyana cleverly used the Hyperion for long-range teleportation, she couldn't be sure that she could bypass Dumbledore and the Ministry of Magic's line of sight.

In the wizarding world, the destructive power of every adult wizard should not be underestimated.

Especially when they form a certain organization, this is an even more worrying thing. No matter what the reason for its existence, as long as it appears in the sunlight, it will inevitably arouse fear and hostility from other forces that do not belong to this group.

Although, in theory, Illyana had the right to mobilize all the Saints, she did not intend to put everything on Grindelwald's shoulders. Moreover, those old Saint grandpas were not suitable for handling some special matters concerning this land.

Hatred is the easiest thing to make people lose their minds and judgment.

The purpose of the SCP Foundation is to handle some things from an absolute standpoint, to rescue and protect from an angle that has nothing to do with any magical politics or secular laws, but only from the perspective of the most basic continuation of human civilization.

Only in this way can she not be bound by Grindelwald's and Dumbledore's values and do some naive and stupid things.

For example…

Newt Scamander took out a list and glanced at it, saying in a serious tone.

"There are only six hours, and there are a total of twenty-five targets who have been placed under house arrest because of the 'Wizarding Woe'. Our goal is very simple: to take them and their families away from here before the Ministry of Magic and the International Confederation of Wizards react."

"Code name—Silver Fang Project! Start!"

"Please, everyone!"