Games of Strength
"Everyone, let's welcome the Leprechauns of Ireland!" the commentator shouted as the tiny creatures flew out, releasing waves of gold toward the audience. They were Ireland's mascots.
The twins quickly grabbed as many coins as they could until Einar spoke.
"These coins seem fake. They're created with magic, so they'll probably disappear," he said, examining one of the coins with interest before quickly discarding it as useless.
"Really?"
"Damn it!" both of them said, throwing the coins to the ground angrily.
Ron had also grabbed quite a few and tossed them away sadly while Harry patted his shoulder in sympathy.
"Now we also have to welcome Bulgaria's mascots, right? Everyone, give a big welcome to the Veelas of Bulgaria!" the commentator shouted again as beautiful women gracefully danced onto the field, driving all the men crazy.
Many even wanted to jump off their stands to run toward them. Ron and Harry were no exception, and the others had to hold them back to prevent them from doing so.
"How vulgar," Hermione said with some irritation.
"Calm down."
Einar cast a spell over them and, just in case, over everyone else, who had more psychological resistance but still looked a bit distracted.
Ron and Harry, now embarrassed, wished they could hide in a hole while the twins laughed at them.
"You need to work on your magical resistance," Einar said with a smile.
The match then began, and at one point, the Veelas, furious at the opposing team continuing to win penalties, started a fight against the Leprechauns. The Veelas revealed a horrible appearance, completely different from the beautiful image they had shown before. Even the referee lost his mind for a moment and stopped the game to walk towards the Veelas with a goofy smile.
But he was quickly restrained, and the match continued, with Ireland taking the lead by a lot of points. However, Viktor Krum, ignoring his team's point deficit, caught the Golden Snitch, ending the match and, obviously, losing.
After that, the two teams received their prizes from a chubby, arrogant man who seemed to be the Minister of Magic of England, who stood beside the ministers of Bulgaria and Ireland.
Afterward, everyone returned to their tents.
"That was fun. Especially... we won the bets!" the twins said excitedly.
"We're going to find Ludo, go ahead," they said as they ran off.
"How about you kids go for a walk? It's still early," Arthur encouraged the youngsters to have fun. After all, there were always plenty of things to do after the match. "Keep an eye on the kids," he told the older ones.
"Sure," they all replied.
So, they went for a walk as a group. But at some point, they lost Percy, who saw Barty Crouch and quickly ran after him like a little fanboy.
Bill and Charlie got distracted by a women's beauty competition.
"Why are you still with us?" Ron asked when he saw Einar walking beside them.
"Someone has to keep an eye on you, according to your father," Einar said calmly. He was already getting used to Ron. Though he only tolerated him because he was part of the Weasley family.
"Why are you always so unpleasant?" Ginny said, starting to get annoyed.
"I'm not unpleasant, I just asked," Ron said quickly.
"Come on, it looks like something's going on over there," Harry said, trying to change the subject.
They all walked over to where there seemed to be a large, muscular man standing in front of a crowd.
"Come on, who dares to challenge the great Pali to a tug-of-war?" said a smaller man, holding up a sack of money. "You only need to bet 10 Galleons, and you can take all the gold collected," he said, tempting people with the sound of the money in the bag.
"That man looks like a monster, it's impossible," Ron said, eyeing the money bag with temptation. Though he didn't realize from the start that he didn't even have 10 Galleons to bet.
"Einar broke a chimney with his bare hands. How about you give it a try?" Harry said, looking at Einar with a bit of excitement.
"Mmm, sure," Einar replied calmly.
"Oh, we've got a new challenger. Are you sure... kid?" the man said, looking at Einar's mask with confusion.
"Sure. It's just 10 coins, right?" Einar said as he pulled the coins from his pocket.
"Oh, feeling pretty confident, huh?" the man replied with a grin as he took the coins and put them in the sack. "You just have to grab the other end of the rope and try to move the Great Pali. If you manage to pull him out of the ring, you win. Easy, right?" the man explained quickly.
Einar simply nodded as he grabbed the rope.
"You don't look strong, kid. Don't hurt yourself," said the man they called the Great Pali.
Hearing those words, Einar, who had been quite unconcerned, turned serious.
Ron, feeling that, shivered.
"He's not going to summon that storm again here, is he?" Ron said, looking at Einar with some fear.
"Begin," the man said quickly.
Einar grabbed the rope with both hands and pulled with all his strength. Everyone watched as the massive man, nearly 2 meters tall, was sent flying backward behind Einar and crashed to the ground with a loud thud.
"Looks like I won," Einar said, staring at the other guy who was still looking at him in shock.
"Y-yes," he replied, handing over the bag of gold he had in his hand.
"That was amazing!" Harry said excitedly as the other two girls also approached Einar. Even Ron had to admit it now.
"Come on, let's keep looking for games," Einar said with a smile.
As Einar and the others following him continued wandering around the area, they found several strength-based games, all of which Einar dominated, collecting quite a bit of money along the way while everyone had fun.
By the time they returned, Einar had gathered up to 1,000 Galleons just from games.
"Here. This is for your company," Einar said as he handed 100 Galleons to each of them.
"No, no..." everyone said, trying to refuse.
"Just take it. You all stayed with me while looking for games. Besides, it's not exactly the most legal way to earn money," Einar said calmly, to which everyone thanked him since they knew Einar wouldn't take "no" for an answer.
Ron no longer found Einar so irritating.
When they arrived at the tents, it was already quite late. The twins, Bill, and Charlie had returned later with big smiles full of happiness, though Percy seemed rather grumpy.
"Were you able to get your winnings?" Einar asked the twins with a smile.
"That's right, look!" Fred said, showing his big bag of gold.
"With this, we'll have enough to open our shop!" George said excitedly.
Einar stared at a coin sticking out of the bag.
"Mm, sorry for being the bearer of bad news, but I think you've been scammed," he said quickly.
"WHAT?!" the twins said, looking at Einar in shock.
"They're the same coins you picked up during the match," Einar said as Fred and George quickly opened the bag to examine the coins. But some of them started to disappear slowly.
"Nooo!" they both shouted as they tried to grab the money that was vanishing from their hands.
"Hahaha, while you guys were getting scammed, we made a lot of money from the games," Ron said proudly, as if he were the one who had won everything.
Fred and George, upon hearing that, took their frustration out on Ron and started throwing all the joke items they had in their bags at him.
"Ouch! Stop it!" Ron shouted as he ran away to escape.
"That's enough, you two. Stop bothering your brother. It's time to sleep," Arthur said as he walked into the tent.
"Are you sure, Einar, that you want to sleep alone in your tent? We still have space between Ron and Harry," Arthur asked.
"I'm fine. I usually have crazy dreams. I wouldn't want to accidentally decapitate one of them," Einar said with a smile.
Hearing that, both Harry and Ron trembled with fear.
"It was a joke," Einar quickly said.
"Coming from him, it doesn't sound like a joke at all," Ron said while Harry nodded quickly.
Then, everyone quickly went to where they were supposed to sleep. Ginny and Hermione went to a smaller tent, Einar to another one, and the others to the Weasley tent.
"---------------
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