Hey gamers, how are you all doing? Continuing my adventure in Hogwarts Legacy and this time I decided to jump into the next mission on the list — a side quest involving Mr. Gladwin Moon and the mystery of a series of statues that have been causing him no small amount of grief. I'd been walking past this quest for a while letting it sit in the log while I focused on main story content and other priorities, but the time had come to finally sit down with the school caretaker and find out what exactly his problem with some stone sculptures is. And as it turned out, this mission had a very welcome surprise waiting at the very start that made the whole thing immediately worthwhile. So without further ado, let's get into it.
Talking to Mr. Moon and Getting the Full Story
Gladwin Moon is one of those characters in Hogwarts Legacy who exists at the edges of the school's official hierarchy — not a professor, not a student, but someone who knows every inch of the castle in a way that nobody else does because it's literally his job to maintain it. He's the caretaker, and when you find him and start the conversation it's immediately clear that he's been dealing with a situation that is genuinely driving him up a wall. Literally, in a sense. A series of stone statues called Demiguise Statues have been placed at various locations around the castle and the surrounding areas, and they're keeping doors locked that Moon needs access to in order to do his job properly. The statues only move at night, which makes the whole situation even more maddening from his perspective — he can see them, he knows they're the problem, but the timing of when they're actually interactable creates its own logistical nightmare.
He explains the full situation with the particular brand of frustrated exhaustion that someone develops when they've been dealing with a problem that nobody else takes seriously and that has no obvious solution. The statues are holding moon symbols that are connected to the locking mechanisms on certain doors throughout Hogwarts. Collect the moon from the statue, unlock the door, problem solved in theory — except the statues only reveal the moons at nighttime, which means if you show up during the day you're out of luck and have to wait. Moon asks for your help tracking down the statues and retrieving the symbols, and in exchange he offers to teach you something genuinely invaluable. That exchange is where the conversation gets very interesting very quickly.
Learning Alohomora
Before you even step out the door to start hunting statues, Moon delivers the reward upfront: he teaches you Alohomora, the Unlocking Charm. And if you understand what Alohomora does in the context of this game, you understand immediately why this is one of the most exciting spell unlocks in the entire playthrough. Alohomora opens locked doors. Not just any locked doors — the locked doors that are scattered throughout absolutely every area of Hogwarts and the surrounding regions, the ones with the lock-picking minigame that you've probably been staring at since the very beginning of the game wondering when you'd finally get to open them.
The Alohomora lock-picking minigame is simple but satisfying — you manipulate two concentric rings using the two analog sticks simultaneously, finding the right position for each one that makes a small gear mechanism inside the lock respond. Green light means you've found the correct position for that ring, so you hold it there while adjusting the other stick until the second ring also hits its position, and then the lock clicks open. The level of the lock determines how precise you need to be — basic locks have generous margins for error and open relatively quickly, while higher level locks require more careful and deliberate positioning. Mastery of the minigame comes fast with practice, and the sense of satisfaction every time a lock clicks open and a door swings wide never really goes away.
What Alohomora means practically is that the entire castle just opened up. Every locked door you've been mentally filing away as something to come back to later is now accessible. Rooms you've walked past a dozen times suddenly have interiors you can explore. Collectibles, chests, and secrets that were sitting behind those doors this whole time are now within reach. Getting this spell feels like the game handing you a master key to Hogwarts, which is exactly what it is, and the timing of getting it alongside a quest that sends you wandering through the castle at night creates the perfect opportunity to start putting it to use immediately.
Sneaking Into the Prefects' Bathroom and the Hospital Wing
The statue hunting takes you to two particularly interesting locations inside Hogwarts for this first batch — the Prefects' Bathroom and the Hospital Wing. Both of these are places that have specific after-hours access restrictions, which means the nighttime requirement for the statues fits perfectly with the unofficial nature of what you're doing. You're not supposed to be wandering the castle at night. You're definitely not supposed to be letting yourself into the Prefects' Bathroom as a non-prefect. And yet here we are, and Alohomora makes all of it possible.
The Prefects' Bathroom is worth taking a moment to actually appreciate once you get inside because it's a beautifully designed space — enormous compared to the standard student bathrooms, decorated with that specific kind of understated luxury that signals exclusivity without being ostentatious about it. The Demiguise Statue is visible once you're in and the moon symbol is retrievable without any complications, but it's the room itself that's the real attraction. Standing in there at night with nobody around, the castle quiet outside the windows, feels like one of those genuine Hogwarts experience moments that the game delivers really well when it's not rushing you toward an objective.
The Hospital Wing infiltration has a slightly different energy — there's something inherently tense about sneaking through a medical facility at night even when you know intellectually that nothing bad is going to happen. The wing is well-designed and fills in a part of the castle that you don't get much access to during regular gameplay. The statue there is easy enough to find with Revelio active, the moon symbol comes away cleanly, and you're back in the corridors of Hogwarts with another piece of the puzzle secured. The Disillusionment charm is useful throughout both of these sections if you want to move with extra confidence, though the castle is quiet enough at night that you can largely navigate without worrying too much about being spotted.
Finishing the Quest With Mr. Moon
Once you've collected the required Demiguise moons from both locations and returned them to Moon, the quest wraps up with a conversation that's warm and genuinely appreciative. He's the kind of character who doesn't make a big production out of being grateful but whose relief is obvious in how he carries himself compared to the frustrated exhaustion he was radiating at the start of the conversation. The doors are unlocked, his job is easier, and he's already thinking about the next batch of statues that need attention — because of course this isn't a one-time thing. This is the first of multiple rounds of Demiguise moon collecting that Gladwin Moon will ask for over the course of the game, with each subsequent round requiring you to upgrade your Alohomora to higher levels to open the more complex locks protecting the statues in harder-to-reach locations.
That progression system tied to Moon is actually one of the smarter pieces of game design in Hogwarts Legacy because it gives you a reason to keep engaging with the Demiguise statues scattered throughout the world rather than treating them as a one-and-done collectible. Every time you bring Moon enough moons to upgrade Alohomora to the next level, a new tier of locked doors opens up across the entire map, which in turn unlocks new exploration opportunities, new chests, new secrets, and new rooms you hadn't been able to access before. It's an ongoing incentive structure that keeps the castle feeling like it still has things to reveal even deep into the playthrough.
So gamers, the Caretaker's Lunar Lament was a really enjoyable quest and Alohomora alone makes it one of the most valuable side quests in the entire game in terms of what it unlocks for your ability to explore freely. The castle is more open now than it's ever been and I fully intend to take advantage of that in the sessions ahead. See you in the next post!
