Chapter 33.
On May 29, Professor Sprout announced at breakfast that the Mandrakes were finally ready for harvest, and that evening all the petrified victims could be cured.
Sitting in the corner of the Gryffindor table, Soren quietly observed Ginny, who was hesitating to speak to Harry. Just as she was about to muster the courage to tell the truth, she was interrupted by Percy Weasley, causing Ginny to hurriedly flee. Soren quietly followed her without alerting anyone.
With the experience from the last time, Soren easily cast the Disillusionment Charm on himself and followed Ginny to the girls' bathroom at the end of the third floor. He watched as Ginny hesitated for a long time before finally opening her diary, and a plume of smoke rose from the book, slowly taking on a human shape.
Although the figure appeared blurry, Soren could still confirm that it was the remnants of Tom Riddle from his younger days.
Ginny cried out in anguish, accusing Tom of summoning the basilisk to harm people, and attempted to cast ineffective spells on Tom's remnant. Then, with a cold laugh, Tom forcibly attached himself to the struggling Ginny. Just as Tom was about to control Ginny to write on the stone wall outside according to the original plot, he suddenly felt an inexplicable alertness, looked towards Soren's direction, raised his wand, and shouted, "Who's there!"
Clearly, Tom did not see through Soren's invisibility magic, but his exceptionally keen intuition was still able to sense something amiss.
The opponent was Voldemort from his younger days, and Soren dared not underestimate him in the slightest. Taking advantage of his invisibility, Soren struck first, using a silent spell-casting technique combined with a momentary double-cast technique, firing off a disarming spell and a knock-back spell in quick succession, both spells racing towards Tom.
who was Tom? even at such close range, he could manipulate Ginny's body to dodge the disarming spell, and while trying to avoid the knock-back spell, he was unexpectedly hit head-on by the sudden turn of the knock-back spell and was sent flying. Tom fell heavily and, in a panic, opened the entrance to the Chamber of Secrets with Parseltongue, hurriedly escaping inside without even taking the time to close the entrance.
Soren took out his Night Star cloak from his pocket, put it on, gripped his wand tightly, and rushed into the entrance of the chamber.
Following the winding water pipes, Soren descended steeply, reaching a bright water pipe exit. He cast a cushioning charm on himself, leaped, and landed straight on the damp ground.
Before him was a dark stone tunnel, large enough for a person to stand inside, and Tom had already vanished.
Soren cast a lumos spell and proceeded forward through the tunnel. At the end of the tunnel was a long, dimly lit room filled with thick stone pillars, intricately carved with various entwined serpents, towering to support the ceiling that melted into the darkness above, casting long, eerie shadows throughout the room.
Soren raised his wand slightly and silently moved among the coiling stone pillars.
When he reached the space between the last pair of pillars, a massive statue, as tall as the room itself, appeared before him, pressed against the dark wall behind it. The slightly green stone gave it an air of eerie terror.
He tilted his head back to see the face of the statue—a wrinkled, monkey-like face with sparse long whiskers that almost dragged down to the hem of the stone wizard's robe. Two large feet stood firmly on the smooth floor of the room. Between the statue's feet lay Ginny Weasley's small figure, face down.
Tom's blurry remnant of a soul leaned against the nearest stone pillar, locking eyes with Soren as he approached, watching each other warily. "I thought everything I did to control this silly girl was secret, but I didn't expect to be discovered so soon. Who are you? Did Dumbledore send you?"
Soren let out a cold laugh. "I know who you are, Tom. There are more than just Dumbledore who can deal with you!"
Tom showed a curious expression. "You really know who I am?"
Soren contemptuously replied, "Aren't you just the remnant of Voldemort from his youth, left behind by the murders he committed to create Horcruxes?"
What? Voldemort? Murder? Horcrux?
Tom had seen information about Soren in Ginny's memories—top of his class, published articles in various academic journals, regarded as a prized student by two professors... He was no less impressive than Tom in his day, but he was just a second-year student. Tom had never thought that his greatest secret would be seen through by this little wizard in front of him, revealing an expression of disbelief.
Soren, however, did not have the bad habit of wasting words with his enemies; everything he just said was to distract Tom for this moment!
Soren knew that the spells he understood would be ineffective against Tom in his remnant state. In that split second, he summoned the diary to his hand with lightning speed while a pure silver dagger, long hidden in his sleeve, slid into his other hand. In that thousandth of a second, Soren decisively infused magic into the dagger and plunged it into the diary!
Tom let out a terrifying, prolonged, eardrum-piercing scream, twisting and struggling, his arms flailing wildly, glaring at Soren with hatred as he hissed a final phrase in Parseltongue before dissipating into smoke.
Soren did not relax his guard; Tom's last snippet of Parseltongue was likely a spell to summon the Basilisk.
Sure enough, the enormous stone face of Slytherin began to move. Its mouth opened wider and wider until it formed a massive black hole. The Basilisk slowly slithered out from within the statue, its body a vibrant green, glistening with the unique luster of a venomous snake, its girth as thick as an oak tree trunk, its upper body stretching high into the air.
From the first day of school, Soren had been contemplating tactics and spells to deal with the Basilisk. At this moment, although he felt nervous, he wasn't particularly afraid. Just as the Basilisk slid out of the statue, Soren seized the fleeting opportunity to cast his long-prepared Flash Spell!
The Flash Spell was inspired by flash-bangs from the Muggle world, and it took him considerable effort to develop it.
Blinded by the bright light, the Basilisk fell into Soren's trap, allowing him to execute the next move in his strategy—The Conjunctivitis Spell! With a quick double cast, his shooting accuracy, honed since he was four years old, did not disappoint him. Even though the Basilisk was thrashing its massive body from side to side, both Conjunctivitis Spells accurately struck its eyes, rendering it temporarily blind and successfully neutralising its most threatening weapon.
The blinded Basilisk did not lose its target, however. Its tongue had an extremely keen sense of smell, and between its eyes and nostrils were two heat pits that could sense infrared radiation. Even without its ability to kill with its eyes, it continued to charge wildly, sweeping its tail back and forth in an attempt to crush Soren with its massive size. But Soren, having anticipated the situation, was far from unprepared.
Soren unleashed another unique spell he had created—the Sonic Boom Spell. Like the previous Flash Spell, this Sonic Boom Spell was also inspired by sound bombs from the Muggle world.
While reading the original story in his past life, Soren had long noticed that modern wizards' attack methods were overly simplistic and monotonous. Most wizards merely competed in the destructive power of their spells and their own dodging ability during battles, with little tactical application or strategic layout. Only a few masters, like Dumbledore and Voldemort, would employ various transformation spells to attack.
With his understanding of the Muggle world, Soren mimicked the combat methods of special forces and designed a series of tactical spells.
He first based the Flash Spell on a fluorescent spell, enhancing its brightness to create the blinding Flash Spell. Then he based the Sonic Spell on sound amplification, raising the volume and frequency to the limit to develop the Sonic Boom Spell, which produced a loud noise to stun the opponent.
Soren believed that using various tactical combinations of spells to flexibly respond to complex situations was the essence of true wizard combat; simply shooting spells and dodging them was too childish.
As the Sonic Boom Spell exploded in the air with a high-frequency blast, the Basilisk was stunned into a state of immobility.
Soren transformed the pure silver dagger in his hand into a gleaming silver sword with a transformation spell, shouting "Waddiwasi!" He hurled the dagger like a javelin, and under the amplification of the "Waddiwasi" spell, the dagger streaked through the air like a meteor, accurately piercing through the Basilisk's brain between its two eyes. The Basilisk writhed in pain, rolling on the ground a few times before coming to a stop.
After putting in so much effort and risking his life to fight, it was finally time to reap the rewards.
Soren snapped his fingers to summon Dobby, and together they dismembered the Basilisk's corpse. Snake skin, snake eyes, snake gallbladder, snake blood, snake venom, snake horn, snake fangs—each was a precious material, and he didn't even spare the dozens of kilograms of snake meat.
The materials were stored in Newt's suitcase space; most could be directly placed in the laboratory, while some needed refrigeration and were stored in a specially opened cave in the snowy mountains.
[Basilisk corpse materials acquired!]
Before leaving, Soren also remembered to pick up Tom Riddle's diary from the ground, soaking it in snake venom for a while before placing it in a special container to take with him.
Soren instructed Dobby to take him and Ginny out of the Chamber of Secrets using apparition, returning to the washroom on the third floor.
At this point, the entrance to the Chamber had already closed, and from the outside, it appeared completely normal. It seemed that the entrance would automatically close after a period of time once opened.
Soren waved his hand, and with a bang, Dobby left first with the two of them, apparating away.
Just as Soren was stepping out of the washroom with Ginny in his arms, he unexpectedly ran into Harry and Ron, who had just arrived. The two looked at Soren, who was holding Ginny, and both drew their wands, facing Soren with wary expressions.
Although they didn't know about the monster in the Chamber of Secrets, Harry successfully deduced that the student who died fifty years ago due to the Chamber was Moaning Myrtle, and that the entrance to the Chamber was likely in this washroom. At this moment, Soren was standing here holding the unconscious Ginny...
Seeing the expressions on their faces, Soren immediately understood what these two kids were thinking; they must have taken him for the heir of Slytherin.
Facing the one who had previously overpowered him, Harry mustered his courage and asked with difficulty, "What's going on? Why are you and Ginny here?"
Before Soren could respond, Ron, who was anxious about Ginny's safety, suddenly noticed that Soren was holding Ginny with both hands—he had no wand!
Images of the humiliating moments Soren had caused him over the past two years flashed through Ron's mind, filling him with rage. He let out a furious shout and cast the Slug-Vomiting Charm at Soren! However, Ron seemed to have forgotten that his wand was malfunctioning, and instead of successfully casting the spell, it emitted a series of strange popping sounds before suddenly exploding!
The explosion was quite serious, sending Ron crashing against the washroom wall and rendering him unconscious; Harry was also knocked to the ground by the blast, landing in a disheveled heap. Ginny was very fortunate, as she was protected by the Shield Charm that Soren quickly cast, leaving both Soren and Ginny unharmed.
At that moment, a soft groan sounded—Ginny had woken up. She looked around in confusion before turning to Soren, who had been holding her. Soren, showing no embarrassment, gently set Ginny down, but she seemed to misunderstand and thought she was the cause of the current "situation," and began to cry in panic.
The sound of the explosion had also attracted Professor McGonagall and Professor Snape. Without saying anything, Snape took the unconscious Ron to the hospital wing, while McGonagall led them back to her office—shortly after Soren entered the Chamber, Ginny's roommates had informed the professors about Ginny's disappearance.
After searching every corner of the castle without success, the professors had no choice but to notify the board of governors and Ginny's parents, and then Dumbledore returned. Professor McGonagall clearly thought it was more appropriate for him to handle the situation since he had just arrived.
As they left, a muffled rumble of collapse echoed from the Chamber, causing the entire ground to tremble slightly.
*****
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