I, Hogwarts Second Time Around.

Chapter 511 Supreme Will

(This chapter has been revised)

Deep within the forbidden forest, a thick fog hung in the air, as if an unseen entity was quietly awakening. Whenever the wind blew, the fog surged like an awakened ghost, bringing with it a chilling cold.

In the mist, some strange shapes could be vaguely seen; they seemed to be wriggling and deforming, yet remained elusive.

Occasionally, a mournful cry would break the seclusion of the forest, but it would soon be drowned out by the gradually fading wind and snow.

Irving didn't encounter a single wizard along the way.

Indeed, in this kind of weather, most people would love to carry a stove on their backs.

He entered the shed through the gap left in the third grade.

The room's furnishings remained unchanged since Lupin graduated.

It was messy and gloomy, with peeling wallpaper, stains all over the floor, and broken furniture.

In a corner of the living room, there were still dark red marks on the floor that couldn't be removed.

The culprit who left the traces—the corpse—had long since disappeared.

Irving thought of the vampire who died here, a passerby whose name he still didn't know.

It seems to be some kind of progenitor of vampires.

It's strange, really.

Vampires are not considered dark creatures in the Harry Potter world. Apart from prohibiting vampires from biting other wizards or Muggles, there are almost no legal restrictions on them, not counting implicit discrimination.

For example, the wizard singer Rocken Deis, who is a vampire and is very popular among witches, had his song "Beside You" stay at the top of the music charts for 19 consecutive weeks.

Vampires don't just drink blood; they can eat other foods and can bond with wizards and Muggles. There are people in the Ministry of Magic who have good relationships with vampires.

But in recent years, more and more vampires have turned to Voldemort, and the reasons behind this are unknown to anyone.

Unlike werewolves, vampires, while also discriminated against by veteran wizards, generally enjoy a healthy social standing and have no reason to follow Voldemort in order to improve their social status.

Perhaps there are other reasons, deeper, darker reasons.

From the shadows, a heavy voice rang out, "Did you orchestrate the battle in London?"

Suddenly, the dilapidated wall in front of Irving began to bulge, then the wallpaper cracked, and a person squeezed out of the bulge.

"Too bad, it wasn't me." Owen raised an invisible barrier of light with his right hand, keeping the dust out. "A Muggle scheme."

"Impossible!" Bellatrix stared at him coldly, a strange rage flickering in her eyes. She felt humiliated.

Suddenly, strands of silver metal, woven from ancient runes, spread at an alarming speed from her right arm to her shoulder, and then to her neck.

A look of horror crossed Bellatrix's face as she tried to pull at the silver metal wires with her left hand, but they seemed alive, writhing beneath her skin as if trying to devour her life.

She suddenly collapsed, her face turning deathly pale, her lips trembling, unable to utter a sound. Someone had grabbed her neck.

"You want to kill me?" Owen lowered his gaze and stared at the woman. "You should be smarter; at least don't let such a thought pop into your head so directly."

Bellatrix, kneeling on the ground, clenched her fists, closed her eyes tightly, and quickly calmed the agitation in her heart. A few seconds later, she took a deep breath, and the threads on her body caused by the Unbreakable Curse gradually disappeared.

"You shouldn't have ambushed the Death Eaters." She struggled to her feet, frowning as she looked at Owen. "Some of them are people I'm trying to win over."

"What does this have to do with me?" The boy's emerald green eyes gazed at her face with a flippant look. "Did I send them to their deaths?"

"And one last time—I want to reiterate that everything was arranged by the Muggles themselves; I didn't interfere."

"That's Dumbledore!" Bellatrix declared, her face heavy with resentment. "Otherwise, it would be those stupid beasts."

"Let me correct you on one point." Owen strolled leisurely over the screaming shack. Through the broken walls he had come through, the wind howled in, the snow fell heavier and heavier, and all that could be heard was the echo of wailing. The white death god had completely taken over the bodies of the creatures outside, forcing them to rush frantically toward anything that emitted heat.

The boy's long silver hair danced wildly in the wind, and his emerald green eyes were like the eternally frozen ice beneath the ten-thousand-meter-deep ice sheet of Antarctica—clear, yet chilling to the bone.

"You're not smart." The wailing sound of the wind and snow was finally blocked by Owen using his wand to conjure a door with a glass window. The gap was sealed.

"Wizards are not smart, and Muggles are not weak. From a rational and objective point of view, because wizards can use magic, they can solve many difficult things by waving their wands. This leads to most people not being good at using their brains and having almost no basic logical reasoning ability."

"When we were in first year, Snape once gave us a test, a logical deduction problem about potions and poisons."

Owen said casually, flicking out a ball of fireflies. "On the other hand, Muggles, because they have to rely on their intelligence to solve many problems, use their brains frequently and are naturally smarter."

For example, even with magic, a wizard can't build a bridge across the sea, but a Muggle can create one without magic. It's obvious who's smarter.

"So, the truth is, the stupid animal you thought killed the person you were trying to win over."

Bellatrix remained silent, her expression showing more disdain than anything else, clearly not believing the horrific "truths" Owen was telling her.

"The power of wizards is supreme, and Muggles are nothing but lowly creatures," she emphasized. But it was precisely this reiteration that proved the fear in her heart; she was simply unwilling to accept it.

"Heh—" Owen chuckled eerily, "Drowning with this mindset isn't so bad, at least you don't have to accept the silent roar when your worldview collapses."

"Alright—" He raised his smooth, jade-like hand, waved it, and said, "Where's Voldemort? Is he dead?"

Upon hearing this, Bellatrix suddenly frowned, her emotions becoming somewhat agitated. After a long pause, she replied, "Dead."

"Dead? Are you sure?"

"When the Muggle weapons fell, a mile or so was engulfed in flames; no one could withstand that kind of attack. If he had escaped beforehand, the month should have passed. But he didn't—"

"Tsk tsk—" It wasn't good news. Owen rested his chin on his hand, just as he had said at Harry's bedside, with concern.

"You didn't see him die directly. Strictly speaking, he disappeared in the sunlight."

"Interpret it however you like." Bellatrix's body trembled slightly. She had witnessed that scene. In temperatures of five or six thousand degrees, what difference was there between disappearance and death?

"Then how do you survive?" Owen suddenly looked at Bellatrix. "Don't you have Voldemort by your side all the time?"

Voldemort's death had some benefits; at least it slowed down his search for the Tower of Gods, and Grandpa was safer in Canada.

“No—” Bellatrix shook her head, “I was exposed. Just those few days. So I didn’t follow him.”

"Oh, you're lucky then," Owen said casually. "But Voldemort will definitely come back to life; he's not dead yet."

"So, what about Gaunt's ring? Do you have any clues?"

"no."

"But there will be clues later."

"after?"

"If someone helps to revive him, then that person should have some information."

"Really?" Owen sensed the perfunctory tone in Bellatrix's voice.

Yes, she remained loyal to the Dark Lord. Their common enemy was Voldemort, who had made a deal with the Outer Gods. She naturally wasn't willing to fully commit to helping him search for the other Horcruxes, because Tom needed to keep one so he could live forever. A pathetic life.

"Heh—" He turned to Bellatrix and murmured in a strange tone, "I believe the most merciful gift in this world is that people cannot understand the universe. Most people spend their lives on a quiet island called 'ignorance,' isolated in a black ocean surrounded by layers of miasma. Many people, including you, are blindly sailing on this ocean, completely unaware of the disaster they are about to create."

A mocking smile played on his lips as he conjured the Phoenix Wand with a flick of his wrist, pointing it at Bellatrix and declaring, "Shatter to pieces!"

"boom--"

The gray spell tore through the air and collided with an invisible shield.

Bellatrix stared wide-eyed at Irving in disbelief.

He stared intently at his right hand.

The same silver threads also appeared on his wrists, spreading like blood vessels towards his heart and neck.

But this stretch only reached his forearm before stopping.

It felt like something was blocking it.

"Why?" Bellatrix murmured, staring blankly at Owen.

"The way a contract is made must conform to the laws of nature." The boy put away his wand. "Just like a stream cannot make a contract with the ocean, because a stream will eventually flow into the ocean."

He stared at Bella with a half-smile. All magic will eventually return to ancient magic; this is an eternal truth determined by the principle of reversion.

Unless Bella used the same ancient magic as he did at the time to form an unbreakable curse with him.

Otherwise—it would be destined to be just a one-sided agreement.

“The same,” he said, pacing around Bellatrix, “what natural law do you think was used to heal Tom’s broken soul? Was it that river? That sea? Where did it originate?”

"you"

"Focus on your work, or you'll find that you lose some things much faster than you gain them."

With that, Irving stepped forward and pushed open the door, letting in the wind and snow once again.

But Bellatrix felt something far colder than the wind and snow.

She looked up and glanced one last time at the figure that had disappeared into the wind and snow.

Suddenly, she recalled a few years ago on the Greek island of Mothrace, in a mysterious tower, where she had only caught a glimpse of the ancient madness. Just one glance was enough to plunge her into an icy abyss, leaving her unable to eat or sleep.

That marked the beginning of the Dark Lord's descent into madness and self-destruction.

It was that cunning and evil god who used ingenious lies to capture souls through priests.

She thought she had escaped from that cage that felt like falling into an abyss, that she was free.

But now...

In Bellatrix's increasingly maddening memories, those two fleeting figures slowly overlapped.

Ultimately, they merged into one.

In an instant, those memories, those towering stone pillars in the massive tower built of rugged boulders, were covered with green, viscous, towering stone pillars, exuding a strange and inexplicable malice and evil, and on those stone pillars, endless hieroglyphs covered their surface.

She still remembers the maniacal laughter of the African priest, Lawiyu, when he first saw these bizarre characters.

Behind that laughter was a string of ancient prayers, older than the magnificent pyramids of ancient Egypt or the beautiful gardens of ancient Babylon, blasphemous words recorded on clay tablets unearthed in the Mesopotamian plain.

—The supreme will was there then, the supreme will is there now, and the supreme will will be there forever.

The Quidditch match is over.

Hogwarts has fallen into a period of calm again.

As December arrived and Christmas approached, Slughorn announced that he would be hosting a Christmas party, inviting a group of famous wizards to attend. He would also invite some junior wizards, and each invitee could bring a companion.

Unlike the Christmas ball held two years ago due to the championship, this year's party is private.

It is not made public to everyone.

But it was precisely because of its privacy, and because Slughorn promised to invite a group of renowned wizards from the wizarding world, that the ball became popular among the younger wizards.

Everyone wants to broaden their horizons.

Moreover, the atmosphere in the magical world has been too tense lately, and everyone needs to relax.

But none of this matters to Owen. Ever since he made that outrageous remark on the Hogwarts Express, Slughorn has been completely disoriented and avoids him like the plague. Unsurprisingly, Slughorn won't invite him. Never.

But would they even care?

The castle has regained some of its vitality, and the DA's gatherings are proceeding as normal.

The last gathering before Christmas.

It was an ordinary day.

This exchange mainly focuses on experiences in casting spells without a staff.

Compared to these obscure and difficult techniques, the young wizards were much more interested in the magnificent and wondrous Origin Magic.

But because of the weather, Irving didn't want to teach them.

If you want to practice Origin Magic, you can't stay in the Room of Requirement; you have to go outside.

And this—Irving refused.

The frigid weather made him decide not to leave the warm fireplace any longer.

no way!

Just then, in the meantime, as Harry was teaching Neville how to properly cast the Levitation Charm without a wand, a member of the DA rushed into the Room of Requirement.

He brought a message.

"Hermione is back."

Miss Granger is back?

I haven't had time to revise the article lately, so it's been delayed. It will be back to normal tomorrow.

(End of this chapter)