Chapter 309
Felix saw a hazy green light, and he squinted as he saw the greenish light emanated from a stone basin that resembled a Pensieve, with a foot attached beneath it.
At his feet were clusters of crystal-like stones, messily stuck upside down on the ground, reflecting a faint bright light. Felix’s gaze swept around, the darkness around is too thick to be dissolved, and the death breath mixed together.
Sirius helped Kreacher up and raised his wand high, the light from the tip of his wand only illuminated a very small area, and even half of his face remained hidden in the darkness, making it impossible to see his face.
“We’re deep into the core of Voldemort’s base.” Sirius said quickly, with a bit of exuberance and the thrill of revenge in his voice: “But the atmosphere here is much more powerful, magic does not work well.”
“It’s just some magic that doesn’t work well,” Felix tilted his head, gesturing for him to look at Kreacher next to him, the tips of the house elf’s fingers lit up with a brighter light, “and it’s given me some inspiration … ”
Felix extinguished the light of his wand and blended completely into the darkness. They are only a few feet apart, but Sirius couldn’t see the slightest outline of him, and the silence around them felt eerie and his perception of danger grew steadily.
He heard Felix utter an odd sound, like some kind of language, with a strange rhythm and tempo, and right after that, he saw light. A large, soft, milky white light bloomed in front of him, revealing an insignificant dot in his eyes, but in an instant, the light poured down, spreading over the earth, the air, filling every inch of space within his sight.
The light is not blinding, Sirius can even look over Felix and see the scene behind him, he could not help but open his mouth wide – it is a boundless, mirror-like lake, he previously subconsciously ignored it, the lake is hidden in the darkness, calm and undisturbed, without a single ripple or sound, just like a flat open space.
But the most surprising thing about the lake is what’s in it, the corpses! Body after body floated beneath the mirror-like surface of the lake. He looked around, and the nearest body is just three or four feet away from him, as though it could touch his feet if it reached out.
Sirius could even make out the corpse’s soaked white face, like marble, wearing a brown top and blue or black pants … Sirius’ heart became cold, Regulus might have been dragged into the water like this …
“Wow!”
The dark lake rippled, and a hand poked out, “Watch out! This is not just a corpse, it’s an army of Inferius created by Voldemort!” Sirius backed off and warned loudly, “And, many of them are muggles … Damn, it’s that village! He destroyed a village in order to get a source of soldiers!”
Sirius had no time to curse as he raised his wand and prepared to strike back. It is not easy to restrain yourself while keeping an eye out not to accidentally injure the remains of Regulus.
But Felix said calmly, “It doesn’t look like they’re planning to attack us.” Sure enough, the Inferius did not climb up to the island in the center of the lake, but kept moving away from them, or to be precise, from the light source in Felix’s hand.
“Fear of light and fear of fire, these are the characteristics of the Inferius, and Voldemort will definitely restrict these two types of magic, plus the inability to Apparite, it’s really a brilliant plan …”
Felix said, “But just like he didn’t take into account the magic of house-elf, Voldemort didn’t consider the ancient magic that relies on runes to cast, of course – probably considered but couldn’t restrict it.”
Felix held up his hands, allowing a round white ball of light to slowly rise, the cave they were in is very high, look up you can not see the top of the cave, so the white ball of light simply rose to the highest point, and like the sun, shedding a warm light.
The darkness trap designed by Voldemort failed. Light and darkness tangled together and light eventually expelled the darkness, the entire cave illuminated like a day.
Now, they could completely see everything around them – they’re standing on a small island in the center of the lake, which is surrounded by a large black lake, only the black water has been illuminated with a transparent glow.
Hundreds of Inferius were holed up at the bottom of the lake, yet they could not evade the light, so they simply relied on their instincts to hide.
Felix said to Sirius and Kreacher, “Now you can go and find him, I want to study this crystal stand.” After a few seconds, he looked at the one man and the elf as he asked in surprise, “Do you need me to cast a Bubble-Head Charm on you?”
A Bubble-Head Charm could create a bubble over the caster’s head that resembled the shape of an inverted fish tank, allowing the wizard to explore underwater or hide from unpleasant smells, and it’s not some uncommon magic. As far as Felix knew, the Weasley twins were quite skilled at this magic.
“You’re not going to ask me to find him together, right? I don’t exactly recognize Regulus …”
Sirius waved his hand, he spent a lot of effort to apply a Bubble-Head Charm on himself and Kreacher as he said with a muffled voice, “Are you sure these Inferius won’t suddenly attack us?”
“As long as they’re still Inferius.” Felix scanned the whole area with a black and white perspective, “I don’t see any hidden magic, don’t worry.”
Kreacher immediately jumped into the lake and swam nimbly on all fours, Sirius muttered something and also jumped in after him.
Sirius endured the cold, stinging lake water, his vision was not affected in any way, he first found Inferius hiding behind the reef, so he opened the Inferius’ hand which was covering its face, and tried to see it properly – then Sirius started to look for his next target, and was not attacked in any way.
” Sick magic,” Sirius remarked from the lake, the Inferius feared the light, but a normal bright light didn’t have this effect.
The next part became boring – Sirius stayed in the black lake for twenty minutes, feeling stiff, his clothes soaked with water, dragging him down continuously, Kreacher was no better than he was, or even worse, he had to pull Kreacher up with him to recover their strength.
The cold lake water crashed down from the Sirius robe, as he walked step by step, trembling all over.
Kreacher’s teeth were chattering from the cold, and he couldn’t speak well, but he tried to hold on: “Kreacher has seen 47, no, 48 of them …”
Sirius said with a black face: “You are trying to get sick, so I can take care of you? Come and have something to eat, he even made a fire, just, just …”
Sirius felt a little outrageous, around the fire, there are all kinds of food scattered around, he also saw two jars of butterbeer, this is not a camping trip! He didn’t know how he managed to eat it, nevertheless, he replenished some energy.
“You can use the warming spell, it will make you feel better.” Felix suggested without looking up.
…
One hundred, two hundred, Sirius had seen the faces of one Inferius after another, and two hours had passed.
But the black lake is too big, and because of Felix’s magic, all the Inferius instinctively sought out a dark corner and scattered widely, making the search even more difficult. Despite the fruitlessness of all this – the bottom of the lake is by no means darker because of the magic.
And then during this period, Felix has been observing the stone basin, as well as the green potion in the stone basin.
For Voldemort, the Horcrux should be his most important thing, the protection measures around the Horcrux should be his strongest magic that he can think of, and can master.
Felix can use this to glimpse a tip of Voldemort’s strength.
In black and white perspective, a circle of magic ripples spread around him, Felix scanned the place, imprinting everything around him firmly in his memory, and then he finally moved, his hand went into the stone basin, and when he was an inch or two away from the potion, he could no longer submerge his hand.
Felix tried different methods, but none of them worked.
“Unless violently cracked … but this is not really an accurate measure of Voldemort’s power, and he must have thought about it …”
Felix called out to Kreacher, who came up for the third time, “Do me a favour and bring the ring I put out here, if it’s a laborious process just forget it.”
“As you wish, Mr. Hap.”
Kreacher’s figure disappeared, and after a few seconds, he reappeared, holding a ring in his hand.
“Is this ring too much of a burden on you?” Felix asked curiously, he was worried earlier that Kreacher wouldn’t be able to move together with him, Sirius, and a dozen dementors, but perhaps it’s a mistake to think so.
“Some effort … but not compared as much you alone Mr. Hap, you are truly a powerful wizard, more powerful than anyone Kreacher has ever met.”
“Uh, well, thank you, Kreacher.”
Felix scratched his head, so Sirius got so tired before, the problem was with him? Still, Sirius was travelling across a long distance, while Kreacher was simply making a round trip across a door, the two could not be compared.
Kreacher bowed deeply, pressed his nose to the ground, and walked away backward.
Felix took a cup out of his ring and he tossed it into the stone basin. This time, there is no magic to obstruct it, and the cup plunged into the liquid. Felix reached out and scooped a cup, then he observed it for a while, and then poured it out.
The bright green potion streamed out of the cup, forming a curved stream, but then it disappeared abruptly in midair, and Felix emptied the cup without a drop of liquid on the floor. He looked back and the height of the liquid in the stone basin had unknowingly recovered.
“Interesting … is it necessary to drink it in order to get it?”
Felix once again scooped up a cup of potion and used the Scarpin’s Revela spell to analyse the ingredients of the potion. A fuzzy image appeared above the potion, which is not clear enough to see, and Felix had to scan his memory to look for some out-of-the-way magic, a few of which he didn’t even use for once, he just categorized them and kept them in his memory.
The good thing is that he learns things quickly. With the help of the Thinking Room, and his understanding of magic at the moment, most of the magic can be quickly mastered.
“Mixed snake venom … unknown creature venom … Flobberworm mucus … Liquid found inside the Erumpent horn… …and bad blood herb, which causes impatience, recklessness and has a disorienting effect … phantom grass, a rare one …”
Felix raised his head and whispered to himself, “The effect of the potion does not seem to cause death, but rather increased pain and powerful hallucinogenic? This is quite consistent with what happened to Kreacher, no, there is also the effect of chaotic magic, making it difficult to use magic … In this way, even powerful wizards will be dragged to the bottom of the lake in despair.”
After another half hour, Sirius came up to see Felix choking a dementor and feeding it a potion, Sirius’ eyes almost burst out, where did it pop out from?
Before he could ask, he heard Kreacher’s sobbing cries: “Found it – Master Regulus -” The house elf’s voice kept echoing in the cave, over and over again.
Sirius rolled over and jumped into the water, following the sound. He suddenly realized that he hadn’t put on the Bubble-Head Charm yet, but it is too late to think about it, he held his breath and swam quickly to Kreacher’s side.
He saw a familiar figure, not much different from his memory, just a little whiter, and the same black curly hair as it’s fluttered in the water.
Sirius mumbled something, the pungent smell of salt mixed with the rotting lake water choked him and caused him to shiver and let out a violent cough.
He swam back to shore with the body of Regulus, panting heavily, breathing heavily as “ho ho” sound emerged from his mouth, while he got soaked to the bone, the lake water flowing through his eyes along with his hair, making it unclear if he’s crying.
When the mood calmed down, Sirius picked up Regulus, walked to Felix’s side, the Dementor already disappeared, he took a look, the potion in the stone basin is only left with a shallow layer, you can faintly see a locket in the bottom of the stone basin.
But he knew it is fake, so he didn’t have a slight interest, he just wanted to bring Regulus back now, and place him in a proper place, preferably after a funeral.
“Sirius, Kreacher, you guys wait for me outside, I need to do one more thing.” Felix said.
“What do you need to do?”
“To put it bluntly, I want to do some damage …”
So Kreacher appeared outside the rock wall with the body of both Sirius and Regulus. After a while, the rock wall in front of them began to shed its layers by turning into sand, and they took a few steps back and watched as the rock wall bloomed with a layer of light, then quickly darkened and decayed. The solid, sturdy rock turned into a fine powder and flopped down, eventually forming an open space.
Felix stepped out, and Sirius glanced behind him for a moment along with the light, the lake island had disappeared. And a small boat swayed against the edge of the lake.
“Let’s go.” Felix said calmly.
“You ruined this place?”
“It’s not good to let the next person who walks in do useless work.”
“Then what about that glowing magic of yours, that big ball of light …”
“Don’t bother with it, it’ll be gone in a week or two at most.”
Felix pulled Sirius and Kreacher, along with the body of Regulus, and instantly disappeared from the place.
“Rumble!”
Then a large chunk of rocks smashed down, completely burying everything inside.
———-
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