Chapter 40 – Saturday 04.
[Chapter Size: 2100 Words.]
Third Person POV
Hogwarts.
...
...
Snape looked once more at the top of the cliff, not seeing any more signs of the creature. "I noticed something on its arm when it tried to grab me..." He was remembering, "It was burning with exposure to the sunlight..." Concluding this thought, he came to an understanding that whatever that was, it seemed to have some problem with sunlight.
"HEEE" The sound of the Graphorn caught his attention as it began to leave the waterfall.
"Hm? What is it?" He looked at the animal as it twisted.
"Alright, I'll put you down..." Snape murmured, placing the animal on the ground.
His gaze returned to the valley in front of him. "We must leave here now... but we need to know where we are." He murmured as he began to enter the forest, which contrasted with the Forbidden Forest.
Meanwhile, Albus Dumbledore was at his desk, preparing to take a trip this weekend, waking up early and having a small breakfast with the students in the common hall that Saturday as they prepared to leave the school while chatting animatedly with each other.
He greeted the professors who joined him at the main table, while observing the students. At the Slytherin table, he noticed Snape's absence. Although Snape never appeared at noon, he certainly showed up a few times at dinner and every day at breakfast, which made Dumbledore wonder what he was up to.
'It seems the girl couldn't even get close to him... Which only increases the chance that he may have a completely different personality... But it is still a great mystery...' Dumbledore thought as he looked at Lily, who kept a sad expression. Whatever Snape had said to her, it hurt the girl deeply.
After breakfast, he returned to organize his things for the rest of the morning, not even bothering to go down to the common hall at noon, as most of the students were in Hogsmeade at that time.
Time passed as he was finally ready to leave in the early afternoon when a strange crow appeared at his window.
"This..." He frowned at it, while Fawkes emitted a sound of displeasure towards the crow and began to spread its wings with flames in a show of hostility.
"Calm down, Fawkes..." Dumbledore requested as the crow seemed to fear the phoenix.
The crow cautiously left the window as the phoenix stopped producing flames but still kept an eye on the black bird.
Albus approached the crow and took the letter from its feet. "Why is she sending a letter..." He wondered, after all, it had been a decade since that woman had spoken to him, after a certain incident where he almost destroyed her, and his threats seemed to have worked well since she hadn't bothered him in that time. After taking the letter, the crow fled through the window from which it had come.
The letter then began to unfold but suddenly came to life and started flying, folding into a mouth shape, as it began to speak.
"ALBUUUUUUUSSS!!!" The voice was horrible and hostile, causing the portraits of the other headmasters to look at it surprised, wondering what was happening.
"..." Albus said nothing, as there was no way to respond to a letter; he just waited for the artificial mouth to speak.
"A student from the school appeared in my territory and attacked me!!! I swear Albus, I will get my revenge, I swear by all forces! Luckily, he died going to the West side, the only thing stopping me from attacking Hogsmeade is the thought that that damned brat is just bones by now!" The voice complained with the same tone of hostility. "I want something for the attack, otherwise, our agreement of the last 10 years will mean nothing!" She growled, and the letter lost its life, falling on the desk with only the text of what she had just said.
"What is happening..." He murmured.
"Who is this?" One of the headmasters asked, not knowing what it was about.
"This is Ravena, a witch from my time, but she became corrupted and has lived in the Forbidden Forest for decades." Dumbledore decided to answer. He had never told the story to his headmasters, keeping it only in his memory curtain. "Ten years ago, there was an incident with some Muggle-born students entering her area; all were killed and eaten by her." He said with a sigh.
Because they were of Muggle origin, he managed to prevent anyone from killing her, although he threatened her and made her promise never to harm any student again.
"She killed 2 students?!" a headmistress shouted, horrified.
"Yes..." Dumbledore said.
"Wait, why is she alive? Why didn't you kill her or send her to Azkaban?" another questioned.
"She promised me she wouldn't hurt anyone else..." Albus commented.
"You're too soft, Albus. Now another student is dead." Someone mocked among the frames on the wall.
"But it wasn't because of this woman... It was because of that thing in the West!" one of the headmasters commented.
"What is in the west of the Forbidden Forest?" an older headmaster asked, confused.
"Didn't you take over this school with that thing?" someone asked.
"I haven't taught here for over 800 years, so I don't know what you're talking about." He replied.
"There is a creature that no one knows its origin, it simply appeared more than 300 years ago. We call it... Juggernaut!" a headmaster said, horrified.
"That thing would even make Merlin himself sweat..." one of the headmasters said.
"Of course. I died because of that thing!" a headmaster shouted, startling many.
"I tried to get rid of it 20 years later, I also died!"
"I after 50 years... it was horrible!" another headmaster said.
"For Merlin's sake, what is this thing?" a headmistress from an even older time asked, horrified.
"No one knows, it appears as a shadow. I went with 50 Aurors after that thing killed 2 pure-blood nobles. The Ministry of Magic at the time decreed we should exterminate that thing. What followed was a massacre. That thing appeared with a mist and became invisible quickly. We tried magic, but that thing is immune to all our spells, even the Unforgivable Curses had no effect on it..." The headmaster who faced it 20 years after the first headmaster died said.
He continued. "What should have been justice against two pure-bloods turned into a massacre of 53 people, including me and two other professors at the time... my body was split in two..." he said with a tone far from pleasant at the memory.
"Damn... how can something like that exist!?" another headmaster exclaimed.
"Anyway... according to the witch... whoever this student is, is dead... no one would survive that thing. Our only advantage is that the creature cannot touch sunlight without getting hurt, according to the reports left by you... I always decreed the extreme prohibition of stepping on the east side." Another headmistress voiced her opinion.
"That's not the only bad side of that place... Remember, there's something much worse in the north." Another headmaster commented.
"Damn, don't remind me of that... I don't want to talk about that region!" a headmaster shouted, and others agreed.
"Anyway, headmasters..." Dumbledore finally decided to speak. His tone was urgent, and he had a furrowed brow. "I need to know what is happening... and who this student is." He said and used Apparition, disappearing from the place.
He reappeared in that side of the forest. It was a small territory created by that witch. Dumbledore looked at the place, and the environment was utterly dreadful, as he remembered. He went directly to the witch's hut. In front of him was a hut in the middle of the forest, with smoke coming out of one of the chimneys. The place screamed horror, but Dumbledore did not seem afraid as he began to approach.
He walked to the door, treading on the dark ground of the Forbidden Forest. When he was about to knock, the witch's voice was immediately heard.
"Dumbledore!" she shouted in hostility.
He opened the door without her permission and entered the old hut, thinking that this place hadn't changed at all... It was quite horrible for anyone to live there, with pieces of meat scattered around and a foul smell of rot. There was a cauldron in the middle of the hut. The witch herself was sitting there, trying to keep her wrist up, which fell limp after being broken by the rock Snape threw. She used her wand with the other hand with some difficulty while trying to heal herself, but she didn't seem to have any success.
"Look at this, Albus! That student did this to me!" she growled angrily as Dumbledore raised an eyebrow.
"What exactly happened?" he asked.
"I was harvesting my little plants like every morning, until a student approached me. Besides entering my territory, he attacked me without warning, laughing in my face while he broke my arm without me even realizing it with a dark magic..." she cried. But Albus knew that was a lie and an act from her. After all, this woman could control all the Acromantulas in that region. Why would a student attack her? And given her history, it was much more likely that she had done this... But what puzzled him was that this woman was a witch his age, she could kill any Hogwarts student, so who could have done this?
"Who did this?" Dumbledore ignored her crying and asked. "Exactly who was the student? Describe him to me." He demanded, the most urgent question being that this student had entered the western region.
"Describe him? You're not even worried about me?! Look what happened, your student attacked me!" she growled.
"Answer me now!" Dumbledore got angry and raised his voice in response, making the place tremble. The witch cowered at that, after all, she feared the headmaster.
"Is this how you treat someone who's injured? Dumbledore, I still remember how you were in love with me in the sixth and seventh year," the witch said with a tone of fear. It was true; Dumbledore had been enamored with her during school. However, their paths had diverged greatly, and he no longer recognized that feeling.
"I'm losing my patience with you. Answer me now!" Dumbledore said once more, and the witch nodded with more fear, feeling she was overstepping. Not even the blackmail from the past had any effect, which she had used so he wouldn't kill her 10 years ago, even though she had become a dark witch and a cannibal.
"I don't know. He was over 1.80 meters tall, black hair, eyes that shone extremely bright blue. He had an animal too. That damn animal tried to attack me. It was thanks to it that I was distractedly attacked!" she cried while Dumbledore furrowed his brow.
'Eyes that shone in blue...' Only one person had that characteristic. Since he had heard many reports, Snape had also done this to him when they talked for the first time at the beginning of the year... After all, no one could make their eyes shine, even in the magical world, but Snape had this characteristic after he returned from vacation.
"Snape," he furrowed his brow while murmuring. It was Snape who had entered that region with the Juggernaut, dealing with a creature that not even Albus Dumbledore could handle, as it was immune to magic, incredibly strong and fast, a natural predator in its natural environment, no one should have a chance to fight against it.
While Albus thought that Snape might be dead, Snape himself had just made a great leap from a tree at that moment, looking around the area, trying to guess where he was. He landed on the ground a moment later when gravity called, falling next to the Graphorn.
"Well, I think we're in the right place. It'll take a while, but I believe we'll reach Hogsmeade before sunset..." Snape commented after managing to orient himself in the middle of that valley.
He was lucky to have read many reports about the region before starting to venture on the first day, so it was easy for him to find his way, finding some reference points that matched the descriptions in the books.
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