"Avada Kedavra!"
As expected of Voldemort, he opened with the Killing Curse right from the start.
The blinding green light erupted from his wand tip like a bolt of toxic lightning, instantly tearing through the warm air of the room with a sound like ripping fabric. The curse was aimed directly at Harry's chest.
Fortunately, Harry had prepared in advance, his muscles were already tensed for movement. He threw himself sideways in a desperate roll, tucking behind the leather sofa just in time. His shoulder hit the floor hard enough to bruise.
The sickly green light of the Killing Curse grazed past his hair so closely he felt the charge in the air, felt hair strands singe and crackle. The curse blasted a smoking hole in the wall behind where he'd been standing just a moment before.
He wondered absently, even in the midst of mortal danger, whether the Room of Requirement had the ability to repair itself from this kind of magical damage.
"Expelliarmus!" Harry emerged from behind the sofa. A red beam of light shot toward Voldemort.
However, Voldemort merely flicked his wand with contemptuous ease, barely moving his wrist at all. He brushed away Harry's most proficient Disarming Charm as casually as one would swat away an annoying insect, as if the spell were nothing more than dust motes in sunlight.
"Too weak, Potter," he said with a cold, mocking laugh. "Five years of studying at Hogwarts under the supposedly great Albus Dumbledore, and this pathetic display is all you're capable of? How disappointing."
Back in his own day at Hogwarts, he thought with superiority, by fifth year he had already learned and mastered every Dark Arts spell housed in the Hogwarts library, even those hidden in the Restricted Section.
Disarming Charm?
What use could such a feeble, defensive spell possibly have in real combat? It was a child's magic, training wheels for those too weak for true power.
Harry said nothing in response to the taunting, refusing to be baited into anger. He merely continued to wave his wand with focused determination.
"Expelliarmus!"
Another red beam shot out from his wand, crackling through the air with force. Only to be deflected once again by Voldemort's casual, almost lazy flick of his wand.
Voldemort didn't even bother using the Shield Charm or any defensive spell, relying solely on his precise wand control and superior magical power to neutralize the attack.
"How truly disappointing—"
Before Voldemort could finish his contemptuous sentence, the deflected red beam unexpectedly curved sharply in mid-air to strike toward him from behind!
Voldemort's eyes widened in genuine surprise. He quickly dodged sideways, but even his superior speed wasn't quite enough. The redirected spell still grazed his left arm, catching the fabric and flesh. It tore a long, ragged gash in his dark robe.
Beneath the shredded fabric, the sight that met Harry's wide eyes made him gasp audibly.
Voldemort's entire arm was covered with cracks of varying depths, like a shattered porcelain vase barely holding its shape. The fissures were deeper and more wide than what Harry had glimpsed on his hand, these ran all the way from wrist to shoulder.
Dark energy flowed slowly through the cracks like oil through fractures in stone. The arm looked as if it might completely collapse into dust at any moment.
"You can't hold on much longer," Harry said, staring intently at those horrifying fissures. "Your body is falling apart around you."
Voldemort didn't answer immediately, his jaw were clenching with fury at having his weakness exposed.
He knew the dire condition of his own body all too well.
Although he had already reclaimed some of his soul fragments over the past months, because he had split off so many pieces over the years in his quest for immortality, his soul remained in a deeply unstable state.
If it were merely the instability of his soul, that wouldn't necessarily affect his physical body so terribly.
However, even with only a portion of his soul remaining in this vessel, it was still several times stronger and more potent than that of ordinary people.
The unstable, too-powerful soul combined with the weakness of this borrowed child's body, this fatal mismatch was the root cause of his impending physical collapse. The vessel simply couldn't contain what he'd forced into it.
He had come to Hogwarts specifically to find the Horcrux he had left behind years ago, the Ravenclaw diadem, to reclaim it and repair his soul. To stabilize himself before this body disintegrated completely.
Unfortunately, the diadem he had placed in the Room of Requirement decades ago had already disappeared.
Moreover, adding to his frustration, he had sensed the presence of another soul fragment somewhere at Hogwarts.
However, that presence was extremely faint, and he had been completely unable to determine its exact location despite months of searching. It was infuriating.
Voldemort spoke no more, looked done with conversation and taunting. He fiercely swung his wand in a vicious slashing motion.
Another blinding green light tore through the air, brighter and faster than before, surging toward Harry with destructive energy that made the air itself scream.
Fortunately, Harry still had cover. He dove desperately behind what remained of the furniture. The entire sofa was blasted to pieces by the Killing Curse's impact, wood chips and cotton stuffing were scattering everywhere like snow, filling the air with debris.
Wizard battles were usually quite monotonous most of the time, Harry realized with strange clarity even in the midst of mortal danger. A deadly exchange of spells, dodge and counter, attack and defend, until someone's luck or skill ran out.
"Avada Kedavra!"
"Expelliarmus!"
The two spells collided in mid-air with a shower of sparks.
But Harry's red beam of disarming magic was instantly swallowed by Voldemort's superior power, consumed like a candle flame in a hurricane. The green light ate through it as if it were nothing.
The Killing Curse continued forward with remaining force driving Harry back step by stumbling step until his spine pressed against the cold stone wall.
Harry now understood that in terms of raw spell power, he was completely outmatched by Voldemort. The difference in their abilities was simply too vast.
He needed to seek some variation in tactics, needed to be clever rather than powerful.
He quickly changed strategy: "Incarcerous!"
Thick ropes shot from his wand tip like striking serpents, seeking to bind and restrain. Simultaneously he waved his wand in a complex pattern to transfigure the broken wood scattered on the ground, transforming the debris into a flock of small wooden birds that immediately took flight to obscure vision and create chaos.
Voldemort easily dodged the magical ropes with contemptuous grace, his body twisted out of their path. But the swarm of wooden birds, each one autonomously flying and diving, flew wildly through the room's limited space, and constantly interfered with his sight and movement, pecking and swooping.
It was irritating, and distracting, exactly what Harry needed.
Voldemort impatiently waved his wand in annoyance, and several wooden birds shattered instantly into splinters under focused cutting curses.
But more birds continued their relentless harassment, replacing the fallen creating an endless distraction that kept him from focusing properly on Harry.
This revealed one of the fundamental weaknesses of the Killing Curse, Harry realized.
It was a skill that could only cause single-target damage. It seemed completely powerless against swarms of small, fast-moving interfering objects. You couldn't kill what you couldn't hit.
Voldemort's face twisted with rage at being so effectively obstructed by such simple tactics. He angrily waved his wand in a broad, sweeping gesture.
Violent flames instantly swept through the entire room in response to his fury—Fiendfyre, the most dangerous and uncontrollable of fire spells. The cursed flames roared to life, burning with unnatural colors. Wherever the fire reached, the wooden birds were reduced to ashes in an instant.
But Fiendfyre clearly didn't distinguish between friend and foe in its hunger to burn, and Voldemort's current deteriorating body couldn't withstand long exposure to its heat either. The flames were already licking too close, growing beyond his control.
Seeing the fire about to spiral completely out of control, he had no choice but to immediately withdraw the spell.
But it was already too late for a clean disengagement.
Taking advantage of the chaos created by the Fiendfyre and the swirling wooden bird ashes, Harry nimbly slipped through the gaps in the deadly flames with reckless courage. He used the smoke and heat as cover, moving low and fast, and instantly closed the distance to Voldemort in a desperate gamble.
Though he couldn't match Voldemort with spells, he still had one final trump card to play.
That was the mysterious ancient magic dwelling within his body, the protection his mother had died to give him.
Why had he been staying with the Dursleys during the summer holidays all this time, year after year despite how much he hated it?
Wasn't it precisely to replenish the energy of this protective magic through the blood connection!
Now, finally, it was time to put it to use!
Harry grabbed Voldemort's upper body tightly in a wrestler's grip, his arms were clamping around that thin, child's neck like iron pincers. He held on with all his strength.
"Let go, Potter!" Voldemort hissed, his voice was distorted with rage and something that might have been fear.
His current body was at best that of a first-year child. Under Harry's full physical restraint, with Harry's superior size and strength bearing down on him, he could barely move his arms to point his wand.
So, what if his spells were more powerful?
Magic required space, required movement, required the ability to aim and cast.
In the intensive training regimen that Adrian had carefully established for Harry over the past year, physical conditioning was also an extremely important component!
Harry even used his teeth when Voldemort tried to twist away, biting down on the Voldemort's shoulder like a wild beast. Looking exactly like a cornered animal fighting for survival.
The instant their bodies made intimate contact, skin touching skin through torn clothes, a strange power surged from deep within Harry. It transmitted through their touching skin directly to Voldemort's borrowed body, flowing like electricity.
This was the ancient magic that Lily Potter had cast at the cost of her own life, sealed in her son's blood and bone.
"Let go!" Voldemort shouted again, his pale face was turning even more ugly with strain and distress.
Only this time, his voice carried concentrated magical force behind it, a compulsion woven into the words themselves. The command instantly penetrated Harry's eardrums with pressure.
Harry felt as if his head had been struck by a heavy hammer swung with full force.
With a buzzing sound that drowned out all other noise, his thoughts instantly went blank. White noise filled his mind.
A compulsive force originating from deep instinct impossible to consciously comprehend or resist, seized control of his body from his conscious mind. His arm muscles relaxed despite his desperate mental commands to hold on.
Was this some form of magic he'd never encountered before?
Harry had no time to think.
His eyes glazed over for an instant.
Before he could react or regain control of his own limbs, a powerful impact force exploded out with Voldemort at its center!
"Bang!"
Harry's entire body was violently thrown backward, rag-dolling through the air helplessly. He slammed hard against the stone wall of the Room of Requirement with bone-jarring force before sliding down to crumple on the ground in a heap.
Coming back to his senses, struggling to process what had happened, he felt as if his internal organs had shifted position from the impact. His vision was somewhat blurred, doubled at the edges, and his scar transmitted a burning pain.
He shook his dizzy and struggled to get up on unsteady legs, his whole body was aching. His heart was filled with confusion and fear.
What had just happened?
Why had he instinctively let go?
Though it had only been a single moment, that terrifying feeling of his body not being under his own control had already been indelibly imprinted in his mind.
Voldemort stood in place several feet away, breathing slightly heavily from the exertion and the close call. His chest rose and fell rapidly.
He straightened his disheveled robe with hands that trembled. A flash of surprise crossed his crimson eyes at what had just occurred, which then slowly transformed into understanding.
"I see," Voldemort said slowly, examining Harry carefully with new eyes, as if seeing him truly for the first time.
He revealed a cruel smile that split his young face unnaturally. "So that's what I've been sensing. A part of me is inside you."
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