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The suffocating chill was immediate, absolute. The air seemed to turn to ice and rot, sucking every particle of warmth and happiness from the carriage. The darkness that invaded the compartment was not merely the absence of light; it was a spiritual vacuum.
Harry was closest to the door. He tried to move, to shout, but his limbs were frozen. A high-pitched, screaming laughter, the sound of his mother's final moments, invaded his mind. Despair, thick and black, consumed his heart, dragging him down into the most agonizing memories of his life.
The shadowy figure, blurred and decaying, glided to the door, its face a rotting void. It lowered its head toward Harry, opening its mouth in a gesture of profound, ultimate malice, ready to perform the Dementor's Kiss.
Lupin, startled awake, moved instantly, his wand already appearing in his hand. But Hermione was faster. Her focus was not hampered by despair; she felt only a cold, analytical surge of purpose.
She pointed her wand at the looming horror. "Expecto Patronum!"
The incantation was clear, sharp, and commanding. A blinding, incandescent surge of pure, silver-white light erupted from her wand tip. The light coalesced, taking the vibrant, joyful shape of a sea otter—a Patronus so powerful it seemed to radiate warmth, chasing the cold and darkness from the carriage.
The Dementor recoiled, letting out a raw, soul-rending shriek of pain that made the windows rattle. It writhed, trying desperately to escape the luminous purity that was its natural antithesis.
But Hermione wasn't done. She wasn't just driving it away. She was weaponizing her spell.
With intense concentration, her eyes narrowed, she channeled her will. The spectral sea otter, an animated spirit of light, instantly twisted, compressed, and solidified, forming a dense, brilliant sphere of silver-white energy that enveloped the shrieking Dementor.
The sphere of light—a magical prison of pure, concentrated joy—began to shrink under Hermione's relentless magical will. The Dementor, a captive beast, thrashed violently, its struggle becoming weaker and weaker as its essence was crushed by the power of the Patronus.
"Boom!"
With a muffled sound, the light ball was compressed to its limit and exploded, dissipating the Dementor into a final, scattering cloud of black, formless gas. The chilling cold receded instantly.
The silence that followed was deafening. Lupin, supporting the unconscious Harry, stared at Hermione with an expression of profound, unadulterated shock. He had seen Patronuses drive Dementors away, but he had never, in his entire life, seen one compressed and detonated like a magical grenade.
He looked back at the exhausted, sleeping face of the unconscious Dementor—which had been absorbed by the magic book—and then at Hermione. "Miss Granger," he coughed, breaking the stillness. "Your Patronus Charm… it is extraordinary. I have never seen anyone… destroy a Dementor with one before."
"It's simple, really," Hermione said, shaking out her wrist. "The Patronus is just a flexible construct of positive energy. Imagine it's a piece of playdough. You use your magic to mold it into whatever shape you need to contain the enemy."
Playdough? Lupin thought, his mind reeling. He had struggled for years to produce a wisp of silver smoke, yet this girl was treating the most advanced defensive charm in existence like arts and crafts.
After the Dementors fled, chased away by the spectacle of their comrade's annihilation, the lights flickered back on, and the train started to move. Harry slowly stirred, sitting up with a confused moan, rubbing his scar.
He saw Lupin's tired, bearded face leaning close to him. The proximity, combined with the lingering trauma in his mind, triggered a wave of anxious, dark paranoia.
"What… what happened to me?" Harry stammered, his eyes darting frantically to Hermione.
"You fainted, Harry," Ron supplied quickly.
Harry looked back at Lupin, his eyes narrowing with deep suspicion. He subconsciously recoiled, putting distance between himself and the man. "Did… did anyone," he asked, his voice trembling, "do anything strange to me while I was out? Don't tell me… someone gave me mouth-to-mouth?"
He imagined the scenario: the bearded, shabby man leaning over him. His face instantly went pale green.
Hermione watched the scene with a sudden, overwhelming urge for mischief. He's asking for it.
She paused, deliberately allowing the tension to coil, then spoke slowly: "Hmm… you know, Harry… you guessed correctly."
Harry froze, paralyzed by absolute horror. His mind screamed in silent, visceral agony. He glanced at Lupin, then at Ron, a look of profound betrayal on his face.
Lupin, completely thrown by the sudden, bizarre turn of events and the look of green-faced terror on the student he was meant to protect, quickly intervened. "Miss Granger! Please don't use such a misleading statement!" he protested, his own face flushing with acute embarrassment. "Mr. Potter, I assure you, no such thing occurred!"
Hermione finally burst into laughter, a sharp, clear sound that filled the compartment. "Pfft! Okay, okay, I'm just kidding, Harry." She patted his knee. "You were indeed kissed, but it was by the Dementor, not Professor Lupin. It only tried to suck out your soul, not give you artificial respiration."
Harry, completely exhausted by the emotional whiplash, just slumped back into his seat, breathing heavily. He looked down at his hand, remembering the suffocating coldness of the Dementor's touch. The joke was over, but the terror was real.
"It was aiming for your soul, Harry," Lupin said quietly, his voice regaining its professional calm. "The only thing it sucks out is happiness." He glanced at Hermione with a troubled, complex expression. He knew his job this year was going to be anything but normal.