A Boy Won't Encounter Old Den Without a Nose. Leaving Harry, who wandered around before finally returning to his dorm to play chess with Ron, Cohen successfully reached the grounds outside the castle.
"Damn it! In Hogwarts Legacy, you can use Floo Powder to teleport directly into the Forbidden Forest!"
The Forbidden Forest was clearly visible, and so was Cohen's position.
A flat, open meadow separated the castle from the Forbidden Forest, making it difficult to cross it unnoticed during the day.
However, Cohen managed to slip in by pretending to befriend Hagrid, then feinting and making a detour directly into the Forbidden Forest.
The trade-off was a pile of rock biscuits in his pocket, which he could use as boulders if he encountered danger.
Upon entering the Forbidden Forest, the still-bright sunlight outside was completely obscured by the shade of the trees.
The ground was littered with a tangled web of old tree roots, and tall, sturdy, ancient trees stretched their branches from their summits, forming a dense protective network—it was hard to imagine how one could navigate this place on a flying broomstick.
The forest was filled with the scent of earth and decaying leaves. Cohen looked left and right, occasionally spotting mushrooms and herbal plants from the book "A Thousand Magical Herbs and Fungi."
But he saw no creatures with a Soul Strength higher than 2—meaning that so far, Cohen had only seen insects.
However, Cohen didn't want to absorb the souls of worms. Their Soul Strength was only 1, simply because the system marked it as the minimum.
Perhaps even consuming the souls of an entire castle's worth of worms wouldn't fill his soul gap.
"Gu—"
The thought of eating souls rekindled Cohen's hunger. Fortunately, he had brought some candy to satisfy his cravings, so he wouldn't have to endure the hunger all the way.
His efforts paid off. Finally, in a tree hollow, Cohen found a nest of magical creatures with a Soul Strength of 3—fire ash snakes.
Furthermore, Cohen happened to stumble upon the final minutes of a Fire Ash Snake's egg-laying period. A Fire Ash Snake's lifespan is only an hour, and after laying its eggs, it will turn to ash.
"Even if I don't eat it, it will die. The forest nourishes the Fire Ash Snake with all its creatures, but the Fire Ash Snake gives nothing in return. Inhale!"
Cohen gulped down the Fire Ash Snake's mother soul—feeling nothing, even less than Professor McGonagall's transfiguration.
Watching the Fire Ash Snake's mother crumble into ash as her egg-laying period concluded, Cohen's attention shifted to the clutch of Fire Ash Snake eggs.
"Hiss..."
Cohen felt his long-dormant conscience stir.
"These little ones will definitely burn this tree down when they're born. Preventing forest fires is everyone's responsibility. I—"
A clutch of Fire Ash Snake eggs, each with one Soul Strength point, plus a Fire Ash Snake with three Soul Strength points, finally boosted Cohen's Soul Strength by 0.1%, but that was more than enough.
With enough, even a small amount could become a mountain!
And the forest was in no short supply of Fire Ash Snake eggs.
Born from uncontrolled magical fire and parthenogenetic reproduction, if a single nest of Fire Ash Snakes appears in a single location, a vast colony will ensue.
Fire Ash Snakes are frequently hunted, both because of their numbers and pest-like harmfulness, and because of their medicinal properties: their eggs are used as ingredients in aphrodisiacs and as a remedy for malaria.
Confident in his pursuit of the best, Cohen, after extracting the souls from the eggs, froze them all with a freezing spell, intending to use them as potion ingredients. The Fire Ash Snakes, hiding in crevices and tree hollows, are difficult to find, but Cohen possesses a unique advantage: he can read the soul strength labels through some obstacles.
Throughout his journey, Cohen fervently hunted them, freezing their eggs and collecting them.
Hagrid's rock biscuits also proved crucial, as Cohen threw them along the way (to make room for the eggs), eliminating the possibility of losing his way.
There was no need to worry about the rock biscuits being eaten by passing forest animals, as no one except Hagrid could chew them...
Besides the fire ash snakes, the forest would occasionally see a few lost eight-eyed spider pups—
"Evil monster! Suck!"
Two more confused eight-eyed spiders appeared in the forest.
The giant eight-eyed spiders were clearly a level above the fire ash snakes, even their juveniles possessing a Soul Strength of 4.
Cohen swept through the souls of passing creatures, seemingly sucking on every passing dog.
Of course, if the animals were adorable, Cohen would let them go—
"Double-standard dog!"
The Count stopped near Cohen by a broken tree trunk, a black rat in his mouth, and uttered an inarticulate sound.
"You have to understand one thing: being cute means you can do whatever you want."
After stuffing the last frozen fire ash snake egg into his overflowing robe pocket and letting a cute, still-drowsy moon beast escape, Cohen rolled his eyes at the Count who had come running in out of nowhere.
"Stop being cute! I'll always remember you cursing a rat's ancestors for an entire hour."
"Oh."
The Earl turned his head, tilting it to pretend cuteness.
"You should continue working on the extinction plan in the forest—I'm here to bring you a message. Harry Potter asked me to find you and ask if they'll be coming to Hagrid's place at three in the afternoon. Would you like to come with them?"
"Sure, I'll just ask Hagrid for some valuable unicorn hair or something—I'll use Harry's favor," Cohen planned. "Tell Harry I'll be out at three and there's no need to wait for me in the castle."
The chimes of Hogwarts could be heard even at the edge of the Forbidden Forest, and Cohen wasn't worried about missing the deadline.
The Earl flapped his wings and flew away, and Cohen had already entered the middle of the Forbidden Forest.
The temperature here suddenly dropped colder, the sunlight almost completely obscured by the trees. Occasionally, an unknown creature with a soul strength of seven, eight, or even ten would scurry by.
Cohen was already considering whether to end his leveling quest now. Thanks to his tireless efforts, the Forbidden Forest's family of fire ash snakes and a few lost acromantula hatchlings had contributed a whopping 3.4% to Cohen's soul integrity.
Cohen's Soul Strength had now reached 15 points, a much faster rate than exchanging Sin Points for Soul Fragments!
However, Cohen had also encountered a problem: his Soul Integrity seemed to have hit a plateau. He had already reached 15 Soul Strength when he destroyed the fifth-to-last Fire Ash Serpent lair, but until now, the number behind his Soul Integrity hadn't even increased by 0.1.
It seemed... these low-level souls were no longer able to provide him with any improvement.
Suddenly, as he was about to turn back, Cohen saw a shimmering silver stain of blood scraped across the leaves of a bush in the woods.
It was unicorn blood.
The blood trail led deep into the Forbidden Forest, hidden by a thicket. These bushes showed signs of trespassing, many of their branches bent and broken.
Magic... mingled with the sweet scent of souls, and Cohen felt his heart pounding. The only person who had attacked unicorns in the forest recently... seemed to be Quirrell, who had pressed Voldemort against his head.
Could he be sucking unicorn blood now? Cohen had originally thought this incident would happen in the second half of the semester.
Voldemort was no match for Cohen right now—a full forty points of Soul Strength, and the store didn't sell "Five Minutes of True Manliness, 100 Soul Strength Trial Cards." To confront Voldemort now would be sheer suicidal. Just because the Aurors hadn't killed Coin didn't mean Voldemort, with his long history in the Dark Arts, couldn't kill him. What if Voldemort had a spell specifically designed to kill Dementors?
"Swish!"
Cohen was about to flee when a loud horse brayed from behind him.
"Evil creature, get out of our territory!"
What? Evil creature? Quirrell being chased out by the centaurs? Behind him?
A chaotic clatter of horses' hooves made Cohen undecipherable.
But with the centaurs around, Quirrell wouldn't dare to act rashly...
Cohen turned his head to look behind him, hoping to catch a glimpse of a certain Voldemort fleeing in anger.
But it seemed...
"Is the script wrong?" Cohen's mouth twitched. There was no Quirrell behind him; it was all centaurs. A quick glance revealed at least ten of them.
The centaurs drew their bows like crescent moons, all aiming for Cohen!
[Soul Strength: 15]
was just what Cohen could handle right now, but he had no intention of killing the centaurs unless they wanted to kill him first.
The leading centaur had a full beard and looked wild and proud.
It stared at Cohen for a long time, finally blurting out with a strange expression:
"What is that?"
"It's a strange foal, Bane, but we never harm foals." Beside it, a melancholy red-haired centaur intercepted the bearded Bane's arrow. "The one who hurt the unicorn wasn't him—"
Suddenly, a stinging arrow shot from the direction of the unicorn's bloodstain. Cohen dodged it with incredible reflexes—and then Cohen realized he could release half of his soul to survey the area. If he had known the centaurs and Voldemort were here, Cohen would have slipped away from the fifteen meters.
"Swish!"
The next arrow followed, accompanied by the sound of horse hooves from that direction—clearly, there was more than one centaur team trying to capture Voldemort, with another flanking force.
Cohen could even hear the clatter of darting through the bushes halfway up to his waist.
If he didn't run, he'd be accidentally killed by another group of centaurs shooting arrows!
Cohen couldn't bear to leave his current body. Not only was it adorable, but if he changed, Edward and Rose might become distant. Cohen didn't want to hear himself asking his parents, "Do you love my soul or my body?"
Just as Cohen decided to run, a certain Quirinus Noseless Starfury Quirrell, who wished to remain anonymous, emerged from the bushes wearing a hooded black cloak.
Cohen immediately pulled his hood up as well—both were wearing vests, and revealing their real names would be embarrassing.
Two seconds later, Quirrell was level with Cohen, their escape routes almost identical—because this was the flattest path in the forest.
"What a coincidence! You're running too?"
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(End of this chapter)