Quirrell did not open the door.
He stood behind it with one hand raised, frozen in place, as if the wooden panel between him and Theodore Snow could somehow protect him.
It could not.
Quirrell knew this very well.
The door had a lock. Theodore knew space magic.
The door had defensive charms. Theodore knew stranger things than charms.
The door had Quirrell behind it. That was probably its greatest weakness.
Another knock sounded.
Calm.
Polite.
Patient.
"Professor Quirrell."
Quirrell swallowed.
Inside his turban, Voldemort's voice was cold. "Open it."
Quirrell's fingers twitched. "My Lord…"
"Open. The. Door."
Quirrell slowly reached for the handle.
At that moment, he seriously considered pretending to faint.
Unfortunately, Voldemort knew him too well.
"If you collapse, I will wake you up."
Quirrell opened the door.
Theodore stood outside with a perfectly normal expression.
That was the most frightening part.
If Theodore had arrived with killing intent, Quirrell could at least scream. If Theodore had blasted open the door, Quirrell could pretend to be a victim. But Theodore stood there like an excellent student visiting a professor during office hours.
"Good evening, Professor."
Quirrell forced his mouth to move.
"G-good evening, Mr. Snow."
Theodore glanced past him into the room.
"May I come in?"
No.
Absolutely not.
Quirrell wanted to say that.
His mouth betrayed him.
"O-of course."
He stepped aside.
Theodore entered the office.
The door closed behind him.
Quirrell felt as though his coffin lid had been shut.
Professor Quirrell's office looked worse than usual.
That was saying something.
The shelves were packed with books on defensive magic, dark creatures, counter-curses, and several volumes that should not have been visible to students at all. Bundles of garlic hung near the window. Protective amulets dangled from nails. A cracked skull sat on the desk, supposedly for teaching purposes, though Quirrell had never successfully used it in class without dropping it.
The room smelled of old parchment, nervous sweat, and desperation.
Theodore looked around once.
Then he smiled.
"Professor, your office is very lively."
Quirrell laughed weakly.
"Y-yes, well, D-Defence Against the Dark Arts requires preparation."
"Indeed."
Theodore walked to the bookshelf.
Quirrell's heart followed his steps.
Behind the turban, Voldemort had gone completely silent.
That silence was not calm.
It was calculation.
Theodore casually took down a book, flipped through two pages, and put it back.
Quirrell tried not to breathe too loudly.
The fourth node was beneath the office floor.
Not directly under the desk.
Not under the carpet.
A little to the left of the bookshelf.
Three feet below the stone, hidden inside a cavity that Quirrell himself had not known existed until Voldemort ordered him to prepare the ritual there.
Voldemort had chosen this office for a simple reason.
No one wanted to stay here longer than necessary.
Students avoided it.
Professors rarely visited.
Even ghosts seemed to prefer taking other corridors.
It was the perfect hiding place.
Until Theodore knocked.
Theodore moved another step.
Closer.
Quirrell's fingers tightened around his wand.
"Mr. Snow," he said carefully, "w-was there something you needed?"
"Yes."
Theodore pulled another book from the shelf.
"I came to borrow something."
Quirrell almost relaxed.
A book.
It was only a book.
"What kind of book?"
Theodore turned a page.
"The one under your office."
Quirrell's mind went blank.
For half a second, even Voldemort did not speak.
Then Quirrell made a sound that could barely be considered human.
"U-under?"
Theodore looked at him.
"Is that inconvenient?"
Quirrell wanted to cry.
Was it inconvenient?
It was extremely inconvenient.
It was the kind of inconvenience that ruined lives, bodies, souls, and possibly entire school terms.
Voldemort finally spoke, his voice low and sharp.
"Deny it."
Quirrell immediately shook his head. "I d-don't know what you mean."
Theodore nodded.
"That is also fine."
He closed the book and placed it back on the shelf.
Then he raised his hand.
Quirrell's expression changed.
"My Lord!"
"Attack!"
Quirrell's wand snapped up.
"Expelliarmus!"
The spell shot across the office.
Theodore did not dodge.
Space folded lightly in front of him. The red light entered the ripple and came out behind Quirrell, striking a hanging garlic bundle.
The garlic exploded.
Quirrell was showered in garlic pieces.
For a moment, the office became very quiet.
Theodore looked at him.
Quirrell looked back, face pale, hair covered in garlic.
Then Theodore said sincerely, "Good aim."
Quirrell nearly choked.
Voldemort's anger surged.
"Fool!"
Quirrell was close to collapsing. "You told me to attack!"
"I did not tell you to attack yourself with vegetables!"
"It was garlic!"
"That is not the point!"
Theodore ignored their internal quarrel.
He stepped forward and lightly tapped the floor with the tip of his shoe.
The stone did not react.
At least, not to ordinary senses.
But in Theodore's eyes, the office floor had already changed.
Thin black threads covered the stone like hairline cracks. They had no visible light, no obvious magical fluctuation, and no curse residue. If not for the Wuzhuang foundation he had planted beneath Hogwarts, even Theodore might have needed more time to find them.
This was not the Heaven's Extinction Array.
The first node twisted probability.
The fourth node was different.
It was quieter.
More sinister.
The black threads climbed from the floor to the walls, then from the walls toward Quirrell.
Not his body.
His shadow.
Theodore's eyes narrowed slightly.
"So that's why it was placed here."
Quirrell's heart sank.
Voldemort understood at the same time.
This node had been fed by the unstable connection between his remnant soul and Quirrell's body. A half-dead Dark Lord parasitizing a living wizard was not a normal magical state. It produced fear, resentment, pain, soul pressure, and a constant tearing between two identities.
For most people, that was a disaster.
For a soul-type array node, it was fertilizer.
Theodore looked at Quirrell's shadow.
"Falling Soul."
The office shook.
The black threads snapped taut.
The node had been named.
Just like before, once Theodore spoke the correct principle, the hidden thing reacted.
Quirrell stumbled back.
The shadow under his feet stretched unnaturally toward the bookshelf.
Theodore took one step forward.
A cold wind swept through the office.
Books burst from the shelves.
Not flying like ordinary objects.
They opened midair, pages flipping by themselves. Ink rose from the paper, gathering into twisted faces that screamed without sound.
Quirrell's office had been turned into a small killing field.
It was not strong enough to threaten Theodore directly, but it was annoying.
Theodore lifted two fingers.
Wutu Divine Light spread beneath his feet.
The stone floor grew heavy.
The flying books slowed as if they had fallen into thick mud.
Yimu Divine Light flowed along the walls.
Green threads pierced the screaming ink faces and pulled them apart one by one.
A defensive textbook tried to bite Theodore's sleeve.
A thin willow root emerged from the gap in the floor and slapped it back onto the shelf.
The book landed with a thud.
Theodore glanced at the root.
The root tilted proudly.
Quirrell stared at it.
"How did the tree get in here?"
Nobody answered him.
Outside the office, Hermione stopped in the corridor.
The fire-crab pendant at her throat had grown hot enough that she could feel it through her robes.
Harry stopped beside her, hand already on the willow branch.
Ron arrived a few seconds later, out of breath.
"Why are we running toward the obviously dangerous room again?"
Hermione gave him a look.
Ron sighed.
"Right. Because we always do."
The office door trembled.
A black line slipped under the door and crawled toward their feet.
Harry's willow branch jerked.
"Move!"
He swung downward.
Green light flashed.
The black line split apart and evaporated with a faint hiss.
Ron stared at the floor.
"What was that?"
Hermione's face tightened.
"I don't know, but I don't like that it came under a professor's door."
Ron looked at the office nameplate.
"Quirrell."
Then he slowly stepped back.
"No, actually, that makes sense."
Inside the office, Theodore heard them but did not turn.
The Falling Soul node had begun attacking outward.
That was troublesome.
Not because it was strong, but because soul attacks were difficult for students to resist. If the node spread through the corridor, nearby students might experience nightmares, confusion, or temporary possession.
In a school full of children, temporary possession was not a small matter.
Theodore raised his hand and pressed down.
The office floor sank an inch.
Quirrell fell backward onto the carpet.
The black threads under his shadow screamed silently.
Theodore finally stopped treating the room gently.
Heaven and Earth in My Palm opened.
The space beneath the office folded.
The floor, the cavity, the hidden node, and the dark threads wrapped around Quirrell's shadow were all pulled into Theodore's palm in layers.
From the outside, nothing seemed to move.
But Quirrell felt as though the whole room had been lifted, squeezed, and placed inside a teacup.
His stomach turned.
He vomited onto the carpet.
Voldemort was not concerned about the carpet.
"Stop him!"
Quirrell lifted his head miserably.
"How?"
Voldemort had no answer.
Because Theodore had already found the node.
A black bead rose from the stone.
It was no bigger than a marble.
Unlike the first node, it had no bone, no metal, no obvious alchemical shell. It looked like a drop of condensed shadow.
Inside it, countless tiny faces appeared and disappeared.
Quirrell saw one of them and nearly fainted.
It looked like him.
A thinner version.
A more frightened version.
A version that had been screaming for a very long time.
Theodore's eyes became colder.
Voldemort had not merely used Quirrell's office.
He had used Quirrell himself as part of the preparation.
Fear.
Submission.
Soul pressure.
Host and parasite.
All of it had been refined into the Falling Soul node.
Quirrell noticed Theodore's gaze and suddenly felt something worse than fear.
Shame.
He lowered his head.
For the first time in many months, he looked less like a villain and more like a man who had walked into a cage and only realized after the door closed.
Theodore did not pity him.
Pity was useless.
But he understood the structure now.
"Your master really likes using people as materials."
Quirrell said nothing.
Voldemort spoke through him instead.
"Greatness requires sacrifice."
Theodore looked at Quirrell.
"Interesting. He says that while sacrificing your soul."
Quirrell's face went even paler.
Voldemort's voice turned venomous. "Snow, do not pretend you are kind. You cultivate, you calculate, you manipulate those around you. Do you think yourself different?"
Theodore smiled.
"Yes."
The answer was so direct that Voldemort paused.
Theodore lifted the black bead.
"The difference is simple. People who follow me become stronger."
The willow root beside him gently tapped the bitten textbook again, as if agreeing.
Outside the door, Ron's voice came faintly.
"Is that why I have murder vegetables?"
Harry replied, "Probably."
Hermione hissed, "Stop talking!"
Theodore continued, "People who follow you become ingredients."
Quirrell's mouth twitched.
He did not dare agree.
But he also did not dare deny it.
The Falling Soul bead suddenly burst.
Black mist filled the office.
Voldemort had acted.
Since the node was exposed, he chose to detonate part of it.
The mist rushed toward Theodore's face, carrying countless whispers.
Fear.
Regret.
Doubt.
Memory.
For an ordinary wizard, even a professor, this mist could drag the soul into confusion for several breaths. In battle, several breaths meant death.
Theodore did not retreat.
He opened his mouth and lightly exhaled.
The sound was not loud.
It was almost gentle.
But the moment it appeared, the black mist froze.
Fuxi Divine Heaven Resonance.
The sound did not attack the soul directly.
It adjusted the rhythm.
The chaotic whispers lost their disorder. The screaming faces in the mist became clear for a moment, then collapsed one after another like ink washed away by rain.
Quirrell clutched his head.
He heard nothing, yet tears suddenly flowed from his eyes.
For a brief instant, the pressure on his soul loosened.
Only briefly.
Voldemort immediately crushed it down again.
But that one breath was enough for Quirrell to understand something.
He had almost remembered what it felt like to be alone in his own body.
That feeling nearly broke him.
The black mist cleared.
The Falling Soul bead had shrunk by half.
Theodore caught the remaining piece between two fingers.
"You are wasting good material."
Voldemort's rage filled the office.
"Give it back."
Theodore looked amused.
"You placed it under a professor's office in Hogwarts. That makes it school property."
Quirrell stared.
Even Voldemort seemed stunned for a moment.
Then the door burst open.
Hermione, Harry, and Ron stumbled in together.
Technically, Hermione opened the door.
Harry was ready with the willow branch.
Ron was pushed in by a Chomping Cabbage that had apparently decided waiting outside was boring.
All three froze when they saw the room.
Books scattered everywhere.
Garlic on Quirrell's head.
A willow root crawling out of the floor.
Theodore holding a piece of black shadow between his fingers.
Quirrell sitting on the carpet looking like a man whose soul had been wrung out.
Ron looked around slowly.
"I feel like we missed the beginning."
Hermione ignored him and stared at the black fragment.
"What is that?"
"A soul-type array node," Theodore said.
Hermione immediately understood enough to look horrified.
Harry looked at Quirrell.
"Was it attacking him?"
"Yes."
Quirrell flinched.
Ron's expression changed. He did not like Quirrell. Nobody in their group did. But seeing a teacher sitting on the floor with that expression made even Ron uncomfortable.
"That's nasty," he muttered.
Theodore nodded.
"It is."
The remaining black threads tried to crawl toward the students.
Harry moved without needing instruction.
The willow branch flashed.
The threads snapped.
Hermione pointed her wand.
"Lumos!"
Bright light filled the room.
The spell was simple, but under her concentration and the fire-crab pendant's heat, the light carried a faint purifying warmth. The black threads shrank from it.
Ron panicked, then shoved his sleeve forward.
"Bite anything dark!"
Three Chomping Cabbages dropped to the floor and began attacking shadows.
One bit Ron's shoe by mistake.
"Ow! Not mine!"
Theodore looked at them.
Not bad.
Harry reacted to killing intent faster than before.
Hermione had begun instinctively adding fire-crab power into ordinary spells.
Ron's cabbages were still stupid, but they were stupid with enthusiasm.
That counted.
Theodore threw the black fragment downward.
Willow Immortal's root rose and swallowed it.
The root immediately turned black.
Then green light flowed through it.
Wutu Divine Light sealed the sinking force.
Yimu Divine Light refined the soul residue.
The blackness struggled for a few seconds, then became a dark pattern inside the root.
Not destroyed.
Transformed.
The Wuzhuang foundation beneath Hogwarts gained another mark.
This mark was different from the first.
The first node helped Theodore trace the Heaven's Extinction network.
The Falling Soul fragment helped him understand how the enemy intended to target minds and souls during the tournament.
Theodore looked at Hermione, Harry, and Ron.
"You three will need protection."
Hermione's face became serious.
"For the tournament?"
"Yes."
Harry frowned. "Is it going to attack people's souls?"
"It will try."
Ron immediately looked at Quirrell.
"Like him?"
Quirrell lowered his head.
Nobody laughed.
Even Ron realized it was not the moment.
Theodore raised his hand.
Three thin green lights emerged from Willow Immortal's root and landed in front of them.
The lights twisted into small leaf-shaped talismans.
One for each of them.
Hermione caught hers carefully.
It felt warm.
Harry's talisman vibrated slightly near his willow branch.
Ron's was immediately sniffed by a Chomping Cabbage.
"Don't eat that."
The cabbage looked disappointed.
Theodore said, "Keep them on you. If you hear voices that do not belong to you, hold the talisman and call my name."
Ron blinked.
"What kind of voices?"
"The kind telling you to do something stupid."
Ron opened his mouth.
Hermione looked at him.
Harry looked at him.
Ron closed his mouth.
"That's going to be difficult to identify."
Theodore smiled. "Then assume all of them are suspicious."
A soft cough came from the doorway.
Everyone turned.
Dumbledore stood there.
Fawkes perched on his shoulder.
The headmaster looked at the destroyed office, the garlic-covered professor, the students with talismans, the willow root in the floor, and the Chomping Cabbage still trying to bite Ron's shoelace.
His expression remained peaceful.
Only his eyes looked tired.
"Once again," Dumbledore said gently, "I find myself arriving after the furniture has lost."
Ron whispered, "That's one way to describe it."
Hermione elbowed him.
Dumbledore stepped inside.
His gaze fell on Quirrell.
Quirrell became stiff.
For one terrifying second, Theodore wondered whether Voldemort would try to flee.
He did not.
The Dark Lord buried himself deep inside Quirrell's body, hiding behind layers of fear, pain, and fragmented soul pressure. The Falling Soul node had helped conceal him, but now that Theodore had taken part of it, that concealment had become less perfect.
Dumbledore sensed something.
Not enough to expose Voldemort.
Enough to become suspicious.
Theodore saw the shift in the old wizard's eyes.
Good.
A clever person did not need the full truth at once.
A direction was enough.
"Professor Quirrell," Dumbledore said softly, "are you injured?"
Quirrell opened his mouth.
Voldemort forced him to answer.
"N-no, Headmaster. Only startled."
Dumbledore looked at the garlic in his hair.
"I can see that."
Theodore handed Dumbledore a small piece of burned black thread.
"This was under his office."
Dumbledore took it.
The moment his fingers touched it, Fawkes let out a sharp cry.
Flame flashed across the phoenix's feathers.
The thread twisted like a worm trying to escape.
Dumbledore's expression darkened.
Very slightly.
That was rare enough.
"This is not ordinary dark magic."
"No," Theodore said. "It is part of the same trap prepared for the tournament."
Hermione's fingers tightened around the leaf talisman.
Dumbledore looked toward Theodore.
"You have found more of it?"
"Enough to know canceling the tournament now may not solve the problem."
Ron immediately looked miserable.
"So we really are still going?"
Dumbledore gave him a mild look.
"Mr. Weasley, I assure you, if the tournament continues, additional protections will be arranged."
Ron looked at Theodore.
Then at Dumbledore.
Then at his Chomping Cabbages.
"With respect, Professor, the phrase 'additional protections' is starting to sound like 'please stand near the explosion.'"
Dumbledore's mouth twitched.
Theodore laughed.
Even Harry smiled.
The tension in the room eased a little.
Only Quirrell did not laugh.
He sat on the carpet, staring at the place where the black bead had vanished into the willow root.
He had lost something tonight.
Not power.
Not a plan.
Something worse.
Theodore had shown him, for one breath, that the chain around his soul could loosen.
Now it was tight again.
Tighter than before.
But once a prisoner remembered the feeling of air, the prison became harder to endure.
Voldemort knew it too.
His voice inside Quirrell's mind was cold enough to freeze blood.
"Do not think."
Quirrell lowered his head.
"Yes, Master."
Theodore glanced at him once.
Then looked away.
The seed had been planted.
Whether Quirrell lived long enough for it to grow was another matter.
Beneath Hogwarts, the Wuzhuang foundation absorbed the Falling Soul fragment.
Willow Immortal's roots spread a little deeper.
The fourth node did not die completely. The main body had retreated through the connection, slipping toward the remaining network. But Theodore had taken enough from it.
The first node had exposed the movement of fate.
The fourth node had exposed the attack on souls.
The pitch core still waited.
The lake node still itched.
And below all of them, the ancient prison remained silent.
Too silent.
Dumbledore looked at the office floor.
"Mr. Snow."
"Yes?"
"How many more of these things are hidden in my school?"
Theodore thought for a moment.
"Nine total, if we count the one under the pitch. Several are already awake."
Ron covered his face.
Hermione inhaled sharply.
Harry gripped the willow branch.
Dumbledore closed his eyes for one second.
When he opened them, his smile had returned.
It was gentle.
It was also very dangerous.
"I see."
Fawkes spread his wings.
For the first time that night, Quirrell felt afraid of someone other than Theodore.
Dumbledore turned toward the door.
"Then I believe Hogwarts should prepare properly."
Theodore looked out the window.
Across the dark grounds, the Quidditch pitch gave a faint pulse.
As if answering him.
The tournament was still days away.
But the school had already entered the field.
◇ BONUS & SUPPORT ◇
◇ 1 bonus chapter for every 10 reviews — drop a comment!
◇ 1 bonus chapter for every 100 Power Stones.
◇ Read 60 chapters ahead on P@treon → patreon.com/StrawHatStudios