Pre-Chapter A/N: More chapters on my Patreon(https://www.patreon.com/c/Oghenevwogaga)— same username as here and link in bio.
Around me, pieces of black cloth fell to the floor. What the hell had that been? I feel myself beginning to tire. That thing had taken my magic. More of it than it had any business taking, and more than I should have given without noticing the drain. I guessed that was the reason for the dream. What a danger our creature? To place one in a dream while feeding on their magic of all things. A deadly creature and one that I had never heard of. With a scowl, I continued my journey into the tunnel but remained careful to be aware of my surroundings. Now I recognised that the initial blast of darkness I'd faced in the corridor had been the creature attaching itself to me. I'd been in the illusion right from the very beginning.
The next creator I faced announced itself far ahead of time. I could hear it while I was metres away from rounding the corner as it lumbered from one place to the next, pacing across the tunnel for no clear reason. The next of my senses to be assaulted by this creature was my sense of smell. It began to reek even before I'd reached the end of the hall. I waved my wand to cast a bubblehead charm, wary that this might be some sort of smell designed to ensnare the senses. I was putting even more focus on my occlumency than usual, so I would probably be able to fight it, but it was better to be safe than sorry.
When I rounded the corner, I almost facepalmed that I didn't guess what was coming. It was at least twelve feet tall, over double my height and nearly as tall as the tunnel was high, with brown skin that cracked in places to show its earthen nature. It was humanoid, two legs, two arms, genitals in all the same places, and that was a massive member if I did say so myself. And in its left hand was a club made of pure granite. An earth troll. How fascinating. Weren't these things endangered? I considered my options as I levied my wand. If not for the encounter with the dream stealer, I would have smote this thing where it stood with a bolt of lightning that would have torn through its earthen skin like a hot knife through butter. Now, I would have to take a less magically intensive route, but one no less thorough.
I met eyes with the troll, and ran straight at it. A smarter creature might have flinched at my run and stalled, but this one was too dumb to see my run as anything apart from a challenge. With a roar, it matched my pace, heading for me just as I headed for it. I came to a stop on a dime, thanking magic for ritual enhanced physicality. With a twist of my wand, I silently cast one of the variants of the Glisseo spell, turning the earth floor as slippery as a freshly polished slide. The troll took one step, and then went crashing down, coming to a stop right in front of me, eyes closed and clearly winded. Its head was so large that it came up to my thigh.
I stepped forward and placed one of my feet against its skull, kicking it to wakefulness. It opened its eyes and I wasted no time in sending a piercing curse right through the fleshy mass of vulnerability most creatures shared and into its brain. It slumped, dead. I turned to walk around it, dispelling the Glisseo spell with a flick of my wand as I continued down the corridor, onto the next turn and the next challenge it held.
I faced two more trolls and dispatched them in eerily similar ways before I came across the next thing that could even vaguely qualify as a threat. The tunnel rounded off in a giant theatre that was surrounded with stone statues that lined the wall. Each of them weilded one of a small set of weapons— sword, hammer, axe, or spear, in alternating order. I could count close to fifty of them from my spot outside the entrance. And if life had taught me anything, it was that the second I stepped into that room, those statues would come to life and attack me. It was the only possible defence the room had.
I briefly considered disillusioning myself ad waiting for the others to catch up and brave the room themselves but apart from the fact that that would look cowardly to the watching public— and Doom was no coward, there was the possibility that they had all taken the other turn and might be faced with an entirely different challenge. It was possible that the two routes were yet to coalesce— if they ever would.
With a scowl and some small trepidation at the numbers I was set to follow, I took a step into the room, staring at the statues and noting that they did not move a step. Didn't even flinch at my entrance. Could they not be the room's defence? Was I wrong? I wondered.
It was not until I heard the sound of stone cracking and something moving that I flipped my head to the side to find that one of the statues I hadn't been looking at had begun moving. It had only managed to take half a step before it had com to a decisive stop, but that was a sign of potential. Was there some sort of glitch with the enchantments at play here?
Hearing movement, I returned my gaze to the stars that were previously the focus of my attention, only to find that they themselves had been able to move only to come to an abrupt stop. Movement behind me forced me to turn my attention back to the second set of statues. That was when I figured it out. The statues wouldn't move if I was looking at them, but the second my attention was food away from them by the other moving status, then they would be free to move again. It was a fascinating enchantment. Definitely the kind of thing that Flitwick and Mcgonagall would dream between them. The clear goal seemed to be to get to the centre of the large amphitheater. That was about 30 paces away if I was walking at my full stride. With how large those statues were, they'd get to me before I got there if I just ran for it and fucked the consequences.
On the other hand, I doubted I had enough spare magic to just out-and-out fight the statues and fuck the consequences. That meant I had to be crafty about it. I spun my wand in my grip, creating a cushion of water around me with a modified use of the aqua eructo spell. One thing few appreciated about the spell was the second difference it had from the standard aguamenti. It not only created vastly more water, but it did it in such a way that the caster had almost entire control over what the water did once it was called into existence.
I rested on the watery cushion and commanded it to carry me straight to the centre of the hall, while panning my gaze between both sides equally to make sure that none got close enough to present a threat. I almost made it even, except that I had done the same thing every stereotypical movie villain did— I forgot to look up. The first statue landed next to my watery carriage and was sent flying backwards with a wave of my wand as I commanded the water to slam into him. The second managed to swing its weapon, forcing me to jump over the arc of its blade, abandoning my water carriage. With a slash of my wand, the water rose from its position and slammed into this one as well. 15 paces to go, I thought.
"Come at me", I screamed, daring the statues. The one who managed to be the closest was the first to eat a blasting curse straight to the head. I spun to the side, freezing a set that were coming from that angle in their tracks, before taking the stones that made up the first statue under my control and transfiguring them into a series of round metal balls, dense as all hell. Levitating them was more draining than expected, even as my imagination, and knowledge, did the bulk of the heavy lifting for the transfiguration. It made sense that that was the art Dumbledore focused on so much in his old age. The approaching statues were mowed down as the dense steel balls tore through them like they were made of paper.
While that happened, I continued to run towards the center. Something told me that once I made it there, they would stop. One made it through the chaos wreaked by my steel tools and swung a sword right in front of me. I stopped on a dime, allowing the blade bury itself in the ground before I flicked my wand with a hissed incantation. 'Serpensortia' was a powerful enough spell on its own, but when cast in parseltongue it could let the caster transfigure nearly anything into a snake of their choice with almost no power or skill required.
The sword turned into a giant constrictor that wasted no time in beginning to bind the statue and keep it still. I jumped over an axe that tried to cleave me in half as I rolled into a front flip and then rolled another step forward to reach the Dias at the middle of the room. The statues that had moved to surround me suddenly froze and began to step backwards. Impressively, the ones I'd destroyed also reassembled themselves and returned to their position.
My transfiguration was forcefully undone, and then the stone collected itself to form a statue that I could have sworn glared at me as it made its way back to its position on the wall. Once all the statues had reassembled themselves, the Dias at the centre of the room that I just realised was shaped perfectly circularly began to twist to reveal a set of stairs that went all the way down into the depths.
"Into the unknown" I vocalized as I cast a silent lumos that I deactivated in favour of Hermione's favoured bluebell flames when I thought better about it. More magically draining, but they kept my wand free to fight whatever creature would be waiting for me there. I'd done air, I'd done earth, and next— next was fire.
I could feel the heat from the next chamber even before I made it to the bottom of the stairs. Whispered incantations flowed from my mouth in rapid succession. "Arresto ignis" I whispered over and over again. The flame freezing charm was one of the oldest pieces of magic still in use today, and so the incantation was in the style of the older magics, more like a song than anything else. When I felt the spell click in place, I continued my journey downwards. When I finished the next spiral of stairs, I began to notice a red glow coming from further down the stairway.
I marched towards it, waiting for the next challenge I would face. It was a door. A locked door from which the red light leaked through its edges and bottom. It was obvious that passing through the door was the only way to the next test, and passing the door was easy to see as well. There was some sort of runic puzzle on either end of the door. I tried a basic unlocking charm, far from surprised when the door failed to even budge. Next, I tried a more advanced variation, before unleashing every spell in my arsenal for unlocking locked objects to no avail. I tried a risky blasting curse as well, but the second I finished the incantation, the orange jet of poor hit the door and ricocheted, heading back in my direction. I ducked underneath it, only for it to hit the wall and be reflected at a different angle.
The spell gained speed as it reflected off surface after surface, quickly becoming an orange blur bouncing from point to point, and in the end I only managed to get rid of it by jumping right in front of it with a mage shield when it was about to hit the wall. If I had let that continue for much longer, then it would have become too fast and too unpredictable to survive without injury. Well, that struck off direct means of making it through the door. That only left the puzzle.
I turned towards the puzzle. It was made of runes in different areas that were clearly supposed to come together to represent something else. The puzzle was about 64 squares— eight by eight. Each go the runes meant a different thing— I could see the runes for fire, water, air, and some other popular ones that got my attention almost instantly. Trying to translate them one by one made it pretty clear just what exactly the puzzle was trying to say. In a manner of minutes, I had managed to arrange the first half of the puzzle that had been delivered to us ahead of the task—
"Stand firm at destiny's gate this day:
Prepare yourself, Champion,
For you shall dance with the elements
To save and protect that which one holds most dear.
Swim in the water,
Fly through the air,
Dig beneath the earth
And brave the hottest flames"
I took a step away, and went to the next puzzle, the one on the other side of the door. This time, the puzzle took even less time to arrange in the desired format—
"While the sky weeps thunder
To prove your mettle on the biggest stage.
Let the winds herald your courage,
Let the waves salute your will,
Let the embers burn with your resolve,
Let the stones remember your tread—
For in the crucible of trial
You rise, a true Champion."
I expected the door to swing open with little fanfare, only to be faced with disappointment as it remained stubbornly closed. I looked at the puzzle in front of me and it remained complete. I took a step to the other side and noted that the puzzle had scrambled itself again. I growled before fixing it. Still, no opened door greeted my effort. When I went over to the other side, I was almost unsurprised to find that it had been scrambled again. I growled with irritation before fixing it and then hitting it with a stasis charm to stop it from scrambling itself as I went over to the other puzzle and fixed that one. No door opened.
I went back to it and found it scrambled, regardless of the fact that my spell remained in place. I went back and forth at least three times before I stepped back, trying to think of another way to approach the problem. That was when I heard the sound of people coming down the stairs I had just used. Someone else had made it through this way, I thought. Faced with no progress on the door, I made my decision quickly, snapping a disillusionment charm over my body and taking a step to the side.
XXXXXXXX- DAPHNE GREENGRASS
She tried not to look to her side, to the empty spot beside her. Tracy's spot. People had enough respect to keep the seat empty as everyone had lost someone in that mess of a ball, but she knew this was not the time to break down in tears. Malfoy was being surprisingly tolerable and respectful about the grief almost everyone felt. He'd lost Parkinson as well, even if Daphne doubted he had cared much about her either way. Turning her mind away from the past, she focused on the giant screens showing the second task in full swing.
Potter had been in the lead for the longest time, but he'd lost his lead when he spent half an hour just standing still with that creature wrapped around him. Krum and his partner had made it ahead of him, taking a turn in the opposite direction. When the same creature that had caught Potter caught Krum, his partner wrenched it from his body in seconds before they both destroyed it. When Potter had started moving again, he was only a few minutes ahead of Delacour at best.
Just like Krum, her partner had rescued her from the magical creature, even if it had taken the other girl the better part of a minute to overcome her shaking hand and panic to help her friend. Delacour was clearly disadvantaged by the partner she had been saddled with. Diggory had followed soon after, following in Potter's footsteps as he and Chang worked their magic to defeat obstacle after obstacle. Krum and his partner went down wands blazing into the room with the animated warriors and fought their way to the centre. At his heels, Delacour and her partner managed to figure out the enchantment in a matter of minutes and were able to make it across by standing back to back and walking to the centre.
It was much the same for Diggory, who had to destroy a few of the statues he and Chang failed to take into account. When he finally made it to the door for the final stage, Potter heard their arrival and disillusioned himself. It might have just been the camera, but everything she could see told her the spell was perfect, and that was impressive in a way few things were. Diggory and Chang faced the puzzle. The fastest time across belonged to the French witches, but if there was any duo going to beat that, it was this one.
Diggory and Chang debated for a few minutes before they went their separate ways, each going to one of the tablets. They completed the puzzle in unison and just like the other pair of doors had done for the two earlier champions, this pair swung open. Thy were about to step in when they fell to the floor, stunned. A blast of red had hit Diggory right as another hit Chang. Potter removed his disillusionment to step over their bodies and walk to the next challenge, not able to hear the boos his action drew from the home crowd.
Booos that were supplanted by cheers from the Durmstrang coalition as Krum swung to the top of the platform, clinching first place, just as Potter walked in.
A/N: Yes, Harry gets handed his first L here. A real L? Well, that's up to you. So the inside baseball here is that Dumbledore stewarded over a task designed to only work if the Champion and hostage work together. If Ron had saved Harry's arsenal from the dream eater, and then been pivotal to crossing the animation room before helping get access to the third task, then Dumbledore would expect a rekindled friendship. Sadly, Harry's decision to just transfigure Ron into a rat and move on without him tossed a wrench into that one. Next two up on Patreon-https://www.patreon.com/c/Oghenevwogaga- ( same username as here and link in bio), support me there and read them early.