Chapter 352: A Perfect Finish! Yaxley's Final Howl!
Whoosh!
Brilliant light enveloped Ethan completely.
Like sinking back into a mother's arms — warmth and comfort, absolute and total.
"Phew."
Ethan let out a breath.
Standing beside the blood-soaked dark wizard, he smiled with open satisfaction. "Now this was a haul."
Soul Fusion alone had gone up by a full 0.5%.
To put that in perspective — the entire summer holiday, giants expedition included, hadn't netted him that much.
Ethan: "Dark wizards really do give the most~"
Beyond that.
Ethan looked down at the curved wand in his hand.
And the silver-white fragment in Luna's.
Bellatrix's wand — no question, that's the key to getting the golden cup.
As for the Crescent Moon Prayer…opening power and healing power…
"Oh! I could use it to upgrade my Portal painting!"
Ethan's eyes lit up.
The Portal was genuinely useful, but at this stage, it came with some very real limitations.
The biggest one: it could only be opened within the visible range of his eyes. Even with Door Within the Eye as a supplement, that made it feel almost redundant in the outside world, where Disapparition wasn't restricted.
"I've got higher-tier painting skills now. Time to give the old works an upgrade."
The concept was already forming in his mind.
No restriction on line of sight. No restriction on location.
The Anywhere Door.
"But before that…"
Ethan turned his head towards the cave entrance.
The corner of his mouth curved into a pleasant arc.
"Let's deal with the little insect buzzing around first."
After all.
Bellatrix's wand was now in hand. The other party had outlived their usefulness.
"There's no way I'm letting you go off and tip anyone — say, the Ministry — about any of this."
Ethan called to Luna and turned, heading for the exit.
He didn't notice.
A dense silver-white radiance slipped from the Crescent Moon fragment and drifted quietly into Luna.
Causing the colour of her eyes to deepen, just slightly.
At the entrance to the manor.
Yaxley watched anxiously as Ethan — re-disguised as "Professor Unknown" — tallied up the students.
The longer he watched, the more unfathomable the man seemed.
Why would he go to all this trouble to disguise himself as a professor? And put in this much effort actually teaching the students — as though he genuinely wants to help them improve?
"Is he trying to take control of the school? Conquer things starting from Hogwarts? Damn it — I can't read him at all!"
Yaxley clenched his fist.
Fingernails pressing into his palm, using the pain to keep himself barely functional.
"Are you alright, Mr Yaxley?" Connie, walking beside him, spoke up. "You look… a bit pale."
Yaxley: "…I'm fine. I just found myself thinking — Ethan Vincent is really something else."
The Lamp Master and the Defence Against the Dark Arts professor.
At this point, the entire wizarding world seemed to revolve around Ethan.
Hearing her idol's name, Connie brightened. "Mr Vincent? Hmm, I think he just wants more people to see his art. He's quite a pure-hearted person, really—"
"Hah!"
Yaxley cut her off with a cold snort.
"Pure-hearted? It's never that simple!"
"That man has some grand plan — something terrible, something he's hiding — I'm certain of it!"
"Something beyond ordinary people's ability to comprehend…"
Connie stared at the Ministry senior official — drenched in sweat, muttering away to himself — with quiet puzzlement.
A grand plan?
Ha. The way he's talking, it's like Ethan's trying to overturn the wizarding world.
He's our brightest, most righteous saviour.
Meanwhile.
"Right, then!"
Ethan clapped his hands and looked over the thoroughly filthy students with warm approval. "I can see clear improvement from all of you. Just goes to show — cooping yourselves up in school all the time won't cut it. You need to get out and stretch your legs every now and then."
Ron wiped the foul-smelling mud from his face and slumped. "It would be even better if we could have a normal field trip."
Rather than being locked in with dark wizards, bare-handed, in some kind of gladiatorial pit.
But — it had to be said.
The results were undeniable.
Word had it that even Neville had managed to cast a successful wandless spell.
Though for some reason.
He didn't look happy about it. He was hanging his head, subdued and quiet.
Using the key prepared in advance.
The group made ready to head back.
Seeing that nothing had happened, Yaxley let out a slow, careful breath of relief.
Good.
Ethan didn't seem to have noticed that he was a Death Eater mole.
Right at that moment.
A shadow fell over him.
Something settled on his shoulder.
He looked up.
And came face to face with a featureless spiral of a face.
Ethan said, pleasantly, "Come take a walk with me, mate."
A bead of cold sweat ran down the side of Yaxley's face.
His legs had started to shake.
"I — I actually need to get back to the Ministry, so perhaps another —"
Ethan said, regretfully, "Ha. Did that sound like a question to you?"
Yaxley, "Ah?"
The word had barely left his mouth.
Before Yaxley's bewildered eyes.
The ground beneath his feet simply vanished — and a black door yawned open below him.
Yaxley, "AAAAAAAHHHH—"
His screaming faded into the distance.
Ethan stood at the edge of the portal, looking calmly down at the rapidly disappearing figure, and said quietly, "Well, if you don't want to keep me company, you can go on your own."
"Have fun~"
THUD!
Yaxley hit the ground hard, every bone rattling, his insides feeling like they'd been rearranged.
That bloody little — !
He was certain the intelligence reports had never mentioned the Portal requiring a drop from height! Was that deliberate?! Or just casual cruelty?!
And at the same time.
A deep chill settled through him.
The Portal was something only "student Ethan" could use. The fact that Ethan had shown it to him meant —
Ethan already knew everything.
"…Damn it. Snape, you traitor!"
Yaxley nearly ground his back teeth to dust.
He'd never imagined it — that even Snape, once the Dark Lord's most trusted lieutenant, had turned.
One delightful surprise after another, apparently.
Doesn't matter. I'm not dead yet. There's still a way out.
Yaxley drew his wand and scanned his surroundings warily.
As a veteran Death Eater with a long list of kills, he had a reasonable degree of confidence in himself.
"As long as nothing abnormally powerful shows up — the advantage is mine!"
He was still thinking that.
When suddenly.
BOOM. BOOM. BOOM.
A sound like an earthquake.
As though something colossal was slowly making its way towards him.
Yaxley's eyes went wide.
He watched leaves cascade down from above — felt that all-too-familiar pressure bearing down on him —
A single thought surfaced.
"No — that's not — that can't be —"
His gaze kept climbing upward.
Climbing.
Until he saw those unmistakable silhouettes, and a shriek of pure terror tore itself from his throat:
"GIANTS!!!"
In an instant.
Every awful memory of past beatings came flooding back.
Shattering what remained of Yaxley's composure like a battering ram through paper.
All rational thought — gone.
Under those enormous axes, drawing closer by the second.
Yaxley's eyes went bloodshot, and with every last scrap of breath in his body, he screamed at the top of his lungs:
"ETHAN VINCENT, YOU LITTLE —!!!"
Hogwarts.
"Achoo."
Ethan sneezed.
He turned, glancing towards the Forbidden Forest, where a flock of birds had scattered into the sky.
He rubbed his nose and grinned sheepishly. "Heh heh~ who's saying nice things about me?"