Chapter 355: Physically "Opening Their Hearts"! Demon, Get Out of Those Pure Souls!
Whoosh—
A misty, bone-deep chill poured outward.
Frost flowers bloomed across the clean white floor and walls of the ward.
A slender rapier had appeared in Ethan's hand.
True to its name — it looked like an oversized sewing needle, magnified and sharpened to an almost blinding point. The silver-white guard and grip were carved with intricate, beautiful patterns.
Like a sword made for a woman.
[Name: Crescent Moon's Grief]
[Tier: Third-Tier · Blue Rare]
[Category: Instrument Painting]
[Description: Once belonging to an unyielding woman in exile, the chill that clings to it may well be born from the bone-deep hatred she carried in her heart.]
[Effect: Capable of severing anything — including magical curses — and inflicting direct damage to the soul. Whatever is struck by the blade will suffer an ice attack and be rendered immobile. Drawing the blade across flesh allows direct entry into the target's soul space.]
Ethan gripped the elegant rapier.
Frost settled along his lashes, white breath rising from his lips.
The cold sharpened something about him — an air of icy, aristocratic refinement, like a prince out of a painting.
This rapier, imbued with the Crescent Moon magic —
Was more than just a tool for the Longbottoms.
It was also Ethan's new weapon.
After the razor-sharp claws of Rat in the Wall, this was the second thing capable of directly deflecting spells head-on — and the first weapon that could act on the soul itself.
Comparable, really, to a physical Killing Curse — ahem.
Ethan would like to clarify that he had absolutely not woven any magic harmful to one's physical or spiritual well-being into this painting.
Hehe~
Having a new weapon also dramatically improves my own combat capability. Ethan thought. And makes the fighting considerably more aesthetic.
Wizards shouldn't just be standing there going pew-pew with spells — this isn't some magical cannon.
The power of magic has no limits.
He was already planning to test it out when they went to Gringotts.
He pulled his thoughts back.
Ethan looked at the Longbottoms sitting before him — smiling blankly, faintly confused.
He raised the frost-gleaming rapier, levelling its sharp tip towards them.
"I'm beginning the treatment now," he said calmly.
Neville: ???
— Wait — why are you pulling out a weapon to treat someone?!
Is this healing by blunt force?!
"W-wait a moment —"
Clack!
A thin, wiry hand shot past Neville and seized Ethan's wrist!
Clamping down on it like an iron vice!
A sharp twinge of pain shot through his wrist.
"Hss."
Ethan's brow furrowed slightly.
He looked at Neville's grandmother, who was gripping him with furious strength, and nodded. "Ah — starting with a sacrifice of suffering? Quite the refined taste."
Neville's grandmother, Madam Augusta:
What on earth is this boy talking about?
Her brows shot up so high they nearly left her forehead — she looked like an enraged pumpkin ready to sit on something and crush it flat.
Which immediately sent Neville scrambling sideways, barely breathing, trying to make himself as small as possible.
"What do you think you're doing?!" Madam Augusta hissed in a low, ragged snarl. "Are you trying to hurt my son and daughter-in-law?!"
Ethan blinked.
Those diamond-blue eyes went instantly dewy. He gasped. "Oh, Merlin's beard — how could you have such a terrible misunderstanding?"
"I am trying to heal these brave and unfortunate souls!"
Ethan looked absolutely stricken.
That fair, handsome face — like a suffering angel —
Radiating a glow capable of melting stone.
"Oh my goodness, he's adorable—!"
The cluster of nurses pressed together in the doorway, maternal instincts spontaneously combusting.
"Someone ought to just hold him in their hands—"
"Honestly, even if he is the dreadful Ethan Vincent, it hardly matters~"
"Come here come to big sis"
Neville, listening nearby, felt a wave of second-hand embarrassment wash over him.
He stared at the president of his Morning Star Club, jaw somewhere near the floor.
He felt a distinct crack forming in the glorious image he had of Ethan.
…Is this Ethan's magic?
No one else could pull this off.
Even the stony Madam Augusta's expression had involuntarily softened.
Without quite meaning to, she loosened her grip and said gruffly: "Hmm. Fine. But why are you bringing a sword to heal someone? Very strange."
Ethan smiled. "Ha, well — I'll need to cut them open, of course~"
A sudden silence.
Into that silence, Ethan's clear and cheerful voice continued:
"Slice open the flesh, lay bare the chest…"
"Like cracking open a ripe pomegranate — you'd be able to see the heart beating inside, the blood vessels branching out in all their complex, intricate beauty."
"And at the very centre — the soul, burning like a flame."
"Ahh~ just the thought of it, doesn't it make the scalp tingle with delight?"
He looked out at the dead-silent room.
Ethan's smile stretched wide.
The sunlight receded. Shadow crept in.
Like a noble, bloodthirsty demon — standing among them all.
Outside the door.
The nurses who'd been peering in had gone blank.
After a long pause, one of them said faintly:
…That's the Ethan Vincent we know. The overtime demon.
There he is.
Then —
Madam Augusta snapped back to herself.
She stared at Ethan with genuine alarm, something flickering in her eyes — something she herself hadn't noticed — the faintest trace of fear.
As though the person standing before her was not a half-grown boy roughly her grandson's age.
But something wearing a human face. Something chosen by the Four Founders.
"You — you get away from them this instant!"
Madam Augusta's voice cracked like a whip, her hand flying for her wand.
But she hesitated for just a second.
He was still technically a student. Using a wand against him felt like it might be going a bit far —
But that was the moment a devil always chose to strike.
"Take this — OPEN HEART!"
Ethan's voice rang out, bright with excitement.
And without a second's hesitation, he drove the rapier into the Longbottoms' chests.
WHOOSH—!
Silver-white radiance erupted outward, instantly flooding the entire ward!
"Gaah—!!"
The Longbottoms' heads snapped back, light blazing from their eyes.
As though something terrible had been woken in them — some memory too horrible to hold.
They began to struggle, wild and desperate. Their whole bodies shook. Tears rolled down their faces like children's, and their cries of anguish filled the ward:
"No — no — please — AAAHH—!!"
"LET GO OF MY CHILDREN, YOU DEMON—!!"
Madam Augusta threw herself against the protective barrier Ethan had raised.
Her body slid down it.
That face — always hard, always severe — showed something it had never shown before. Something raw and broken.
The nurses wrenched the door open, rushing to stop Ethan's "madness."
But —
Clack-clack. Clack-clack.
Tangled black threads dropped from the ceiling.
Settling over the nurses' heads like a curtain.
They looked up.
Into a pair of blood-red eyes.
[Do not…pass…]
The Rat in the Wall — the ghost-woman — rasped, her face a contorted ruin.
Nurses: Understood.
Honestly, if you'd just said so from the start, we wouldn't have had to make this whole thing so dramatic.
Through the wailing.
Ethan's expression didn't change. He murmured quietly: "I'm sorry. Just a little longer."
He felt a tremendous pull.
Like a straw drawing up a bubble tea pearl — his consciousness was sucked into the blazing light of those chests.
— Into the soul itself.
Then, suddenly.
A sharp crack.
A hand burst through the protective barrier from outside and seized his arm!
Oh?
Ethan's eyebrow lifted. His eyes moved.
He found Neville's face — urgent, and completely decided.
His mouth curved. "Well. Is it a Longbottom family tradition to express things exclusively through physical restraint?"
Could've just said take me too.
His arm was nearly bent clean off.
— Gryffindor loses one hundred points for entering a classroom with their limbs.
Neville blinked.
Before he could process that.
The next second.
"AAAAHH—"
Both of them were pulled in together, swallowed into the soul.
Cracks spread like spider-webs across every surface of the dark.
Crunch.
Ethan retracted his foot, watching a fragment break off beneath it.
Like standing on ice. One wrong move from disaster.
"Wh-where are we?"
Neville hunched over in alarm, looking frantically in every direction.
Ethan: "This is your mum's soul world."
Neville: "…"
Ethan: "Oh — and your dad's, actually. They've fused together."
Neville went completely still.
He stood there with the expression of a man attending his own funeral, staring into Ethan's "gentle" smile. Wishing he could sink through the floor and disappear.
…When he got back to school, was he going to be strung up and flogged for walking into a club meeting with his left foot?
Ethan was so magnanimous and kind-hearted, surely — surely he wouldn't —
Neville hadn't even decided what grovelling pose to adopt.
When a hazy white light bloomed ahead of them.
And came hurtling towards them at full speed.
Ethan's pupils contracted. A cold flash moved through those diamond-blue eyes.
One hand tightened around the silver-white rapier. The other readied a defensive shield.
This was his first time entering a soul world.
He didn't know what to expect.
For all he knew, he might be facing a pair of mindless, wrathful spirits.
But very quickly.
He realised he'd been overthinking it.
The misty, luminous shapes slowed as they drew near. Condensed rapidly into two figures.
Arms spread wide.
And wrapped around them — warm and fierce, like being buried under a heavy blanket on a cold winter night.
"Neville — our boy—!!"
A cry of pure joy rang out.
Neville's eyes went slowly wide. His eyelids reddened all at once.
Huh.
Ethan quietly stepped out of the embrace.
Put the rapier away. Folded his arms. Watched the reunion in silence.
…That was warm.
For just a moment, it made him think of Luna and her father.
A pity.
Mr Lovegood's constitution was rather fragile.
He tended to collapse after just a few sentences.
Ethan waited.
Until both sides had settled and the emotions had calmed.
Then he tipped a conjured hat-brim and said politely: "Good day to you both. I'm Ethan Vincent."
"I was hoping to ask you something."
Two round-faced people — who looked very much like Neville — well, actually it was the other way round.
In any case.
Two gentle, mild-mannered soul-figures wiped their eyes and broke into warm smiles: "Neville mentions you often, Mr Vincent — can we call you Ethan?"
"Mm." Ethan gave a composed nod.
The Longbottoms: "Hehe~ Ethan, Neville always says you're a hero."
Alice stepped forward. She raised a hand and lightly patted the top of Ethan's head.
"Thank you for teaching our Neville so much," she said softly. "Thank you, Ethan."
"Whatever you need — please, just ask."
This is probably something Voldemort will never feel, not once in his life.
Ethan thought.
The soul-figure's touch above his head carried the cool stillness of something not quite alive.
And yet, like a soft-boiled egg from a hot spring, it was oddly comforting.
Ethan: "Neville mentioned that you have a secret passage map of Gringotts. Is that true?"
The Longbottoms exchanged a surprised look and laughed: "Ha! So his gran told him, did she?"
"Merlin, her memory really is something — we only mentioned it to her once in passing."
"Yes, we do have a secret map of Gringotts. Our original plan was — if the Black family home fell, we'd move the Order's headquarters underground into Gringotts."
"It's the safest place in the world, after all~"
Alice gave a playful wink.
Her young face suited it perfectly.
"If you need it, we can draw it out for you now… ah. We don't quite have the strength."
They raised their hands and looked at their palms, cracked through with fracture lines.
But the next second.
BOOM—!
A force of enormous, sweeping golden energy.
Flooded the soul world in an instant — like a torrential downpour breaking over cracked, parched earth!
In the blink of an eye.
The dense web of cracks—
Nearly vanished.
The darkness blazed into radiance, bright as full daylight.
"Is that enough?"
Ethan stood with the silver-white rapier driven into the ground, golden light coiling around his body, and spoke with complete calm.
The Longbottoms' mouths formed perfect circles.
Their bodies — which had been on the verge of collapse — were bathed in golden light.
And became whole.
For a long moment.
They couldn't speak.
Finally, they murmured in disbelief: "This is extraordinary… no wonder you can enter a soul space… you carry a power that far surpasses most adult wizards."
The Longbottoms collected themselves.
Looked at Ethan with deep, wordless gratitude.
Then immediately set to work, drawing in the air — tracing out the secret map of Gringotts.
Efficient and precise, not a wasted stroke.
[You have obtained: Gringotts Underground Secret Passage Map × 1!]
[A route allowing undetected infiltration of Gringotts from below.]
[Left behind by one of Gringotts' original founders, who planned to use it to abscond with funds. Unfortunately for him, his furious employees — unpaid for months — hanged him from a lamppost before he ever got the chance.]
["Mate, mind if I use your back door?"]
…Quite a storied passage.
Ethan's lips curved up as he looked over the map with satisfaction.
Whatever back door was involved — with the secret passage map in hand, he could slip into Gringotts from underground without a soul knowing.
Give those goblins a little taste of Morning Star hospitality.
The Longbottoms: "The map is complex. Do you have a way to bring it back with you?"
Ethan looked puzzled. "Bring it back? Why would I need to do that?"
He tapped the side of his head, and said cheerfully: "I've already memorised all of it~"
The Longbottoms: Oh…
They were struck speechless again, staring at this black-haired boy.
…He feels like a different species, somehow.
Are young wizards really all this formidable these days?
Just then.
A force from outside began to push.
Signalling that Ethan and Neville's time in the Longbottoms' soul world was coming to an end.
The Longbottoms steadied themselves, watching the outlines of Ethan and Neville grow hazier.
They smiled — a smile touched with loneliness. "Good luck out there, children."
"Ethan — thank you for everything you've done for us. If you can — please take our strength with you, and make the world a little better."
[You have obtained "The Longbottoms' Gratitude"!]
[You may summon the soul-forms of Frank and Alice Longbottom once to fight alongside you — or use this inspiration to create a new painting.]
[You have partially healed the Longbottoms.]
[Their souls could not be fully restored, but are significantly better than before.]
[You have obtained 0.1% Soul Fusion.]
[Warning! To continue healing the Longbottoms further will invite extreme hostility from Fate itself!!]