Voldemort got back to his feet. The punishment was over, and the pain in his neck had already faded. Hiding the venom in his eyes, he headed toward the cave on the island.
Cappadocia followed behind him, and the two soon reached the end of the cavern.
A stone wall saturated with magic blocked their way.
"I discovered this wall when I was young. It can only be opened with human blood," Voldemort said, pointing at it.
Mockery was carefully hidden in Voldemort's eyes. He had deliberately withheld this piece of information before bringing Cappadocia here, specifically to set him up.
The wall required half the blood in a person's body to open, and the passage it revealed would only allow two people through.
Even for a monster built like this one, losing half his blood would leave him crippled at best, if not dead, wouldn't it?
Then Voldemort would have his chance to turn the tables.
Voldemort saw himself as a great dark lord in his own generation. There was no way he would just meekly accept being humiliated like this.
Unfortunately for him, his little scheme did not seem to matter in the slightest.
After hearing him out, Cappadocia merely sneered, and then his body began to swell.
In the blink of an eye, he had turned into a gigantic Titan engulfed in flames. His skin looked like cracked earth, with molten lava running through the fissures and dripping onto the ground, melting the rock beneath it.
Cappadocia raised a hand, and the stone wall shook violently. Great cracks instantly spread across the barrier, a barrier whose magic even Voldemort had once failed to break.
The cracks healed quickly, but not nearly fast enough to keep up with the rate at which the wall was splitting apart.
In barely a dozen seconds, the wall Voldemort had pinned his hopes on collapsed with a thunderous crash, revealing the passage leading downward behind it.
Voldemort's expression darkened.
"Hah. A natural magical barrier, that's all. You thought this could stop me?" Cappadocia said with contempt, striding into the passage without even dropping his Titan form.
If Voldemort had possessed a body at that moment, he would have ground his teeth to powder.
What he hated most in the world was being looked down on like this.
What made it worse was that he genuinely had no answer to Cappadocia. This brute, whose body was all monstrous muscle yet whose brain was clearly not made of muscle, completely outclassed Voldemort in both strength and cunning.
After seeing Cappadocia's transformation ability, Voldemort understood one thing immediately.
In his current state, he had absolutely no way to deal with him.
Since that was the case, all he could do was endure it. Voldemort had already been surviving in disgrace for more than ten years. A little longer made no difference.
The fact that Cappadocia had not killed him meant he still had a use for him.
And that meant opportunity.
Sooner or later, Voldemort would find a chance to bite back.
It would not be long now.
Voldemort followed Cappadocia down the passage, and before long they reached the underground lake.
Cappadocia looked back at Voldemort, clearly telling him to explain.
"I placed over a thousand Inferi here. They'll kill anyone who touches the lake water," Voldemort said obediently.
"Inferi? Kill anyone who touches the water?" Cappadocia sounded utterly dismissive.
Voldemort did not respond to that. He continued, "Nothing can fly over the lake. To cross it, you have to use magic to draw one of the boats to you. That's the only way across."
"Did you make those?" Cappadocia asked.
"No. That part was already here naturally. The only things I altered were the Inferi in the lake and the potion at the center," Voldemort answered quickly.
"This place formed naturally?" Cappadocia looked around at the dense magic in the air, clearly doubtful.
"It was already like this when I found it."
Cappadocia thought for a moment, then followed Voldemort's instructions and stretched out a hand.
A chain suddenly appeared in his palm, and the cold touch made him pause.
His entire body was covered in burning lava. Even goblin-forged magical metal would have melted at that temperature. Yet this suddenly appearing chain was even tougher than goblin metal.
Magic flowed uncontrollably into the chain as Cappadocia stared at the boat being slowly dragged toward him across the lake, his expression growing serious.
This place was strange.
He eyed the boat warily, then after a brief hesitation chose not to board it. Instead, he reached down and touched the lake water.
The water was unnaturally cold. Even Cappadocia could sense the eerie presence in it. But then again, someone with molten lava flowing through him was hardly easy prey.
He stepped into the lake, and the water immediately began to boil.
The dark lakebed lit up. One Inferius after another surged upward, swarming toward Cappadocia the moment he entered the water.
"Hmph..."
Cappadocia could not have cared less. He did not even bother to attack. He simply unleashed the searing heat radiating from his body.
The boiling water spread farther and farther. Thick clouds of steam rose from the lake, condensed against the stone ceiling above, and fell back down as heavy rain.
The Inferi had it far worse. Before they could even get close, they were boiled by the scalding water. Those that made it nearer were cooked until flesh sloughed from bone, and then burned to ash in the flames.
Standing beside him, Voldemort instinctively backed away several steps. Watching Cappadocia wipe out the Inferi so casually, he could not help feeling a stab of pain.
He had spent years assembling that army of Inferi, only for Cappadocia to wipe out most of it in moments.
"Is that all?" Cappadocia laughed arrogantly as he watched the Inferi being destroyed in the lake.
Before long, the entire lake had been cleared.
Cappadocia still did not trust the boat, so instead he raised stone pillars up from the bottom of the lake and advanced toward the center that way.
One man and one soul soon arrived at the small island in the middle of the lake. Voldemort had created this island entirely by magic. The whole thing was as clear and translucent as crystal.
"That's where I hid the other Horcrux," Voldemort said, pointing at the crystal basin on the island.
Cappadocia narrowed his eyes and studied the surrounding magic. Once he was satisfied there was no problem, he walked forward.
Then he saw the pitch-black potion inside the basin, and the jade cup resting beside it.
"That's the enchanted potion and the container. Only that jade cup can scoop it up. Someone has to drink every drop before the Horcrux can be taken," Voldemort explained.
"What does the potion do? Some kind of poison?" Cappadocia asked.
"It's a crude Baruffio's Brain Elixir laced with a curse that intensifies pain. It won't kill you, but it will ravage the drinker's mind. And if you cast spells shortly afterward, the damage only gets worse," Voldemort said.
"How vicious," Cappadocia remarked.