Theodore's gaze went first to the talents he'd earned from the merfolk chieftain.
Where Dragons Dwell, Spirit Wakes.
Waters at Heart's Command.
Both water-aspected. He was curious just how much they would change things for him.
He drew in a long breath.
"System," he murmured, "claim Where Dragons Dwell, Spirit Wakes and Waters at Heart's Command."
The reward list blurred for a moment.
Two new talents settled neatly into place.
Theodore frowned. He didn't feel much of anything. It was as if the talents weren't there at all.
A moment later, the answer clicked.
"Right. It's the Room's nature."
The Room of Requirement was cut off from the rest of Hogwarts in its own peculiar way—almost like a pocket of space apart from the castle. That meant it was also cut off from the water-veins under the Black Lake.
Both talents were strongest wherever water was abundant. Here, they were muted.
He stepped out of the Room.
The instant his foot crossed the threshold, his eyes flew wide. Shock slammed through him.
"What…?"
A rush of something cool and invisible surged against him—currents only he could sense.
Cool, like wind-aspected qi, but softer, more nourishing, brimming with the power to moisten and coax life.
Water spiritual qi, drawn in by Where Dragons Dwell, Spirit Wakes.
In quality, it wasn't superior to the wind-qi from Dining on Wind & Drinking Dew or the earth-qi from Earth-Spirit Core.
But in quantity?
It eclipsed the other two combined.
As it poured into him, Theodore, for the first time, felt like his body was being bathed by a roaring river.
Bones, muscles, blood, even the density of his magic—everything began to strengthen at a rate far beyond what he was used to.
"Of course. Where Dragons Dwell, Spirit Wakes draws on the water-veins."
"Hogwarts sits right on the Black Lake, and the Black Lake feeds straight into the sea. Which means I'm effectively tugging on the ocean's spiritual qi."
"Naturally it's stronger than Dining on Wind & Drinking Dew or Earth-Spirit Core."
"If I went down to the lakebed, the amount I could draw would probably spike again."
He tried cycling the simple cultivation method hidden in the Flying Tiger Manual.
The manual was, at its core, a killing art, and the law it contained wasn't exactly designed for water qi. But even so, it was far better than cultivating blindly.
A quick estimate told him his rate of qi acquisition had nearly doubled.
The torrent didn't just nourish his physique and magic.
For the first time, there was qi left over—fine threads that remained after his body and magic reached their immediate saturation point.
If he chose, he could use the Flying Tiger Manual's crude method to condense that surplus into true mana and step properly onto the cultivation path of the Great Desolation.
But Theodore had no intention of being that shortsighted.
His relationship with Hagrid was already at Close Friend. One more step, and he'd unlock the Eight-Nine Arcane Art.
That law refined both body and mana and included seventy-two transformations. Anyone who cultivated it to completion would be a genuine powerhouse, even by the standards of the Great Desolation.
Even the Great Sage Equal to Heaven in the coming Journey to the West catastrophe—who trained in the Great Heavenly Immortal Canon—wouldn't necessarily have a law superior to Eight-Nine.
Compared to that, the rough foundations in the Flying Tiger Manual didn't even belong on the same page.
He could wait. For a path that led straight up to the heavens, a little patience was worth it.
For now, the sheer increase in qi alone was enough to put him in an excellent mood.
And as that qi flowed, he could feel all his talents beginning to hum, like instruments finally receiving the power they'd always deserved.
The golden light of Adamantine Body, Unclouded Mind blazed brighter, winding over his skin like living metal.
Staffwork Reaches the Divine shivered with anticipation; he could sense how, with this much qi, it would be able to draw on even more killing intent, its force climbing step by step.
Theodore's eyes gleamed.
He stretched out his hand, turning his attention to Waters at Heart's Command.
A strange awareness unfolded within him.
It felt as though every droplet of water in the air had become visible in his mind, each one sharp and distinct, like countless tiny stars.
He flicked his wrist.
Moisture was stripped from the air above his palm, pulled together into a clear ball of water.
It swelled and swelled, growing until it was half as tall as he was.
A thought—and the water shifted, shape flowing with his will.
One moment it was a spear, the next a sword or staff; in a breath, it was a flock of birds so lifelike they almost seemed ready to take wing.
A sharper idea flicked through his mind.
"They say a high-speed jet of water can cut through steel…"
He'd expected that to take finesse—fine control, careful practice.
But this was a talent from the Great Desolation. Tricks like that were barely even an effort.
The water sphere began to spin.
Fast.
Faster.
The internal shear forces it generated were terrifying. Theodore had no doubt that if he dropped an ingot of iron into it, it would be shredded to pieces.
Then, a hole irised open on the surface.
A thin, needle-like jet of water screamed out of it.
It swept lazily along the row of stone pillars framing the corridor windows.
In the space of a heartbeat, five or six marble columns slid cleanly apart, their cross-sections polished as smooth as mirrors. The upper halves toppled away and crashed to the ground.
That single shot already outstripped most combat spells in raw power.
And he could feel it—this wasn't anywhere close to Waters at Heart's Command's true limit.
He drew a deep breath, pulling more of the gathered water qi into himself and feeding it fully into the talent.
Time to see what it could really do when properly fueled.
In that instant, his senses… changed.
They expanded outward in some subtle, uncanny way.
He became aware of the warm, pulsing blood running through the veins of every student in the castle.
He could feel the owls in the rafters, their hearts pounding, blood surging every time their wings beat.
Following the chill of old pipes downward, his awareness brushed something vast and coiled in the depths of the castle—a presence with cold, reptilian blood.
The thousand-year Basilisk.
A prickling certainty settled in him: with a single thought, within a certain radius, he could draw the blood straight out of someone's body.
It wouldn't be easy against wizards or magical creatures. Their blood carried magic; the stronger the magic, the more fiercely they'd resist.
But if he were dropped onto a Muggle battlefield… one stray thought, and a rain of blood would rise into the sky.
Even without using it as a weapon, this new sense gave him an extraordinary scouting tool—he could locate any living thing in range by the flow of its blood alone.
Tracking down the Giant Squid at the bottom of the Black Lake would be a great deal easier with this.
Theodore nodded, satisfied.
"We'll call this spin-off from Waters at Heart's Command… Water Sight."
Just then, a flicker at the edge of his perception made him pause.
"…Little loud, are we?" he muttered. "That's quite a reaction."
In the Headmaster's office, Dumbledore's hand had closed around the Elder Wand. Magic surged through his body, vast and terrible, as he prepared himself for battle.
A moment earlier, the faintest tingling of danger and… surveillance had brushed him, sharp enough to make his blood run cold.
Who in the world had the ability to probe him inside Hogwarts like that?
"Tom," he thought, alarmed, "was that you?"
At the same time, Voldemort seized control of Quirrell's body.
"Someone just spied on me. My magic reacted."
He bit down hard on his lip, eyes gone murderous.
"That old fool Dumbledore. It must be him."
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