Chapter 26.

  After gathering all the materials, Soren's life returo the two-point routine of st semester. Aside from daily studies and homework, he spent most of his time immersed in dull magical research.

  Though the quantity of information on bloodline magic found in the library's restricted se was limited, it was still suffit for Soren to process over aended period.

  Time flew by, and the first two months of the new semester passed just like that.

  During this time, nothing particurly special happened. Lockhart no longer brought living creatures into the . Instead, he read rge excerpts from his books to the students, sometimes ag out dramatic ses.

  Most Gryffindors pined endlessly, but this became one of the most enjoyable csses for the Slytherins.

  Since Lockhart seemed to think that a monologue couldn't showcase his bravery and strength, he often sought out a small wizard to act alongside him, and the student he selected most often was Harry. So far, Harry had been forced to py the roles of: a vilger uhe Bubble-Head Charm, a Yeti suffering from a cold nose, and a vampire that only ate carrots since Lockhart had dealt with it.

  Whenever Harry helplessly pyed the struggling vilger or the smirking vampire, Drad the Slytherins would make faces at him in mockery. Soren actually felt sympathy for Harry, but si didn't him, he simply used the css time to plete assigs for other subjects, allowing him to save more personal time for himself.

  With Halloween approag, acc to the plot, the basilisk's first atta the Chamber of Secrets would occur on that day.

  On Halloween night, even Soren, who had stayed at home, had to take time to attend.

  In the Great Hall, a thousand pumpkins floated in the air, their ghostly faces radiating e dlelight, illuminating the entire hall instead of the usual dles pced on ptes.

  Soren took his seat at the Slytherin table, right beside Draco.

  Draco put his arm around Soren's shoulders—having undergowo months of Quidditch training, he had beuch sturdier than before, with a more resolute expression on his face. "Hey, Soren, it seems like I haven't seen you much these past two months. You didn't e to watch my Quidditch training, and I barely saw you at dinner. What have you been busy with?"

  Soreended not to hear the st question and smiled slightly. "Do I still o be reminded of your skills? Whether I watch your training or not doesn't matter. With your talent and the exceptional performance of the Nimbus 2001, Slytherin's Quidditch championship this year will more likely be in your hands."

  Draodded proudly in agreement.

  Daphne and Meredith looked at Soren with forlorn expressions, seemingly because they felt ed by him over the past two months. With some sweet talk and coaxing, Soren ma smiles back to the faces of the two girls.

  Soren quietly observed the Gryffindor table. The trio of Harry was not there, and after carefully recalling the inal plot, he remembered that they had goo the rotten food feast.

  Soon, the ba began.

  A pile of roasted turkeys suddenly appeared oable, squeezing the goldeo emit a creaking sound, as groups of bats flew in gliding formation overhead. With a bang, the smoke on stage slowly dispersed, revealing a skeleton daroupe perf their unique dance.

  It wouldn't be accurate to say the skeleton dance was exceptionally beautiful, but the plex movements of the skeletons' body structures breaking apart and reassembling with the beat of the music were quite special and iing. Even the pure-blooded young wizards were watg with great i.

  While enjoying the performan stage, Soren discreetly cast goward tonight's target—Ginny Weasley. Sure enough, just a few minutes before the dinner ended, Ginny, pale-faced, quietly left the Great Hall.

  Soren followed her without a sound, casting an disillusio charm at the er to ensure he wouldn't be seen, and thehily tracked Ginny, who iably arrived at the girls' bathroom at the end of the third floor.

  This girls' bathroom had a reputation; everyone called it "the bathroom of the Weeping Myrtle." Ever since a student named Myrtle Warren was murdered there fifty years ago, her ghost had been wandering around in a ghostly form, causing most students to be relut to enter, and over time it became semi-abandoned.

  Sorehat there was a hidderao the Slytherin Chamber within this bathroom; a copper serpent tap above a sink never released any water, and a small snake was engraved on it. If one spoke "Open" in Parseltohe serpent tap and sink would slowly disappear from view, revealing a rge pipe leading to the Chamber, rge enough for a person to crawl through.

  Soreered the bathroom and witnessed Ginny using Parseltoo activate the tap meism, seemingly calling out for the basilisk. Although he was fident in his invisibility magid had ducted many experiments around snakes, he didn't have one hundred pert certainty that the basilisk, as the king of serpentine creatures, wouldn't be able to see him. For safety's sake, he quietly exited the bathroom and hid behind a suit of armor he entrance, awaiting the events to unfold.

  Then he saw a rge amount of water flowing out from the bathroom entrance.

  The school caretaker Filch's cat, miss norris, approached the bathroom and began meowing persistently at the entrance, as if pleased about catg a mischievous student, unaware of the impending misfortuined for her.

  Just as Soren closed his eyes, he heard the sound of a rge, heavy object slithering, followed by a sudden stop in miss Norris cries, and then another slithering sound, after which everything fell silent.

  When Soren opened his eyes again, he saw a red slogan painted on the wall reading "Chamber of secrets has been opened, beware enemies of the heir," and miss Norris, petrified, hanging high on the wall in front of the stone wall. Immediately after, he saw Harry and his friends rushing to the crime se, following a strange sound only Harry could hear.

  Soren didn't want to cause any misuandings, so while remaining invisible, he blended bato the group of students who had just finished dinner and were returning to the dormitories. Shortly after, he witnessed Harry and his friends being wrongfully accused by an angry Filch, and only after Dumbledore intervened were Harry and his friends taken away, bringing the matter to a temporary close.

  Ever since Halloween, the atmosphere at the school had bee quite eerie.

  The legend of the Slytherin Chamber had somehow resurfaced, and various rumors began to spread around the school, with most people suspeg that the culprit was Harry Potter.

  Among those who first discovered Miss Norris on Halloween, Hermione's parents were Muggles, so she couldn't be the heir of Slytherin; Ron's family sisted entirely of wizards, but they were all Gryffindors, and Ron himself wasn't powerful enough; leaving Harry as the most suspicious, as he had defeated Voldemort, leading most young wizards to believe that only the most powerful dark wizard could defeat the Dark Lord.

  Soren scoffed; it didn't him anyway, and he soouro his previous secluded life.

  November saw Hogwarts officially wele the start of Quidditch matches, with the first match being Slytherin versus Gryffindor.

  This Quidditch match was different from the description in the inal story—Slytherin's brooms were far superior to Gryffindor's, and Draco was nearly on par with Harry's skill, while Dobby, under Soren's instrus, did not interfere with the match.

  On the day of the match, Soren did not attend in person; he merely sent Dobby to hide in a er and watch the match, rep the oute to him afterward.

  In that day's match, Slytherin took the lead all the way thanks to their superior flying brooms, and Draco effectively restrained Harry. One only say that Harry truly is someone uhe protagonist's halo; even amidst the numerous obstacles, he mao catch the Golden Snitch with a sweeping motion, allowing Gryffindor to narrowly win by just 10 points.

  Since Dobby didn't do much, Harry was not injured by a Bludger, nor did the erroneous spell by Lockhart cause him to lose a bone in his arm as it did in the inal story.

  After listening to Dobby's report, Soren sighed in awe of Harry's remarkable flying talent, while also feeling helpless about his protagonist's aura.

  "Dobby, weren't you worried about Harry Potter's safety at Hogwarts this year? Now, I have a task for you. Go to Harry Potter when he's alone; you give him some warnings. Tell him that the Chamber of Secrets has been opened and that he should leave Hogwarts and go home quickly."

  "Uood, little master, Dobby will definitely do it."

  Slytherin did not fall into despair after their first match loss.

  On the trary, the team's superiority in equipment had already been revealed in this match. Though Draco's performance wasn't stunning, it was much better than expected, and few first-time pyers could perform as he did. Harry was merely a rare exception. Moreover, Slytherin lost by such a small margin that it was almost negligible, so they still had great potential for championship tention.

  Under Draco's call, the eeam trained even harder. Slytherin's team's dition was evident, which put pressure on the Quidditch teams of Hufflepuff and Ravencw.

  Soren's magical research tinued uninterrupted until the first week of December.

  Soren rubbed his temples to ease his somewhat fatigued mind. Long hours of closed-door research had left him looking a bit haggard, but it also id a solid foundation for his theoretical knowledge of bloodline powers.

  What he needed now were samples for experimentation and practice. He already had some ideas about this, but what was more important at the moment was to unfold his pns for the plot that was about to happen this semester and see if he could gain maximum bes from the Chamber of Secrets i.

  While Soren was immersed in his magical research, atack occurred at Hogwarts.

  This time, the victim was Creevey, a first-year student from Gryffindor. , just like Miss Norris, was fortunately only petrified rather than killed by the Basilisk's stare. News of his attack quickly spread throughout Hogwarts.

  Rumors ran rampant in the school, and everyone was suspicious, fear began to spread among the students. During this time, charms, wards, and other protective items started to bee popur among the students.

  As Soren walked down the corridor during his free time, it felt particurly quiet, clearly because students were afraid that wandering the castle would make them the victim. This situation actually facilitated Soren's exploration of the castle.

  Soren's first target was the Room of Requirement, which had beeioned in the inal work. The inal stated that the entrao this magical room posite the tapestry depig the giant troll hitting the dumb Barabbas on the eighth floor of the castle. Soren silently recited, "I need a pce to hide things," and after passing by that wall three times, a door indeed appeared.

  With anticipation, he opehe door and found himself in a room as rge as a cathedral. Sunbeams through the high windows illuminated what looked like a city surrounded by tall walls.

  Soren dised that those tall walls were built from items hidden away by geions of Hogwarts students. There were piles of precariously stacked broken furniture, likely stuffed io ceal evidenishandled magic; thousands of books, undoubtedly forbidden, defaced, or stolen; winged slingshots and wolf-toothed flying disks, with some still weakly h over the mountain of forbidden items; hats, jewelry, cloaks, and things that resembled dragon eggshells; a few bottles with stoppers still glinting with evil light; and several rusty swords along with a bloodstained axe.

  Soren couldn't help but excim, "This pce is like a treasure trove! How could so many people who have ever entered Hogwarts be so blind? How could they overlook so many pieces of what seem to be treasures?"

  Soren called for Dobby, and the two began slowly sifting through and anising the junk-like items.

  After a long period of effort, Soren discovered that most of the items were damaged or in disarray, and he only found three iing objects: a suitcase, an a-looking pure silver dagger, and the Ravencw diadem, which was one of Voldemort's Horcruxes.

  After anizing everything, Soren eagerly returo his dormitory to study his findings.

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