"Huh? That's strange. How exactly was I messing with you?" Wade asked with a surprised expression.
"You clearly just..." Tom stopped halfway through.
Because the idea that Wade had been affected by the curse was only something Tom had assumed based on Wade's behaviour.
So technically, he really couldn't blame Wade. Tom had simply guessed wrong.
No... that wasn't important!
"So you weren't affected?" Tom asked urgently.
"Affected?" Wade smiled and patted him on the shoulder. "The curse on you was already removed just now."
"Removed?" Tom stared at Wade in surprise. "I didn't even see you do anything!"
Wade spread his hands. "I'm an expert. It's normal that you couldn't see what I did."
"But... that's it? It was removed that easily?" Tom still found it hard to believe.
The curse that had tormented him for almost an entire day and night had been broken just because Wade patted him on the shoulder?
Wasn't that a little too ridiculous, bastard?
Still, the moment he heard that the curse was gone, Tom let out a huge sigh of relief.
"Tom, that's because this was simple to begin with. What, did you expect me to set up an altar, perform some ritual, and dance around to drive out evil spirits?" Wade said.
Tom frowned. "What is that supposed to mean..."
"Nothing. I've already sent Fawkes to find Dumbledore. Once he gets here, you'll know whether the curse on you has really been removed," Wade said with a smile.
"What exactly happened?" Tom asked urgently.
Wade found a relatively clean rock nearby and sat down on it.
"I know you have a lot of questions. Don't rush. I'm not going anywhere today, so you can ask them one at a time."
Tom looked around.
Apart from the rock Wade was sitting on, there was nothing else nearby.
With a cold expression, he sharply swung his wand.
Boom!
A nearby reef exploded.
Tom picked out a large piece from the scattered rubble, dragged it over, and sat down opposite Wade, staring straight at him.
"Wow... you really are angry. Personally, I'd recommend drinking some honeysuckle tea. It's good for cooling internal heat..."
"You still feel like joking? Do you think this whole thing is some kind of game?" Tom asked coldly.
"I'm not joking. Honeysuckle really does..."
"You know that's not what I'm talking about!" Tom interrupted Wade's attempt to change the subject.
"All right... all right. This really was my oversight. I didn't expect the magic to go out of control..."
"Wait! The magic went out of control?" Tom asked.
"Yes..."
"So... the magic on me went out of control?"
"Right..."
"Which means you actually used that bizarre magic of yours on me again?! How could you do that? That's against school rules! I'm telling Professor Dumbledore... No! This is illegal! I'm reporting you to the Ministry of Magic!"
Tom jumped to his feet.
"Go ahead. You don't have any evidence now anyway," Wade said with a shrug.
"You..."
Tom nearly ground his teeth to pieces.
Thinking about how worried he had been over the past day and night, he genuinely felt sorry for himself.
"Don't get worked up yet, Tom. Professor Dumbledore knew about this from the beginning. And it wasn't just you. Everyone who saw me receive the Special Contribution Award in the Great Hall that day was affected by the same magic," Wade explained.
Tom stared at Wade in shock.
"How could Professor Dumbledore possibly agree to something so ridiculous?"
"I'm sorry, Tom... but I didn't have much choice."
Dumbledore's voice came from behind him.
Tom turned around.
Dumbledore was standing not far away, with Fawkes perched on his shoulder.
Since Dumbledore could stand this close to him without being affected, that proved the curse on Tom really had been removed.
But when Tom looked at Dumbledore, there was clear disappointment in his eyes.
"Professor... I always thought you would never secretly cast magic on students..."
"Tom, that's not quite right. I was the one who cast the magic on all of you, not Professor Dumbledore," Wade said.
"But he agreed to it," Tom replied.
"I was too confident. I thought I could keep it hidden from everyone, but plans never keep up with reality. I didn't expect a spell I was so sure about to go wrong when it came to you," Wade said with a sigh.
"Why did you have to do something like this in the first place?" Tom asked.
"I needed to leave for a while," Wade said.
"Leave for a while? Then you could've just told us. You didn't even need to tell the truth. You could've lied, asked for leave, and gone. Why did you have to hide it from us so thoroughly that you resorted to magic?" Tom asked unhappily.
"No, Tom. That wouldn't have worked," Dumbledore said, shaking his head. "The attack on the Hogwarts Express at the start of term... those people may actually have been after Wade. After the dragon pox potion formula appeared, some people began taking an interest in what he had."
Tom finally understood.
Wade had already attracted dangerous attention. Going outside was unsafe, so if he had to leave, the best option was to make everyone believe he was still at school.
"Then what exactly was so important that you absolutely had to leave? You knew people out there were watching you!" Tom asked in confusion.
Dumbledore looked at Wade.
Wade shrugged. "Tell him. She won't mind. All she wants now is freedom. She doesn't care about anything else anymore."
"She? Who is she?" Tom asked in surprise.
So Dumbledore briefly explained the Senior's situation to him.
"So you risked going out, and even cast magic over the entire school, just to rescue her?" Tom asked Wade.
"Yes. Tom, once you owe someone a favour, repaying it is never as pleasant as receiving it," Wade said, spreading his hands.
"And what about the magic on me?" After going in circles for so long, Tom finally returned to the matter of the curse he had been carrying.
Wade said cheerfully, "As for that, I'm quite happy that you genuinely consider me a close friend."
"What the hell? When did I ever consider you a close friend?" Tom shuddered.
"The magic I cast on everyone was actually very simple. It merely made all of you subconsciously feel that I was still at school, still right there beside you. Whenever anything related to me came up, the nightmare magic would interfere."
"So that's what happened!"
At that moment, Tom suddenly remembered many things. Even the memory of using Occlumency to bypass the nightmare magic by replacing Wade with [Friend W] began returning.
"No wonder I always felt like I was forgetting something! Every time I thought about you, my memories were being altered!" Tom exclaimed.
"Exactly. No one else noticed, but you did. Because the bond between us is stronger than what I have with the other students, the nightmare magic had to work harder to alter your perception. What I can say for certain is that at some point, you briefly broke through its restraints and realised that I was gone."
"What bond..." Tom said through gritted teeth.
Wade continued, "And then comes the interesting part. Although you briefly broke through the nightmare magic, the harder you pushed against it, the harder it pushed back. Your strong emotions amplified your magic enough to break through the nightmare magic, but the nightmare magic I placed on all of you runs on your own magical power as its source of energy. So when your magic was amplified by emotion, the nightmare magic was amplified too. Naturally, its backlash became even stronger. It even underwent some changes and partially went out of control."
"What about Professor Dumbledore, then? Why was he affected too? No matter how much my magic was amplified, it couldn't possibly match his," Tom asked.
"Your magic wasn't enough on its own, true. But like I just said, nightmare magic runs on the target's own magical power. By then, the nightmare magic on you had already gone out of control and begun radiating outward, affecting other people. When Professor Dumbledore came close to you, the nightmare magic acted on him as well. And once it did, the nightmare magic affecting him began running on his own magical power."
"In other words, Professor Dumbledore was deceived by nightmare magic powered by his own magic. Once you left, however, the runaway nightmare magic on you was no longer there to guide the process, so his magic gradually returned to normal, and the effect naturally faded. That's why he recovered as soon as you left Hogwarts."
Tom finally understood.
So that was why Dumbledore had still been affected even after preparing countermeasures in advance.
"Then why weren't you affected?" Tom asked again.
"I'm different from all of you, because I already carry the power of nightmare magic myself. Once I understood that the nightmare magic on you was being driven by emotion, how could I possibly still fall for it? I only needed to bring out stronger emotions than yours, amplify my own nightmare magic, and naturally overpower and disperse the nightmare magic on you. It's just using overwhelming strength against something weaker. Nothing special."
"Stronger emotions than mine?" Tom looked at Wade suspiciously.
"Of course. You consider me a close friend, right? So what kind of bond is deeper than the bond between close friends?" Wade asked with a grin.
"What... what kind?" Tom was already getting goosebumps.
Damn it. This was disgusting.
"Why, the bond between father and son, of course! Once I put myself in your father's role, the nightmare magic on you couldn't compare at all to the strength of our father-son bond! So calling you my dear son was perfectly justified, wasn't it?" Wade said happily.
"You fucking... what father-son bond?!" Tom's temper flared up again.
"Of course it's a father-son bond! What else did you think it was?" Wade asked in surprise. "Go on, then. If it wasn't father-son affection, what could it have been?"
"I... how the fuck should I know?"
Wade sighed. "How disappointing. I thought you'd at least say brotherly affection."
Tom genuinely wanted to pick up a solid chunk of rock from the rubble and smash it straight into that bastard's infuriating face, just to see whether Wade could still keep smiling afterward.
But...
Endure it.
Just fucking endure it.
He still couldn't beat him.
__
[]~(￣▽￣)~*
Read 12 Advance Chapters—P@t- Captain69