"Another one?"
The face on the back of Quirrell's head hissed. Its blood-red vertical pupils turned toward the doorway, shifting its focus from Harry to the girl wearing Gryffindor robes.
There was no emotion in Lord Voldemort's voice, only the coldness of an interrupted calculation.
"An inconsequential mudblood," he finished his assessment and issued an order. "Eliminate her."
"Yes, Master."
Quirrell's body turned half-around stiffly, like a marionette. As he faced Hermione, the sickly fervor on his face vanished, replaced by the absolute emptiness of executing an order.
He raised his magic wand.
The tip of the wand pointed at the girl in the doorway, who was panting heavily from running and had yet to grasp the situation.
A spark of green light took shape at the tip of the wand.
The Avada Kedavra Curse.
Hermione's pupils suddenly contracted to the size of pinheads.
Fear wasn't an emotion; it was a physical state. It severed her neural pathways. The commands issued by her brain—"dodge," "block," "Shield Charm"—all became useless electrical signals mid-transmission.
Her hand was stuck to the edge of her robe pocket, only centimeters away from the magic wand inside, yet separated by an entire world.
She could see the spark of green light expanding.
She could hear her own heartbeat drumming in her ears.
But she couldn't move.
Not even a finger.
She became a spectator imprisoned within her own body, watching helplessly as death approached her.
"Hermione!"
Harry let out a roar. Thought ceased, and his body was taken over by the most primal killing intent. His hand darted into his pocket like lightning, gripping the warm Philosopher's Stone.
No incantations, no schemes.
He pulled his arm back to its limit, every muscle screaming in a near-tear. He was going to use this Alchemical miracle, capable of overturning the world, as a primitive stone and smash Quirrell's head with all his might!
But something was faster than him.
Just a split second before Harry's arm swung up.
Just as Hermione's consciousness was about to be swallowed by despair.
Within Lia's mind, the module named "Fear" was ruthlessly burned away by a higher-priority command: [Protect Hermione]!
Instinctive dread of the Dark Lord and painful memories of death were completely formatted by a higher-order will at this moment.
Analyze the situation? Switch forms?
No time!
*Crack!*
A sharp, brittle sound came from Lia's own body.
Her hind legs kicked off the stone tiles at an unnatural, inverted angle. The terrifying explosive force instantly caused spiderweb-like cracks to erupt at the point of contact! Her petite body compressed and ignited all its life potential, achieving a speed beyond limits through a self-destructive posture of dislocated bones!
There was no meow.
Only a white streak tore through the frozen air.
It wasn't jumping; it was launching.
A physical entity, trajectory straight, target clear.
It bypassed Harry's stunned gaze and placed itself precisely and unerringly in front of Hermione.
Using its body made of flesh and fur, which was incredibly fragile in the face of absolute malice.
"Avada Kedavra!"
Quirrell spat out the cold incantation.
A thick, blinding beam of sickly green light erupted silently from the tip of the wand.
The green light did not hit its intended target.
It was swallowed whole by the white streak blocking the way in front of Hermione.
There was no explosion.
There was no sound.
Not even a trace of magical energy dissipated.
Lia's momentum in mid-air stopped abruptly. When the green light hit, her body seemed to be gripped by an invisible giant hand and folded inward violently.
*Crack!*
The sound of a spine snapping was piercingly clear in the deathly silent room.
All vitality, all kinetic energy, and all will were forcibly zeroed out within a thousandth of a second.
Then, that small body stiffened, lost all support, and began a vertical fall.
*Thud.*
A dull sound of flesh hitting the floor.
The body broke through the silence, landing on the cold stone floor, and then there was no more movement.
Harry's raised arm froze in mid-air. The Philosopher's Stone slipped from his numb fingers, clattered on the floor as it rolled a few times, and stopped beside Lia's corpse.
Quirrell... and Lord Voldemort also paused for a moment.
The thing that blocked the Killing Curse... was a cat?
One second.
Absolute silence.
Lord Voldemort's hissing voice tried to break the frozen air: "See, this is love. A meaningless..."
His mockery stopped abruptly.
Because Hermione moved.
*Thump!*
Her dual knees slammed straight onto the hard stone tiles, making a sound like bone striking rock. She didn't cry out; her lips trembled uncontrollably as she scrambled forward!
She didn't pick up the small white body.
Her movements were frantically fast, filled with an orderliness that was calm to the point of madness.
She flipped Lia over and blew two futile breaths into that face full of soft fur. Then, she pressed two fingers together, mimicking the posture from a first-aid manual, and pressed down hard on its tiny chest, beginning rapid, mechanical, and chaotic compressions.
The force was so great that the faint sound of bones dislocating could be heard.
Her brain turned into a mess at that moment. Countless bits of knowledge about healing and resuscitation flashed before her eyes, only to be immediately overwritten by the first-aid procedures she had seen in Muggle books. She was using the wrong knowledge on the wrong subject, performing a rescue mission that was doomed from the start.
This was knowledge's most vicious curse upon her.
She finally stopped all movement.
She looked up, her gaze meeting Lia's eyes.
Those eyes, which had once been like sapphires, always reflecting her image and full of life, had now turned completely into a murky grayish-black.
The pupils were dilated, no longer able to focus, no longer reflecting any light.
Inside was pure, absolute "nothingness."
A black hole.
Hermione's sanity was completely sucked into that black hole and crushed to pieces.
A raspy, inhuman wheeze escaped her throat, and her chest heaved violently like a punctured bellows.
The silence was completely torn apart at this moment.
"Lia—!!!"
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