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"Big D, you finally made it."
Neville could not keep the joy out of his voice, staring at Dudley with eyes sparkling with admiration.
'Wh-what an incredible pose.'
In the future, I want to be just like D too.
As for Harry, no one knew whether the protective spell consumed a huge amount of energy when it activated, but in any case, he had already passed out by the time Voldemort's soul fragment tried to escape. Because of that, he ended up missing that classic scene.
Run.
That was the only thought left in Voldemort's soul fragment.
If he could not win, then at least he could run, couldn't he?
With only the barest shred of soul left, Voldemort had no intention whatsoever of fighting Dudley.
He no longer had a body, could not get close, and if Dumbledore appeared, he would be finished. Of course, taking another slap from Dudley would amount to the same thing.
At the end of the day, he was nothing more than a mixture of vapor, shadow, and soul, as intangible as something could possibly be.
If he wanted to escape, all he had to do was pass through the wall.
Unless it was a barrier specifically designed to affect souls, even ordinary defensive spells would not be able to stop him.
Voldemort's remnant soul slipped around Dudley and threw itself headfirst into the wall.
Bang.
But something unexpected happened.
The wall, which should have been passed through without the slightest problem, now seemed to possess an invisible barrier, and that barrier was precisely capable of stopping Voldemort from passing through.
The soul, which had only just managed to pull itself together, was torn apart once more, and the black gas spread in all directions.
"My esteemed Dark Lord, isn't leaving without even saying goodbye a little too rude?"
"That's hardly the behavior of a gentleman."
Dudley raised his chin, looking at the black smoke gathering together again with a faintly mocking expression. Then he lightly tapped the closed door behind him.
"From this moment on, this place is one-way only."
With a soft snap of his fingers, Dudley flicked them once.
The surrounding walls began to emit a faint glow, and one symbol after another slowly appeared across their surface.
Every single one of them was a transmutation circle.
Dudley had already started drawing them the moment he descended underground. By now, several of the rooms along this path had already been completely covered in transmutation circles.
He raised his right hand toward Voldemort's soul and slowly drew his five fingers closer together.
The circles began shrinking at an astonishing speed, shrinking the space around Voldemort's remnant soul to less than half a meter across.
Although Voldemort did not know what Dudley intended to do, nor did he recognize the meaning of those circles, his instincts told him clearly that whatever it was, it definitely was not good.
He could not just sit there and wait to die.
So he hurled himself at the wall again.
As expected, he burst apart again.
When he reformed once more, Voldemort's remnant soul was clearly panicking, darting wildly inside that ever-shrinking space.
"What are these things? Magic? Dark Arts? Ancient Runes? No! I've never seen anything like this!"
Voldemort frantically searched through his memories for an answer.
But found nothing.
He did not recognize those symbols, did not recognize that writing, and did not understand what it was.
Was there really something in the wizarding world he did not know?
A great philosopher once said:
"The oldest and strongest emotion of mankind is fear, and the oldest and strongest kind of fear is fear of the unknown. Unless, of course, you have enough firepower."
Before becoming the most terrifying Dark Lord, Voldemort had still belonged to the category of human. Even now, being neither exactly human nor exactly ghost, he could still be considered... an incomplete fragment of a man.
Realizing he could not escape, the fragmented soul tried to pry information out of Dudley. If he knew what it was, then perhaps he could find a way to respond.
"Alchemy."
Dudley pronounced those few syllables slowly.
Even if he told Voldemort, it would make no difference.
After all, this was something from another world.
Would Voldemort really be able to understand it?
And even if he did, would he be able to use it?
"No. This can't be alchemy."
Voldemort let out a shrill scream, unable to hide the fear and unease inside him.
After all, as the Dark Lord who had shaken the wizarding world eleven years earlier, how could he possibly not know what alchemy was?
Even when facing Dumbledore, he had never shown this level of loss of control.
"This is alchemy."
Dudley answered simply, then turned his face toward Neville, who was already completely stunned.
"Just look at this pitiful wretch who doesn't even have a body left. Do you know who he is?"
Even though, from the exchange between Harry and Voldemort's soul fragment, Neville had already begun to suspect the truth, no one had yet stated it openly.
"He's the Dark Lord who terrorized the wizarding world more than ten years ago."
"Voldemort."
"And now... whether he lives or ceases to exist depends on a single word from me."
At the sound of the name Voldemort, Neville instinctively shrank his neck. It was not because he understood Voldemort's strength. It was a conditioned reflex. Neville had grown up hearing stories about Voldemort. To him, Voldemort was something like the bogeyman, the old hag with the sack, or the monster under the bed.
And now, that very same childhood terror was being toyed with like a plaything in Dudley's hands.
Neville's admiration for Dudley had already reached a level beyond description.
If Harry had been awake, he surely would have said:
After all, this is Big D. There's nothing he can't do.
In truth, if the confrontation had been purely frontal, with no chance to close the distance, Dudley probably would not have had any absolute guarantee of defeating Quirrell while possessed by Voldemort.
But Harry had the protective spell of love.
And Dudley still had Hamon as his final trump card.
With those two layers of insurance one after the other, the body Voldemort had found at such cost had simply ended up destroyed.
He thought he had chosen wrong.
But in truth, if he had chosen Neville, the result would have been exactly the same.
Because Neville was wearing the very item Dudley had prepared specifically for Voldemort.
Hamon Energy would still have hurt him just the same.
Maybe not quite as badly as now, but still enough to drive out his remnant soul.
At this point, Voldemort no longer cared about dignity.
As long as he could continue to exist, he would do anything.
He began pleading with Dudley without pause, throwing out one tempting offer after another, trying to manipulate him with words.
Back when he had not yet been powerful, that had always been his greatest weapon.
And it had almost always worked.
For example, Quirrell himself, who had just died because of the protective spell, had been won over that very same way in Albania, through a mixture of threats and honeyed promises.
In Voldemort's mind, Dudley was still only a young boy.
If he personally made a move, would winning him over not be laughably easy?
Unfortunately, he ended up disappointed once again.
In simple terms, what Voldemort called "verbal manipulation" was nothing more than selling dreams.
Dudley did not listen to a single word.
In his previous life, he had heard empty promises every single day until he'd had his fill.
Compared to that, Voldemort's speeches felt childish.
Perhaps only honest, inexperienced wizards who had never been beaten around by reality would fall for that kind of talk.
Dudley even went so far as to point out the contradictions and flaws in Voldemort's "grand promises," explaining everything to Neville as if it were a lesson.
Neville felt like he had learned quite a lot.
When Voldemort realized Dudley simply would not budge and had no intention at all of negotiating, he changed tactics.
The promises turned into threats.
There was a clear sense of frustration and loss of control in his voice.
But by then, Dudley had already completed the final stage of preparation.
Right beneath Voldemort's remnant soul, a design appeared, made up of a circle and a regular heptagon.
There was only one reason Dudley had prepared those transmutation circles and trapped Voldemort's soul.
He had a bold idea.
He was going to turn Voldemort into a Philosopher's Stone.
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