Chapter 40: Don't Be Disgusting
The weekend had finally arrived, but it brought with it a biting November wind that carried bone-chilling shards of ice. High up in the stands surrounding the Quidditch pitch, the roaring crowd was a deafening sea of color and noise. Wrapped tightly in a thick emerald scarf and clutching a magically heated hand warmer, Tamara Riddle still felt the freezing gusts seeping straight into her bones.
'A barbaric sport.'Sitting primly among the raucous Slytherins, she leveled a gaze of absolute disdain at the tiny figures darting across the overcast sky. They were chasing a few battered balls on wooden sticks. The sheer absurdity of it made her upper lip curl.'A group of so-called wizards, flying around like headless flies in the freezing wind just for a few pitiful house points,'she sneered internally, her dark eyes tracking the chaotic movement above.'They would be far better off spending that time researching two new curses in the warmth of the library.'
Beside her, Draco Malfoy was practically vibrating with malicious glee. He cheered hoarsely for the Slytherin Chasers, his pale face flushed red from the cold, never missing an opportunity to hurl insults across the pitch at the Gryffindor stands.
"Look!" Draco shouted, pointing a gloved finger at the sky. "That idiot Potter, he's flying like a drunken duck!"
Halfway through the chaotic match, the atmosphere abruptly shifted. High above the pitch, Harry Potter's prized Nimbus 2000 suddenly began to shudder violently. It bucked like a wild, untamed horse desperately trying to throw its rider. The sleek broomstick jerked up and down, twisting frantically and erratically through the freezing air. Gasps echoed across the stadium, quickly swelling into an uproar of panic.
"Ha! I knew it!" Draco shrieked excitedly, nearly vaulting right over the wooden railing of the stands. "He's going to fall! He's going to break his neck!"
Tamara narrowed her eyes, the icy wind whipping a stray strand of dark hair across her cheek. As a former master of the Dark Arts, she was intimately familiar with the subtle, unnatural fluctuations of malicious magic. The erratic jerking of the broom was not a mechanical failure.
'That is not a malfunction,'she judged coldly, her mind calculating the trajectory of the spell.'It is a jinx.'
Instead of staring up at the flailing boy in blind panic like the rest of the sheep around her, Tamara calmly raised her brass Omnioculars. She bypassed the aerial spectacle entirely, aiming the lenses directly at the staff stands across the pitch. She found the source of the magical disturbance almost immediately.
Professor Quirrell sat rigidly in his seat. His eyes were locked unblinkingly on Harry's struggling figure, his pale lips moving in a rapid, ceaseless mutter.
Tamara slowly lowered the Omnioculars. A look of extreme, unadulterated contempt curled the corners of her mouth.
'Low-level methods,'she silently mocked the foolish main piece of her soul currently residing under that ridiculous turban.'The dignified Dark Lord, attempting to assassinate an eleven-year-old child in broad daylight with such a pathetic, drawn-out jinx?'To Tamara's refined, ruthless sensibilities, this strategy was no different from dropping a banana peel at the Hogwarts entrance gates in the vague hope that Harry Potter might slip and crack his skull.'Truly pathetic.'
If Quirrell were actually a loyal, competent servant, he would have simply drawn his wand, aimed it at the boy's back, and hit him with a clean, unblockable Avada Kedavra. A flash of green light, and the problem would be solved.
Shifting her gaze slightly through the brass lenses, she spotted Severus Snape sitting in the row directly behind Quirrell. The Potions Master was also staring fixedly at Harry, his sallow face tense, his mouth moving in a rapid, continuous chant.
'A counter-curse.'Tamara saw through Snape's intention in a fraction of a second.'It seems this supposedly loyal servant does not want the precious savior to die quite so soon... Is he merely protecting the school's reputation, or does he harbor other, more treacherous plans?'
Snape's blatant interference gave Tamara pause. Her brilliant mind spun, sifting through decades of memories. She had indeed overlooked one minor, irritating possibility. In her previous life, she had heard fleeting rumors about Snape's pathetic infatuation with a certain Mudblood woman.
That woman... Lily Evans. Or rather, Lily Potter. The very woman who had died screaming under Tamara's own wand.
Snape had appeared utterly devastated at the time, begging for her life like a whipped dog, looking as though he might drop dead from grief himself. But based on his subsequent actions and unwavering service to the Dark Lord afterward, the loss did not seem to have affected his loyalty in the slightest.
'So, it could not possibly be that Snape actually wishes to protect that mudblood's spawn, could it?'
Tamara quickly dismissed the absurd notion. She had used Legilimency on Snape countless times in the past and had never found anything amiss in his dark, orderly mind. This desperate counter-curse was highly likely just a frantic attempt to uphold the school's reputation and prevent a student from dying on Dumbledore's watch.
High above the pitch, the situation grew increasingly critical. Harry had been violently tossed about until he was dangling hundreds of feet in the air, clinging to the slick wood of the broom handle with only one hand. His fingers were slipping. He was liable to plummet to his death at any given second.
'Fall, then.'Tamara watched the horrifying spectacle with complete indifference, her cold heart utterly unmoved by the boy's desperate struggle.'It is for the best if he falls and splatters across the grass. It will save me the immense trouble of having to kill him myself later.'
However.
Just as she leaned forward, a cruel smirk playing on her lips, fully preparing to enjoy the glorious sight of the savior's messy demise, that overly cheerful, utterly damned voice boomed inside her skull.
[Ding! Emergency Alert!]
[Detected that the key figure 'Harry Potter' is in extreme mortal danger.]
[Warning: This character is the Child of Destiny of this world. His premature death will cause the world line to collapse, severely affecting the host's future plans (and this system's performance metrics).]
[Forced Mission: Save the savior.]
[Mission Description: Although you despise him, he cannot die yet. Set aside your arrogance and lend a helping hand! This is the true mark of a benevolent leader who considers the bigger picture!]
[Mission Reward: Calculating...]
Tamara's angelic face instantly darkened into a mask of pure, murderous fury.
'Are you completely insane?!'she roared at the glowing interface in her mind.'You want me to save him? Save the prophesied arch-enemy who is destined to destroy me?!'
She felt she was already being extraordinarily generous by not discreetly casting a Blasting Curse at the boy's broom to finish the job. And now this parasitic entity was demanding she actively save the damned Potter brat?!
[System Notification: Given the host's current first-year magical restrictions, which make it exceedingly difficult to counter an adult wizard's jinx from such a vast distance, the system has temporarily unlocked a powerful auxiliary spell for your convenience.]
[Unlocked: Sectumsempra... Oops, sorry, wrong one! Tee-hee!]
[Unlocked: Finite Incantatem (Simplified Version).]
[Description: A universal counter-curse enhanced by the Virtue System. It can remotely target and purge persistent malicious magical effects on a designated individual.]
[Please use it immediately!]
Tamara's knuckles turned a stark, bone-white as she gripped her wand inside her pocket.
She had never suffered such a humiliating indignity in all her decades of life. Being forced to actively save Harry Potter was infinitely more disgusting than being forced to swallow one of that oaf Hagrid's tooth-shattering rock cakes.
But a warning prickle of electricity was already pulsing at her fingertips, a sharp, stinging reminder of the system's absolute authority. If she did not act immediately, the next step would undoubtedly be a full-body shock therapy session right here in the stands. She would end up twitching on the floor like a dying fish in front of the entire school.
Tamara had no doubt this damned system would fry her nervous system until she complied.
"...Go to hell," Tamara hissed under her breath, her teeth grinding together so hard her jaw ached.
Taking a deep, shuddering breath to suppress her extreme, violent annoyance, she slid her wand down into the wide sleeve of her winter robes. Keeping her movements entirely concealed from the cheering Slytherins around her, she covertly pointed the tip of her wand at the struggling figure suspended in the sky.
She reached deep into her magical core, summoning every drop of her currently restricted reserves. For a fleeting, intoxicating moment, that long-lost sense of absolute power surged through her veins, hot and demanding.
"Finite Incantatem," she whispered, the incantation barely a ghost of a sound on the freezing wind.
An invisible, concentrated ripple of magic—a frequency only she could truly sense—shot upward through the icy air like a silent arrow. It struck the frantically twisting Nimbus 2000 with pinpoint accuracy.
Instantly, the broom's violent bucking ceased.
Although Quirrell continued to pour his dark intent into the jinx, Tamara's powerful, system-enhanced interruption provided Snape's desperate counter-curse with a massive opening. The two opposing forces clashed, reaching a sudden, strained stalemate.
Harry finally got a fraction of a second to breathe. Gasping in terror, he swung his leg over the wood and regained his grip on the broom handle with both hands.
Just as the stalemate held, a sudden, bright plume of blue fire erupted in the staff stands directly beneath Quirrell and Snape. Chaos ensued. Quirrell was violently knocked forward by the panicked scrambling of the surrounding professors, instantly breaking his line of sight.
Without visual contact, the dark curse was completely lifted. Harry's broom snapped back to normal, hovering smoothly in the air as if nothing had happened.
Tamara swiftly withdrew her wand, her arm trembling slightly beneath her heavy robes. Channeling such a concentrated burst of magic in her current, restricted state felt absolutely terrible. While she could cast simple charms and hexes with effortless grace, forcing out a system-enhanced Finite Incantatem over such a vast distance left her feeling hollowed out and overtaxed.
Her porcelain face was noticeably paler than usual, but the physical drain was nothing compared to the sheer, unadulterated rage boiling in her chest.
'I actually... saved him.'
Watching Harry Potter safely regain his balance high above the pitch, a sickening wave of revulsion washed over her. She felt as though she had just swallowed a fat, buzzing blowfly.
[Ding! Forced Mission Completed: Save the savior.]
[Evaluation: Although you were extremely reluctant, your intervention was absolutely crucial. This spirit of considering the bigger picture is highly commendable!]
[Reward: Designated Skill Book x 1 (Can bypass Virtue Point restrictions to forcibly learn one standard first or second-year spell).]
Tamara snorted coldly in her mind. At least the reward was somewhat worth the utter humiliation. There would be plenty of time to slaughter this so-called savior later, when the system wasn't breathing down her neck.
She had absolutely no interest in watching the remainder of the match. The lingering nausea from actively protecting Harry Potter left her feeling drained and listless.
She sat in stony silence until a massive roar erupted from the Gryffindor stands. Harry Potter had just tumbled to the ground and spat the Golden Snitch directly out of his mouth.
Gryffindor had won.
A chorus of furious wails and boos rose from the Slytherin section. Beside her, Draco jumped up and down with sheer rage, his face purple. "Cheating! He swallowed it! That doesn't count as a catch!"
With the match finally over, Tamara could at last leave this tormenting place. She stood up gracefully, her face a mask of polite composure as she brushed non-existent dust from her pristine robes. Before turning away, she cast one last, lingering look toward the staff stands, her dark eyes locking onto Quirrell, who was currently picking himself up and pretending to be entirely innocent of the chaos.
'Stupid people surrounding stupid people,' she thought with a final, disdainful sneer, and turned her back on the pitch.
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