Ethan suddenly had a very bad feeling.
The Burke family couldn't possibly be completely extinct… right?
The manor was destroyed, and the first surviving Burke he encountered turned out to be a half-starved prisoner abandoned here by the Ministry of Magic to work as a glorified caretaker.
"Look on the bright side," the Count said awkwardly after noticing Ethan's silence. "At least you're technically free."
"Damn it," Ethan muttered bitterly. "I thought I'd get to murder them all and inherit the family fortune."
He looked around the ruined cabin with increasing disappointment.
"They're obviously broke now. Illegal magical creatures alone cost thousands of Galleons to maintain."
The Count stared at him for several seconds.
"You really can't say anything normal, can you?"
To prevent his newly discovered Uncle Herbert from waking up and interfering with the investigation, Ethan transfigured several ropes from the old chair and tightly bound the unconscious man in place.
After finishing, he stepped back proudly to admire his work.
Herbert now resembled an aggressively wrapped dumpling with only his nostrils visible for breathing.
"Perfect."
This way, the man would not cause problems while Ethan searched the ruins.
Naturally, Ethan intended to release him before leaving. If Herbert died here, the Ministry would eventually notice that nobody remained guarding the cursed estate. An investigation would follow immediately, and Ethan had no intention of appearing in Ministry paperwork anytime soon.
As he prepared to leave the cabin, Ethan realised the Count had not followed him.
"You're staying here?"
"No," the Count replied immediately. "I'm not stupid enough to wander into a cursed ruin filled with lingering Dark Magic. I still haven't successfully seduced Hedwig yet. I refuse to die before achieving greatness."
"Fair enough."
Ethan pulled the owl's new wand from his enlarged handbag and tossed it over.
The Count caught it proudly in his claws.
Honestly, Ethan was beginning to think he needed to invent some kind of miniature enchanted holster for the owl. A full-sized wand was annoyingly difficult for a bird to conceal properly.
Perhaps a tiny pouch with an Undetectable Extension Charm tied to the owl's leg?
Though he was not entirely certain owl anatomy supported fast wand-drawing techniques.
After leaving the Count behind, Ethan stepped back out into the snow-covered ruins.
"The snow melts and the ice fades."
With a casual wave of his wand, the surrounding snow rapidly dissolved outward from him in expanding circles, revealing the blackened stone beneath.
Now that the manor's remains were fully exposed, Ethan could vaguely reconstruct the original layout from the surviving foundations and collapsed walls.
Residual Dark Magic still hung heavily in the air.
Normally, ancient cursed magic remained hostile to living creatures long after its caster vanished.
But the black mist surrounding these ruins behaved differently.
The moment Ethan approached, the lingering darkness began circling around him almost happily.
"This is…"
He frowned slightly.
The drifting black fog looked strangely familiar.
In fact, it resembled the exact same dark aura effect that constantly surrounded him whenever his powers surged too far.
Before Ethan could react further—
One strand of black mist suddenly plunged directly into his body.
Then another.
And another.
The surrounding darkness rushed toward him like streams flowing into the sea.
[Soul Completeness: 22.1%]
[Soul Completeness: 22.2%]
[Soul Completeness: 22.3%]
The system notifications appeared continuously.
Ethan stared in shock.
The wand he had instinctively raised to defend himself slowly lowered again.
These were his soul fragments.
He could feel it now.
The sensation was indescribably comforting, like finally sleeping properly after years of exhaustion. Never before had Ethan absorbed so much soul integrity in such a short time.
The black mist continued pouring into him until the final strand vanished completely.
[Soul Completeness: 27%]
Then everything stopped.
Ethan blinked slowly.
"…That enormous amount only restored five percent?"
He looked around at the now strangely lifeless ruins with obvious disappointment.
All the cursed darkness had returned to him.
Which also meant something deeply concerning.
A tiny fragment of his damaged soul had contaminated the entire manor for over ten years.
Apparently, he himself qualified as a catastrophic source of Dark Magic pollution.
Most of his scattered soul fragments had likely dispersed elsewhere after the manor's destruction. Only a small portion had remained trapped here.
Still—
Five percent was an enormous gain.
Especially because the Acromantulas in the Forbidden Forest were no longer useful.
Now that Ethan's soul integrity had exceeded twenty percent, weak souls provided almost no improvement whatsoever. Even a fully grown Acromantula only offered tiny amounts of soul energy, and raising them took months.
The farming efficiency was terrible.
He desperately needed higher quality sources.
After absorbing the lingering soul fragments, Ethan finally shifted his attention back toward the ruins themselves.
Because everyone knew how ruin exploration worked.
The protagonist always discovered a secret underground chamber hidden beneath the destroyed manor. Previous investigators somehow never noticed it despite the entrance being ridiculously obvious.
That was simply how stories operated.
After searching carefully, Ethan eventually found the section of ruins where traces of Dark Magic remained strongest.
Using a powerful sweeping charm, he blasted away the rubble and dirt covering the ground beneath.
A cracked stone floor emerged.
"Reveal your secrets."
Ethan cast a revealing spell.
Nothing happened.
Well—
Not exactly nothing.
The cracks in the stone suddenly began moving like living creatures. Slowly, they rearranged themselves into several words.
SHOW YOUR MERCY
Ethan stared at the message blankly.
"Mercy?"
Was there even a spell called Mercy at Hogwarts?
No.
Absolutely not.
"Avada Kedavra."
Brilliant green light erupted from the tip of his wand.
The Killing Curse smashed into the stone floor like an explosive cannon shell, instantly blasting the slab apart into countless fragments.
Apparently the Killing Curse worked surprisingly well as a demolition spell.
Ethan had no patience whatsoever for ancient puzzle mechanics.
And honestly—
The Killing Curse was mercy.
At least compared to what Dementors usually did.
Fortunately the stone slab lacked a soul, otherwise Ethan would have gladly demonstrated a Dementor's Kiss firsthand.
As the shattered debris cleared away, a staircase descending into darkness finally appeared beneath the ruins.
"Lumos."
The tip of Ethan's wand illuminated the underground passage.
Below lay a long stone corridor lined with sealed doors on both sides. Each room bore a faded golden number plate.
At the far end stood a pair of massive double doors far more elaborate than all the others combined. Intricate patterns covered the surface, marking it as the most important chamber in the entire underground structure.
Ethan felt reasonably confident nobody else had discovered this place.
If Dumbledore or the Ministry had found it already, there would not still be hidden chambers beneath the manor.
Then suddenly—
A familiar system notification appeared.
[Soul Strength: 67 (Weak)]
Ethan stopped walking instantly.
The signal originated from behind the large double doors at the end of the corridor.
Whatever waited beyond them was still alive.
And it had survived underground here for ten years.
Ethan tightened his grip on his wand.
A Dark creature?
Some kind of forbidden magical experiment?
A failed creation abandoned by the Burke family?
Or perhaps—
A human?
....
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