Chapter 377: Kneel and Apologise
"It was you!" Flint stared at Harry with a cold, vicious look.
They could not be certain who had cast that spell just now, but since Harry had spoken up, Flint assumed it was him.
After that brief test, everyone understood the truth.
It was not that Flint and his lot were especially strong or especially fast.
They had simply cast defensive magic on themselves before coming in.
It was obvious they had come to make trouble, and they had come prepared.
"Flint, don't take this too far," Cedric could not help saying as he stepped forward.
"This is Hogwarts, not your house."
"Diggory, nobody asked you," Flint said, sweeping Cedric with an icy glance.
"Get back to Hufflepuff where you belong."
"Flint, I'm a prefect," Percy said, coming forward and deliberately pinning his gleaming silver prefect badge to his chest.
"You'd better apologise right now, or I'll report this to the professors."
"Percy finally made himself useful," Fred remarked.
"About time," George added.
"Oh, look, another Weasley," Flint said with a grin.
"You look like you've been bullied outside and now you're running home to tell your mummy."
"What, want to write her a letter? Have a little cry as well?"
"You…" Percy's face flushed scarlet with rage.
By now, the crowd was seething, but Dudley still had not spoken, so everyone had been forcing themselves to hold back.
At this point, though, they were close to snapping.
All eyes turned to Dudley, waiting for his decision.
"Flint, is it?" Dudley walked forward slowly and stopped right in front of him.
"That's me," Flint sneered at Dudley.
"And?"
He was a head taller than Dudley, big and broad, deliberately looking down on him.
"Kneel," Dudley said, and his gaze sharpened like a blade.
A terrifying sense of authority burst from Dudley and slammed down on Flint.
In the next instant, Flint's knees buckled, and he dropped to the floor, kneeling in front of Dudley with a sharp slap.
That pressure was not something an ordinary person could bear.
Even though Flint was already an adult wizard, it still crushed him.
Before this kind of qualitative, overwhelming majesty, only someone on Dumbledore's level could resist without being deeply affected.
"What?"
The room erupted in shocked gasps.
Dudley controlled his authority well, keeping it almost entirely on Flint alone.
To everyone else, Dudley merely looked far sterner, carrying an imposing presence, but they did not truly feel the full weight of it.
"Apologize," Dudley said again.
Flint was soaked in sweat.
Facing Dudley, he couldn't summon a shred of defiance.
All that remained was raw, instinctive fear, awe that bordered on paralysis—as if Dudley needed only a single thought to end him.
Never in his life had Flint felt such suffocating pressure.
"I'm sorry," he ground out through clenched teeth, his voice trembling.
"I was wrong."
The expressions around them turned blank with disbelief.
The Flint who had been swaggering a moment ago, acting as if nothing in the world could touch him, was kneeling and apologising.
If they had not seen it with their own eyes, nobody would have believed it was real.
"Flint, what are you doing? Get up!" a seventh-year Slytherin shouted, his face dark.
Flint kneeling was not only a personal humiliation.
It was a slap in the face for every Slytherin present.
Seeing Flint still frozen on the floor, the seventh-year strode up, intending to haul him upright by force.
But the moment he stepped close, he felt an irresistible pressure pin him down.
His muscles locked, and he could not make himself move, not even enough to draw strength into his hands.
"You," Dudley said coldly, "kneel."
In full view of everyone, the seventh-year Slytherin sank to his knees.
A stunned silence fell over the room.
Not just the Slytherins—Gryffindors stared, mouths slightly open, unable to comprehend what was happening.
Harry, Ron, and Hermione could vaguely guess at something, but their faces were still full of shock.
Ginny, Luna, and Neville did not understand what had happened at all, but they felt a fierce satisfaction and pride, staring at Dudley with open admiration.
This was what a real powerhouse looked like.
He did not even need to use magic to make the other side kneel and apologise.
And for those who had only come to watch, still undecided about joining the Kingdom of Order, admiration also rose in their eyes.
Strength commanded respect wherever it went.
Just moments ago, they had watched the Slytherins act without restraint and had been wondering how Dudley could possibly break the situation.
After all, those students stood on the backing of pure-blood families.
If things turned into a fight, those families could use the incident to pressure the Board of Governors into dissolving the Kingdom of Order.
But if nobody fought back, then the blow to the Kingdom of Order would be fatal.
A new organisation that could not even protect its own members, letting them be humiliated at will, had no reason to exist.
Yet nobody expected Dudley to defuse it like this.
It was even better than fighting.
It was cleaner, sharper, and far more satisfying.
Watching those who had been so arrogant a moment ago kneel and apologise, nothing felt better than that.
"The people you need to apologise to aren't me," Dudley said, looking down at the two kneeling Slytherins.
Flint's already pale face changed again.
He hurriedly turned on his knees to face Hermione.
"I'm sorry," Flint said, voice trembling.
"I shouldn't have called you a Mudblood. I deserve to die."
He began slapping himself across the face, again and again, as if eager to prove sincerity.
The other kneeling Slytherin also apologised repeatedly.
They both felt that if they did not do enough, they would die in the next second.
That suffocating fear was too horrific to resist.
"I…" Hermione's furious expression faltered, her cheeks colouring.
Watching the people who had just insulted her kneel and apologise, even hitting themselves, she did not know what to do with her hands or her voice.
"What did you do to them?" the remaining Slytherins backed away in fear.
"Wait, this is the Imperius Curse. You must have used Imperio on them!"
The moment those words were spoken, the whole room's faces changed.
The Imperius Curse was one of the three Unforgivable Curses.