When that blinding red light shot straight toward him-
Kingsley's intuition told him he didn't even need to dodge, because this spell was going to miss!
Almost as soon as the incantation was finished, he was already preparing to raise his wand again.
Kingsley had never expected to defeat his opponent in a single move.
Severus's skill had always been among the sharpest of the former Death Eaters, and countless Aurors from the Ministry had fallen to him in the past!
Even if he drank the Felix Felicis, it would still be a tough battle.
Years of accumulated experience in wizard duels led Kingsley to forgo casting another offensive spell. Instead, he chose a Transfiguration spell, transforming the rubble around Severus into a swarm of serpents to restrain his movements immediately!
Just as he predicted-
The Disarming Charm that flew toward him veered slightly to the right, missing him by less than two inches and blasting a chunk of concrete from the road behind him.
The Transfiguration also worked as intended, and the stone became snakes!
However, when Kingsley looked back at Severus's original position after the dazzling red light disappeared, he found that the man was gone!
At this moment, a chill ran down his spine!
He turned around suddenly and found that a figure had appeared behind him at some point, with his wand raised high.
A pale green light flickered at the tip of his wand.
That flash of green seemed to fill Kingsley's entire vision!
His whole body turned cold, his muscles seemed to be frozen solid and he couldn't even twitch a finger!
The terror of death made him hold his breath without realizing it.
He trembled and suddenly, everything went dark before his eyes.
When he regained consciousness, he found that he had been bound tightly by a Body-Bind Curse, and his wand had fallen to the ground!
He looked in a daze at Severus, who was still standing in the same place and had not moved from beginning to end. His throat felt dry and his voice became a little hoarse.
"When did you cast the Confundus Charm?"
"The moment you noticed your breathing getting heavier." Severus flicked his wand casually, and the serpents conjured by Transfiguration reverted to harmless rubble with a general counter-spell.
Kingsley let out a bleak chuckle.
"I thought with Felix Felicis, I'd at least be able to stall you."
"If I hadn't resorted to underhanded tactics, you might have stood a chance." Severus patted the hem of his shirt, where there was a burnt hole that was still emitting white smoke, left by Kingsley's Stunning Spell.
The moment his first spell missed Severus, the duel was already over.
A non-verbal, wandless Confundus Charm, cast through eye contact, had ensnared Kingsley from the start, making him duel against thin air.
After firing his Stunning Spell and using Transfiguration, from Severus's perspective, Kingsley just stood there in a daze, allowing him to do whatever he wanted.
"Give my regards to Robards and tell him I appreciated his comments in The Daily Prophet, accusing me of being the next You-Know-Who."
With those final words, Severus used Apparition, vanishing into the night.
The bound Kingsley could only watch him go.
The cold night wind bit at him as he hopped awkwardly toward a nearby rock. It took Kingsley twenty minutes to fray the ropes of the Body-Bind Curse against the stone before he could retrieve his wand.
He raised it and fired a signal into the sky.
Soon, his own team of Aurors arrived, followed by Robards and his squad.
"Did you find him?!" Robards asked immediately.
"I ran into him by chance, but I couldn't hold him. He got away." Kingsley didn't mention what Severus asked him to say, "He hasn't been gone long… trace his Apparition points and see if we can still catch up."
Robards looked at him deeply but didn't hesitate.
The Aurors worked with professional precision. Robards quickly located Severus's first Disapparition point and immediately led the team in pursuit.
Only Kingsley and his own team remained on the mountain path.
Instead of following right away, Kingsley glanced toward the hilltop, where a house stood invisible in the darkness… he knew exactly whose home it was.
But he did not say anything, and only spoke to his subordinates.
"Let's go. We'll follow too."
…
The next morning, the front-page headline of the Daily Prophet reported that the Aurors had tracked down Severus and fought with him.
This caused an even greater uproar in the Wizarding World.
In particular, according to The Daily Prophet's exclusive coverage, Severus had not only been caught once that night.
First, Kingsley Shacklebolt confronted him in Surrey but was overpowered, allowing Severus to escape.
Then, Gawain Robards joined forces with Kingsley, and the two led over a dozen elite Aurors in pursuit, tracking Severus through seven consecutive Apparitions before finally catching his trail again near the outskirts of Birmingham.
A fierce battle broke out in the suburbs!
Despite being surrounded and outnumbered by over a dozen elite Aurors, Severus managed to disarm four, petrify three, and escape unscathed!
This made Rufus Scrimgeour, the Head of the Auror Office, extremely angry. He publicly reprimanded Kingsley and Robards at the Ministry, and declared that he would personally lead the investigation from then on.
When the general wizarding public in Britain learned of this incident, it sparked widespread panic.
The strength displayed by Severus is too terrifying!
It had been eight years since the Dark Lord's fall, and many had forgotten how viciously the Death Eaters had terrorized the Wizarding World back then.
Now, this manhunt had brought those memories rushing back.
After The Daily Prophet's front-page report, countless wizards wrote to the Ministry, urging them to capture Severus as quickly as possible.
At the same time, some sent letters to Dumbledore at Hogwarts, accusing him of being overly partial to Severus. However, it was said that Dumbledore treated these letters as light reading material, pairing them with sweet snacks to relieve the stress of his daily work.
Just as the uproar over Severus's case reached its peak in the British Wizarding World-
That very afternoon, The Quibbler quietly included a free supplementary magazine for its subscribers.
But when readers opened this magazine titled [Blood Love: The Vampire and The Muggle], they realized it was less of a magazine and more of an exquisitely written, deeply researched novel about vampires.
At least, that was what many thought before reaching the latter half… because aside from vampires, there was no mention of Muggles at all, despite the title.
Until they kept reading.
A vampire named 'Sanguini', unable to find work due to his identity and forced to survive through petty theft, accidentally wandered into the estate of a Muggle Duke. There, his use of magic was witnessed by a disabled Muggle girl named 'Patty'. (T/N: The name is actually written in different characters, but it still read the same, so I just use the same name.)
In order to avoid being discovered by the Ministry and facing fines he couldn't possibly afford, Sanguini went to great lengths to erase Patty's memory, but then he learned that Patty wished for death.
In the process, the two became unlikely friends, the only ones who truly respected and understood each other.
The two outcasts, one from the Wizarding World and the other from Muggle society, began their story under the cover of night, where the sun could never reach them.
This novel, which was included with the newspaper, moved many witches who subscribed to The Quibbler to tears.
Especially since the story was clearly unfinished!
At the climax, just as Sanguini finally resolved to erase Patty's memories of him, an unexpected vampire transformation overtook him. He bit into Patty's neck… only for her to cling tightly to him, whispering in his ear: "We are both outcasts."
And there, the story abruptly ended.
By that same afternoon, dozens of reader letters had already arrived at the Lovegoods' home, demanding to know why the story was incomplete and what ultimately became of Sanguini and Patty.
While the novel merely stirred waves among the mostly housewife witch readership-
For those closely following the potion-poisoning case, it was nothing short of a thunderbolt!
Because the Muggle heroine in the novel, no matter her identity, name, and physical condition, matched the victim Severus had allegedly abducted exactly!