The days following the second petrification were thick with a cloying, paranoid tension. The vibrant, bustling corridors of Hogwarts had transformed into quiet, anxious thoroughfares where students moved in tight, nervous clusters. No one wanted to be caught alone. The gazes directed at my fellow Slytherins were now openly hostile, and I, as their "Uncrowned King," became the focal point of that animosity. Rumors swirled that I was the Heir of Slytherin, using my dark powers to purge the school of Muggle-borns.
I did nothing to dispel them. In fact, I used them.
Within Slytherin, I cultivated an aura of dangerous mystique. My followers—Zabini, Nott, and Rosier—became my eyes and ears, silencing any internal dissent and spreading tales of my power. To the rest of the school, I presented a calm, analytical front, frequently seen in the library with Daphne and, to the confusion of many, Hermione Granger, poring over ancient texts. This contradictory public image—the dark prince of Slytherin who was also a dedicated scholar and friend to a Muggle-born—created an enigma that no one, not even the professors, could quite decipher. It kept them guessing, and that was exactly where I wanted them.
My true objective, however, was singular: gain access to the Chamber of Secrets. I knew its location, thanks to the System's analysis, but simply walking into a girls' bathroom as a first-year boy would attract precisely the wrong kind of attention. I needed a pretext, a key. That key was the ghost for whom the bathroom was named: Moaning Myrtle.
I knew from my foreknowledge that Myrtle was a lonely, perpetually miserable ghost, starved for attention. Approaching her required a delicate touch.
I found my opportunity one afternoon, feigning a need to escape the "unbearable pressure" of the suspicious crowds. I made my way to the second-floor lavatory, ensuring I was seen entering by a few passing Hufflepuffs to establish my alibi.
The bathroom was cold and damp, the sound of dripping water echoing off the cracked tiles. A mournful wail emanated from one of the stalls.
"Is someone there?" I called out, my voice filled with a gentle concern.
The wailing stopped. A translucent, gloomy-looking girl with pigtails floated through the stall door. It was Myrtle. "Who are you?" she sulked. "Have you come to throw something at me? Everyone does."
"Certainly not," I said softly. "My name is Tom. I was just... looking for a quiet place to think. It's difficult, you know. When everyone is staring at you. Whispering."
Myrtle's perpetually sullen expression shifted, a flicker of interest in her ghostly eyes. "Whispering? Do you mean about the attacks? They think it's you, don't they? Because of your name."
"You've heard, then," I said, affecting a weary sigh. "It's tiresome. To be judged for something you had no part in."
This was the bait. I had resonated with her own eternal plight. She floated closer, circling me. "No one ever wants to talk to Myrtle," she lamented. "Unless they want to know about... dying. No one ever asks how I lived. They only care about how I died."
"Then tell me," I said, my voice earnest, my gaze sincere. "Tell me how you lived."
No one had ever asked her that before. For the next hour, I became her confidant. I listened to her endless, dreary stories about her unhappy school days, her bullies, and her loneliness. I offered sympathy. I validated her feelings. I was the perfect, attentive friend she had craved for fifty years.
Finally, as I was preparing to leave, I broached the subject I had truly come for, framing it with practiced subtlety. "Myrtle, the place where you... where it happened. It must hold a great deal of power, a great deal of residual magic. As the person closest to it, you must sense things others cannot. These new attacks... do they feel the same?"
Her form flickered. "It's... similar," she whispered, her voice trembling. "The cold... the feeling of ancient, terrible eyes... I remember a pair of great, yellow eyes. In the sink."
She pointed a translucent finger towards a specific copper tap on a row of sinks, one that was different from the others, etched with a tiny, almost invisible serpent.
Bingo.
[Quest Update: The Headmaster's Gambit] Objective progress: Key information regarding the Chamber of Secrets has been obtained through social manipulation. [+5 to [Diplomacy] Sub-skill.]
"Thank you, Myrtle," I said, my voice filled with genuine warmth. "You've been a great help. You are a true friend."
I promised to visit her again, leaving her in a state of ghostly bliss. I now had the final piece of the puzzle: the trigger mechanism for the entrance.
My next step was to acquire the one skill necessary to open it. A skill I knew I did not possess naturally, but one which my namesake, the other Tom Riddle, had mastered. A skill that would confirm every suspicion about me if I were caught using it, but one that was absolutely essential for the next phase of my plan.
I needed to learn Parseltongue. And I knew just where to find the "teacher." In the pages of the diary Horcrux that Lucius Malfoy, in his infinite foolishness, would soon slip into Ginny Weasley's cauldron. The game was about to get much more interesting.