[ Location: Hogwarts - The Room of Requirement ][ Date: November 10th, 1993 - Wednesday Afternoon ]
I was dying.
My lungs were on fire, my arms were shaking, and my sweat was practically drilling a hole into the floor.
I had asked the Room of Requirement for a "Gravity Training Chamber," and the room delivered.
The gravity in here was set by magic to exactly three times normal Earth gravity.
Every step felt like I was giving a piggyback ride to a rhinoceros.
"98..." I grunted, doing one-handed pushups. "Expelliarmus!"
A red jet of light shot from my wand which was gripped in my other hand and blasted a training dummy across the room.
"99..." I switched hands, pushing my body up against the crushing gravity. "Stupefy!"
A stunning spell slammed into another dummy.
Merlin said my physical body would explode if I didn't get stronger to hold my 70% cosmic soul. So, I was grinding hard.
I was lifting weights, doing cardio, and rapid-firing spells at the same time to build my magic stamina.
My new passive skill, [ Aether Respiration ], was humming in my chest like a engine.
It was sucking in the heavy magical energy of the Room of Requirement, Slowly feeding it straight into my body and soul.
"This is a human rights violation," a lazy voice groaned from the corner.
I looked over.
Shikamaru was lying flat on his back on a gym mat. He wasn't doing pushups. Instead, his dark shadow was stretched across the room, wrapping around two heavy dumbbells.
The shadow was lifting the weights up and down while Shikamaru just laid there, trying not to pass out from the gravity.
"You're cheating, Shika," I panted, standing up.
"I am adapting," Shikamaru corrected, closing his eyes. "My new Abyssal Shadow lets my shadow do the heavy lifting. I am training my mind ,So my body is just resting."
I rolled my eyes, grabbed a towel, and turned the gravity back to normal.
Instantly, I felt light as a feather. Like I could jump over the castle.
I grabbed a water bottle and tapped my temple, opening the Chat Group.
Usually, they just bragged about murder. Today, Something is different.
Lelouch vi Britannia: My new rebel base needs a perimeter defense and human guards are incompetent and too easily bribed. I need something flawless and invisible, Any suggestions?
Optimus Prime: Hidden motion sensors utilizing non-metallic alloys and I strongly advise against lethal force, Lelouch. A true leader protects life.
Esdeath: Lethal force is the only force, machine. Lelouch, just freeze the ground for a five-mile radius if you can. Trespassers will have their legs shatter like glass and it serves as a beautiful warning to the next wave.
Wanda Maximoff: You people are literally insane. Lelouch, just cast an illusion over the area. It's quieter and speaking of quiet... Vivan, how do I hide a magic signature? The guys in suits (HYDRA) are scanning my block for energy spikes, and Pietro is freaking out.
Vivan Frostwell: @Wanda Maximoff Treat your magic like a bomb and shove it into a mental lead box and weld it shut. Don't let a single drop leak and tell Pietro to stop pacing, he's probably making it worse and I strongly advice you to go to kamar taj.
Ryomen Sukuna: Hiding, llusions and non-lethal sensors. You all sound like rats scurrying in the dirt. If someone steps on my territory, I dice them into wet chunks, Problem solved.
Boa Hancock: Men are so delightfully barbaric, My island is protected by giant sea kings and lethal poison and any man who dares approach my beauty dies screaming. As is their proper place.
Lloyd Frontera (Admin): IGNORE THEM, LELOUCH! I CAN SELL YOU PREMIUM LANDMINES! 50 POINTS EACH! BUY 10, GET 1 FREE! GUARANTEED TO VAPORIZE INTRUDERS AND PROTECT YOUR WALLET!
Sosuke Aizen: I have a question for the group.
The chat went completely silent.
Aizen rarely asked for advice and when he did, it usually meant something crazy will happen.
Sosuke Aizen: When one is ascending to rule an organization... what is the most efficient way to dispose of the obsolete, stubborn fools currently sitting in the chairs?
Makima: You treat them like disobedient dogs, Mr. Aizen and you put a tight collar on them. If they learn to heel, you keep them and if they bite... you put them down.
Sosuke Aizen: How wonderfully pragmatic, Miss Makima. I believe I will take that advice. Farewell for now, everyone. I am resigning from my current post today. No one has ever stood at the top of the world. Not you, not me, not even gods. But the unbearable vacancy of the throne in the sky is over. From now on, I will be the one sitting on it.
Vivan Frostwell: Uh oh. He just slicked his hair back and crushed his glasses, didn't he? Peak villain monologue right there.
Shikamaru Nara: Sounds like he just declared war on his entire universe. What a massive drag. Glad I'm not in his zip code.
I closed the chat, grinning.
'I think Aizen just betrayed the Soul Society, So bleach plot is moving, haha things are getting wild.'
"Come on, Shika," I threw my towel at his face. "Shower time and we have a Quidditch match to watch, and the weather is going to be garbage."
I closed the chat, grinning.
[ Location: Quidditch Pitch ][ Date: November 13th, 1993 - Saturday Afternoon ]
The weather was like a hurricane.
Freezing rain hammered the stadium, thunder shook the wooden stands and you couldn't even see the players in the storm.
I sat high in the stands with Hermione and Ron, completely dry.
I was holding a tiny, invisible Telekinetic umbrella over our heads.
"I can't see a thing!" Ron yelled over the thunder, wiping water from his face. "Harry's going to crash!"
"They should cancel the game!" Hermione shouted, shivering.
"Relax," I said smoothly. "Harry is a magnet for trouble and don't worry he'll survive."
I looked up at the dark sky.
Suddenly, the temperature dropped and my breath turned to white fog.
The rain turned into sharp needles of ice and puddles froze solid.
A massive wave of black, rotting cloaks swarmed the stadium.
"Dementors!" Ron screamed, pointing a shaking finger at the sky.
Hundreds of them glided onto the pitch.
They were starving, and a stadium full of screaming teenagers was an all-you-can-eat buffet.
High above the field, Harry was totally surrounded.
He went stiff, lost his grip on his broom, and started falling.
Hundreds of feet in the air, dropping like a rock.
"HARRY!" Hermione shrieked.
Down in the teachers' box, Dumbledore stood up, looking furious.
He pointed his wand and cast a spell, instantly slowing Harry's fall to safely lower him to the mud.
The whole stadium panicked and students were trampling each other, screaming and running.
I smiled.
"Cover me," I told Shikamaru.
"Don't get us expelled," Shikamaru grumbled, watching the chaos. "Make it quick."
I slipped backward into the dark shadows under the wooden bleachers.
Everyone was watching Harry; nobody was looking at me.
I stood in the pitch-black dirt under the stands and right above my head, the Dementors were flying around in a frenzy.
'Time to hit the buffet.'
I slashed my hand through the air.
SSSHHHH-RIP.
A massive, ten-foot-wide green portal ripped open in front of me, showing the toxic, ashy wasteland of my Upside Down dimension.
I looked up through the gaps in the floorboards at the swarm of ghosts.
I raised both hands and my eyes flashed violet.
'Telekinesis: Gravity Well.'
'SUCK.'
I created a massive, invisible vacuum cleaner right above the portal.
It was pure chaos.
Forty Dementors swooping over our section suddenly stopped dead in mid-air and they shrieked as the invisible weight grabbed them.
They were yanked violently out of the sky.
They tumbled through the wooden gaps like dirty laundry, screaming in confusion, and were sucked straight down into my green portal.
Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh.
Forty soul-sucking demons, gone in exactly five seconds.
I clapped my hands.
SNAP.
The portal shut tight.
Seeing forty of their friends vanish into thin air absolutely terrified the rest of the Dementors. They broke their formation and fled the stadium in a blind panic, flying back to the forest.
I dusted off my jacket and walked back up into the stands, looking totally innocent.
"Man," I muttered, sitting back down next to a shaking Ron. "Bulk harvesting is way faster than catching them one by one."
"What are you talking about?!" Ron yelled. "Harry almost died!"
"But he didn't," I winked. "Now let's go check on him."
[ Location: Hogwarts Hospital Wing ][ Time: 8:00 PM ]
The hospital wing was dead quiet.
Harry was lying in bed, looking miserable.
At the foot of his bed were the smashed, splintered remains of his Nimbus 2000 broomstick. It had blown away and crashed into the Whomping Willow.
"It's my fault," Harry muttered. "I fell off and got scared."
"You were attacked by a hundred Dementors , Harry," Hermione said softly. "Anyone would have fallen."
"She's right, mate," I said, leaning against the wall. "Don't beat yourself up."
Ron sat in a chair next to the bed, holding his rat, Scabbers.
The rat was shivering out of control.
It looked terrible balding, twitching, and absolutely terrified.
I stared right at the rat.
'Sixty,' I calculated in my head. 'I have over sixty Dementors guarding the Upside Down right now and my monster army is officially big enough. I don't need to stall anymore.'
I looked at Scabbers.
The rat met my eyes and squeaked loudly, trying to dig into Ron's hands to hide. May be It knew I was up to something.
"Scabbers is acting abnormal again," Ron complained, poking the fat rat. "He hasn't eaten in days."
"He doesn't look sick, Ron," I said.
My voice, making it sound cold and dangerous. "He looks guilty and knows he's running out of time."
Ron frowned. "Guilty? He's a rat, Vivan and what could he be guilty of?"
"You'd be surprised," I said, pushing off the wall.
'You've had a nice, long vacation for a traitor, Peter Pettigrew,' I thought, staring holes into the shivering animal. 'But playtime is over.'
I turned and walked out of the hospital wing, my boots clicking on the stone floor.
'Tonight, the rat gets exposed.'
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