"Oh? You know about wizards, sir?" Sullivan's eyes lit up as he leaned in.
The innkeeper's face crumpled in pain. He stumbled back two steps and dropped heavily into his chair, clutching his head. "No… no wizards! Wizards bring death— Little Ji is dead— Everyone's dead! Go—get out of here!"
His frantic warning didn't scare them off. If anything, it made them more interested. Sullivan stepped forward and grabbed the man's shoulders. "What happened? Why do wizards bring death?"
"Little Ji, run! Everyone's been poisoned! Go east to the Count's castle—find Lord Front and beg him for help!" The innkeeper suddenly shoved Sullivan away with surprising strength.
The next instant his eyes rolled white. His skin shriveled and tightened, eye sockets sinking deep as his bones jutted out. Sharp fangs slid from his gums while he stared at Sullivan with pure, mindless hunger.
"It's an Inferius! Reducto!" Snape barked. One hand yanked Sullivan back while the other whipped out his wand and fired a Blasting Curse.
The spell slammed into the innkeeper and sent him flying—but it also acted like a master switch. The entire town froze in place.
Every single resident turned their heads toward Snape at once. Three seconds later, every person—and even that dog—began mutating. Their bodies twisted into grotesque Inferi as they surged forward in a hungry wave.
"They're all Inferi! Now what?" Even Snape looked rattled.
Worse, the innkeeper he'd just blasted wasn't fully destroyed. Severed arms and legs were still twitching and crawling, trying to stitch themselves back together. That was enough to make Snape want to bolt.
Sullivan drew his wand too. "Like the man said—head east to the Count's castle! Impedimenta!"
A heavy Blasting Curse and an Impedimenta charm bought them a few precious seconds, blocking the nearest Inferi. But these creatures were far stronger and faster than anything they'd seen in the movies. The spells wouldn't hold long.
The three of them spun and ran. Luckily the inn sat right at the edge of town, so they avoided being completely surrounded. As they sprinted they dropped a trail of trap spells behind them. It didn't take long to shake off the horde.
Soon a castle loomed ahead. It looked far more run-down than the buildings in town—clearly abandoned and unmaintained for years.
"This doesn't exactly scream 'safe,'" Snape muttered.
"Still safer than being torn apart by a thousand Inferi," Sullivan shot back. "We're already here. Might as well go inside and take a look."
The castle was huge but poorly lit. With the sun already setting outside, the interior was dim and gloomy. Both Sullivan and Snape cast Lumos so they could explore carefully.
"Su, you remember those four murals we saw before we came in?" Snape asked as they moved forward.
"Of course. The first one showed a noble and his men collecting taxes from the townspeople," Sullivan answered.
"So is it possible this castle belonged to that noble?" Snape continued.
"Very likely."
Snape frowned, scanning their surroundings. "But if those murals told the truth, the townspeople should have driven the noble out long ago. So why did that innkeeper tell us to come here?"
Sullivan answered with a question of his own. "Who do you think killed everyone? The wizard, the noble, or someone else?"
"I think it was the wizard," Snape said. "They've all turned into Inferi. If the noble did it, this doesn't feel right."
Sullivan thought for a moment. "If that's the case, then it matches the story from the human-skin book. An evil wizard tried to steal the Hopping Pot and ended up killing the entire town."
"And the Hopping Pot, to stop the wizard from doing more harm, sealed itself and dragged both the wizard and the whole town into an alternate dimension."
Snape nodded. "That does line up. But something still feels off. What's controlling the townspeople right now? And who's maintaining this blend of illusion and reality?"
"It has to be the Hopping Pot," Sullivan guessed. "If the story is true, the Pot is sealed here too. Maybe it's trying to save itself."
Snape wasn't convinced. "If it was the Hopping Pot, why didn't it just tell us everything when we visited the temple today?"
"Maybe something is restricting it," Sullivan suggested. "It has to follow certain rules. Perhaps that innkeeper was sent by the Pot to guide us here to the castle."
Snape remained skeptical. "If that's true, then whatever is restricting the Pot is probably hidden inside this castle. We could be walking into something very dangerous."
"How about a bottle of Felix Felicis then?" Sullivan suggested with a grin. He pulled out a small vial—the one Snape had given him for Christmas.
"You bastard. Do you know how long it takes me to brew that stuff? That tiny bottle is worth at least fifty Galleons," Snape growled. Nearly all the Felix Felicis he had painstakingly made had ended up in Sullivan's hands.
"Come on, potions are meant to be drunk, aren't they?" Sullivan said as he popped the cork and downed the entire bottle in one go.
This was only the second time Sullivan had taken Felix Felicis. That familiar, wonderful feeling immediately washed over him, making everything feel perfect.
Following the golden liquid's guidance, he led the group straight to a bedroom.
It was clearly the original owner's chambers. The walls had intricate, exquisite patterns, and the domed ceiling was covered in a grand painting of various gods—pure artistic mastery.
Sullivan's eyes landed on a portrait hanging on the wall. It depicted a handsome man in classical British noble attire with meticulously styled long hair. His looks were on par with Sullivan's.
More importantly, the man looked strangely familiar. Sullivan stepped closer, holding his wand up for better light, and finally spotted the name in the bottom right corner.
Charles Dracula!
Dracula? As in the same vampire count who had kidnapped and cursed Tonks?
Why was his portrait here? Could Dracula have been that evil wizard?
No—Sullivan quickly dismissed the idea. The man in the painting looked quite young, and there was no terrifying scar over his eye. This portrait must have been painted long before Dracula became a vampire.
Sullivan suddenly remembered what Dracula had said when they fought: "I was imprisoned for five hundred years, then exiled from my homeland."
Could this be the "homeland" Dracula was talking about?
And if so, who had imprisoned him for five hundred years? It couldn't have been the dark wizard… right?
The more Sullivan thought about it, the more tangled and confusing the whole situation became.