"Excellent."
Grindelwald looked around at the faces before him—some suppressing wild joy, others full of anticipation mixed with a trace of fear—and nodded lightly.
"Since everyone who should come has arrived, let us begin. Don't forget to remind your master later that he owes me a favor."
"Igor, begin."
"Yes."
Karkaroff nodded respectfully to Grindelwald, then drew his wand and pointed it at the altar for the resurrection ritual.
There sat a huge, exquisitely crafted cauldron, filled with a deep purple potion whose surface reflected an eerie sheen beneath the sunlight. The walls of the cauldron had been engraved with magical runes using all kinds of precious materials. At this moment, they were glowing faintly, interacting with the potion inside in a mysterious way, stirring it into a slow flow and occasionally sending faint ripples across its surface.
Beneath the cauldron sat a brazier that had yet to be lit.
Karkaroff's wand was aimed precisely there.
Then, as Karkaroff softly chanted a long and complicated incantation, pale blue magical flames began to burn within the brazier. And the instant the first tongue of flame touched the bottom of the cauldron, the potion within abruptly changed from purple to crimson and began boiling violently.
Large amounts of steam spread outward, making it nearly impossible for the surrounding Death Eaters to see Karkaroff's and Grindelwald's faces clearly...
"It's ready, Lord Grindelwald!"
They heard Karkaroff shout, causing their hearts to tremble.
Then they saw Grindelwald take out something shaped like a small bottle from within his robes and step forward. He tapped the mouth of the bottle lightly with his wand, then slowly poured its contents down...
At that moment, almost no sound of breathing could be heard among the Death Eaters.
They all knew exactly what was inside that unremarkable little bottle. Three years ago, Dumbledore had publicly displayed it before the entire magical society—
The soul of Voldemort, which he had sealed away in one stroke.
And now, with Dumbledore having fallen into the trap and ultimately been defeated by Grindelwald, their poor master—who had spent eleven years as a wandering ghost, then another full three years imprisoned inside a little bottle—was finally about to recover his former power and see the light of day again, leading them alongside Grindelwald to restore the glory of pure blood...
And so, under everyone's focused gaze, strands of gray mist poured from the bottle in Grindelwald's hand, slowly drifting down into the boiling potion inside the cauldron.
Even through the thick steam, they could clearly see that when the first wisp of mist touched the potion's surface, a violent burst of light suddenly bloomed from that point, catching the staring Death Eaters off guard and dazzling their eyes.
In the next instant, the entire cauldron of potion began evaporating at an unbelievable speed. A thick column of steam shot into the sky, then swiftly dispersed high above, spreading outward until a large area—including every Death Eater present—was shrouded in crimson vapor...
"Wait, this reaction... Is this really what the resurrection ritual is supposed to look like?"
Quite a few Death Eaters coughed after being choked by the steam and frowned strangely.
Logically speaking, this potion should have been used to reconstruct a body for their master. Why was it evaporating everywhere like this?
If not for the fact that the steam did not seem to be poisonous, hypnotic, paralyzing, or otherwise harmful, they would almost have suspected that Grindelwald and Karkaroff had conspired together to put on an act and wipe them all out here...
"Wait, this steam..."
Suddenly, several Death Eaters whose expressions had been shifting uneasily, and who had quietly drawn their wands to analyze the composition of the vapor, changed color and began shouting.
"Not good! Run! This steam is—"
Boom!!
At the center of the altar, Grindelwald suddenly drew the Elder Wand again and struck the enormous cauldron—still shimmering faintly—with a heavy tap.
In the next moment, the complex runes on it erupted with dazzling brilliance. Once that light shone upon the potion vapor permeating the air, it began triggering an entirely new, unknown reaction.
The Death Eaters did not know what that meant. They could only vaguely sense that whatever was now happening to the vapor's composition was absolutely not a good thing...
"Grindelwald! Karkaroff! What are you do—"
One Death Eater was just about to shout a furious question at Grindelwald ahead, but halfway through his words, he was shocked to discover that he had lost the ability to speak.
Because of those potion vapors.
A moment ago, they had been harmless, leaving the Death Eaters unwary as they watched them spread. But the instant the vapor was illuminated by that light, its composition changed immediately!
Damn it! This is a trap!
The Death Eaters, now deprived of speech, roared inwardly. While gripping their wands tightly, they rapidly retreated, trying to escape the range of the vapor.
Then they discovered in despair that not only had the Anti-Apparition wards, which Karkaroff had supposedly shut down earlier, been quietly reactivated at some unknown point, but an incomparably sturdy barrier had also appeared around them, trapping them firmly in place.
If they could still chant spells, perhaps they might have been able to concentrate fire on one point and shake the barrier together.
But now that everyone had lost the ability to speak, relying solely on nonverbal magic—whose power was greatly weakened—made it impossible to damage that barrier at all.
"Then I hereby declare—"
An old voice filled with immense delight suddenly rang in their ears, making them turn toward the source of the sound.
At some point, Gellert Grindelwald and Karkaroff had already retreated outside the barrier. Even the enormous shield that had originally covered Durmstrang Castle had disappeared.
Grindelwald was laughing loudly while shouting toward the castle:
"The true third task of the Triwizard Tournament officially begins now!"
And as those words fell, an incomparably terrifying sight entered the Death Eaters' hearts through their eyes, almost destroying their already fragile sanity on the spot—
Gellert Grindelwald's aged face suddenly began melting slowly like a wax figure, then reassembled itself into another face, long white beard continuously sprouting from his chin...
Before everyone's eyes, he transformed into Albus Dumbledore.
And beside him, the "Dumbledore" who had supposedly been "knocked unconscious on the ground" sprang up with a nimble kip-up, grinning as he waved to the people in the castle and inside the cage. Then his face and limbs began changing just like "Grindelwald's" had, gradually revealing his true appearance...
It was Alastor Moody.
(End of Chapter)