The Dungeon classroom was as cold as ever.
The air was filled with a mixture of bitter roots and rotting petals, making every breath heavy in the chest.
Snape glided between the cauldrons, the hem of his black robe undisturbed, a moving shadow.
His oppressive presence materialized, sweeping past the Gryffindor long table, and finally, fixating on the non-human figure beside Hermione.
Ever since that "accident" in the Defense Against the Dark Arts class, this Cat-girl had become a key object of Snape's observation.
As a former Death Eater, he was more familiar with the texture of dark power than anyone.
He could smell that within this creature, there was an ancient, primal power, even more chaotic than that Lord's Dark Arts.
Part of that power bore the imprint of the man he hated most in his life;
The other part, however, was intertwined with the creature's soul, transforming into a monstrous entity he had never seen before, full of savage vitality.
It sickened him, yet he couldn't suppress his curiosity.
Today, he decided to personally pull back that disguise.
"Weasley, are you stirring your cauldron with Troll snot? It's burnt! Gryffindor, five points from you!"
Snape's voice scraped through the Dungeon.
Ron's face instantly turned beet red as he fumbled to salvage his cauldron, which was spewing black smoke.
In the chaos, Snape silently strode to Hermione's table.
He took a plant from his private material cabinet, entirely black, with serrated edges on its leaves.
"dark mark grass."
He uttered the name.
A light tap of his magic wand, and a pinch of black powder, finer than dust, detached from the leaf.
An imperceptible current of air precisely picked up that pinch of powder, carried it across half the classroom, and blew it towards Hermione's cauldron.
The target was Lia, who was curiously peering in, fascinated by the purple bubbles emerging from the cauldron.
Hermione's face suddenly changed.
dark mark grass! An extremely dangerous magical plant, with a near-self-destructive affinity for pure Dark magic!
She was about to raise her magic wand—
Too late.
When the black powder touched the breath exhaled from Lia's nose, it didn't ignite, but underwent an even stranger transformation.
Instead of exploding, it was absorbed, pulled, and devoured by an invisible force!
"Sizzle—!"
As if a drop of water had fallen into boiling oil, a fine, pure black electric arc flashed before Lia and vanished.
The pinch of powder instantly annihilated, not even a wisp of smoke rising. Immediately after, the air around Lia visibly distorted, and an aura far more primal and ominous than the dark mark grass itself leaked out for a moment.
In the cauldrons of several surrounding students, the brewing Potions instantly spoiled, all emitting a burnt, foul odor.
The cruel curve Snape had preset on his lips froze.
He had expected a cloud of black mist, a perfect excuse.
Not this magical reaction that even made his heart palpitate.
But he was Snape after all. After a brief moment of surprise, he turned the tables, his voice becoming even more unctuous and venomous.
"Oh, what do we have here?" he drawled. "Miss Granger, it seems your 'pet' has added some unexpected 'flavor' to our rather ordinary Forgetfulness Potion."
His gaze swept over Hermione, and he pronounced, "Gryffindor, another twenty points deducted. For failing to discipline your own pet, allowing a potential dark creature to contaminate my classroom."
"Professor!"
Hermione shot up, her chair scraping against the stone floor with a shrill shriek. She faced Snape without flinching.
"Chapter Seven of advanced potion-making clearly states that dark mark grass powder only produces revealing smoke when it comes into direct contact with high-concentration Dark magic!" Her words were rapid, her logic a drawn blade. "Lia has been sitting here motionless, and your herb was at least fifteen feet away from us! Moreover, there was no smoke just now; it was a magic annihilation phenomenon!"
She took a step forward, anger burning in her brown eyes.
"Unless someone deliberately used magic to maliciously guide that powder precisely towards a specific target! I'm very curious to know, in this classroom, besides you, who else has this ability and this motive?"
In the Dungeon, the sound of a stirring rod falling was clearly audible.
Everyone stopped what they were doing, looking in horror at the Gryffindor know-it-all who dared to accuse Snape in public.
Snape's face completely darkened.
He hadn't expected this bookworm not only to recognize obscure plants but also to instantly grasp the essence of the phenomenon and turn the tables.
The air in the Dungeon suddenly became viscous, the candlelight dimmed, and even breathing carried the scent of rust.
A massive magical pressure burst forth from him, this time, with unconcealed murderous intent.
Just then, a small, cold hand tightly clutched Hermione's robe hem.
Lia looked up.
Those sky-blue eyes were unblinkingly "looking" at Snape in front of her.
The moment magic went out of control, her Eye of Truth was passively activated to its limit.
In her vision, Snape was no longer the swirling, roaring black storm of Occlumency.
Because of the magical pressure he actively released, a crack appeared in the storm's barrier. Lia's "gaze" was forcibly pulled inside.
She saw a sorrowful doe.
Immediately after, a woman fell, her red hair spread out like withered roses.
Then, a man's heart-wrenching, silent roar.
That despair and regret solidified, turning into countless black chains that stretched from the depths of his soul, tightly binding, dismembering, and dragging that originally brilliant silver doe into the abyss.
That wasn't weeping.
It was a twenty-year-long, never-ending self-execution.
The massive information flow and extreme grief instantly overwhelmed Lia's consciousness.
"Ugh…"
She let out a suppressed groan, her body suddenly stiffening, and a warm liquid flowed from her nasal cavity, dripping onto the back of her hand.
It was blood.
She leaned into Hermione's ear, using her last bit of strength, her voice trembling with pain, and whispered:
"He... is killing himself."
The words were soft, as light as a cat's breath.
But Snape heard them.
His face, twisted with anger, instantly froze.
The suffocating pressure in the Dungeon didn't vanish; instead, it suddenly collapsed inward like a punctured balloon, all rushing back into his own body.
He stood stunned, his black eyes violently contracting, losing absolute control of his Occlumency for the first time.
That sentence, not an accusation but a statement, was more precise than any curse.
It directly pointed out the essence of all his actions over the past twenty years—a grand and desperate slow suicide.
How could this creature... see this!
What exactly is she?!
Finally, he spun around abruptly.
His black robe swished through the air in a decisive, almost hurried arc.
"Continue with your Potions!"
His voice was dry and hoarse, devoid of its usual unctuousness.
"If you don't hand them in before class ends, all of you get out!"
He didn't deduct any more points, didn't look at them again, and with a stiff back, returned behind the podium, once more disappearing into the shadows.
But this time, everyone felt that the shadow was no longer cold, but scorching. A scrutinizing gaze, mixed with fear and an uncontrollable, insane thirst for knowledge, was fixed on the Cat-girl who had collapsed in Hermione's arms, a streak of blood beneath her nose, and it never moved away.
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