After the woman's roar, a brief silence fell over the plane.
Then came the sobbing.
At first, it was intermittent, as if something was stuck in the throat. But soon it couldn't be suppressed, growing louder and louder until it turned into a wail.
The child cried heart-wrenchingly, sobbing out between cries, "You're lying... You're lying..."
Edgar felt like the crying was right in his ear, drilling into his brain, impossible to avoid.
He was so disturbed he couldn't sleep, so he simply stuffed his eye mask into his pocket and sat up straight, ready to watch the scene.
Many others had the same idea.
Several passengers in the front rows had already poked their heads out to look back.
The child cried harder and louder, his entire face turning bright red, covered in tears and snot.
His mother stood helplessly beside him, reaching out to hold him, only to be pushed away.
As Edgar watched, he suddenly felt the fuselage shake slightly.
He didn't pay much attention at first.
But then it shook again, more noticeably than before; the cola on the cup holder was wobbling.
Then another one.
Edward beside him suddenly sat up straight. "A Magic Outburst?"
Before Edgar could react, a piercing noise came from outside the window.
The sound was hard to describe, like metal grinding, or like something suddenly getting stuck, making an abnormal clattering sound.
Along with that sound, the fuselage jolted violently, and the whole plane tilted to the right.
Edgar grabbed the armrest and turned to look out the window.
On the right side of the plane, those two things that were spinning frantically—he remembered William saying they were called engines—one of them had stopped spinning.
The fan blades were stationary, and several cracks were faintly visible on the outer metal casing.
Edgar's heart skipped a beat.
"Dad... Dad, what... what's going on?"
Edward was also stunned.
He stared at the stalled engine outside the window, his lips twitching twice, unable to speak.
He had been a Ministry of Magic official for so long, handled all kinds of magic accidents, and written countless reports, but he had never handled anything like this—
At an altitude of several thousand meters, a Muggle plane's engine had stopped because of a child's Magic Outburst.
Just then, the announcement sounded again.
It was still the Captain's voice, but this time it was no longer steady. "Passengers, this is your Captain speaking.
We have encountered some technical issues with the engine on the right side of the aircraft, and it has been safely shut down.
The aircraft is currently flying normally on the remaining three engines, and the situation is completely under control."
He paused, as if to stabilize his emotions.
"Please remain in your seats, keep your seatbelts fastened, and follow the instructions of the flight attendants. Thank you for your understanding and cooperation."
The announcement cut off.
The cabin was silent for about two seconds.
Then it exploded.
People were screaming, people were crying, some stood up from their seats to get their luggage, only to be sternly stopped by the flight attendants.
In the aisle, the man who said he was going back home to get married turned pale, clutching his fiancée's photo so hard his knuckles turned white.
The man who said he had won the lottery huddled in his seat, his lips trembling, muttering something unintelligible.
But the chaos only lasted a short time.
Because the plane was indeed still flying steadily.
No falling, no jolting; the sea of clouds outside still looked lazy, and the sunlight was still golden.
If not for the stalled engine hanging on the right, it would be as if nothing had happened.
People slowly quieted down.
Flight attendants walked back and forth in the aisle, their voices trembling as they repeated, "Please sit down," "Fasten your seatbelts," and "Do not panic."
Edgar leaned against the back of his seat, his heart rate not yet fully settled.
He took a deep breath and slowly exhaled, about to say something to Edward—
Then he saw it.
In the clouds outside the window, a mass of black mist was emerging.
The thing had no fixed shape, like a clump of crumpled ink, rolling and writhing at the edge of the sea of clouds.
Its edges were like charred paper, curling and crumbling, yet constantly regenerating.
Edgar's eyes widened.
The black mist only paused outside the window for a moment, as if observing the plane.
Then it moved.
Without any sound, without any warning, it directly penetrated the plane's hull.
Like passing through a curtain of water, silently, not even a single metal fragment was splashed. The fuselage hull was intact, but the black mist had already appeared inside the cabin.
It hovered above the aisle like a giant black jellyfish, its tentacle-like mist spreading in all directions.
The passengers' screams erupted again.
"What is this thing?!"
"Help! A ghost!"
"God bless us! God bless us!"
Some jumped from their seats and ran back, some huddled together shivering, and some closed their eyes and desperately made the sign of the cross.
The aisle was in chaos again; luggage slid from the overhead bins, hitting seats and people.
The black mist ignored the screams and the chaos.
It just hovered there, as if looking for something.
Then, it suddenly contracted, like a piece of squeezed cotton, shrinking to the size of a fist, and then—it darted into the child's body.
The child who had been wailing just now stopped crying abruptly.
His body froze, sitting straight in his seat, eyes wide open, but his pupils lacked any luster. It was as if he had been hollowed out from the inside.
Then, black patterns began to emerge beneath his skin.
Those patterns started from his wrists, crawling up his forearms. They converged at his neck, branched out again, crawled up his cheeks, and spread near his temples.
Then, he floated up.
The surrounding passengers had completely panicked.
Some crouched on the floor holding their heads, some hammered desperately on the windows, and some pulled out life jackets and put them on.
Edward stood up abruptly, his right hand reaching into his suit's inner pocket.
Beside him, Anna's action was even faster.
"Stupefy!"
The spell shot out from the tip of her wand.
The spell passed through the black mist and the child's floating body, hitting the cabin ceiling, bouncing once, and dissipating.
It missed.
Or rather, it hit, but it was useless.
The black mist only rippled slightly, like the surface of water ruffled by the wind, then gathered again, motionless.
The child still floated there, the black patterns under his skin deepening, as if something were crawling in his veins.
Edward's face changed.
"It's an obscurial."
"What?" Edgar thought he had misheard.
"It's an obscurial," Edward repeated, his wand already pointed at the black mist. "Damn it, how could this thing appear on a plane?"
Anna didn't speak; she flicked her wrist and cast another spell.
"Flipendo!"
The spell hit the edge of the black mist, and the thing contracted sharply as if burned, peeling away from the child for a split second.
The child's body dropped half a meter, but the black mist immediately wrapped around him again, even tighter.
The child let out a cry, and Anna's face turned even grimmer.
"It's assimilating the child's magic," she said. "The child is an Obscurial—no, he's about to be."
Edward and Anna moved at the same time.
No discussion, no eye contact, not even a second's hesitation.
"Stupefy!"
Anna's spell traced a dazzling path through the narrow cabin.
The surrounding passengers were still screaming; it seemed no one noticed this light that shouldn't be here.
But the black mist noticed.
It didn't even move; the black patterns spreading under the child's skin suddenly brightened for an instant, and a translucent black barrier appeared out of thin air in front of the child.
The Stupefy hit it and vanished directly without making a sound.
At the same time, Edward's wand was raised, and a second spell followed immediately.
Silver-white chains flew from the tip of the wand, unfolding in the air and wrapping toward the child.
This time, the black mist finally moved.
It separated a wisp of black mist, flicking it gently like a tentacle.
The silver-white chain paused in the air, then suddenly reversed direction, flying back at an even faster speed, heading straight for Edward's face.
Edward's pupils constricted, but fortunately, Anna quickly cast a Shield Charm to block in front of the three of them.
This thoroughly provoked the black mist; it didn't just separate a wisp but moved as a whole.
The mass of black mist expanded from the size of a fist to the size of a bucket in an instant, enveloping the child entirely.
The black patterns spread from under the child's skin, merging with the mist like countless thin snakes slithering through the body.
Then, the black mist diffused, attaching to the surface of the Shield Charm like acid, hissing.
"Reinforce it!" Edward shouted.
Anna gritted her teeth, pouring her magic in desperately. The shield brightened again, pushing the black mist back a few inches.
But those few inches only lasted for less than two seconds.
The black mist contracted sharply and then expanded again—this time, it directly penetrated the shield, just as it had penetrated the plane's hull earlier, silently and without any resistance.
The shield was still standing, its light still flowing.
But the black mist had already passed through, hovering before Edward and Anna, so close they could see the black patterns slithering within the mist.
Edward took half a step back, raising his wand, but before he could chant a spell—
A hand reached out from the black mist and gave a gentle wave.
Edward's and Anna's wands flew out of their hands at the same time.
The wands spun several times in mid-air before falling into the black mist and vanishing.
The two stood there, empty-handed, with expressions of disbelief still on their faces.
Then, a pitch-black wand appeared in the child's hand.
He raised the wand, pointing the tip out the window.
A mass of dark red light shot from the tip of the wand, passing through the fuselage hull and accurately hitting the fan blades of the remaining engines.
There was no explosion, no fire; the fan blades simply stopped, as if being pinched, motionless.
In an instant.
The plane began a rapid descent.
---
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