Chapter 104: Comfort
Dungeons, Potions Professor's Office.
The room was cold, and the shelves along the walls were filled with unsettling specimens. The fire in the grate burned a ghostly green, casting Severus Snape's already somber face into deeper shadow.
Tamara stood quietly before the desk, hands folded, her posture impeccably elegant.
"Miss Riddle."
Snape sat in a high backed chair, his hands clasped beneath his chin. His deep black eyes fixed intently on the girl before him.
"I gave you a perfect way out in front of the entire class."
His voice was low and smooth, each word sharpened like a blade.
"But that does not mean I am so old and senile that I cannot recognize an extremely precise accident when I see one."
Tamara lowered her eyes slightly and did not argue.
In front of this fiercely protective Head of House, a suitable degree of honesty would earn more trust than denial.
"Slytherins are not afraid to use power, Riddle."
Snape stood, rounded the desk, and approached her.
"However."
His voice dropped further, carrying a stern warning.
"A Slytherin should learn to solve problems from the shadows, not thrash about in public like a rampaging Troll."
He looked down at her from his height.
"Hogwarts has more than one Professor. Dumbledore's eyes are everywhere."
Snape's gaze grew colder.
"I do not wish to see one of my more excellent students bring unnecessary trouble upon herself over a foolish spat. Do you understand?"
Tamara raised her head and met Snape's gaze.
In her pitch black eyes, there was no panic at being seen through. There was only depth and calm, enough to make even Snape feel the faintest tremor in his heart.
"I understand, Professor."
Tamara bowed slightly, her tone submissive and elegant.
"Next time, I will make the accident look... more like an accident."
Snape stared at her for several seconds before finally giving a cold snort.
He pushed a bottle of shimmering Invigoration Draught toward the edge of the desk with neither gentleness nor patience.
"Since the performance is over, stop wandering around the castle looking as though a gust of wind might knock you over."
Snape's black eyes swept over her coldly.
"Take it and leave my office."
Tamara nodded and thanked him with a smile.
The moment she stepped out of the dungeons, the submissive curve at the corners of her mouth vanished without a trace. In its place came a satisfied, icy sneer.
"A clever dog not only knows how to protect its master, but also knows how to warn that master away from traps."
She gave her assessment inwardly.
"Severus, you are surprising me more and more."
The night deepened.
In the second floor corridor, only a few torches flickered weakly against the walls.
Harry Potter dragged his exhausted feet toward Gryffindor Tower.
A moment of recklessness was not without a price.
Although he had not been expelled for flying the car, punishment was unavoidable.
He had just finished detention in Lockhart's office, helping that narcissist answer hundreds of fan letters. For four full hours, Harry felt as if his very soul had been poisoned by the cloying perfume.
The corridor was deathly silent.
Then, without warning, a voice slipped into his ears.
"...Come... let me rip you..."
Harry stopped dead.
His blood turned cold.
"Who's there?" he asked in terror, whipping his head around.
The corridor was empty.
"...Let me tear you... let me kill you..."
The voice came again, cold, raspy, and thick with bloodlust.
It was not coming from the air.
It was coming from the walls.
Harry pressed himself against the stone in horror. He could feel the voice moving rapidly through the pipes inside the wall.
Was he dreaming?
Or had he finally gone mad?
In a castle filled with magic, hearing voices no one else could hear was definitely not a good sign.
Even for a wizard, hearing hallucinations was a warning of a mind beginning to crack.
Just as Harry's breathing quickened and he stood on the verge of bolting, a slender figure stepped out from the corner ahead.
Black robes cut a cold arc through the firelight.
Tamara Riddle stood there quietly.
Harry froze as if he had found a lifeline, but despair quickly surged up again.
Tamara was so calm.
She certainly had not heard anything.
So he really was mad.
But Tamara's heart was nowhere near as calm as she appeared.
Of course she had heard it.
As the true heir of Salazar Slytherin, she had heard it a hundred times more clearly than Harry.
That was her little pet, asleep for fifty years. A beautiful and elegant Basilisk, waking and roaming through the castle pipes.
Sensing the foul wind of a Dark Arts creature in the air, a faint trace of fanaticism flashed deep in Tamara's eyes.
But when her gaze turned toward the pale faced Savior not far away, all her good mood vanished.
"Can't even handle the movement of a single snake," Tamara thought in disdain.
"To think a fragment of my great and noble soul is forced to reside inside someone like this."
She began to walk, intending to ignore the pathetic creature and leave.
[Ding! Detected that Harry Potter is in a state of extreme self doubt and mental panic!]
[As a Model of Virtue at Hogwarts, you cannot let a classmate collapse alone in the dark!]
[Task: Please confess the bond between you to Harry Potter. Tell him there is a Basilisk inside the walls, that you are both Parselmouths, and even the truth of your soul connection. Use sincerity to dispel his fear!]
[Reward: Life +2]
Tamara's footsteps stopped abruptly.
She repeated one word in her mind with disbelief.
Confess?
Tell that filthy Scarhead he was a living Horcrux, a vessel for her soul?
"You might as well strike me with lightning right now," Tamara retorted through gritted teeth.
[Warning! Detected that the host refuses to execute the core confession task!]
[Punishment Program initiated: Since you are unwilling to express sincerity through words, use physical contact to convey warmth!]
[Punishment content: Please immediately walk to Harry Potter, cup his cheeks with both hands, look directly into his eyes, give him a reassuring hug, and gently praise his bravery.]
[Countdown: 5, 4...]
Tamara's vision nearly went dark.
She could almost feel the system radiating smug delight.
This was more humiliating and disgusting than being electrocuted in the classroom earlier.
But the pressure of the countdown left her no choice.
If she refused, heaven knew what even more disgraceful thing this hellish system would devise.
"...Damn it."
Tamara took a deep breath and forced her face, which looked ready to kill, into an expressionless mask of indifference.
She strode toward Harry.
Seeing Tamara walk straight at him, Harry felt such pressure that he instinctively took a step back.
"Tamara... I..."
Harry stammered, "Inside the walls... there's a voice saying it wants to kill..."
He looked around at the empty corridor. His eyes were filled with despair and helplessness, and his voice grew lower.
"But there's clearly nothing here... no one else can hear it... Am I... am I going mad?"
Tamara looked at his nearly collapsing, foolish state. Even without Legilimency, she could see through this Gryffindor's weak mental defenses at a glance.
"...Shut up."
Tamara had already reached him.
She lifted her pale, cold hands and, with extremely stiff movements, cupped Harry's cheeks, cutting off his meaningless spiral of self doubt.
Harry froze as though struck by Petrificus Totalus.
His eyes widened, and for a moment, his mind shut down completely.
Tamara's fingers were very cold. Her grip was strong enough to make his jaw ache slightly.
But she was too close.
Close enough that Harry could smell the cool fragrance clinging to her robes, like certain herbs mixed with soapwort.
Even the stinging pain in the scar on his forehead, which always signaled danger, was forcibly twisted by the system into an intoxicating pleasure.
This sudden, strange euphoria made Harry's heart race. Between extreme panic and sudden peace, a strange and special emotion took complete control of his mind.
"Look at me."
Tamara suppressed the urge to twist his head off and commanded him coldly.
Harry subconsciously met those bottomless black eyes.
That deep gaze soothed his panic.
In reality, Tamara was thinking only of whether her noble soul fragment had already been contaminated by this useless shell.
The two of them stared at each other in the dim corridor for three full seconds.
Then, under Harry's incredulous gaze, Tamara released him, leaned in slightly, and gave him a hug.
It was absolutely the most perfunctory hug in the world.
Tamara's body was as stiff as a board. Her chin did not even touch Harry's shoulder. She merely looped her arms around him loosely and gave his back two extremely mechanical pats.
The sound was crisp, like someone slapping dust from an old cloak.
But Harry still felt a trace of warmth.
"You're not mad, Potter."
Tamara stepped back half a pace. Her voice was as cold as winter lake water, but to Harry's ears, it sounded like music from heaven.
Harry's pupils contracted sharply.
"You... you heard it too?"
"Not only did I hear it, I also know what it is."
Tamara crossed her arms and looked down at him, beginning to weave the perfect lie she had constructed in her mind.
"But that is not a language, Potter. It is a side effect left by dark magic."
"Side effect?" Harry repeated, stunned.
"Yes."
Tamara narrowed her eyes slightly, her tone carrying absolute authority.
"The Dark Lord is extremely... evil, and highly aggressive."
Tamara forced herself to continue.
"A few months ago, in the chamber where the Philosopher's Stone was kept, he did not merely try to kill us. His curse ridden magic also contaminated our senses."
She watched Harry's green eyes gradually brighten. Her gaze shifted slightly upward, landing on the lightning shaped scar on his forehead as she continued spinning this flawless theory.
"The malice he released touched the lingering soul wounds left in both of us from our confrontation with him."
She paused.
"You are very brave, Potter."
Tamara recited the final line of her script with extreme indifference.
"So put away that stupid expression of wondering whether you are a monster. It is not your fault. Those are marks of honour from our fight against evil. Do not let them frighten you."
The torches in the corridor flickered again.
Harry stood there in a daze.
He looked at the girl before him, always aloof and always powerful.
The fear and self doubt in his heart were instantly washed away by an overwhelming emotion.
So that was it.
He was not a monster.
He was not mad.
It was because they had both faced Lord Voldemort. Because they had both survived that brush with death. That was why they shared this strange resonance.
Harry had always believed no one could truly understand his fear of facing Voldemort. Ron and Hermione were good friends, but they had not personally experienced that soul tearing terror.
But Tamara understood.
Not only did she understand, she shared the same perception.
That slightly stiff, yet impossibly real hug had been like a beam of bright light, piercing straight into Harry's heart, which had been riddled with isolation and doubt.
In this world, in this school filled with criticism and misunderstanding, Harry suddenly felt that Tamara Riddle was the only person who could truly understand and accept him on the level of the soul.
"Thank you, Tamara..."
Harry's voice was a little choked. The way he looked at Tamara had changed from awe into dependence and trust.
"I will. I won't be afraid anymore."
[Ding! Punishment execution complete. The target's negative emotions have been cleared, and a Mental Dependency on the host has been generated.]
[Current Life: 19]
Hearing the system's prompt, Tamara let out a cold sneer in her heart.
Stupid Gryffindor.
A few ambiguous lies and a trivial bit of physical contact were enough to make him profoundly grateful.
"Go back to sleep, Potter."
Harry nodded, light returning to his eyes.
"Okay. Goodnight, Tamara."
Tamara turned and did not look back. Her black robes disappeared around the corner of the corridor.
In her heart, she silently added one last sentence.
"Enjoy this false warmth while you can, you fool."
.....
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