The green light struck Hoff squarely in the abdomen—and at that very moment, something utterly unbelievable happened.
The Killing Curse was absolute. A guaranteed death. The moment it hit, the victim's soul would be torn from their body.
But Hoff… remained completely unaffected.
Hagrid stared at him in horror.
"Hoff… how are you—?!" His voice trembled, words failing him.
Hoff gave no explanation. There were secrets about him that could not be revealed. And by dawn, he knew he would have to leave Hogwarts.
The two attackers were equally stunned.
Someone who survived the Killing Curse… what kind of monster was he?
"What? You're Hoff?!" Wormtail's twisted face broke into wild delight.
"So he's the one the Dark Lord is looking for? Found without any effort." Barty curled his lips, flicking his tongue in that familiar, unsettling gesture.
At that moment, Sean regained consciousness.
He had been out for less than thirty seconds. As his magic power grew, so did his resistance. In the future, a single Stunning Spell would no longer be enough to keep him down.
"Hagrid! Hoff!" Sean spotted them from beneath Wormtail's arm.
Wormtail hadn't realized Sean was awake. No one would expect a third-year student to recover from a Stunning Spell in under half a minute.
"Serves you right for ambushing me," Sean thought coldly, seizing the perfect opportunity.
"Blind."
He was only a meter away from Barty—at that distance, the spell could not miss.
Sean cast a Blinding Charm, one of the highest-level silent, wandless spells he had mastered, composed of seven magical frameworks.
Barty was powerful—stronger than most Aurors. A Stunning Spell wouldn't be enough. Sean had to make this count.
A flash of white light shot from Sean's hand and struck Barty.
In an instant, Barty lost all vision.
Wormtail panicked.
Sean didn't hesitate—he struck again. Another Blinding Charm hit Wormtail.
Wormtail clutched his eyes in terror as Sean dropped from his back.
"Hoff, now!" Sean shouted as he ran.
Taking advantage of Barty's blindness, Hoff immediately cast a spell at him.
But the blindness lasted only a second.
Barty's combat instincts were terrifyingly sharp. Almost simultaneously with being blinded, he cast the Flying Charm.
Just before Hoff's attack could land, Barty shot into the air, narrowly escaping.
At last, Dumbledore sensed the disturbance outside the castle.
Wrapped in a pale gray silk robe, he opened the window.
Barty felt danger immediately. His instincts screamed at him to retreat.
Sure enough, after flying barely twenty meters, Dumbledore appeared beneath the Whomping Willow.
Within Hogwarts, only the headmaster could Apparate—but Apparition required a fixed landing point. Against someone already flying in midair, even Dumbledore couldn't intercept him.
Wormtail wasn't so lucky.
Sensing danger, he instantly transformed into a rat and tried to flee—but Sean and Hoff didn't give him the chance.
"Wind Arrow."
Sean flicked his hand, and a small stone shot forward like a bullet.
It struck the rat squarely in the back.
Speed became force. The stone blasted the rat several meters away. Though his expression couldn't be seen, the impact must have been agonizing.
"Rose Thorns."
Hoff waved his wand. A rose bloomed from Wormtail's body, its thorny vines wrapping tightly around him, immobilizing him completely.
"Peter!" Dumbledore's voice rang out sharply as he approached.
Wormtail transformed back into human form. The vines expanded with him, still binding him tightly.
He coughed violently from the earlier impact.
"Dumbledore, listen to me—"
With a wave of his hand, Dumbledore cast a Silencing Charm. Wormtail's lips sealed shut as if zipped.
"I will hear them first."
Dumbledore walked past the restrained Wormtail and approached Sean and the others.
"Professor," Sean and Hagrid greeted.
"What happened here?" Dumbledore asked.
Hagrid hesitated. He didn't know everything. Both of them turned to Sean.
"Professor… I'll explain." Sean braced himself and revealed the matter of the Marauder's Map.
However, he concealed certain details—such as how he had come into possession of it.
"I'll explain the rest," Hagrid continued, recounting what happened after Sean was knocked unconscious.
His gaze turned strange as he looked at Hoff.
"Professor, before that… I have a question."
"What is it?"
"Is it possible for someone to survive the Killing Curse?"
Dumbledore answered firmly, "No."
"After Sean collapsed, Hoff and I stopped them. Barty fired a Killing Curse at me… and Hoff stepped in front of it."
Hagrid tried to keep his voice steady as he described the impossible.
Dumbledore's expression shifted slightly—then quickly returned to calm.
He didn't seem surprised.
"What happened while I was unconscious?!" Even Sean found it hard to believe.
"We'll discuss that later," Dumbledore said. "Sean, go fetch Professor Snape and Professor McGonagall to my office."
Clearly, Dumbledore knew something about Hoff's secret.
Still in his nightclothes, Sean brought both professors to the headmaster's office. It was already past midnight—half past twelve.
Being summoned at such an hour, both professors immediately realized something serious had happened.
As soon as they entered, they saw Wormtail lying on the floor, his back to them.
They approached, puzzled.
When they saw his face—
Both were shocked.
Especially Snape.
During their school years, he had been enemies with Wormtail and his friends. Everyone had believed Wormtail was dead.
And yet now—
A "dead man" lay before him.
"Peter Pettigrew!" Snape looked up at Dumbledore, his eyes demanding an explanation.
"Now, you will speak," Dumbledore said, lifting the Silencing Charm with a wave.
"Severus!" Wormtail stared at Snape, fear evident in his eyes.
"You can reminisce later," Dumbledore said coldly. "Explain your current situation."
Wormtail hesitated, stammering.
He was surrounded by enemies—core figures of the opposing side. One wrong word could doom Voldemort forever.
"I'm innocent! Voldemort forced me!" Wormtail pleaded pitifully.
"Yeah, right," Sean thought.
Meanwhile, Voldemort—true to his reputation as a Dark Lord—had already sensed something was wrong in Hogwarts that night.
The moment Wormtail was captured—
He fled the castle immediately.
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