In a tunnel that led to the center of the Quidditch Stadium, Asterion and Narcissa looked at each other with serious gazes. The crowd could be heard in the background, everyone seemed happy. But that joy was likely to fade on this day, which would be remembered for a long time.
"What do you mean, Asterion?" Narcisa listened to Asterion with a serious expression.
"Go back to the mansion and don't come out, take Daphne, Astoria, Andromeda and her family and don't come out until everything calms down again." Asterion repeated what he had said a few moments before, his eyes more serious than ever. Three days had passed, today would be the day that the last test of the International Tournament of Witchcraft and Wizardry would begin.
Everything seemed completely normal, even the most paranoid person couldn't have imagined that festivities on this scale could be the harbinger of war. But whether it was Asterion, Dumbledore, Rose or anyone else who knew about the conspiracy, they knew that it was all a cover for what was about to happen.
Asterion also discovered that Gabriele and Apolline Delacour were missing, with only Fleur and Luis Delacour still present at the time. He could imagine that Fleur had asked her mother and sister to disappear to be safe somewhere far away, something he himself was doing at the moment.
Narcissa looked at Asterion with a deep frown, there were countless questions in his mind, but seeing his eyes, unmatchably serious, she remained silent and nodded.
"Take care, Asterion. I love you, my little star." It was the only thing Narcissa could say before she left, leaving a gentle kiss on Asterion's forehead.
Asterion looked at her back and suppressed the feeling of unease running through his mind; there was no doubt, today would be the day that the Third Magical World War would begin.
It was a very good time for anyone who wanted to truly wreak havoc on the world. Asterion and Dumbledore were sure that Louis and Joseph wouldn't miss such a good opportunity right then!
Walking towards the light at the end of the tunnel, Asterion kept his face expressionless as he watched the light getting closer and closer and the voices of the crowd in the stands. For some reason, Asterion felt his heart calm down, unlike he thought it would when the time came.
Perhaps because he had already faced a lot of really big events, he wasn't so nervous or fearful, there was just a calmness in his mind.
Stepping through the blinding light of the tunnel entrance, Asterion saw the Quidditch stadium completely packed. Rose, Luna and Cedric waiting for him.
While Cedric seemed calm and well, the same couldn't be said for Rose and Luna. Both girls showed tense expressions, Luna in particular had a pale face and dark circles under her eyes, as if she hadn't had enough sleep.
"Someone was nervous about the third test." Cedric spoke in an amused tone, trying to make Luna feel better, but it obviously didn't work.
Rolling his eyes at the Hufflepuff Golden Boy's comments, Asterion stroked Luna's hair and spoke in a low tone, impossible for anyone else to hear. "Don't be nervous, Luna. Even if the sky falls, there will be people to hold it up. Me, Dumbledore and Rose."
"I'm not nervous, I just wanted to see far enough into the future to help you." Luna felt incredibly comfortable with the caresses in her hair, however, she spoke with a dissatisfied tone with the assumption that she was scared or afraid.
Raising an eyebrow, Asterion couldn't help but look at Luna with a reproachful look. Seeing the future was such a burden on the mind and body, many seers went mad in the later stages of life. He didn't want the same thing to happen to this sweet but incredibly strong girl.
Sensing his gaze, Luna stuck out her tongue in total defiance and didn't bother to say anything else to Asterion.
"Dumbledore has finished his preparations to prevent the two insects from escaping, if they move, they will die without any resistance." Rose approached Asterion, hugged him and murmured to him showing an intimacy in front of the audience, but it was only an act to mask her words, preventing anyone from reading her words through her lips.
Asterion nodded and thanked her. "Thank you for your hard work."
They both split up and lined up next to the other teams. Asterion felt a gaze fall on him and followed it, staring into Fleur's blue eyes. He showed no goodwill in her gaze, even a slight hostility.
Although Fleur had nothing to do with her father's actions, Asterion still harbored no goodwill towards this manipulative young woman. Perhaps it's normal for one manipulator to dislike another.
However, Fleur only smiled and winked seductively at him, although there was no sense of amusement in her eyes. The young woman looked more serious than Asterion himself, the difference in strength making her feel something completely different when faced with such a big crisis.
Asterion rolled his eyes and looked around, trying to find something suspicious and he did indeed find it, not difficult in the first place when the son of the German Minister was staring at him with a look of extreme hatred. A hatred so strong that it made Asterion feel genuinely confused.
He didn't really remember when he had offended Hans Weiss so deeply, although losing an arm was a real big deal, but it was Rose who had destroyed his arm, not him, so Patriarch Black was genuinely confused as to where such strong hatred from Hans came from.
"Uh?" Suddenly, Asterion noticed something unusual about Hans, apart from the obvious murderous intent towards him. He couldn't sense any magical energy coming from Hans' body, which completely confused him. Alchemical item?
Asterion quickly shook his head, denying the possibility that Hans had used an alchemical item to hide his magical energy so perfectly. They were at a tournament and Hans had obviously been searched when he entered the Quidditch Stadium.
Besides, hiding the magical energy was like putting Hans under a spotlight in front of everyone. The German team captain's lack of magical energy was extremely obvious.
However, Asterion didn't move and let the young man act as he pleased, he would die anyway, so it didn't matter if he was cheating or not. Yes, Asterion decided to kill all the members of the German team. No one would return to his homeland.
Originally, the French team was supposed to suffer the same fate as the German team, but since Fleur had betrayed her own father, country and talked about the conspiracies on the walls of Hogwarts, Asterion wasn't going to hurt the French team, not at the moment. If they met on the battlefield, he wouldn't mind finishing the job and killing them all at once.
Ignoring Hans Weiss's increasingly venomous and resentful glare at him, Asterion looked towards the VIP seats and his eyes met Dumbledore's. The man looked genuinely happy, acting skills that even he wanted to praise.
As if noticing his gaze, Dumbledore smiled kindly at Asterion and stood up with a gentle expression full of joy. He took the microphone and began to speak. "Good evening, world. I hope you haven't waited too long, because I'm just as excited to decide the champion."
"The Third Race is simple, get to the end of the Labyrinth and collect the Golden Cup. Of course, there may be a few obstacles along the way." Dumbledore's words had the crowd cheering, the first two trials had been brutal, there was no reason why the third shouldn't be!
It may sound strange, but most people had violent feelings welling up inside them, so watching something so brutal made the violence inside them feel satisfied, it was almost as if humans were programmed to get off on brutality.
Asterion couldn't help but cluck his tongue in annoyance, although competing was more interesting than he had imagined, being a monkey in a zoo for everyone to admire wasn't the best of sensations. He really wanted to know how world-class stars dealt with fame. It was suffocating to be in the spotlight all the time.
Suddenly, Asterion felt the gaze full of hatred and resentment again. He didn't even have to look to know that it was Hans Weiss, the man was really furious and full of hatred for him for some reason he genuinely didn't know. However, that didn't mean that Asterion liked being stared at like that.
Turning to look at the captain of the German Team, Asterion signaled with his finger near his own throat, as if to say that he was dead. And his actions practically made Hans spit flames of anger out of his eyes.
"You're going to die, and painfully." Asterion muttered to himself, feeling that Hans' gaze still hadn't left him, which was really pissing him off.
---------------
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At the end of Dumbledore's words, all the competitors Apparated at the same time, their figures seeming to distort into a spiral and sucked into a tube, disappearing with a loud pop that resembled a car exhaust.
Asterion felt the earth firm on his feet again and looked around, walls of green with thorns surrounded him, a gray mist hung mysteriously in the air. Waving his hand, he noticed the mist distorting, gradually revealing a clearer environment, but it only lasted a few moments before the mist filled the space again.
He had entered the Labyrinth moments before and everyone had been Apparated to different locations, something he had come to dislike a lot during this competition. Reaching out, a curtain of darkness appeared above Asterion's hand and an eye-like creature emerged from the undulating darkness.
The creature, called the Watcher by Asterion, split into countless smaller versions of itself and quickly spread everywhere. Monitoring everything within a radius of ten kilometers, but because of the fog, their field of vision was severely obstructed.
But it was enough for Asterion to spot other people or battles taking place in the fog.
Suddenly, Asterion heard the sound of heavy footsteps coming towards him forcing him to stop, although he couldn't see, from the sound of the heavy footsteps approaching, it wasn't a small creature at all.
Asterion controlled his magical energy and made himself invisible. He leaned against the green wall of grass and thorns, watching the huge gray creature pass calmly in front of him. He almost immediately recognized the grey magical creature in front of him. It was an Erumpent. It looked like an African rhinoceros, if it didn't have a horn big enough to impale a full-grown human.
The animal could cast a spell similar to Bombard or the Blast Curse with its horn, strong enough to blow up an entire house.
Asterion didn't see the point in fighting such a battle; in his eyes, it was better to leave without disturbing the beast than to start fighting foolishly and attract the attention of everyone nearby. That's what he did, but the world didn't always go according to plan.
In front of Asterion, footsteps were heard approaching, not the footsteps of any magical beast, but human footsteps. Although the footsteps were low and cautious, they still alarmed Erumpent, who was not at all happy about appearing in an unfamiliar place.
A loud snort was heard as the huge gray monster turned around; its small eyes fixed on the vague figure through the mist. At the base of the horn, sarcomas of flesh began to glow with an intense light, a faint smell reminiscent of sulphury wafted through the air.
Erumpent sniffed at the air one after another, ran forward while lowering his head slightly, ready to impale the enemy at a moment's notice.
Asterion just leaned against the wall of grass and thorns as he coolly watched the magical beast run past him, the ground seemed to shake with every step the creature took and a hole was made in the earth. He didn't wait to see the result of Erumpent's attack and walked in the opposite direction, observing his surroundings through the Cursed Spirit called, Observer.
BOMMMM!
At a relatively great distance from the site of the attack, Asterion heard a deafening explosion as the mist around him was blown towards him at great speed. It was obvious that Erumpent had used his own magic and blown up whatever he had hit.
Asterion wasn't interested in the outcome of the battle and disappeared into the mist, leaving only his vague figure appearing in the mist.
On the other side of the Mist Labyrinth, a small, delicate girl held her wand looking at the monster in front of her. The girl had blonde, almost white hair and beautiful eyes that resembled a shade of silver, although the blue could still be seen in her gaze.
It was Luna and in front of her, a beautiful purple and blue serpent with feathery wings seemed to cover the path she had to take to advance through the labyrinth. The snake was so large that it easily covered a distance of fifteen meters.
"Occamy" Luna thought with a helpless expression, the winged serpent wasn't the friendliest of the magical serpents on the planet, and she could imagine that the specimen in front of her wasn't at a good moment, as it had been placed in a completely unfamiliar place.
Normally, she would have avoided this kind of creature with her Gift, but after spending an entire night trying to see the future of the war, her mind and body were completely exhausted, so she hadn't been able to see Occamy before and consequently came across him at this moment.
Taking a deep breath, Luna knew she couldn't stay still, and putting a levitation spell on herself, she jumped into the air and floated forward. The mist was gently pushed away with her movement, but nothing too drastic to make the winged serpent notice anything wrong.
Luna's face was slightly tense, passing over the dangerously close to the beautiful creature, she could even smell the snakes' characteristic scent from how close she was to the creature.
Suddenly, Luna's face showed a helpless expression. In front of her, the snake's purple eyes stared at her with a cold gaze. A shiver ran through her body, those eyes looked as if they would strike at any moment.
"Look how thin I am, I barely have any meat, if you want meat, Rose is more suitable than me, I'm like a stick!" She spoke, her expression showing an innocent touch as she gestured with her arms, showing off her thin arms. Clearly saying that it didn't taste good, just crumbs of meat.
Then Luna's face changed dramatically, her Gift warning her of the imminent danger. She didn't care about the consequences and used her Gift without any hesitation. In an instant, she saw her being killed by a dagger to her throat!
Without hesitation, Luna moved to the side, watching with calm eyes as the dagger passed just a few centimeters from her face. The same dagger that would have taken her life if she hadn't dodged it earlier. The icy blue eyes stared at her with a cold gaze.
Luna quickly backed away and no longer cared about paying attention to Occamy, there was something more dangerous than the snake in front of her. It was a monster that she felt no trace of magical energy.
Looking at the captain of the German team, Luna's eyes narrowed with a cold stare, she held her wand tightly as she spoke. "You're not Hans Weiss."
Her certainty came from the fact that there was no magical energy in the supposed Hans Weiss in front of her, although there were indeed items that hid someone's magical aura, but these items couldn't hide a wizard's magical aura so perfectly.
The only two items known to do so were the helmet of the Wizard God of Death himself, Hades, and the Invisibility Cloak, one of the Three Relics of Death!
Although if you were an Animagus, you could obtain the same ability, but this was a rare ability that few in the world had.
However, if Germany had such items, it wouldn't have behaved so discreetly in the English Magical Civil War a few months ago. They would have attacked in full force and given England no room to recover or get out of the Civil War so easily.
"You're an Abortion, or rather, you were born without any magic, but you've gained an incredibly strong body and keen senses." Luna commented, keeping her gaze on her enemy's body, not daring to underestimate someone who could kill her with any mistake or hesitation on her part.
The mention of the name made the young man's face turn slightly colder, although it was imperceptible, it was more than clear to Luna that this was the confirmation she wanted.
"It seems you've betrayed Dumbledore and England as a result." Luna commented, already discovering the identity of the attacker, there were no other people she knew with such a peculiar situation in England. She had watched the young man fight Asterion in the Magical Self-Defense Tactical Training Class.
"He's allied himself with the monster, how can I follow a man like that?" He replied, his voice so cold that it sent shivers down Luna's small body. There was such an amount of hatred in his voice that it really made her wonder why he felt so much hatred.
"You call him a monster, I call him a hero, better than you, who betrayed his country for revenge." Luna didn't mince words and commented, her voice full of sarcasm as she didn't hide her contempt for the young man in disguise.
"Hero?" Neville seemed to hear the biggest joke in the world, the burnt skin on his body began to burn, as if remembering the pain Asterion had caused him.
If Asterion had heard Neville's thoughts, he would have rolled his eyes at his hypocrisy, House Longbottom still existed because he had more important matters than killing a decrepit old woman and an Abortion without magic, besides he hadn't caused his injuries, it was Bellatrix.
"I'm going to kill you, I'll enjoy seeing the look on his face when he learns of your death." Neville contracted his muscles and got into attack position.
"Kill me?" Luna showed an expression of surprise, but that expression soon turned into the most contemptuous face that could appear on anyone's face.
Putting the tip of her wand to her lips, Luna's lips curved into a smile tinged with sarcasm. She tilted her head to the side and spoke each word with such contempt that it made one wonder how such a sweet girl could turn out to be so prejudiced.
"A worm with no magic and a filthy Abortion like you can never touch me. You should go back to the hole you crawled out of and contemplate your utter insignificance, you traitorous mouse."
---------------------
Author's thoughts: Support me to write more and read chapters ahead of all regular readers!
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Next Chapter Second Volume: Chapter 223 - The Labyrinth of Cnossos (2), Chapter 224 - The Labyrinth of Cnossos (3).
Next Chapter of the Third Volume: Chapter 225 - A Dark Day (1), Chapter 226 - A Dark Day (2), Chapter 227 - A Talk Between Two Monarchs (1), Chapter 228 - Preparations for War (1), Chapter 228 - Preparations for War (1), Chapter 229 - Preparations for War (1), Chapter 230 - The French Battlefront (1), Chapter 231 - The French Battlefront (2), Chapter 232 - The French Battlefront (3), Chapter 233 - The French Battlefront (4), Chapter 234 – Battle Between Special Grade Wizards (1), Chapter 235 – Battle Between Special Grade Wizards (2), Chapter 236 – Battle Between Special Grade Wizards (3), Chapter 237 – Battle Between Special Grade Wizards (4), Chapter 238 – Battle Between Special Grade Wizards (5), Chapter 239 - Occupation of the Principality of Andorras (1).
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