—A ghost?
The thought came to Wade instinctively.
But she was not one of the familiar ghosts that often drifted through the castle.
As the distance closed, the figure suspended in the water seemed to turn slowly, carried by the currents, until she finally faced Wade directly.
It was a young girl. She had a very beautiful face, almost rivaling Fleur's, and her slender, delicate body carried an aura of ethereal, unsettling allure.
Wade felt his heart pound so violently it seemed it might burst from his chest. He immediately widened the distance between himself and that uncanny figure, and watched her warily while swimming upward.
Just as they were nearly level, the figure suddenly opened her eyes—blue as starlight, set in a pale face that curved into a strange smile.
A chill clutched Wade's heart.
Everyone knew that ghosts were pearl-white all over—their very blood as well—so it was impossible for one to have blue eyes.
He whipped his tail hard, shooting upward while aiming his wand at the eerie girl. But in the very next instant, his mind went blank, and in his vision, nothing remained but that radiant, beautiful figure.
The girl stretched out a pale arm, and her hand swayed lightly in silent invitation.
When she saw the merman-shaped wizard drift closer, her smile bloomed ever brighter, as though a full moon had appeared in the depths of the lake.
But beneath the robes, her lower half suddenly swelled and spread. Countless green weeds uncoiled like tendrils, twining around the wizard's wrists and tail, dragging him down toward the darker depths.
Her soft arms coiled around him as well and her icy body pressed close—an embrace as intimate as a lover's. Her form swayed gently as she pulled the boy toward a vast shadow lurking deeper in the dark.
In the pitch-black water, silver-white hair tangled with black, and long green weeds streamed like ribbons, revealing two equally pale faces in their dance.
Suddenly, a glimmer of gold flashed in Wade's dull gray eyes. His pupils shifted ever so slightly, and his long fingers strained against the weeds, inching forward until at last they touched the wand nearly smothered in vines.
His lips moved, whispering:
"Solaris Arkaion!"
Bubbles streamed past his ears. The girl turned her head curiously, locking eyes with the wizard for a single instant.
A heartbeat later, a wave of crushing danger surged through her. She flung the boy away in a panic—but too late!
A thousand searing white beams burst from the gaps in the weeds, blazing like a miniature sun erupting in the depths, slicing the lakebed into quivering golden cages. The light swallowed the girl whole.
Wade clenched his eyes shut, crossing his arms before his face as waves of burning pain seared across his body.
The merman's form had allowed him to survive in the depths—but it also made him vulnerable to the devastating force of the Sunlight Charm.
A piercing scream tore through the water, sharper than glass shattering against his eardrums. In an instant, the restraints binding him vanished, the force dragging him away dissipating completely.
It was a long while before the burning pain ebbed. Lowering his arms, Wade quickly cast a Shield Charm, and blinked for a moment before his vision finally cleared.
He waved his wand, summoning another sphere of bright light that spread through the darkness.
Shreds of weeds drifted around him, scattering slowly, while faint trails of blood diffused into the water.
And the vast shadow the girl had tried to drag him toward revealed itself: a palace sunk beneath the lake. Massive pillars wrapped in black weeds loomed out of the gloom, while behind the dark windows, strange shapes flickered and shifted.
Suddenly, a pair of cold, sinister eyes appeared behind one of the windows.
It was a monster, and its entire body was seared and burned. Its skin was mottled red and black, covered with great swathes of bloody wounds, with a few strands of broken weeds tangled around it.
Its face resembled that of a horse, with uneven tufts of silver-white mane. Its one eye dripped blood, while the other—an icy blue—stared at the wizard with venomous hatred.
Though moments ago Wade had wanted to avoid it, now he did not flinch or turn aside. Floating in the water, he locked eyes coldly with the creature. After a pause, he slowly raised his wand again.
The monster jolted in fright and vanished swiftly from the window, fleeing who knew where.
Wade lowered his wand. After waiting for a while longer, he resumed his slow ascent.
The water pressure around him gradually lessened, though the bone-piercing chill still clung to him. The steep walls began to slope more gently, and now and then he glimpsed underwater caves or jutting slabs of rock.
Then he spotted a wrecked wooden boat overturned on the lakebed. Its hull was coated with blue-gray algae, and a few small golden fish darted about nearby.
Oars were stuck slantwise in the sand, with only half of the wooden handle visible, like a crooked gravestone.
As Wade swam closer, he saw letters carved into the wood:
[God.]
"—God?"
Wade wondered: Did this boat once belong to a believer?
The glow of his Lumos spell lit the mottled patterns beneath the hull, and Wade realized that although the vessel looked battered and broken, the underside was still largely intact.
Like Durmstrang's great ship, it carried the strange sense of being a "ghost ship that could still sail."
Naturally, Wade wasn't about to drag a wrecked boat out of the lake. But when he felt a peculiar tug of attraction from it, he flicked his tail and sped upward toward the surface.
At last, faint light filtered down through the water above—he was close to breaking the surface. Wade even saw a small blue fish—the master-mirror used for recording—spot him and dart over with what seemed an oddly urgent air.
Exhaling slowly, Wade did not immediately rise out of the water. Instead, he shifted direction and swam toward the disturbance ahead.
As a merman, he was highly sensitive to the changes in current, and he could tell a battle was raging not far away. The water churned with violent motion.
Breaking through a dense forest of weeds, Wade suddenly caught sight of a figure—Jabari, the champion from Uagadou, with a catfish head. He was thrashing desperately, trying to pry loose the grindylows wrapped tight around his neck.
But already, more than a dozen of the grindylows clung to him.
Each of the small monsters had seven or eight tendrils and long, thin fingers. They coiled around Jabari's neck, gripped his arms and legs, and together dragged him downward into the deeper waters.
Even with a catfish's head, Jabari was weakening from lack of air. His limbs convulsed and his strength was nearly gone. His wand had slipped from his grasp and was drifting slowly toward the bottom.
Something caught Wade's eye, glinting faintly.
A short sword-like object was strapped to Jabari's belt, swaying with his struggles.
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⭐Harry Potter: Becoming a Study God (HP:BSG)- 200+ Chapters
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