Draco Malfoy was currently experiencing a profound sense of utter bewilderment.
What on earth was Maurise Black blabbering about?
Draco couldn't comprehend the philosophy or the logic behind Maurise's grand speech. However, there was one singular, horrifying fact he grasped with absolute clarity: Lord Voldemort had just offered Maurise an alliance!
And Maurise had casually rejected him.
Rejected him!
That was the Dark Lord! The terrifying figure the entire Malfoy family had once sworn total allegiance to! To this day, Lucius Malfoy still spoke that name in hushed whispers dripping with profound reverence and deep-seated fear.
And yet, here was Maurise Black, casually talking down to him as if he were an annoying, slightly disappointing classmate.
Tom remained silent for a long moment. Gradually, his dark, dead eyes began to bleed into a chilling, luminous scarlet. He locked his furious gaze entirely on Maurise.
Suddenly, a sharp, piercingly cruel laugh echoed through the grand stone chamber.
"Excellent, Black. Arrogant. Unbelievably, unparalleledly arrogant. I have encountered countless fools who believed themselves exceptional in my time, but I must admit, I have never met anyone quite like you."
"Well, you clearly haven't met enough people," Maurise shrugged dismissively.
Tom's crimson eyes flared brighter.
"I honestly have no idea why you are so desperately trying to provoke me," Tom smiled, a genuinely sadistic expression twisting his handsome features. "But you have successfully managed it. Well done. As for the consequences..."
His eyes narrowed into terrifying slits. "I will slowly, meticulously drain every last drop of life force from you... and your pathetic little rat cowering behind you."
Draco completely forgot how to breathe.
How was this his fault? Why was he being dragged into this? He had merely stepped out for a late-night stroll to the library! How had he ended up as collateral damage in a standoff against the Dark Lord?
It was over. Everything was completely over. The grand Malfoy legacy, his father's suffocating expectations, his own bright future... all of it was going to be brutally extinguished in a damp, forgotten dungeon.
Absolute, suffocating despair wrapped tightly around his heart.
Having delivered his death sentence, Tom completely ignored the two boys. He turned his spectral body to face the colossal stone statue of Salazar Slytherin.
Opening his mouth, he unleashed a barrage of rapid, terrifying hisses. It was Parseltongue once again. Clearly, the ancient mechanisms hidden within the Chamber required the serpent language to activate.
The hissing echoed chillingly through the cavernous hall, carrying a bizarre, almost hypnotic rhythm.
Draco's scalp went completely numb. Pure survival instinct screamed at him to turn and run, but his legs felt like they were cast in solid lead.
The hissing finally ceased.
Slowly, the massive stone mouth of Slytherin's statue ground open, revealing a pitch-black abyss within.
Immediately following the movement, a heavy, scraping sound echoed from the depths of the statue.
There was absolutely no doubt what was making that noise. The Basilisk was slithering out.
"Malfoy," Maurise's voice cut through the tension, perfectly calm and measured. "If you actually wish to survive the next ten minutes, tightly close your eyes, find a dark corner, and do not move a single muscle."
The blunt command snapped Draco out of his frozen panic. Scrambling desperately on his hands and knees, he practically crawled behind the base of the nearest massive stone pillar, curling himself into a tight ball.
Accompanied by the heavy, grinding sound of thick scales scraping against ancient stone, a colossal, sickeningly green, almost black serpent head slowly emerged from the statue's gaping mouth.
Naturally, Maurise was not foolish enough to stare directly at a Basilisk's face.
The exact instant the monstrous serpent opened its lethal, yellow eyes...
"Shath... Môr... Keth!" (Umbral walk)
Maurise instantly sank into the surrounding darkness, his physical form vanishing completely without a trace.
Tom, witnessing Maurise completely disappear into thin air, frantically scanned the massive chamber, trying to lock onto his magical signature. He couldn't detect a single trace of the boy.
'What on earth is happening? Is he Apparating? No, impossible. This is Hogwarts. The anti-Apparition wards are absolute.'
'Damn it.'
Meanwhile, the colossal Basilisk fully emerged from the statue, coiling its massive, serpentine body on the damp stone floor. It reared its terrifying head high into the air, its tongue flicking aggressively.
From the safety of the shadows, Maurise accurately assessed the monster's physical dimensions. It was easily over fifty feet long, its body horrifyingly thick and armored with dense scales. Even with his eyes firmly shut, his magical senses could detect the profoundly dark, lethal aura radiating from its eyes.
'I need to blind it immediately.'
Maurise silently reappeared several yards away from the Basilisk—keeping his eyes screwed shut, of course.
"Qwa... Zinth... Oor!" (Wailing Curse)
"Xul... Noth... Vras!" (Fainting Curse)
"Vor... Kul... Teneb." (Torment Curse)
Why settle for one when he could deliver the entire combo meal?
Following his rapid incantations, three distinct streaks of sickly grey light materialized from his wand, shooting forward and sinking directly into the Basilisk's thick, armored hide.
A deafening, furious hiss of pure agony violently shook the chamber!
The moment the curses connected, Maurise cast his concealment spell again, melting seamlessly back into the shadows.
He hadn't held back in the slightest. He had channeled a massive amount of his magical reserves into those three curses. In fact, he had pushed himself so hard that a sharp throb of pain pulsed behind his temples—the classic symptom of rapid magical exhaustion. He had overexerted himself slightly.
The Basilisk's colossal body shuddered violently. It began thrashing wildly against the stone floor, its massive tail smashing into the ground, sending chunks of shattered masonry flying in all directions.
"What did you do?!" Tom shrieked, his voice laced with shock and genuine fury.
However, from his hidden vantage point, Maurise realized a grim truth. While his curses were undeniably effective initially, their potency was dropping at an alarming rate. The Basilisk's ancient, highly resistant magical constitution was actively fighting off the dark magic!
'What a terrifyingly resilient creature.'
It was blatantly obvious that curses alone were not going to bring this beast down.
Refusing to waste the narrow window of opportunity his curses had created, Maurise reappeared once more.
"Kruk... Tak... Gûl!" (Bone Calling)
Without a single warning, two massive, wickedly sharp bone spikes materialized from the thin air directly in front of the thrashing Basilisk. Like twin artillery shells, they launched forward with terrifying velocity, aiming squarely for the monster's lethal yellow eyes.
Because the beast was currently writhing in agony and blinded by the dark curses, its usually lightning-fast reflexes were severely compromised.
Squelch! Squelch!
The sickening sound of solid bone puncturing soft ocular tissue echoed simultaneously through the chamber.
A perfect strike!
The bone spike cleanly pierced the Basilisk's left eye, causing the massive orb to violently rupture. A geyser of dark, venomous blood and foul, unidentified fluids sprayed across the stone floor. The right eye fared slightly better, but it was still heavily mangled, effectively blinding the beast permanently.
"HISSSSSSSS!"
A screech of unimaginable, world-ending agony tore from the serpent's throat as it rolled frantically across the stone floor, desperately trying to dislodge the bone spikes.
"Kill him!" Tom shrieked hysterically, completely losing his composed facade. "Tear him apart! Crush him!"
Tom was beginning to panic. Maurise's combat capabilities vastly exceeded his wildest estimations.
Although the Basilisk was now completely blind, its acute senses of smell and hearing were perfectly intact. It easily pinpointed Maurise's general location.
Throwing its jaws incredibly wide, exposing massive, venom-dripping fangs, the colossal serpent lunged forward with terrifying speed. Its massive bulk tore through the air, closing the distance between them in a fraction of a second. It moved with an agility that completely defied its massive size and recent grievous injuries.
Maurise instantly cast his ahadow concealment, attempting to slip away. However, the sheer physical force of the Basilisk's lunging attack generated a violent shockwave that violently disrupted the stability of the surrounding shadows, effectively forcing Maurise out of his concealment.
'The sheer physical force actually disrupted my spell model!'
Fortunately, Maurise's reflexes were razor-sharp. In the absolute nick of time, he cast his Bone Armor.
CRASH!
Maurise felt as though he had just been hit head-on by a speeding train. The immense kinetic force sent his body flying backward through the air. He slammed violently into a solid stone pillar, sliding heavily to the floor.
"Cough... careless... cough, cough..."
He groggily pushed himself up, coughing violently to clear his lungs.
The heavy bone armor had held firm, absorbing the vast majority of the lethal impact. He hadn't suffered any serious internal injuries. However, because he hadn't had the crucial split-second required to conjure the helmet, his cheek had been scraped quite badly by a flying chunk of debris.
Coincidentally, the massive stone pillar he had just crashed into was the exact same one Draco was using for cover.
Draco, who had been cowering in a tight ball with his eyes clamped shut, heard the deafening crash and instinctively snapped his eyes open.
When he found himself staring directly at Maurise fully clad in terrifying bone armor, with a massive, bleeding Basilisk thrashing wildly just a few feet away, his fragile nerves finally snapped.
Draco let out a pathetic squeak, his eyes rolled back, and he promptly fainted dead away.
"Tch."
'What a fragile child.'
Maurise shook his head. 'Whatever, this is perfectly fine.'
He was fairly certain the sheer, unadulterated terror of the past twenty minutes had definitely left a profound, lasting impression on the arrogant young Malfoy.