Crack!

The wand spun through the air in a perfect rotation, tracing a smooth arc before landing precisely in Bryan's outstretched hand under many astonished gazes. The movement seemed almost choreographed.

Stroking the smooth, familiar surface of his wand, Bryan felt a scorching sensation emanating from the dark wood. It was as if the wand itself were angry, actively reproaching him for abandoning it, for allowing it to fall into unworthy hands that had tried to use it.

With an apologetic smile fixed at his wand, Bryan said gently, "All right, I promise this is the first and last time I'll let that happen. We're partners, after all. Deal?"

The ebony wand trembled slightly in his palm. Then it lay quietly, its anger seemingly appeased by the promise.

Bryan had recovered his wand, which was indeed cause for celebration. However, the people gathered around him showed no joy at all at this reunion.

While Bryan was having his "long-awaited reunion" and communicating with his wand as if it were a sentient companion, Sirius and the others remained obsessed on that small cluster of faint golden flames still burning where Graves had stood. Their expressions were indescribably strange showing a mixture of disbelief, confusion, and rising unease.

'Graves was dead?'

Well, this outcome wasn't particularly surprising to Sirius or the experienced Aurors from the Magical Congress of the United States of America, not in principle.

After all, Bryan Watson was here in person, and Albus Dumbledore was here in spirit. Although one of them was without his wand initially and the other had merely projected his consciousness across thousands of miles through his phoenix, both severely diminished in their actual power, these two legendary wizards had such formidable combat records, such intimidating reputations, that even in their 'weakened' states, no one seriously doubted their combined capabilities.

But still—

Sirius's mouth twitched several times as he struggled to process what he'd witnessed, showing a particularly wry expression.

He trusted Dumbledore and Bryan completely, would bet his life on their abilities without hesitation. But surely defeating an 'immortal' dark wizard should have been a fierce battle, shouldn't it?

There should have been dramatic spell exchanges, clever tactical maneuvers, perhaps some ingenious countercurse.

After all, Graves had just appeared so supremely confident, radiating such power, that they all believed he had truly obtained unimaginable abilities through some supremely evil dark magic. His arrogant words still echoed in everyone's ears like a haunting catchphrase.

Immortal life... eternal existence in the world... no force that could destroy him.

Yet before he could even make a proper move, before he could demonstrate this hyped power, he had died, no, been obliterated, in the trap Bryan had apparently set within his own wand?

The anticlimax was almost funny.

"Is he—"

But as a wizard with wide experience in war and betrayal, someone who'd learned never to assume victory too quickly, Sirius still showed appropriate vigilance.

He looked toward Fawkes perched on Bryan's shoulder and asked with cautious concern, "Is he finished, Dumbledore? Truly gone?"

After a long moment of silence, during which the phoenix seemed to be perceiving something, the pupils were half-hidden by slowly lowered eyelids. Dumbledore's old voice finally responded with troubling words:

"Not quite yet, Sirius. I'm afraid it's more complicated than that."

At these ominous words, more than just Sirius was alarmed. All the Aurors who had fought until now, who'd survived the battle through luck and skill, stared at the phoenix in united shock and new fear.

"But he's already been eliminated by Bryan's magic, hasn't he?" Amelia blurted out, pointing with a slightly trembling hand at the thin layer of ash on the ground, apparently all that remained of Trask Graves's. "There's nothing left of him!"

"Not quite yet?"

Sirius seized immediately on the more important and deeply troubling point. His eyes narrowed with growing concern. "What do you mean, Dumbledore? What exactly do you mean by 'Not quite yet'? How can he still exist?"

Whoosh!

Just then, as if summoned by their discussion, a sinister wind suddenly surged through the hall with unnatural force. The gust carried no scent of the outdoors, no freshness—only something old and corrupt. In the eye-stinging smoke and swirling dust, a shadow flew out from the pile of ash beside the blood pool where Graves had fallen.

The shadow was formless and utterly insubstantial, even less solid than a ghost which at least maintained some approximation of their living form.

This was merely constantly wriggling darkness, a void in the shape of something that might once have been human. And within that wriggling darkness, a pair of crimson eyes glowed, fixed constantly and hatefully upon them all.

"Wh-what the hell is that thing?!"

What appeared in front of them exceeded Uriel's understanding of magic, surpassed anything in his Auror training or years of experience. He shouted in alarm and rising terror, his voice was cracking.

The eerie shadow hovered in midair like smoke that refused to disperse, defying gravity and natural law. Its scarlet eyes stared directly at Bryan with intensity, piercing into him.

Though it said nothing, merely glaring with palpable malice, everyone present could see the venomous hatred concentrated in those eyes.

Bryan's arm hung casually at his side, his somewhat indifferent gaze meeting the shadow's malicious stare without flinching. He didn't answer Uriel's terrified question, didn't offer explanations or reassurances. He seemed to be waiting for something specific, and Fawkes on his shoulder adopted almost the same patient, watchful posture, the two who understood what was coming.

"I will return."

The shadow finally spoke, breaking its hateful silence. The voice was so shrill it was nearly soundless, existing at the very edge of human hearing like twelve musical saws being drawn simultaneously across metal, the sound was piercing everyone's eardrums with physical pain while making their hearts race with instinctive dread.

It was a promise and a threat.

After uttering these words with concentrated venom, the shadow's already blurred outline suddenly began to fluctuate violently, wavering like heat shimmer. It became even more ethereal, more transparent, as if about to escape through some crack between worlds.

But at that precise moment, just as freedom seemed within reach, an unexpected change occurred!

The Vampire Lord puppet standing motionless beside the blood pool lost its physical form without any warning. One moment it was solid, the next it was transforming.

The goodlooking body dissolved into a dazzling red light that shot toward sky. Before anyone could react or even cry out in surprise, the red light broke through the shattered dome above them and flew into the night sky like a comet.

The red light flew extremely high, soaring over the highest peak of the Appalachian Mountains with effortless speed. It tore through a few sparse clouds floating in the upper atmosphere, leaving trails of crimson in its trail, before finally hovering in the sky thousands of feet above the earth.

There it hung, complementing and nearly merging with the blood moon that dominated the night sky.

"Heh—"

A sigh like a voice from beyond the heavens, from some realm beyond mortal understanding, sounded right by their ears. The sound caused Sirius, who was looking up at the red light that now appeared like a conspicuous spot of concentrated darkness within the blood moon's face, to feel his scalp tingle.

Cold sweat broke out instantly across his forehead and down his spine.

He wasn't the only one experiencing such visceral terror. In the hall, the remaining vampires collapsed to the ground as if encountering some monstrous flood that would sweep them away. They pressed their foreheads hard to the floor in absolute submission, bodies trembling uncontrollably with instinctive fear of their ancient progenitor.

The red light began to fall, trailing dazzling flames like a meteor in reverse. It plummeted back toward the Appalachian Mountains with increasing swiftness.

The primitive forests covering the peaks and valleys, whether inhabited by ordinary creatures or magical beasts, all instinctively sensed impending catastrophe in their consciousness. Birds took flight in massive flocks, deer bolted in panic, and even the magical creatures normally territorial and aggressive began to flee desperately in all directions.

BOOM!

The impact was like a dam collapsing, like a geological catastrophe. The furious flood of magical energy carried earth-shattering power as it washed over the physical world, distorting reality itself.

The instant before it would have crashed into the remaining buildings scattered through the valley, obliterating them completely, the red light suddenly blazed with even more intense intensity.

It transformed in front of many horrified gazes into a vast and ferocious sea of blood suspended in midair. The crimson ocean hung like a massive canopy covering the sky, blocking out the stars, larger than any building, larger than the mountain itself.

In the violently churning sea of blood, countless despairing, grotesque crimson faces flashed by in the roiling currents—hundreds, perhaps thousands of faces. Sirius, squinting up despite his terror, was absolutely certain he had seen Trask Graves's face among those fleeting, tortured faces.

That face, twisted beyond recognition by suffering, seemed to endure immeasurable agony. From the moment it appeared, it struggled desperately against the tide, trying frantically to break free from the sea of blood that contained it.

Graves's mouth was open in a silent scream of horror and desperation. But then a massive wave composed of many blood-red faces came crashing down heavily, and Graves's face was submerged beneath the crimson flood, disappearing completely into the mass of other tormented souls.

Bryan and Fawkes gazed up at the sea of blood with solemn, grave expressions, acknowledging the terrible power before them yet remained basically composed and unafraid. The others were in far worse condition, barely maintaining lucidity.

Inside the hall, forget about the vampires who had already prostrated themselves in abject submission—under this terrifying, sinister sea of blood radiating malicious power, most of the MACUSA Aurors also showed complete breakdown.

Many were so frightened they collapsed on the ground, bodies convulsing uncontrollably with shock. Some Aurors who retained fragments of rationality, who could still form clear thought, actually abandoned their companions and Disapparated away in panic, fleeing without shame!

Only a few MACUSA employees like Selena, Uriel, and Amelia still managed to steady their emotions, though their legs trembled beneath them.

ROAR!

A massive face whose specific features couldn't be clearly discerned, composed of hundreds of smaller screaming faces melded together, emerged from the surging, churning sea of blood.

The horrifying amalgamation was easily a hundred feet across, dominating the sky. The terrifying face opened what was truly a a mouth large enough to swallow buildings and unleashed a deafening roar at the living beings far below. The sound alone was a physical force.

The powerful pressure completely crushed the already shattered remains of the MACUSA's former aurors. What walls still stood collapsed, what foundations remained cracked and buckled. Amidst rumbling sounds of total structural failure, blowing clouds of smoke and dust spread in all directions, obscuring vision.

Bryan seemed to sense something. His brow moved slightly in concentration as he quickly raised his wand. Milky-white radiance gushed from his wand tip like water from a spring, forming an enormous inverted bowl-shaped magical barrier over the survivors. The moment the protective magic took solid form—

Dense, wriggling tentacles began growing from the massive face formed of blood, sprouting like some horrible fungus. Each tentacle was as thick as a tree trunk and extremely long, each one topped with a perfectly formed human face frozen in expressions of terror and agony!

These horrifying tentacles rapidly extended toward the ground below reaching for prey. Amid screams mixed with extreme terror and utter despair, the mouths of the human faces at the tips of the tentacles split open wide.

They bit down hard on the submissive vampires who couldn't flee, who were paralyzed by fear. The tentacles dragged the screaming creatures up into the sea of blood where they dissolved like sugar in water, absorbed completely.

The blood-tentacles that attacked the MACUSA Aurors, seeking to harvest them as well, were blocked by Bryan's shimmering barrier. The tentacles slammed against the shield repeatedly with tremendous force, testing it, probing for weakness.

After the composite face roared in fury repeatedly, the tentacles retreated back into the holes in the massive blood face, disappearing into the churning mass.

Even Graves's phantom hovering above was stunned by this catastrophic scene, frozen in incredulity. He didn't understand why such a change had occurred, why his carefully laid plans had gone so terribly wrong. Hadn't the vampire ancestor already become his Horcrux, his vessel for immortality? Hadn't he done everything correctly?

He had meticulously planned to send his soul into the body and replace the weak, newly-formed consciousness that the resurrected vampire had developed, thereby completely controlling this immortal and supposedly indestructible body to achieve eternal life.

That was the design.

That was how it was supposed to work. But what was happening now? This wasn't the plan!

ROAR—

The terrifying giant face in the sea of blood, assembled from countless smaller faces all screaming in unison, once again let out a shrill shriek. The fierce pressure made even the air visibly blur and distort, made breathing difficult for those below.

The phantom hovering above the Aurors finally came to its senses, terror was overwhelming even its bodiless nature. It tried desperately to flee, to escape whatever doom awaited. But at that moment, an overwhelming suction force suddenly erupted from the sea of blood.

The hall building, already on the verge of total collapse, was sucked into the sky by this irresistible force. Stone and steel flew up, and were submerged beneath the swelling sea of blood, absorbed into the mass.

The fleeing phantom, despite its insubstantial nature, was also pulled toward the sea of blood.

It fought against the pull, tried to anchor itself to something, anything. But the force was supreme.

Carrying unwillingness that clotted the air, resentment that poisoned the magic around it, and aborted dreams of immortality that would never be realized, Graves's fragmented soul was finally drawn into the crimson mass and dissipated into nothing.

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