OHOHOH!!!

"...Are we still going in?" Hermione asked, looking at the massive crowd that could scare a socially anxious person to death.

"Of course we are!" Harry said, charging straight in and desperately squeezing through with his small body.

Neville refused to be outdone. He was even sturdier than Harry, but against third-year witches and wizards, he simply could not push his way through.

Inside the office, Professor Kayson had no choice but to stand on top of his desk to maintain order.

Honestly, if this had not happened, he would never have known he was so popular with the students.

"Everyone! Everyone, listen to me, listen to me! I'm very gratified by your support!"

"But please believe me! I don't need duel assistants, duel representatives, and I definitely don't need you to sneak into Professor Quirrell's office and assassinate him. Trust me, let me handle this with my own strength, all right?"

The young witches and wizards in the office and hallway gradually quieted down. In the end, after Kayson practically begged them on his hands and knees, they finally left his poor office.

After some more time passed, only Kayson and the four young witches and wizards remained in the office.

"I hope you're not here to help me assassinate Quirrell."

"Of course not, Professor," Hermione hurriedly explained.

"Yeah, even if we wanted to, we wouldn't be strong enough," Harry said with an awkward chuckle.

"I sincerely hope you do not even have that idea."

"Oh, we won't. By the way, are you confident about the duel?"

"More or less. Actually, this is what I wanted too. Even if Quirrell hadn't challenged me today, I would have challenged him."

"After all, if he is allowed to move around the castle freely, who knows what other danger he might cause? If this duel can limit his range of activity to the Hospital Wing, it will count as a small contribution to Hogwarts' safety."

"So you're very confident, Professor?"

"Something like that."

Quirrell set the duel for very soon. From the moment the duel was initiated by throwing down a glove—though Quirrell was not wearing gloves, so he threw a handkerchief instead—to the moment the two stood on the dueling platform, only six hours had passed.

At six in the afternoon, a dueling platform suddenly appeared in the center of the Great Hall. Kayson and Quirrell stood in the middle, each holding a wand against his chest.

Snape stood between them. After explaining the meaning and rules of dueling to both men and the watching students, he told them to bow to each other.

Things had come this far, so naturally they bowed. This was Hogwarts' dueling platform, not WWE.

There would be none of that pre-match rage-building ceremony.

After bowing, they turned at the same time and walked in opposite directions. At Snape's signal, they turned back simultaneously.

Quirrell moved first, sweeping his wand upward. "Serpent Strike!"

A giant serpent over four meters long was abruptly summoned and lunged swiftly at Kayson.

Kayson casually flicked his wand, and tiny pixels of flame spread evenly over the serpent's entire body. He merely shifted to the side, allowing the serpent to fall off the platform beneath him, grazing nothing but his shadow.

After doing all that, he shrugged at Quirrell, spreading his hands like a little bear. Anyone could understand the meaning at a glance.

"Just that?"

"It's not over yet."

Quirrell quickly slashed his wand toward Kayson's feet, and rows of earth spikes spread toward him.

Kayson scratched his chin, then lightly tapped his wand. In an instant, the entire dueling platform became a surface of Obsidian.

The spikes that had already emerged lost their roots and magical supply, falling to the ground and turning directly into dust.

Just as Kayson raised his head after admiring his handiwork, he saw another silent spell flying toward him from Quirrell.

The spell was red, but given Quirrell's usual habits, there was no telling whether it was Expelliarmus or Stupefy.

Of course, it was even more likely to be a Blasting Curse.

Kayson no longer dared to be careless. He did not even use his wand, simply raising a hand and giving it a wave. An Obsidian wall blocked the spell, though the wall itself shattered into fragments across the ground.

Quirrell's spells came one after another. A massive dragon made of scarlet flames charged straight at Kayson.

The moment Snape saw Quirrell use Fiendfyre, he hurriedly jumped down from the platform and turned to look at Dumbledore.

Dumbledore merely waved a hand, signaling him to relax. He seemed to be watching the Fiendfyre with considerable interest.

Kayson, on the platform, was not as calm as Dumbledore. He still appeared composed on the surface, but the damn mass of flames before him did not look like any ordinary fire.

He held his wand in one hand and a sphere of water in the other. In his mind, the dueling platform was already covered in a grid made up of transparent cubes.

It even had three-dimensional axes.

All he needed to do was fill every space on those three-dimensional axes with water source blocks in an instant, while keeping them from flowing.

That instant of spatial compression should be enough to seize the Fiendfyre's living space. Or, more simply put—

The suddenly appearing water source blocks would overwrite the Fiendfyre, just as one computer file overwrote another.

He acted immediately.

Watching the enormous fire dragon grow larger and larger until it was nearly touching the Great Hall's ceiling, Kayson tossed a water source block into a corner of the floor with one hand. With the other, he held his wand and pointed it at one corner of Hogwarts' ceiling. In an instant, an enormous cube of water appeared before the two of them.

As for the fire dragon that had just covered the sky, it had already vanished without a trace.

After extinguishing the fire dragon, Kayson had not forgotten why he had picked a fight with Quirrell from the beginning, then accepted Quirrell's duel.

It was to make the old bastard lie in the Hospital Wing for a few more days.

Though only for a few days. Before the duel, Dumbledore had specifically sent him a message telling him not to take Quirrell's life.

With that one restriction, the Wither Skeleton Skull could not be used.

And TNT flash was too mild for someone like Quirrell. It was nowhere near enough to make him spend several days in the Hospital Wing.

Fortunately, since arriving at Hogwarts, Kayson had been well liked by both the students and professors, so—

"Ender Crystal!"

Kayson lightly tapped his wand, and a purple cube floating in midair suddenly appeared, surrounded by white cubic outlines.

The instant the Ender Crystal appeared, it flew rapidly toward Quirrell.

Quirrell was blasted away and collapsed on the ground, his condition unknown.

The entire Great Hall fell silent for a moment. Then, in the next instant—

"OHOHOHOHOHOHOH!!!!!!"