And Just Like That, the Person Was Gone

Click to begin your wondrous journey in <Hogwarts: Regulus Lord of the Starry Sky>.

Regulus did not retreat. He raised his wand, and an Shield Charm unfolded in front of him, semi-transparent and Crystal -like.

The masked man rushed to the Shield Charm, his right fist clenched, a layer of dark blue light enveloping it, and slammed it against the barrier.

"Bang!"

The Shield Charm trembled violently, and dense ripples appeared on the surface of the barrier, but it did not shatter.

The defensive effect was as expected, but the enemy's attack method surprised Regulus slightly.

He could clearly feel the power of that punch; the physical impact was real, even abnormally strong, but this was not the main reason for the Shield Charm's fluctuations.

The real threat lies in the fist, imbued with a thick, penetrating Magic Power that seems designed specifically to break the Shield Charm.

This is a completely different fighting style from mainstream wizards.

By attaching highly concentrated Magic Power or spell effects directly to the limbs, one can unleash them through close combat.

Regulus himself had considered this idea, but he never actually implemented it.

That's more like the way wizards fought in the distant past, before they invented wands.

It is highly efficient, direct, and extremely dependent on the caster's control over their own Magic Power and body.

Modern wizards rarely do this because wands, as Magic Power amplifiers, make spells easier to cast, more powerful, have a longer range, and are safer.

Using fists imbued with Magic Power to fight is inefficient, risky, and easily countered by the opponent's ranged spells.

But the wizards of the Abyssal Whisper clearly don't care about this, or rather, this is simply their unique Magic system.

A more primitive, direct, and corrosive form of combat.

Thoughts flow in an instant.

With a slight movement of Magic Power beneath Regulus's feet, a fist-sized rock instantly detached from the ground.

The moment it detached, the Transfiguration was complete; the rock was shaped into a dense Stone Spike about fifteen centimeters long with a sharp tip, a rough surface, and a hard texture.

As soon as it appeared, the Stone Spike began to spin, reaching their maximum speed instantly.

As it rotates at high speed and rubs against the air, the surface of the Stone Spike immediately turns dark red, then turns into a bright, fiery red, and emits a sharp, piercing hiss.

The heatwave generated by the rotation distorted the air, and the red light danced in the night, far more powerful, faster, closer, and with a purer killing intent than when it was shown to Hermes last time.

At the same time, he lightly tapped his left index finger, causing ripples in the air.

Spatial Warp, the Stone Spike disappear.

The next instant, it appeared without warning directly behind the masked man's head, less than three inches away, with no flight path or appearance process, as if it had always been there.

The masked man barely had time to sense the deathly aura behind him before he was about to make a move.

Taking advantage of this created opening, Regulus's wand in his right hand was pointed at him again.

It was still the First Form of the Severing Charm, Regulus thought. This spell was being used in actual combat for the first time, and it couldn't be without results.

But upon closer reflection, it's actually quite normal.

The Severing Charm is indeed fatal if it hits, but it can also be dodged.

Dodging spells is routine for him, and this isn't the first time he's missed. It's okay, if he misses once, he'll just try again.

In short, the Severing Charm must succeed.

The masked man opposite him was deeply impressed by Regulus's first attack.

At first, he thought it was just a child. Although the boy was calm and composed, and did not panic when faced with a sudden enemy, and even took the initiative to attack, a child is still a child, and it was obvious at a glance.

The masked man hadn't expected that the opponent's spell would be so powerful and bizarre.

The grayish-green spell merely grazed the hem of his robe, which vanished instantly upon contact. He didn't take it seriously, assuming it was just a piece of his robe that had been burned off.

But then he immediately felt something was wrong with his left shoulder.

It was as if a piece was suddenly missing there; the place that should have been covered by skin and flesh suddenly felt empty.

He glanced at it out of the corner of his eye and saw a sunken area exposed beneath the tear in his clothes on his left shoulder.

That area should have had skin, it should have had muscle, but it's gone.

It was as if that flesh and blood had never existed, as if he had been born with a missing piece in his left shoulder. He could even vaguely see the fragments of his collarbone through that thin layer of tissue.

Bizarre, extremely bizarre.

The masked man had lived for decades and had seen all sorts of Dark Arts, including Cruciatus Curse, Human Transfiguration, and Blood Curse; he had endured them all, but he had never seen an attack like this before.

It doesn't cause pain or impact; it simply cancels out the existence of what was originally a part of the body.

He acted decisively, severing his left shoulder to allow it to regenerate, but in his heart, he had already marked the boy as dangerous.

Next, his close-range attacks also became ineffective.

He had used this technique for many years, imbuing his fist with highly concentrated Magic Power, specifically to break through the weak Shield Charm of ordinary wizards.

But the boy's barrier was ridiculously hard.

A punch landed, and the barrier trembled violently, but that was all; the semi-transparent barrier was stronger and more stable than anyone had imagined.

Just as the masked man was about to change his move, a deadly threat came from behind him.

It was incredibly fast, completely without warning, appearing suddenly, but he sensed it based on his instincts honed through years of combat.

Something was rapidly approaching, its heat scorching his scalp.

He didn't look back; by then it was too late.

The masked man instantly bent low, his body crouching down as Magic Power surged behind him.

He didn't need his eyes; he could sense the object's location directly above him, spinning rapidly and radiating scorching heat—it was already piercing down.

The speed was too fast to dodge, but the Magic Power had arrived.

A mass of water materialized out of thin air behind him, clearly not ordinary. It looked transparent, but its texture was completely wrong, like some kind of viscous, heavy fluid, writhing and struggling in the air.

Its surface has a greasy sheen, and each fluctuation carries a dull, squeezing sensation.

The attack from behind his head was purely physical; it was his instinctive reaction. So, he blocked it using physical methods.

The fluid wasn't even a clear incantation, because the attack came too fast for a spell to be formed.

He simply used Magic Power to condense a substance from the air with a density far exceeding that of normal liquids, which would instantly become incredibly hard once subjected to force.

The next moment, the Stone Spike pierced the fluid.

The moment the high-speed rotating Stone Spike made contact with it, a piercing friction sound was emitted, the red light on the surface of the Stone Spike flashed violently, and ripples appeared on the surface of the fluid, as if a living thing was struggling violently.

The heat wave evaporated large amounts of white steam, and the hissing sound was so sharp it could pierce eardrums.

The Stone Spike stopped less than half an inch from the masked man's head, failing to pierce him.

But the masked man still didn't turn around; he stared intently at the boy in front of him, his gaze never leaving him for a moment.

Compared to the threat behind my head, this boy was the real danger. His expression was too calm; he even glanced at the battlefield around him out of the corner of his eye, as if everything in front of him was under his control.

The masked man took a step back, then another.

He activated the Shield Charm, and a semi-transparent barrier unfolded before him. Then he saw the tip of the boy's wand glow with a grey-green light once more.

That's the incantation.

The masked man's muscles tensed as he stared at the gray-green light, his Magic Power surging wildly into the Shield Charm, reinforcing the barrier to its limit.

He even unconsciously held his breath, as if trying to resist some invisible impact.

He knew how terrifying that spell was; if he hadn't acted decisively and in time, he would already be dead.

A greyish-green spell shot from the tip of Regulus's wand, and the masked man focused, preparing to meet the impact.

The spell vanished in the next instant. Just before it collided with his Shield Charm, the gray-green light disappeared as if it had never existed.

The masked man paused for a moment, then he felt something was wrong with his chest; a piece was suddenly missing there.

He looked down; a small patch of skin on his chest was disappearing.

This time he finally saw clearly that the skin in that area had lost its original shape, turning into tiny, separate particles that drifted away silently.

Then the underlying muscles are revealed, which are also disappearing, their texture becoming blurred, their luster dull, and turning into finer particles.

When the ribs are exposed again, their surface begins to disintegrate, and all the complex structures that make up the bone tissue lose their meaning, turning into a small clump of grayish-white powder.

The masked man's vision began to blur. He looked down at his chest, watching the hole expand inward, exposing the internal organs, and then disappearing as well.

He wanted to raise his hand, to Spellcasting, to do something, but his body wouldn't obey him.

The barrier vanished, and the wand slipped from the limp fingers.

The reflection of the incantation still lingered in his eyes, but that light was rapidly fading.

At the last moment, he raised his eyes and looked at the boy.

The boy stood there, calm, the tip of his wand pointing at him, doing nothing more, just watching him.

Then the masked man began to disintegrate.

Spreading outwards from that point on his chest, skin, flesh, tendons, bones, organs—everything that once constituted him—returned to its most primal state at a visible speed.

The entire process lasted less than half a second.

In the end, only a small clump of ash remained, which was scattered by the sea breeze.

Nothing was left behind.

Such a big, living person, just like that, gone.

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