Trolls Attack

The October night sky hung low, clouds drifting slowly across the tabletops, the warm orange glow of jack-o'-lanterns rippling like a pool of water.

The long tables were filled with the sweet scent of roasted pumpkin and cinnamon, students' plates piled high with treacle tart.

Somewhere, someone hooted like an owl, another tossed Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Beans into their mouth, laughter echoing boisterously. Dumbledore sat at the center of the staff table, his half-moon spectacles reflecting the flickering candlelight.

Suddenly, the clamor of the Halloween feast was abruptly cut short by Professor Quirrell's piercing scream.

"A tr--troll! In the dungeons!"

The Great Hall erupted instantly. Especially the younger students, who panicked and surged towards the exits, scattering in all directions. The professors shouted loudly to maintain order.

"Silence!" With Dumbledore's commanding voice, everyone froze in place.

Dumbledore rose swiftly, his gaze sweeping across the hall like a falcon's, then he instructed the prefects to lead the students away in an orderly fashion, while the professors hurried towards the dungeons. Only one "bat in black" hesitated before running upstairs.

Yulian sat by the Ravenclaw table. Even knowing the plot, he flinched at Quirrell's shrill cry, spilling a good amount of his Pumpkin Juice.

His utterly terrified appearance was truly pathetic—the trembling, the darting eyes, all like a meticulously rehearsed performance.

Professor Quirrell's true objective, of course, was to use the troll to create chaos, distract everyone, so he could sneak into the forbidden area alone and attempt to break through the final barrier to steal the Sorcerer's Stone!

But what did any of this have to do with Yulian? Harry and the others would handle it.

Yulian's gaze involuntarily drifted towards the Gryffindor table. He had already seen Harry and Ron sneak away from the group, heading towards the girls' lavatory (a fact).

It seemed Hermione still had trouble getting along with her classmates, Yulian chuckled and shook his head.

However, just as he was hesitating whether to evacuate with the crowd or follow Harry to see the excitement, a completely different tremor suddenly pulsed from his chest.

This tremor felt like an instinctive warning from his bloodline, not from below, but... the fourth floor! The north corridor!

Though the troll was foolish, the primal, violent magic power within it was like a scorching iron, burning indiscriminately wherever it passed.

And on the fourth floor, the north side, the room where the Mirror of Erised was kept and the stone slab was sealed, made Yulian uneasy.

If the troll rampaged through the castle, could it damage the Mirror? Why did he feel such panic about it?

"Damn it!" Yulian cursed under his breath. He couldn't ignore it; he had to go take a look.

He didn't follow Harry and the others. Instead, he turned, moving against the flow of the panicked crowd, and rushed towards the fourth floor at top speed.

"Hey, where are you going?" Edgar called out from behind him.

"Girls' lavatory!" Yulian replied casually, disappearing in an instant.

"Did he eat something bad?" Kayson asked, puzzled. "I saw him eat a lot of treacle tart earlier."

"Is eating something bad the main point?" Edgar was speechless with his roommate.

"Right, why is he going to the girls' lavatory?"

"The point is, we have a toilet in our dormitory, why would he go there!"

"..."

By the time Yulian arrived, panting, at the north corridor on the fourth floor, the dull thuds and the roar of crumbling walls could already be heard in the distance.

The troll's massive gray form flickered at the bend of the corridor. It seemed to be attracted by something and was lumbering towards this direction!

Yulian's heart leaped into his throat. He couldn't let the troll get near that door!

There was no time to hesitate. He quickly ducked into an empty classroom, pulling a small bottle of Thestral Dust from his robe pocket—a rare material that could temporarily distort light and sound, a gift from his grandfather, Alphard.

He sprinkled the powder on the tip of his wand and quietly chanted a secret Silent Barrier Charm from the Black Family.

An almost invisible, translucent magical barrier silently unfurled, enveloping the room containing the Mirror of Erised and the area ten feet around it.

This barrier couldn't block physical attacks, but it could absorb and dissipate most magical fluctuations, minimizing the room's presence, as if "erasing" this space from the troll's chaotic perception.

Having done this, Yulian held his breath and hid behind the door.

The troll's heavy footsteps grew closer. Its massive body squeezed through the narrow corridor, its single eye scanning its surroundings blankly. When it was only a few steps away from the door, its steps stopped strangely, as if it had lost its target.

It sniffed the air in confusion, let out a low grunt, then turned and shuffled away in the opposite direction of the louder noises—towards the dungeons.

Yulian's taut nerves finally relaxed for a moment. It worked, temporarily safe.

But he didn't have time to leave. He faintly heard Hermione's scream from downstairs. They had already encountered it!

Yulian immediately turned and, silently, took another staircase down, sprinting.

When he reached the corridor outside the girls' lavatory, he witnessed a heart-stopping scene: the troll, raising its club weighing hundreds of pounds, was about to smash it down on Hermione, who was trapped in a stall!

Harry and Ron jumped and shouted from below, trying to attract its attention, but they seemed so small and powerless.

One had to admit, Gryffindors were reckless! Without a moment's delay, the two young wizards picked up stones and dirt clods from the ground and hurled them at the troll's head.

If one were to ask which hurt more, stones or dirt clods hitting the head simultaneously, the conclusion should still be that the head hurt! The troll slowly turned its massive head towards Ron.

Why didn't it look at Harry? Because Harry had already quietly crept onto its back and leaped onto its neck.

Having gained the upper hand, Harry didn't think of using any magical attack at all. His Muggle-like thinking was still at play; he directly used his wand like a dagger, poking it forward towards the troll's face.

As luck would have it, the wand was directly thrust into the troll's nostril, causing it extreme stinging pain.

Enraged, the troll reached back, grabbed Harry by the ankle, lifted him upside down, and swung its massive club at Harry.

Relying on the core strength he had developed from years of being hit, Harry bent his body like a shrimp, dodging the troll's attack, and calmly shouted, "Help! Think of something!"

It was impossible to count on Ron to come up with a solution, but luckily Hermione, the brains of the operation, thought of the only magic she had mastered. Since she didn't have her wand, she simply gestured towards Ron and recited, "Wingardium Leviosa!"

"Wingardium Leviosa!!!" Ron shouted the Levitation Charm with all his might. His wand trembled violently due to nervousness, which happened to fit Professor Flitwick's instruction to swish and flick.

By all rights, with Ron's magic power level, he shouldn't have been able to budge such a heavy weapon. The mace only wobbled extremely slightly.

At the critical moment, Yulian hid in the shadows around the corner of the corridor, his wand already raised. His lips moved slightly as he silently uttered the same incantation, but his magic power output far exceeded that of an ordinary student.

The two streams of magic power met in the air. Ron's spell acted as the fuse, while Yulian's magic power became the true engine.

The mace suddenly paused, then incredibly flew upward as if being yanked out of thin air by an invisible force. The mace rose higher and higher, completely escaping the troll's control!

Just as the mace reached its highest point, Yulian brought his wand down sharply, silently uttering the incantation.

"Deprimo Profundis!"