The Dust Settles

After watching the fake Baker's body become completely encased in a layer of deep blue frost, "Flitwick," who had long since hidden to the side, let out a long sigh of relief. Then, his entire body began to melt away like a wax figure, growing taller, and within seconds, he transformed into another appearance—Avada Kedavra.

[...Mr. Kedavra, what are you trying to say?]

[Professor, according to your theory, at this point, "you" should be putting all your effort into breaking the Spatial Magic, trying to escape the Room of Requirement. And with the magic you've set up, it would be difficult for us to stop him, right?]

[What I mean is, since we can't stop him, then we won't. Or rather, we don't need to stop him; we can just let him run into a dead end himself.]

[Besides the feature of "opening different rooms based on the user's needs," the Room of Requirement has another property: even after entering a room, the contents can change again according to the user's further needs. For example, making it larger, or changing the decorations...]

[So, since that's the case, why don't we build a fake "eighth-floor corridor" inside the Room of Requirement?]

[Anyway, neither you nor your consciousness fragments are recognized by the Room of Requirement; the only ones who can modify it are Baron and me. This way, we can build a fake eighth-floor corridor in the Room of Requirement in advance and hide it. During the fight, weren't you going to use Spatial Magic to hide the door? That's when we can have the invisible Baron take the opportunity to use his thoughts to change the Room of Requirement and block the real door with that fake eighth-floor corridor.]

[This way, even if the fake Baker breaks the Spatial Magic and finds the location of the door, he will only push open a fake door and enter a fake corridor, while in reality, he will still be inside the Room of Requirement...]

[And then, the moment he enters the corridor, he will significantly lower his guard, leaving himself wide open. If I then drink the Polyjuice Potion and transform into Professor Flitwick or another professor to pretend to help, his last shred of vigilance should vanish as well. The only problem is that I don't know how to brew Polyjuice Potion, and the timing of drinking the potion...]

As it turned out, under Professor Baker's explanation, Avada discovered he had overestimated the Polyjuice Potion—brewing that stuff didn't require any auxiliary magic or profound techniques. It only required throwing specific ingredients into a cauldron at specific times in a specific way, and then letting it simmer for ten days or half a month.

In other words, as long as one had the recipe, the ingredients, and enough care and patience, anyone could make it. The reason it was listed as a forbidden book was simply because its effects were too unique and thus strictly regulated.

As for those difficult-to-obtain ingredients, some were gathered in the Forbidden Forest, while others were bought directly by Avada, who spent his own money to send a letter to an apothecary in Diagon Alley. He had money; he didn't need to steal from Snape's office.

As for Professor Flitwick's hair, that was even easier to get—as an elderly British gentleman, even with goblin blood, hair loss was inevitable.

Finally, at Professor Baker's suggestion, Avada and Baron chose to cast the "Flash Smoke" spell to block the fake Baker's vision, using that moment for Avada to drink the Polyjuice Potion and change clothes, and for Baron to begin preparing Dark Magic.

Now, it seemed, the effect was significant.

From beginning to end, all of the fake Baker's actions had been calculated by the three of them. Every step was firmly trapped; from the very start, there was no possibility of a comeback. The fierce battle earlier might have seemed dangerous, and as participants, Avada and Baron were indeed exhausted, but in reality, they were as steady as Mount Tai.

"Phew, it's finally over..."

Avada, having returned to his original form, draped a robe over his shoulders and collapsed onto the floor, completely lacking any grace. After experiencing a great battle and frequently employing schemes, his energy had been squeezed dry; at this moment, he just wanted to fall over and have a good sleep.

Beside him, Baron's face was also somewhat pale—that last bit of Dark Magic had taken a toll on his mental strength, though it wasn't serious and would heal on its own in a few hours.

"Yeah, it's over..."

Baron leaned against the wall, a faint smile appearing on his face.

For the past few months, the two of them had sacrificed almost all their spare time to undergo Professor Baker's teaching and training, just to reach the strength standards required to execute the plan as quickly as possible. Even though, under Professor Baker's clever arrangements, nothing they learned exceeded the difficulty level of a fourth-year student, it had still worn them out completely.

However, this also meant that their strength had seen an exaggerated surge—anyway, Baron couldn't even tell what level he was at anymore.

"Hey, hey, hey, there's still one last step!"

Suddenly, a wry laugh interrupted their thoughts as they were about to relax—it was Professor Baker.

"Cough, sorry, almost forgot."

Baron coughed awkwardly, and Avada struggled to climb up from the floor. Together, the two used the Levitation Charm to lift Professor Baker's body and brought him to the Black Crystal Ball. Then, Baron waved his wand, first dispelling the frost that was still causing damage to his body, and then activated the "Repentance" magic.

As the wondrous magical structure operated under his Magic Sense, a golden light emitted from the Black Crystal Ball and shot into the center of Professor Baker's brow. His body immediately began to tremble violently, veins bulging on the back of his hands and forehead as if he were enduring intense pain.

Avada forced himself to stay alert, observing the changes in Professor Baker's spirit with full concentration—under the guidance of "Repentance," Professor Baker's original mental strength and the magical void had returned to his body and were gradually merging with the residual mental strength in his physical form. The two magical voids, one large and one small, were also slowly drawing closer at a slower pace, eventually merging into one, inseparable.

"Ugh!"

Suddenly, Professor Baker sat up abruptly like a flopping fish, giving Avada and Baron a start.

"Merlin, it's finally back..."

He took a few deep breaths, wiped the cold sweat from his forehead with the corner of his sleeve, and turned to look at Avada and Baron, who had retreated a few steps and were watching him with wary eyes. He revealed a faint smile: "Now, we can truly say we've succeeded."

"Looking at your expressions, fine, I'll leave my wand in your hands for now, as long as you return it to me before I start class..."

Professor Baker laughed dumbly, and after moving his body a few times, he slowly climbed to his feet. With the crystal ball in one hand and the other hand letting the slings return to his sleeves so he wouldn't look so disheveled, he was the first to open the real door.

"Don't worry, you saved my life. Even without a contract, I couldn't possibly harm you."

"Let's head back first. I need some time to prepare the reward I promised you; it should be ready by tomorrow... Come to my office tomorrow night. Besides the Galleons and knowledge we agreed on, I plan to prepare some other things as well, guaranteed to make you feel like these past few months of exhaustion weren't in vain."

"Alright, go back, take a shower, change your clothes, and tell your friends that you can go back to studying and playing with them again, haha..."

In the end, the two returned the two wands to Professor Baker and left the Room of Requirement with him.

Watching Professor Baker's receding figure, Avada frowned, a look of confusion appearing on his face.

In his perception, the sense of dissonance that Professor Baker's mental strength had originally given him still existed—this meant that he had only allowed his main soul to return to his body, without further merging the main body and the fragments to make the soul whole again.

But this also meant that the magic called "Repentance" was not what he had imagined; it could not directly repair the soul. If that was the case, why did Professor Baker name it "Repentance"?