Tris watched the maze gradually shrink and finally vanish after losing its target, his brow furrowed.
Voldemort had actually escaped that way. It was well beyond anything he had expected.
As the maze unfolded, Tris's understanding of the skill had rapidly deepened. Once the Thought Maze activated, anyone who ventured inside had to find the correct path among 129,600 branching routes through twisted, inverted space.
In theory, someone could get out through brute-force trial and error. In practice, every path looked identical, and no traces could be left in the mental world. Memorizing nearly 130,000 routes was virtually impossible.
Voldemort had clearly realized that, so he had abandoned the attempt outright and chosen a method Tris had never anticipated-one that probably hadn't occurred to the system when it created the skill, either.
He had blown himself up!
The Thought Maze existed within Tris's mental world, and only a mental projection-or a soul-could enter it. Detonating a soul was certainly possible if one knew how.
But the cost was obvious just from hearing the idea.
Self-detonation would inflict almost catastrophic damage on one's own soul. Once a soul was damaged beyond a certain point, it would dissipate, and the person would die with it.
Under normal circumstances, no one would do such a thing.
But Voldemort was clearly not normal. He had specially modified his soul, and with his Horcruxes serving as anchors, a single shattering would not cause him to dissipate completely.
He had certainly suffered damage, but he would not be destroyed outright. Just how severe that damage was, Tris could not yet determine.
"Damn it, he actually got away." Tris opened his eyes in bed, feeling both frustrated and worried.
After this encounter with Voldemort, he had not only avoided losing anything but had also caught his opponent in a trap. Yet now Voldemort would remember him.
The satisfaction he had felt at trapping Voldemort had completely evaporated.
It took quite a while before Tris managed to reassure himself. For now, Voldemort was still only a remnant of a soul, with very limited options. Besides, his plan to steal the Philosopher's Stone was doomed to fail.
And since Tris had sent Peter to Azkaban, Voldemort's resurrection would certainly be delayed considerably...
And there's Barty Crouch Jr.!
Tris remembered Voldemort's other helper in his resurrection-the fanatical Death Eater currently hidden in his father's house. He would have to find a way to take him out!
Then whether Voldemort could return at all would be an open question.
At last, Tris managed to calm down a little. Everything else could wait. Right now, he needed to focus on becoming stronger. That was the ultimate safeguard for all his plans.
So he still had to keep meditating.
But whether it was because his emotions had fluctuated too much and he could not settle his mind, or for some other reason, he simply could not enter a meditative state.
What the fuck? This is so annoying!
Tris was annoyed, but someone else was even more annoyed than he was.
In Quirrell's room on the second floor of the Defense Against Dark Magic office, Quirrell stared at the shattered crystal ball before him in horror.
His upper body was bare, revealing several large patches of rotting flesh across his chest and back. A face slowly emerged on the right side of his chest, but its features were extremely indistinct.
"Master, what happened to you?" Quirrell asked timidly.
For the past half hour or more, he had completely lost contact with Voldemort.
Ever since discovering Voldemort's soul remnant in Albania and allowing him to possess his body, Quirrell had maintained a special connection with him.
When that connection broke, Quirrell had initially thought his master had successfully taken over that poor child's body.
Although he regretted the loss of such a gifted child, Quirrell still felt that the sacrifice was worthwhile if it helped his great master return to life.
In fact, if his master could take that child's place and achieve even greater, more glorious things, wouldn't that be an immense honor for the child, too?
Thinking of his master's future greatness, Quirrell had even begun to feel happy himself.
Before long, however, he realized something was wrong.
Although he could no longer sense his connection with his master, he knew his master's soul had not completely left his body.
Housing two souls at once placed an enormous burden on the flesh.
The rotting patches on his chest and back were damage caused by hosting Voldemort's soul, which he had not yet had time to treat. He always kept garlic hidden in his robes, and the students all said it was to ward off a vampire that had been pursuing him.
In reality, he had killed that vampire long ago.
He did it to mask the distinctive stench of his rotting flesh.
If his master's soul had fully taken up residence in that child, it should have severed all ties with his body. The sensation of an extra burden on his flesh would then disappear.
But that sensation had not vanished. In other words, his master's soul had not completely severed its connection with him, and he had not successfully seized that body.
If the possession hadn't succeeded, why couldn't I sense Master anymore?
At that moment, Quirrell had been utterly terrified. He had even wanted to rush out, run to the Slytherin Common Room, and burst into that child's room to see what was happening.
But he could not.
First, he could not simply enter the common room.
Only students of that house, its head, and the headmaster could enter its common room and dormitories. He was merely an ordinary professor and had no such access.
Second, he still had to sustain that ancient magic. Although he did not know why he could no longer sense his connection with his master, the spell that invaded a soul from a distance was still running.
The spell also served as a beacon. If he left, it would lose its support. Should things go badly on his master's end and force him to retreat, he might become lost outside if he could not find the beacon.
Anywhere else, that would be manageable. Almost no one could detect a mere remnant of a soul; even wizards might not notice it.
But Hogwarts was different.
Hogwarts had far too many ghosts, including several with nothing better to do than wander around the castle all day. An encounter with them would hardly be good for his weakened master.
Just as Quirrell was caught in this dilemma, the crystal ball used to cast the spell suddenly exploded.
An instant later, Quirrell regained his connection with his master and could sense him again.
But he could clearly feel that his master seemed to have grown weaker.
His master had already been extremely weak when Quirrell first met him in Albania, but even then, he had been nowhere near this condition. What had happened?
Only after a long time did Voldemort finally seem to recover somewhat.
The face on his right chest at last barely regained the outlines of its features.
"I was careless!" Voldemort's voice carried anger he could not conceal. "The wizarding world still holds far too many secrets, especially those ancient families."
At that moment, Voldemort was furious.
Again!
Once again, he had suffered a devastating blow after encountering an entirely unfamiliar field of magic.
The previous time had been ten years ago, with that child from the Potter family. Even now, Voldemort did not understand why he had failed then. Presumably, it had been some ancient and powerful protective magic unknown to him.
That was a field in which he had always been lacking.
He was proficient in dark magic for slaughter and destruction, and had made considerable progress in studying soul magic for immortality. But he had always lacked talent for protective magic. The Patronus Charm, for instance, was something he had never truly mastered.
That Mudblood woman must have obtained some powerful ancient protective magic he knew nothing about after marrying into the Potter Family.
That made sense.
Although the Potter Family was not among the twenty-eight pure-blood clans, its ancient and lengthy history was known throughout the wizarding world. Even most of the pure-blood families that followed him could not match the Potter Family's historical roots.
Voldemort possessed considerable knowledge of ancient magic, but he would never claim to know all of it.
He could readily understand that those ancient, mysterious families concealed magic unknown to him. Indeed, he had firmly believed it for a long time.
He could not accept that he had failed because of a Mudblood. An ancient inheritance from the Potter Family was a far more palatable explanation.
But what enraged him was that he had actually made the same mistake a second time.
The Weasley family!
A family whose ancient history rivaled, or even surpassed, that of the Potter Family! And a pure-blood clan, at that! He should never have been so careless or acted so rashly.
The price had been devastating.
By detonating his soul, he had forced his way out of that mental maze. In doing so, he had lost more than eighty percent of all the power he had accumulated over the years, including what he had secretly absorbed after possessing Quirrell.
Now, even maintaining his current form of existence had become difficult.
He still would not die. Even if this piece of his soul could no longer sustain itself and disintegrated completely, it would merge with his other soul fragments-those Horcruxes.
But then he would lose his ability to move freely in the outside world.
He knew his own situation best.
All those Horcruxes had been stored in places he had considered safe and secure at the time. Such places were inevitably difficult for others to reach. And without anyone coming into contact with them, the souls within could not influence the outside world.
If he lost his present ability to move freely and attach himself to other living beings, there was no telling when someone might touch those Horcruxes and give him another chance to revive.
It was even possible that, after too much time passed, he would lose consciousness entirely.
Voldemort absolutely refused to accept that.
Rage-indescribable rage. He was furious not only with that damned Weasley, but also with himself for making the same mistake twice.
But for now, he could not let any of it show.
If this newly recruited follower learned that he could barely sustain his own existence, would he abandon him?
Voldemort did not dare take that gamble.
For once, he intended to offer Quirrell some reassurance.
What Voldemort did not know was that his current situation was actually relatively good. Without Tris's appearance, he would still have done something similar, only with Harry as his target.
Then he would have been grievously wounded by the Blood Protection Charm again, forcing him to make Quirrell hunt unicorns.
His injuries were not as severe this time, but unicorn blood had already made his list of backup options.