Gabrielle watched anxiously as her sister struggled within the illusions, her little fists clenched tight.
Only Hermione set down her fork solemnly, her sharp gaze sweeping across the three battlefields as she began analyzing them rapidly.
"No, Professor Holmes is forcing them to shatter their idealizations."
Hermione said.
"This isn't simply a battle. It's an interrogation of their will.
He wants the champions to understand that the person you love isn't that perfect symbol in your imagination who needs rescuing.
When you have to fight her, what choice should you make?"
Inside the Bubble Space, all three champions were having a very difficult fight.
Krum had held back at first. He couldn't bring himself to strike the girl he liked hard.
But "Hermione's" attacks grew increasingly vicious. That strength, born purely for power, was precisely what he had blindly pursued in the past.
Only when that power became a blade pointed at him did he understand how cold and hollow it was.
A jinx slashed a wound across his shoulder, so deep it exposed bone. The searing pain brought him fully to his senses.
He looked at "Hermione's" expressionless face, and in those empty eyes, he seemed to see his former, obsessive self.
He let out a furious roar, and the wild power of Durmstrang finally erupted.
No longer holding back, he overwhelmed her in turn with greater strength, faster speed, and more vicious spells.
He now understood that a real battle required the determination to protect, not unnecessary feelings.
Elsewhere, Pheobe was being tormented to the brink of collapse within the illusions her sister had created.
Just as the illusion of her parents being consumed by flames was about to break her, she caught sight of Krum fighting on, bathed in blood, and Cedric, who still refused to hurt