At some point, the vampires that had filled the entire train window suddenly retreated in unison. Like soldiers who had drilled countless times, they respectfully cleared a passage down the middle, awaiting their king's arrival.
Then a pitch-black vortex tore open in midair. Countless bats swarmed out of its depths, the fluttering of their wings merging into a low rumble.
Soon, the bats gathered, overlapped, and twisted, coalescing into a distinct human figure.
His face as pale as paper, his eyes as scarlet as blood, and his body draped in splendid robes with subtle gold patterns, the vampire leader Gori appeared before the young wizards, separated from them by a pane of train glass.
"Whoa! This old guy sure knows how to make an entrance!" George exclaimed, his eyes gleaming with excitement.
Unlike the flippant George, Harry, who had remained calm until now, finally frowned slightly, an almost imperceptible gravity appearing in her expression.
She turned her head. Though her face was grave, her tongue was as sharp as ever as she remarked to Neville:
"Looks like this fan of yours is getting on in years. To cast teleportation magic on this level, he'd have to be a vampire who's lived for at least a thousand years."
As she spoke, Harry flicked her wrist, and a wand slid from her sleeve into her palm. A dark glow immediately wound around its tip, slowly shifting like a living thing. Against a thousand-year-old vampire, Harry wasn't certain the window could withstand his attacks.
"A thousand years?" Fred's eyes widened, his voice full of curiosity. "A vampire that old came looking for our Son of the Champion? Is he really just after an autograph?"
Listening to their discussion, Herman's mouth twitched slightly, and he silently muttered, Even if I said he was here for me, I doubt anyone would believe it now.
At the same time, he couldn't help wondering what the vampire wanted with him. Surely I'm not a vampire's illegitimate son? If my parents really were that capable, how could they have died in a plane crash? And aren't vampires supposed to be unable to have children?
Draco tightened her grip on Herman's hand, her fingertips almost digging into his palm. She asked Harry in a low voice, "Are you sure he's a thousand-year-old vampire? My father said old monsters like that hardly ever venture outside. They all sleep in their castles."
The question seemed to flip a switch in Hugo, and she immediately took over, speaking rapidly. "The books are very clear about this. Vampires have a completely different magical structure from wizards, and their power grows extremely slowly. Even powerful wizards lose their original magic after being turned into vampires. To cast teleportation spells similar to Apparition, they have to cultivate for at least a thousand years. That was probably the kind of teleportation magic he just used."
"Maybe he was just using some advanced magical item." Draco instinctively curled her lip, offering a habitual retort with her usual tsundere manner.
But the moment she finished speaking, Gori slowly raised a hand outside the window. A spear formed from fresh blood materialized out of thin air, giving off a strong, sickly-sweet bloody smell. Then, without warning, it slammed straight into the windowpane.
With a muffled boom, the spear punched a small hole in the window. The blood-red spear immediately collapsed into a mass of viscous blood, which spread rapidly across the glass as though alive. Web-like cracks radiated outward.
This time, Draco offered no argument. Another piercing scream tore through the compartment, nearly lifting the roof.
George and Fred sprang up, scrambling away from the window. George dragged Ron out from under the table and tossed her onto Fred's back, and Fred bolted for the compartment door with Ron on his back.
As George retreated, he pulled a string of bottles, jars, and oddly shaped magical objects from inside his clothes, throwing them at the window without even looking.
But the viscous blood seemed to have a mind of its own. It quickly split into countless blood-red tendrils as fine as hair, wrapping around the smoking, crackling magical objects one by one before swallowing them into the mass of blood. In the blink of an eye, they fell silent.
Meanwhile, the cracks in the window continued spreading, and the glass gave a teeth-grating creak. Gori pressed his pale face close to the pane, his scarlet eyes fixing directly on Herman through the fractured lines.
A low, hoarse voice sounded in Herman's mind again:
"Come with me, child of prophecy. The bell toller for vampires and werewolves, the boy who will end the bloodline curse."
Herman's heart churned, and he couldn't help silently grumbling, Are you sure you haven't got the wrong person? Shouldn't you be looking for Neville? Or Harry would do, too! Why come looking for an orphan like me?
Unfortunately, Gori's telepathic communication seemed to work only one way. He couldn't hear any of Herman's inward complaints.
While Herman's thoughts ran wild, Harry had already acted. She swung her wand sharply, and fierce flames gushed from its tip like a dragon breathing fire, surging viciously toward the approaching blood-red tendrils.
The flames scorched the air with a hiss, but the instant they touched the blood, they dimmed as though doused with cold water, then went out completely. The blood-red tendrils remained unharmed and instead pressed steadily forward, drawing closer and closer to the group.
Not to be outdone, Neville quickly raised his wand and shouted, "Petrificus Totalus!" A grayish-brown beam struck a blood-red tendril squarely, but the result was even worse than Harry's flames. Without stirring so much as a ripple, the light vanished without a trace, as though it had never existed.
The window finally gave way. Blood-red cracks had covered the entire pane, and with a sharp crack, the whole window shattered, sending fragments flying. The intensely thick smell of blood from Gori's body rushed into the compartment on the night wind, making several of the young wizards wrinkle their noses.
"Now, child, come with me." Gori slowly extended his hand, his tone calm yet brooking no resistance.
At those words, Neville glanced at the friends in the compartment whom he had only recently met, drew a deep breath, and resolutely stepped forward, showing quite the awareness of a protagonist stepping up.
Gori, however, looked at him in confusion, clearly not understanding what the boy was doing.
Herman sighed helplessly. This was clearly beyond what a bunch of beginners like them could handle-a definite scripted death.
He intended to offer a few words of explanation. Even if he really was going to be taken away by a vampire, he at least had to show some of the bearing befitting a transmigrator who, at any rate, counted as a protagonist.
But before that, he had to put up one last struggle. Judging by Harry's performance just now, her magic was clearly far superior to the few tricks he knew, yet she hadn't even scratched the vampire. His own spells would probably be even less useful.
Herman cleared his throat and began, "Um..."
The moment he spoke, everyone's eyes turned to him, waiting for him to continue. But just then, Herman abruptly pulled a black handgun from inside his clothes.
"Bang, bang, bang..."
Amid a series of explosive gunshots, Herman emptied the entire magazine without hesitation. The bullets whistled out, trailing scorching airflow from the rifled barrel, and slammed into Gori's chest, passing through his body and leaving several holes that kept gushing blood.
The sudden attack had clearly caught Gori completely off guard. He had been watching out for the wands in the young wizards' hands all along. How could he have expected someone to pull out such an unusual firearm? Having slept in his castle for years, he had no idea modern handguns had become so astonishingly powerful, their rate of fire far beyond anything from back then. The last time he had seen such weapons, they had still been flintlocks that required a matchcord to be lit.
Dead silence filled the compartment. Everyone stared wide-eyed at Gori, who had been shot, the same question rising in all their hearts: Was it over?
Herman didn't dare relax for an instant. His fingers worked quickly to change magazines, ready to fire a few more shots.
But Gori merely raised his hand and gave a casual wave. A vampire behind him immediately let out an agonized scream, his body abruptly exploding. A great quantity of blood surged toward Gori as though drawn by an invisible force, rapidly filling his still-bleeding wounds. The injuries healed at a speed visible to the naked eye, his skin becoming pale and smooth once more.
Gori's lips curved slightly, and there was even a hint of admiration in his voice. "An excellent attack. A wizard might really have died from that. But I am a vampire."