Chapter 484: Two in One (2 in 1)
Actually, Voldemort has never won against Dumbledore in a more concrete sense.
Didn't win before the prophecy about the Saviour, won once by two against one after the two Voldemort shared a body, and then at present, when they were separated again, it was once again only barely a tie.
And even now, it remains the same.
Voldemort in fact is not even prepared enough and ready to have this duel with Dumbledore, it is just due to the progress of the advancement of the Witching Horizon in Britain was really too fast, if he does not step up to face off against Dumbledore, then there is no need for the top tier combatants to come out, the war will already be over.
So he actually had no choice, if he was going to lose Britain if he didn't step up, and would lose Britain if he stepped up and lost, then initiating a duel might still give him a chance to succeed and possibly win.
Yes, Voldemort knows that his own strength is not comparable to that of Dumbledore, but not comparable to that of Dumbledore doesn't mean anything. There are a lot of factors that contribute to the victory or defeat in a duel between wizards, and it's not as if you'll lose if you're not as strong as you want to be.
Voldemort intends to try his best, even if he loses, he has specially prepared a backhand.
Black mist and golden flames collided and intertwined in the Atrium of the Ministry of Magic!
Dumbledore did not recite an incantation, and after the golden flames held Voldemort in a definite position, he flung the wand in his hand!
A bright red beam of light shot out sharply!
And Voldemort didn't show any weakness, he roared and swung his wand without dodging!
The red beam and the green beam suddenly met, the intense light made the surrounding lights lose their colours!
Under such a frontal confrontation of magic, Voldemort was obviously showing a bit more strain, a semi-circular stream of magic had appeared in front of him, and the tremendous impact it brought caused the soles of his feet to friction with the ground and begin to slide backwards continuously.
Dumbledore, however, kept moving forward, his voice echoing through the vast hall.
"You are squeezing too many resentments, too many desires. There are some things that you are actually only half right about, Riddle, human greed is indeed a very powerful emotion, it can explode into something extremely powerful in a very short period of time. But this kind of emotion will make you indulge yourself, the wizard is using the emotion to control the magic, but the magic launched based on this kind of negative emotion, which is not a power that is truly controlled by the wizard, rather, it is a wizard that is controlled by the power!"
"A load of rubbish!"
Voldemort roared out as his entire body rose up! Dumbledore's spell also passed through the black mist beneath him!
After avoiding Dumbledore's spell, the black mist filled the area around him, and suddenly his entire being, fuelled by the mist, charged head-on towards Dumbledore himself!
But Dumbledore wasn't slow, he just gently waved his wand, and the debris on the ground grew quickly like seeds, turning into one soldier after another clad in armour carrying a knight's sword!
They blocked in front of Voldemort, and at the same time raised their knight swords high in their hands together!
"Rumble!"
Voldemort didn't hesitate for a moment, he silently and instantly cast a blasting curse, and all of these stone soldiers transformed by Transfiguration exploded on the spot.
Debris spread all over the Atrium, and just as Voldemort was about to start his next attack, Dumbledore suddenly raised his arms high.
The wand he was holding was raised above his head!
The entire wall around the Atrium, as well as the ceiling above, began to shake!
It was as if an earthquake had been detected and the entire Ministry of Magic was shaking in response, even Jon and Slughorn, who had been in the Department of Mysteries, could feel it!
Voldemort looked around in some alarm, and right above him, the first cracks began to appear in the ceiling!
Immediately after that, the entire floor above the Atrium began to cave in!
Smoke rose in all directions as Voldemort reappeared as a black mist, trying to dodge the falling slabs of broken stone, but before he could even get to the point where he was about to dodge out of the way, Dumbledore swung his wand violently forward!
The shattered stone slab directly above him evolved into a huge knight's lance under the effect of Transfiguration! It then shot towards Voldemort's direction in an unmistakable position!
All the space above and below Voldemort was blocked, there was no way to avoid it, he could only raise his wand, wanting to destroy this lance just like he did with those soldiers that had been transfigured earlier, but before the tip of his wand could light up, the collapsing ceiling and the charging lance slammed into the shield charm on his body together!
"Bang!"
The sound of the shield breaking made a loud noise as Dumbledore's Transfiguration broke right through his defences, allowing all of this attack to successfully land on him!
In the next moment, the black mist was pressed to the ground, and countless pieces of debris buried Voldemort as if they had been pulled toward him!
Dumbledore's hand movements, however, still hadn't stopped yet!
In a cloud of smoke and dust, he continued to wave his wand in his hand, and the rubble that buried Voldemort in the ground continued to become tighter and firmer under his spell, and eventually solidified into a huge orb!
"Bombarda Maxima."
He recited his first incantation since the beginning of the battle, and a loud boom ensued!
The Atrium of the Ministry of Magic had been completely smashed through, the Department of Magical Games and Sports located above the Atrium had collapsed directly along with the ceiling, and most of the surrounding walls had collapsed, revealing the dirt underneath.
The explosion that had just occurred had caused the entire Ministry of Magic to shake violently, smoke and dust rose from the already chaotic Atrium, but only a pale figure was still standing on the ground.
That piece of boulder that trapped Voldemort in it has been fragmented, and the debris that fell on the ground could not be observed to have any intact human form, on the broken and unsightly floor, there was only a big spread of shocking blood-red liquid left behind, and flowed along the cracks like cobwebs, in all directions.
Voldemort was dead.
He didn't even leave behind a complete body.
But even after seeing that blood, the heaviness on Dumbledore's face still didn't half reduce, because although Voldemort was dead, those rising black fogs around him not only didn't disappear but instead became even more dense!
"Dumbledore! You deserve to die!!!"
A hissing voice came out of the blood as something inhuman and ghostly moved through those black mists.
Dumbledore stared at the thing, it was the Horcrux protecting Voldemort's soul!
The most fundamental reason why he dared to challenge Dumbledore was because of that, after the Witching Horizon attacked Britain, even at the risk that his soul would be split again and his sanity would keep on losing, he still made a new Horcrux!
The illusory figure wandered through the smoke and dust, its spiteful voice constantly screaming curses and swears at Dumbledore, while it began to flee towards the outside of the Ministry of Magic.
It was just that Dumbledore had no intention of stopping him from start to finish, he just stared at the broken main spirit of the dead Voldemort and watched him move away little by little and just as he was about to disappear from view completely!
A new black mist appeared abruptly!
White, slender hands with pitch-black nails reached out and violently grabbed the Voldemort soul that was trying to escape!
"Aha!"
It was a voice of celebration and excitement!
Voldemort's deformed face showed an expression that had never appeared on his face before, it was extreme fear! It was boundless fear!
"Why are you here!!!"
The piercing scream shook all the dust that had filled the air!
At this time, Dumbledore saw the figure that had newly appeared.
It was a witch with a black robe on her body, a curvy figure and a beautiful appearance.
The witch's face was full of smiles, and she just held Voldemort's broken soul, as if it was more relaxed than even pinching a small chicken.
"Finally I've got you."
"It was Barty Crouch? Did he betray me? It must be him! Only he knows! Only he knows!!!"
Voldemort screamed, but soon such screaming turned to pleading.
No one had ever been able to push him this far, but all he could do was beg humbly as if his fear of the witch in front of him was ten times stronger than it had been for Dumbledore!
However, that witch had no intention of communicating with him at all, as she directly opened her tiny cherry-like mouth and ate Voldemort's soul in one gulp!
As if enjoying some rare delicacy, after taking it into her mouth, she even licked her scarlet lips, and the evilness in those eyes and the smile at the corner of her mouth grew even more.
The black mist rose up! As if some kind of expanding substance had been added to them, they became incomparably joyful and unprecedentedly powerful!
The spiritual will of the two iterations of their own souls had even become so thick that it overflowed! The surrounding air distorted, and the debris on the ground began to levitate abnormally!
After more than a decade of two Voldemort souls co-existing, two Voldemort now finally united as one and with the main consciousness fully occupied by the number two; Voldemort pulled out his/her wand and looked towards Dumbledore, who had been silently watching all of this.
"Albus, it's been a long time!"
Dumbledore gave a calm response like he wasn't half surprised by the witch's appearance.
"Yes, it's been about a year since I've seen you."
And seeing his reaction, the witch in turn beamed a little, her smile narrowing.
"You seem to have a very flat reaction."
"If you think I'm going to be surprised by your presence, then you're really underestimating me, Riddle."
"But if you really had guessed all this, why did you even start this duel? And helped me clear all the obstacles and kill that stupid me?"
Voldemort's long hair fluttered as both 'he/she' and Dumbledore stared at each other as if the battle that had just taken place was just a little pre-meal snack and the real duel was only now about to begin.
Dumbledore, however, slowly withdrew the wand in his hand back into his pocket and instead pulled another straight, knotted elder wood wand from the inner pocket of his robes!
"The one you ate himself didn't even realise that no matter what plans he made, he was actually in your calculation the whole time. You planned all this when you wanted to be Jon in the castle didn't you?"
"If everything goes well and actually allows you to become Jon after the Triwizard Tournament, then of course there's nothing to say, it's exactly the result you want most, and even if you fail, you're absolutely sure that you won't die, thus starting another plan."
"Over the years, your two souls coexisted in one body, although most of the time it was your will that was dominant, in the end, no one could do anything to anyone, you wanted to completely merge with his soul and eliminate his will, to become an absolutely strong existence, and of course, he held the same idea."
"But even if this situation continues, sooner or later you will fulfil your objective. It's just that Jon's finding and tearing up the pact from that tower at sea was completely out of your expectation, and his resistance has become even stronger, to the point where he can even regain control of the power that belongs to him and separate it from you in his body. So if you still want to devour him whole, you can only leave from your own body and find a new way to do it."
"So there you have your two plans in front of you, pull Jon to you step by step through the Triwizard Tournament and then become him which is of course the best, and even if that fails then you can continue to move on to devour your other self."
"But even then, it's always a matter of finding the right time, or at least finding him at his most vulnerable state. And what in this world could be more vulnerable than a soul that was protected by a Horcrux, killed but not dead? He cried out that Barty Crouch had betrayed him before he was devoured by you, and it was by using the servant who had been most loyal to you that you managed to induce him to make the Horcrux again."
Dumbledore spoke flatly as if he were stating a no-big-deal, child-like shallow trick.
"The hardest thing you actually had to do was how to get him to make a new Horcrux again, that was already done through Crouch, and then all that was left was how to kill him, well naturally you had countless means to do that, and using me as a knife to do the job for you was of course one of those means. You see, it's all just what you wanted isn't it?"
Voldemort's delicate face grew colder and colder as Dumbledore narrated.
Clearly, Dumbledore had been right from start to finish, and all of this was exactly what 'he/she' had planned!
"And then? Since you guessed and knew it all, you still dared to let me succeed in completing it all like this, becoming stronger than the self that defeated you on the Astronomy Tower?"
As 'she' said that, 'she' suddenly smiled, and that smile was so bewitching.
"It's because you simply can't stop it even if you know it all, isn't it? The only way to stop me is to find me ahead of time, but you don't even know where I am, so you'll just have to be resigned to being the knife, waiting for me to appear. So what is the basis for your confidence in facing such an unparalleledly powerful me?"
'Her' eyes glanced at the Elder Wand.
"Is it this Elder Wand that has re-recognised you as its lord again gave you the confidence?"
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