~ Every 100 Power Stones = Bonus Chapter! Your votes keep this climbing. Thanks!
Hermione glanced at the quill and shook her head. "Undersecretary Umbridge, you really do enjoy playing these games."
"There's a spell on it. The moment you write anything, it carves the words into your skin." Her tone was flat. "Did you think I wouldn't notice?"
She recognized it immediately — the same torture instrument Umbridge had used on Harry in the Order of the Phoenix. She hadn't expected it to surface this early.
An invisible force closed around the quill and crushed it to splinters.
Umbridge's expression shifted. A flicker of panic crossed her eyes. She hadn't expected her carefully laid trap to be seen through so easily.
Beside her, both Aurors frowned, their eyes settling on Umbridge with open displeasure.
Coercive interrogation wasn't unheard of at the Ministry , but it was reserved for Dark wizards. Watching Umbridge deploy something this underhanded against a student, in plain sight, left a sour taste neither of them bothered to hide.
Her petty scheme stripped bare, Umbridge went red with fury.
She yanked out her wand and leveled it at Hermione. "Incarcerous!"
A thick rope of magic appeared from nothing, shooting toward Hermione to bind her.
Subdue her first. Then deal with her at leisure. That was the plan.
Hermione gave her wand a single, unhurried wave.
A jet of scorching flame erupted from the tip and burned the rope to ash before it reached her.
Then Hermione tapped her wand lightly. "Levicorpus!"
An invisible force seized Umbridge and flipped her. Her feet left the floor. She hung upside down in mid-air, head dangling, skirt a ridiculous flutter of pink.
Before she could even process it, Hermione's wand was already moving again. An invisible blade tore through the air, aimed straight for Umbridge's chest.
"Sectumsempra!"
Umbridge's eyes went wide. Disbelief flooded her face. She had never imagined — not for a single moment — that Hermione would dare raise a hand against the Senior Undersecretary to the Minister, right here inside the Ministry of Magic.
The spell hit without resistance.
It sheared through Umbridge's pink jacket and opened a deep gash across her chest, the kind that showed bone.
Blood burst out immediately.
"Aaah!"
The scream that tore from Umbridge's throat was shrill and ragged, filled with equal parts pain and terror. She thrashed wildly, fighting to break free from the Levicorpus. But thrashing accomplished nothing.
The two Aurors snapped into motion.
They disapproved of Umbridge. That didn't matter right now. They couldn't stand by and watch someone commit violence inside the Ministry , not against a senior official, not against anyone.
They locked eyes for half a second, drew their wands simultaneously, and trained them on Hermione.
"Expelliarmus!"
"Stupefy!"
Two spells, left and right at once, closed in on her.
Hermione didn't move. She let out a short, cold laugh, pressed her hands together, and then spread them wide.
A serpent of fire erupted into existence. Massive. Coiling. It spiraled around her like a living thing, its body filling the room wall to wall.
The fire serpent opened its maw and lunged at both Aurors. The room came apart around it.
"Fiendfyre?!"
Both Aurors cried out. The color drained from their faces.
As elite Aurors, they knew exactly what they were looking at. They simply could not comprehend how a student was producing it.
They didn't try to hold their ground. They bolted backward, wands raised, throwing up everything they had.
"Protego Maxima!"
"Protego!"
Defensive light flickered and stuttered throughout the room.
It made no difference.
Against Fiendfyre, their shields were tissue paper. The serpent burned through each one without slowing.
Everything it touched went up.
Desks. Chairs. Documents. Decorations. The walls themselves began to char and crumble.
The serpent slammed into both Aurors and drove them to the ground. They could only pour their remaining magic into barriers around their bodies, hands shaking on their wands, just barely holding the roaring flames off.
It was obvious they couldn't hold long.
BOOM!
The sound shook the entire Ministry.
Out in the reception hall, everyone lurched to their feet and stared toward the room.
The door exploded outward. Rubble scattered across the floor.
Thick smoke rolled out ahead of the fire serpent, devouring what remained of the room, and in its wake the corridor lit up orange.
Hermione stood on the serpent's head.
She looked down at them all from above, wreathed in flame. A witch born from fire.
The hall went utterly silent.
Then Fudge's face drained white.
He pointed at her, his hand trembling. "You... you actually..."
He couldn't find the words. He barely needed them , he could see exactly what had happened.
Umbridge lay in a spreading pool of blood, the wound across her chest grotesque and gaping. Still bleeding.
The two finest Aurors the Ministry had to offer were pinned to the ground by fire, neither of them able to move, each one barely alive behind a magical barrier.
He could not make his mind accept what his eyes were showing him.
Hermione was a genius, yes , but she was a third-year student. Her most notable accomplishment was defeating Quirrell. Where had this come from? How did a student possess this kind of power?
Those two Aurors were second only to Kingsley in the entire Ministry. Their strength was not in question.
And Hermione had crushed both of them at once.
"This... this is impossible!"
It didn't fit in his head. It simply didn't fit.
Snape regarded Fudge with cold, unhurried contempt. "Has the Ministry's intelligence not been updated in some time?"
A pause.
"I would suggest doing your homework before making decisions." Another pause. "Though I suppose that would require a standard the Ministry hasn't met in years."
More Aurors poured in now, drawn by the noise.
They took one look at the scene, drew their wands, and flooded the room with spellfire. Every kind of curse and hex the corps knew, all of it aimed at Hermione.
The fire serpent roared and devoured every spell that came near it.
Then it burst upward.
A ceiling full of fire. The entire upper expanse of the Ministry blazed orange-red, the light bleeding through every corridor.
"Help!"
"Run!"
"Get out!"
The Aurors scattered, stumbling over each other. But panic doesn't outrun Fiendfyre. One by one, the serpent caught them, pinned them down, and left them in heaps across the floor , joining the first two.
The Ministry of Magic descended into chaos.
Fudge found his voice again.
"Hermione Granger!" He was shaking so hard his finger barely held steady as he pointed at her. His voice came out ragged and hoarse. "You dare use Dark Magic to assault the Ministry of Magic!"
His authority had never been challenged like this. The humiliation and fury had no outlet except noise.
The Aurors had nothing in their training for this. Nothing in their careers. No one had ever walked into their headquarters and thrown Dark Magic around with this kind of abandon , let alone put a senior Ministry official in a pool of her own blood.
Hermione stood in the orange light of her Fiendfyre and watched them all.
Watched the fear on their faces.
And allowed herself a quiet, private smile.
When I hadn't reached Level 5 magic, I held back. If I'm still holding back now that I have Level 5 magic , then what exactly was the point of leveling up at all?
➤ Next: The Washing Machine
— .—— .—— .—— .—— .——
Enjoying the story?
Read 130+ chapters ahead on Patreon.
Join the free community tier for early access to the latest updates:
patreon(.)com/DarkGolds