Chapter 143: Prevention, Candidates, Unknown Event (1/2)
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The link is also in the synopsis.
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The same night the Goblet of Fire was revealed to the students and the Triwizard Tournament was opened. A figure walked alone in the empty corridors of Hogwarts castle. The figure, dressed in a dark brown hooded attire, silently moved on the castle's ground floor in the dead of the night. They appeared in front of a great closed door. The figure stepped towards the door but stopped before he could enter and the raised hands could push the door open.
The figure stepped back and took something out from their pocket. After muttering a few words, the figure watched the object intently. Satisfied with their findings, the figure pocketed the article before raising both hands. A white light membrane spread outwards, soon covering the great door. Seeing that the magical membrane remained white, the figure pushed the great door open to enter the hall.
”He should really start using detection wards. He is the headmaster for magic's sake,” sighed the figure. He pulled up the hood. It was Quinn.
Standing in the Great Hall, Quinn looked ahead. He walked forward. A hewn wooden goblet stood with dancing blue-white flames in it. It had been placed in the hall's center on the stool that usually bore the Sorting Hat. Surrounding the goblet, a thin golden line had been traced on the floor.
As Quinn stood just outside the boundary, he squatted down and nodded in appreciation, ”Well, I have to give it to Dumbledore. This certainly will keep the students out.” The Age Line was strong, very strong. But that wasn't exactly surprising, as the one who cast the Age Line was an accomplished magical user that even had the Death Stick as a focus.
”Now... let's see if what is said is true or not,” smiled Quinn and took out a blank slip of paper. The paper slip levitated and flew into the area past the Age Line, but the moment it did, the paper burned into ashes.
”All right, levitating a slip into the Goblet is covered,” nodded Quinn. Then, he continued to test out different things. Like conjuring a bird and, with a slip in its beak to drop it in Goblet, throwing a crumpled ball of paper without magic, and so on. But every time, the blank slip of paper would burn in a white-ish blue flare, turning into dust.
”Is this Dumbledore's spell work or the Goblet's innate magic?” pondered Quinn before coming to a circumstantial conclusion that as the paper burned in white-blue just like the Goblet's flames, the magic must be from the Goblet.
'I should hurry.' He took out a piece of light-red chalk from his pockets and started to draw along the Age Line, circling the Goblet till a dull-red circle enclosed the Age Line.
He knelt down and touched the chalk line with a finger. He closed his eyes and started to channel his magic into the chalk. Suddenly, the dull-red chalk started to glow up in a neon-red colour. Then, the circle's line transformed into thrumming runic characters that sent out slight undulations of magic.
And promptly... everything disappeared.
'Phew, this chalk sure is a powerful conduit,' thought Quinn. The red chalk was one of the runic conduit materials that he had researched and developed in his free time. The chalk stick wasn't something Quinn regularly used to draw runes with, as he preferred to either etch runes into wood/metal or inscribe them in parchment, cloth, or leather.
”Let's see whether this works,” said Quinn. He took out one of his personal royal blue WMF-id cards. Then, he moved the card to see his signature in bronze ink. Below the signature written in bronze was Ilvermorny School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.
He raised his right hand towards and the space near his hand distorted, and at the same time, the area surrounding the Goblet distorted. With every second, the distortion became stronger.
”Come on! This shouldn't be hard. Barty Jr. could do it; I should be able to do the same,” groaned Quinn. He hadn't considered that Barty Jr. had had help from a master of magical arts, though.
Even though he didn't know, when Quinn surpassed eighty percent of his total output, his eyes turned from stone-grey to purple. Starting at forty percent percent output, Quinn's magic had already reached a point that couldn't be seen from a minor. It was so potent that the distortion had grown to form a path between his hand and the Goblet
The Goblet of Fire was now glowing so bright that Quinn was having trouble looking at it, and the entire hall was illuminated in a white-bluish light. The flames inside the Goblet turned suddenly red again. Sparks began to fly from it. The next moment, a tongue of flame shot into the air for a while before the fire subsided to their usual calm state. What changed, however, was the color; the flames remained red.
”... It worked, finally! That was one powerful confundus,” sighed Quinn, and his purple eyes turned stone-gray once again.
The Goblet was in its active state; right now, it would accept every single name put out into it. The Goblet of Fire didn't have an age limit, which meant that if someone got past the Age Line, they would be able to put in their names, but Quinn didn't want to mess with the Age Line in case Dumbledore had done something special with it. So he targeted the Goblet itself by disabling all the innate security measures.
”Now, I can enter my name,” said Quinn and flicked his signed WMF-id card towards the Goblet, fully intending to enter his name for the tournament. From the bottom of his heart, Quinn wanted his name to enter the Goblet so he could become a champion.
The card flew in a curved path towards the Goblet, but mid-flight, the royal blue card was attacked by a red zap of lightning, shredding and incinerating it simultaneously.
”Oh! It worked,” said Quinn clapping his hand.
Quinn West had nothing to gain by entering the Triwizard tournament. He had the money, and even if he wanted personal fame unrelated to his family, Quinn had plenty of ways to publicize him.
The red chalk line was a warding charm bound to the chalk conduit, which was designed to eliminate any mention of his name and a few other names. While Quinn ensured that he carelessly didn't leave behind his signatures and name written by his own hand, a few things outside his secure personal collection contained them. So if someone got their hands on those select few samples and used them to enter his name, he needed to make sure they wouldn't work.
Quinn could enter himself in the Tri-wizard, but no one else was allowed.
”Intent is paramount,” whispered Quinn.
The best way to check that his defense worked was if Quinn HIMSELF entered his name with the FULL INTENTION to participate in a WEAKENED/CONFUSED Goblet of Fire. Putting all those conditions together resulted in the optimal situation to enter a name.
”My work is done here,” smiled Quinn, giving the Goblet of Fire a glance. Red flames flashed before turning back to their normal white-bluish state.
He pulled up his hood, took out Recon, which he had checked before entering the Great Hall, and observed his vicinity. The map showed no one was near him, but Quinn did see the Death Eater out in the corridors outside of the Professor's apartments when he said Barty Jr.'s name.
”Everybody is working hard, even the bad guys,” chuckled Quinn before pulling on his hood and disappearing out of sight.
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- (Scene Break) -
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As the next day was Saturday, most students would generally have breakfast late. However, many students rose much earlier than they usually did on weekends. Quinn and the gang were always comparatively early to get because of Quinn and Eddie's early morning workouts; as such, Marcus and Luna had gained a habit to get up early so they could go have breakfast early. When they went down into the Great hall, they saw about twenty people milling around it, some of them eating toast, all examining the Goblet of Fire. It was in the same place Quinn had seen it at night, and they stood outside of the Golden Age Line.
”Anyone put their name in yet?” Eddie asked a third-year girl eagerly.
”All the Durmstrang lot,” she replied. ”But I haven't seen anyone from Hogwarts yet.”
”Bet some of them put it in last night after we'd all gone to bed,” said Marcus. ”I would've if it had been me… wouldn't have wanted everyone watching. What if the Goblet just gobbled you right back out again?”
Someone laughed behind them. Turning, all saw Fred and George Weasley, along with Harry Potter and Ron Weasley, entering the hall, looking extremely excited.
Quinn watched, semi-interestingly, as Fred pulled a slip of parchment out of his pocket bearing the words ”Fred Weasley. Hogwarts.” Fred Weasley walked right up to the edge of the line and stood there, rocking on his toes like a diver preparing for a fifty-foot drop. Then, with the eyes of every person in the entrance hall upon him, he took a great breath and stepped over the line.
For a split second, everyone thought it had worked —George, Harry, and Ron certainly thought so, for they let out a yell of triumph and leaped after Fred— but next moment, there was a loud sizzling sound, and all four were hurled out of the golden circle as though they had been thrown by an invisible shot putter. They landed painfully, ten feet away on the cold stone floor, and to add insult to injury, there was a loud popping noise, and both of them sprouted identical long white beards.
Quinn looked at Harry lying on the ground and thought in amusement, 'You don't need to try so hard, buddy. Someone already did your work for you.'
The Great hall rang with laughter. Even Fred and George joined in once they had gotten to their feet and taken a good look at each other's beards.
”I did warn you,” said a deep, amused voice, and everyone turned to see Professor Dumbledore coming into the Great Hall. He surveyed Fred and George, his eyes twinkling. ”I suggest you both go up to Madam Pomfrey. She is already tending to Ms. Fawcett, of Ravenclaw, and Mr. Summers, of Hufflepuff, both of whom decided to age themselves up a little too. Though I must say, neither of their beards is anything like as fine as yours.”
Quinn glanced at the headmaster and thought, 'He appeared out of nowhere.. . Does he have a detection imbibed into the Age Line? Maybe something that would trigger with the Age Line.' He looked at the golden line and then shrugged in indifference. As long as his or his close friends' names weren't put in, he couldn't care less.
The four set off for the hospital wing, accompanied by Lee, who was howling with laughter.