The Last Slytherin - Chapter 44

Dumbledore and Neal looked at him who just declared, “Lord Voldemort is back”. Neal was taken aback by the word, “Voldemort? The one who must not be named? Don’t joke around”.

Riddle looked at Neal, “nice meeting you again, Neal. I never thought the House of Slytherin still lived. Anyway, I’ll finish what my ancestor wasn’t able to do, next. But I guess it must wait for a while”.

He looked at Dumbledore, “probably didn’t expect I would return like this, right? Although I’m still wondering how did you manage to make my Basilisk disappear?”. Dumbledore didn’t reply to him as his attention was elsewhere.

After a while, he sighed in relief and mumbled, “thank goodness she’s alive”. He then turned to him and replied, “even if you come back to life, you can’t escape from here, Tom. You are just a fragment of the real you”.

Neal then said, “so, you are Lord Voldemort? But how is that possible? You have a muggle surname and not to mention, He’s way after your time”. Riddle chuckled, “it’s funny, isn’t it? Everyone in the world finds it hard to accept the fact that I have my filthy Father’s muggle surname”.

Tom pointed the wand in mid-air and wrote his name “TOM MARVOLO RIDDLE” and then the letters started to arrange themselves and turned into “I AM LORD VOLDEMORT”. Then he said, “Voldemort was my past, my present, and my future”.

While Neal was taken aback by the truth, Dumbledore spoke, “Neal, take Ginny and get out of here when you see the opening”.

He took out his wand and pointed at Tom Riddle. Riddle then said, “don’t worry, old man. I don’t plan to fight you, yet. I’m going to leave now. After I find my real body, we’ll surely meet again. Not to mention, I should also find out whether I completed making the other Horcruxes successfully or not”.

Dumbledore replied, “you aren’t going anywhere, Tom”. Riddle snorted, “don’t think you are the only one who can apparate out with the anti apparition charms all over Hogwarts”. Then he sighed, “too bad that I didn’t get to see the famous Harry Potter who supposedly killed me, the greatest wizard of all time when he was just a baby”.

Tom Riddle tried to disapparate from the chamber but he was surprised that he wasn’t able to. He looked at Dumbledore with a frown and asked, “I’m positive that I can disapparate from here and yet I can’t. What did you do, Albus Dumbledore?”.

Dumbledore replied, “you see Tom, you are the first Horcrux and didn’t have the memories after you were created. So, you might not know. Just by creating a Horcrux, if anyone can be invincible and immortal, it would have been popular long ago.

You should know that your powers are limited to how much of a fragment you are for the original body. That means you don’t have the necessary magic power to disapparate from here where there are anti apparition charms, all over Hogwarts. Only a person who have more magic power than me can disapparate from here. In your current state, I don’t think you have it.

Tom Riddle boiled up in anger and shouted, “Avada Kedavra”. Greenlight burst from his wand and made its way towards Dumbledore who easily deflected the attack with “Protius”, a defensive Silver shield spell. Then he said, “the killing curse is no longer the unblockable one, Tom”.

Dumbledore then pointed his wand at Tom Riddle, and fired “Expelliarmus”. Tom Riddle blocked the spell with another Killing curse. He gave a light laugh and mocked, “seriously? A disarming charm? You don’t wish to kill me? Above such brutality, are you”.

Dumbledore replied, “We both know there are other ways to destroy you, Tom”. He slowly walked towards Riddle while Neal ran and hid behind one of the pillars as he knew that he can’t defeat him head-on and not to mention, he wasn’t confident to counter a killing curse of Lord Voldemort.

That’s why Neal decided to do the one thing Dumbledore told him to do. To wait for the right time and rescue Ginny.

Meanwhile, Another jet of green light flew from Tom Riddle. This time it was the one-armed centaur, galloping in front of Dumbledore, that took the blast and shattered into a hundred pieces, but before the fragments had even hit the floor, Dumbledore had drawn back his wand and waved it as though brandishing a whip.

The fragments turned into small pieces of glass and hovered in the air and then followed his wand movement. As Dumbledore pointed it towards Tom Riddle, he conjured a Silver shield that turned all of the glass pieces into powder and fell on the floor.

As Dumbledore managed to take Tom Riddle away from Ginny, Neal rushed towards Ginny. Only after picking her up, Tom Riddle remembered Neal who he forgot for a few moments because of a heated battle against Dumbledore.

Riddle shouted, “you little swine, Avada Kedavra”. As Riddle sent a killing curse towards him, Neal jumped to the side with Ginny in his hands. The spell missed him and hit elsewhere. He quickly took out his Blackwalnut wand and waved his hand while poting at Riddle, “Expulso”. A burst of blue light erupted from his wand.

The spell almost hit Riddle but he blocked it with his wand at the last second. But as the spell hasn’t been erased yet, it keeps on pushing Riddle back and as Dumbledore sent another spell towards him from the side.

He roared and brandished his wand to deflect the Expulso curse towards Dumbledore’s spell and countered it. Neal looked at Tom Riddle who defeated his strongest spell and mumbled, “I have no choice.

I’ll have to wait for a whole 6 months again but I guess it’s worth it”. He quickly pulled out two vials from his pocket. One is a dark greenish liquid while the other is brown colored. After drinking the brown-colored potion, he shouted, “Prof. Dumbledore, disapparate from here now immediately”.

As his words attracted both of them, they turned around to see him throwing a green vial towards Riddle. Riddle smirked and immediately sent a spell to smash the vial. But just as the vial exploded, the dark greenish liquid inside of it dispersed into a moist green smoke and spread around the hall.

Riddle looked at him and raised his wand, “Avada…”. Before he even completed the sentence, his skin changed into green in color and fell on the floor as the smoke dissipated.

Neal didn’t waste even a single second. He rushed through the chamber towards the end and saw not only Dumbledore is in the same state as Riddle, but Ginny’s body also turned green from head to toe for breathing that poisonous gas in an unconscious state.

He took out the only vial he had and mumbled, “damn it. I only one vial. What a fool I am. Why didn’t I take Ginny into consideration before performing such an act? Let’s just feed them half and a half. But how should I feed them?”.

Just then, he heard a piercing cry from outside, the Phoenix arrived in a flash and landed on Dumbledore who was still conscious despite being paralyzed completely. As it slowly put its head near his Mouth, he opened his mouth with extreme difficulty.

It dropped a few tears from its eyes into his mouth. As the phoenix tears went inside, his skin changed back to normal but was still paralyzed. Neal sighed with relief and looked at the unconscious Ginny. He pointed his wand to the vial as he opened it. With the use of floating charm, he slowly fed her which dissipated the poison from her body.

As the Phoenix took the paralyzed Dumbledore, Neal went towards Tom Riddle’s body who also managed to stay conscious but paralyzed. Neal then spoke in parseltongue, “a mere vial of poison is enough to kill the greatest wizard of all time, eh. Well, since you are about to die, you should know the answer that’s been bugging you the entire time. Before you even possessed Ginny, I already opened the chamber and moved the Basilisk into a safe place. Take this little secret with you, okay? Goodbye”.

Then, he picked up Ginny’s wand that was in Riddle’s hand and mumbled, “it seems he is the greatest wizard after all. He was able to battle Dumbledore evenly with only a fragment of his power and that too with another person’s wand. Hmm, a Horcrux, huh”.

Then he picked up Ginny with his basilisk wand using the Floating charm and at the same time used Blackwalnut wand for “Lumos spell”. He walked outside and then closed the door with parseltongue. As he was walking inside the dark tunnel, he met the Professors and Harry as he expected.