LRAB Page 70
Page 70
After the three glass bottles were completely filled, Levin put them away and went to the trapdoor.
Ron flung open the trapdoor and peered inside, but it was pitch black and he couldn't see anything.
"【Light Dance Technique】!"
Hermione's staff emitted a white light and floated downwards.
"You've even learned this technique?" Harry looked at Hermione with admiration.
"Never mind that! Look down!" Ron shouted.
As the ball of light drifted down, everyone saw the scene below. It was a good eight or nine meters deep, with a large patch of dense, thick and thin vines at the bottom, wriggling slightly in the light, as if trying to avoid it, like countless earthworms and venomous snakes.
"What the hell is this?!" Ron was so scared that he got goosebumps.
Hermione recognized it immediately: "This is the Devil's Web. Professor Sprout talked about it in class. It kills its prey by wrapping around them. It likes darkness and dampness and is afraid of bright light and fire."
“Entangle…kill the prey!” Harry shuddered. “Then let’s quickly use a Firestarter or something to banish it.”
"And then what?" Levin looked at him like he was an idiot. "With the Devil's Net still there, we have a cushion when we jump down. But if we get rid of the Devil's Net, how are we supposed to get down? Do you want everyone to fall to their deaths?"
Levin himself can use [Feather Fall] to slow down his descent.
But it was too reckless of Harry to propose this plan without knowing the details.
He sighed, "I'll go down first."
“Of course not! You’re the best among us!” Ron gritted his teeth and moved closer to the cave entrance. “Let me do the scouting.”
How could he think like that?
Levin began to look at him with new respect.
However, there's no need to use others as cannon fodder in these minor levels.
Levin stepped forward and leaped into the air.
After a whooshing sound, Levin landed on the Devil's Web.
"Soft landing!"
He shouted upwards, ignoring the devil's web trying to entangle his legs.
"You guys get down here quickly, so I can deal with this thing."
As he spoke, he took a few steps away, clearing the landing spot.
The three women stared at each other at the trapdoor, surprised that Hermione had jumped down first.
Next up were Ron and Harry.
"Damn it, these devilish nets are trying to eat me!" Shortly after landing, Ron started yelling, "Levin, aren't you supposed to be able to handle this? Quickly use your invincible magic to think of a way!"
“I’ll be right soon!”
Seeing that Harry had landed safely, Levine waved his hand—without even using his wand.
"[Plants withering]!"
As the druid's spells were used, the natural power within the Devil's Web was largely drained, and the once wildly entwined Devil's Web began to lose its mobility, withering and turning gray.
Soon, the dense, devilish web turned into a pile of withered vines.
"What kind of magic is this?" Hermione asked, surprised and curious.
“It’s terrible,” Harry exclaimed. “All of these devil’s webs have withered away.”
“Thank goodness you were here, Levin, but why didn’t you do this sooner?” Ron said with a mournful face, his body bearing numerous red marks from the straps.
“Because I don’t want Harry to become a Harry pancake, Ron,” Levin urged. “The withering of the Devil’s Web is only temporary; it will grow back soon. Until then, we have to get out of here.”
"Looks like this is the only way." Hermione used her Dance of Light spells to search around and finally found a stone corridor.
Chapter 75 Professor Quirrell's Abnormality
The corridor in front of us is the only way to go.
In the corridor, besides the sound of their own footsteps, they could hear water droplets slowly dripping down the walls, which sounded particularly eerie in the quiet passage.
"Can you hear anything?" Ron asked in a low voice.
Everyone listened carefully and could hear soft rustling and tinkling sounds coming from ahead.
"Could it be a ghost?"
"I don't know, it sounded like wings flapping."
“There’s a light ahead—I see something moving.”
They came to the end of the corridor, where a brightly lit room stood before them, with a high, vaulted ceiling. Countless tiny birds, gleaming like jewels, fluttered their wings and scurried about the room. "Are they attacking?" Ron asked.
“Is it possible that those are keys?” Levin suggested. “Maybe you should get some glasses.”
“My dad knows a really reliable optician.” Hermione was quite enthusiastic about this.
“I’m not nearsighted!” Ron said, sounding a little aggrieved. “Besides, the wizarding world isn’t as backward as you think. We have opticians too!”
Just as the group started talking about nearsightedness and glasses, Harry interrupted them.
"Forget about the glasses, we need to find the key among these flying keys that can open the door. Do you have any pigs?"
Ron glanced at the key in the sky, then looked around: "...I've got it! Look! There's a flying broom over there! We can fly up and grab the key to that door!"
"But there are hundreds of keys up there. It's going to be so hard to find the right one among so many keys!" Hermione had no talent for flying, and she looked at the keys flying all over the sky with some worry.
"But Harry has the talent of a Chaser, doesn't he?"
Ron said excitedly, "Think about it, the Golden Snitch and the Flying Key are not that different, are they? I guess we're looking for an antique-looking key—maybe silver, shaped like a doorknob."
"No need to bother."
Levine stopped Harry from using his Seeker talent according to the rules set up by Professor Flitwick and Dumbledore.
"[Downdraft]!"
The druid's power caused the once silent and windless cave to suddenly change color, with a strange wind whipping up from the cave ceiling.
Amidst the howling of the strange wind, these keys, which flew like little birds, suddenly lost their ability to fly and fell down with a clatter.
Then a rain of keys began to fall in the cave.
The three looked at Levin in astonishment.
Levin remained nonchalant, as if what had just happened had nothing to do with him.
Once the rain stopped, he gently pointed forward: "Go ahead and look."
What used to be a difficult task has now become so easy that even duds can be fired.
The three of them rummaged through the pile of keys for a while and soon found the silver key with the broken wings. They inserted it into the keyhole and twisted it hard.
With a click, the door lock popped open.
The second room was pitch black; they couldn't see anything. But as soon as they stepped inside, rows of lights came on one after another, illuminating the astonishing scene before them.
They stood around a huge chessboard, with black chess pieces in front of them, all taller than them, seemingly carved from something like black marble.
At the other end of the room, facing them, were some white chess pieces.
The towering white chess pieces had no facial features, and due to the uncanny valley effect, even Levin couldn't help but feel a little creeped out.
"What do we do now?" Harry whispered.
“Isn’t it obvious?” Ron said. “We have to play chess to get to the other side of the room.”
They saw a door behind the white chess piece.
"How do we do it?" Hermione asked nervously.
“In my opinion, we must act as chess pieces.” Ron, having confirmed it was the Wizard Chess Queen, walked to an empty knight without a knight.
Immediately, the stone came to life, and the horse pawed at the ground with its hooves, looking at Ron.
In addition, Black has three other empty positions, which clearly shows that it has automatically adapted to the number of participants.
Seeing Ron's eager look, Levin patted him on the shoulder and called out to him.
"There's no need to really push yourself that hard,"
He said with a smile, "We are wizards, so we shouldn't try to solve problems that can be solved with magic."
"As a wizard, finding a few cannon fodder isn't difficult, is it?"
As he spoke, he waved his wand:
"【3rd Ring Monster Summoning Spell】"
A flash of light appeared, and four rock figures, slightly taller than them, appeared before them.
"What... what is this?" Ron felt that he had seen quite a lot of new magic today.
“These are the pieces you’ll be using later,” Levin said. “Four earth elementals; they will obey your control.”
"So, in short, we're letting them play chess for us, right?" Ron nodded, seemingly understanding. "You're really something!"
Although Ron was not lacking in courage in this level.
But if he could avoid risking his life himself, he certainly wouldn't be foolish enough to insist on doing it himself.
"Then, leave this to me. I'll make the arrangements... You will take the place of the bishop; you will stand beside him, replacing the castle; you will climb onto the horse, replacing the knight; as for you, go to the queen, she is the strongest piece!"
At this moment, Ron displayed strong confidence; he knew he didn't need luck because he was good at it.
His greatest entertainment as a child was playing wizard chess, a gift from his grandfather and his only toy.
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Because the Weasley family was so poor, Mr. Weasley's meager salary was barely enough to buy snacks for the children, let alone toys.
In this game, Ron performed brilliantly, easily matching his unseen opponent to a draw. However, the scene of the pieces clashing also sent chills down the spines of the others.
The White Queen fiercely knocked the knight to the floor and dragged him off the chessboard. He lay there face down, motionless.
Such scenes are commonplace in ordinary wizard chess, but when they occur on a life-size chessboard, they are incredibly impactful.
The two sides fought for about thirty rounds, suffering heavy losses of pieces. Even two of the earth elementals summoned by Levin were smashed. Ron was terrified when he saw this—if it were them on the chessboard, that would have been enough to send him to meet Merlin.