As midnight approached, Allen was completely exhausted from the sudden surge of troublesome events and the strain on his memory. He decided to get some proper rest first, no matter how urgent, that damn thief wasn't going to show up out of nowhere and get caught immediately. Besides, he still had things to do the next day.
Dragging his tired body, Allen reluctantly activated his stealth mode, he already had enough worries without adding unnecessary trouble for himself.
Passing the few staircases that never seemed to change much, Allen soon reached a corner of the hallway, "Ouch!" he gasped softly as something tripped him.
"Meow~!" a cry sounded along with Allen's, Mrs. Norris, Filch's cat.
Thanks to Allen's generous supply of little dried fish treats, credit to the kitchen next door, Mrs. Norris chose not to loudly summon Filch but instead gave Allen a disapproving glare.
"Good girl, sorry, no more fish now, maybe next time," Allen crouched down and petted Mrs. Norris on the head. The cat, practically a Hogwarts veteran by now, gave a disgruntled meow, shot Allen a displeased look, then gracefully walked away, yes, truly with a cat's graceful stride.
Watching Mrs. Norris's retreating figure, Allen smiled softly. Somehow, his pressure eased and the urgency faded from him, wait, something felt off!
Only then did Allen realize that bumping into Mrs. Norris had pulled him out of stealth mode, though that wasn't important, as no one was nearby. What mattered was that while crouching to pet Mrs. Norris, he had placed himself under the starlight streaming in through a window!
Though the legacy from the Widowmaker let him ignore basic light sources to enter stealth, as a top-tier assassin he never made a habit of stepping into starlight, hence, on his way, he habitually stuck to the shadows.
Because he was so tired today, Allen hadn't noticed Mrs. Norris silently approaching. And it was thanks to Mrs. Norris that he'd crouched right under the stars, triggering the legacy from Soraka, the Child of the Stars.
A sudden coolness washed over his mind, calming the murderous intent that had filled him, and was soon replaced by a lingering fear.
He had always set a mental line to avoid becoming a ruthless killer, so why was his first instinct today to kill the thief?
A simple Forgetfulness Curse would have solved everything!
No doubt, it was the Pharaoh's curse's doing, since it could control Allen's despair, it naturally stirred his anger as well.
Silently elevating his research into Soraka's power on his priority list, Allen badly wanted to find that blasted Pharaoh and give him a piece of his mind, after all, Allen hadn't killed the vampires who had disturbed his rest, and those vampires were likely descendants of the ones who had dug up the Pharaoh's grave. So why was this curse haunting him?
No sense arguing with the dead. After grumbling, Allen stood and headed back the way he came, he had missed many details in his anger.
Resolving to act, Allen pulled out from the system's shop a small, inconspicuous item, after buying the Goddess's Tear, he finally had over a hundred gold coins, and he spent most of them on a True Sight Guardian.
He carefully tucked it away among a pile of miscellaneous items, he avoided using the free trinkets the system gave, as their short two-hour duration wasn't enough for long-term monitoring of this place he couldn't visit often.
Done with that, Allen hurried toward the two rows of footprints, the most important clue he had overlooked in his earlier fury.
The footprints were large but smaller than those of an adult wizard. This helped Allen narrow down suspects significantly.
Except for a few special students, the owner of the footprints was likely older than Allen but not an adult wizard, because even adult witches had slightly larger prints.
Allen wasn't an expert in forensics, but the prints assured him it wasn't Dumbledore or any other professor.
Unfortunately, wizard shoes didn't distinguish between male or female styles, so his target wasn't yet clear, but at least the trickiest suspects, especially Crabbe (a fanatical follower like young Bartemius Crouch), were ruled out. Allen shuddered to think what might happen if Crabbe got a hold of a soul artifact.
Sweeping away his own traces, Allen left the Room of Requirement, he didn't want the thief to immediately notice someone had been there. And as for the inscriptions, well, Allen was already clear on the thief's face, and probably they were already blocking the door.
Sighing quietly, Allen felt these were the only damage control measures he could manage. Hopefully, the thief was greedy enough to return soon, otherwise, Allen would have to spend time searching Hogwarts wizard by wizard, which was no small task. And he only had a theory, that long exposure to soul artifacts causes backlash on the holder.
After finishing, Allen stepped out of the room, and was dumbfounded.
Before him, a thin, bright white arc appeared slowly from the dark blue night sky, like molten iron splashing in smoke. Then light burst from the heavens, put simply: dawn had come!
That meant, after a whole night of exhausting work, Allen would soon be sitting at the breakfast table, because a new day had begun!
Unfortunately, worse news awaited, there was no magical history class today, and the first class was Professor Sprout's Herbology for Hufflepuff, followed by Professor Snape's Potions!
Um, Madame Pomfrey at the school infirmary, quick question: does "cultivation failure" qualify for a hospital stay?
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