"What's with the professors' expressions? Isn't it just a name?" Harry asked, puzzled, as he walked back.
"You idiot. That expression means the person behind that name is anything but ordinary!" Draco sneered, mustering the courage to mock Harry despite not knowing much himself.
"Oh? Then do you know who it is, Malfoy?" Harry asked, fixing his eyes on Draco.
Draco, under Harry's sharp gaze, shrank back and fell silent again.
Too lazy to press the issue further, Harry turned to Noah, who had remained quiet the whole time. "What about you, Noah? Do you know something?"
"I know a bit. Just like Malfoy said, the name belongs to someone... extraordinary," Noah replied, nodding calmly, not bothering to hide anything.
Extraordinary was putting it mildly.
That name—Tom Marvolo Riddle—was none other than Lord Voldemort, the very dark wizard Harry had been obsessed with defeating.
His full name came from his Muggle father, Tom Riddle Sr., and his grandfather, Marvolo Gaunt. But Voldemort despised his Muggle heritage so much that he abandoned the Riddle name and crafted a new identity: Lord Voldemort, an anagram of his birth name.
Of course Noah knew who he was.
What surprised him, however, was that Draco Malfoy, a self-proclaimed pure-blood supremacist and Death Eater fanboy, didn't seem to know Voldemort's original name.
You worship him so blindly, yet don't even know his real name? Pathetic.
If Draco had been faking it, Noah might've taught him a lesson. But it was clear Draco was genuinely clueless.
Death Eaters were nothing more than foolish pawns, and as a Muggle-born, Noah would always be their enemy. And he had no mercy for enemies.
Just recently, while in the U.S., Noah had sent more demons to hell than he could count.
Sure, they got a "free return ticket," but that was just sugarcoating the truth—he killed them, plain and simple. Mercy was never on the table.
"Who is he?" Draco finally asked, curiosity outweighing his pride.
In truth, the only professors he paid any attention to were Professor Snape, his godfather, and Professor Flitwick, the short Charms Master who, despite his looks, was an exceptional duelist.
He didn't care much about the others. But if the professors were this shaken, the name had to carry weight.
"It's actually very simple. It's all just a word game," Noah said, pulling out his wand with a calm expression. "Honestly, Draco... are you really a future Death Eater?"
Noah raised his wand and began to write Tom Marvolo Riddle in the air with golden magical letters.
Draco watched, baffled.
After everything that had happened tonight, Draco realized his worldviews were being shattered. Noah's words—"future Death Eater"—didn't bring him pride, but discomfort.
Death Eater... It sounded more like a joke now, mocking those arrogant fools who didn't know they were playing with fire.
Strange. He never thought he'd have such a thought.
Even Noah didn't expect tonight to have such an impact on Draco.
"I really didn't know..." Draco muttered after a long silence.
"It doesn't matter. You'll know soon enough," Noah replied with a smile.
As Noah finished writing the name, the golden letters hung in the air. He waved his wand again, and the letters started shifting, rearranging themselves.
Harry and Draco stood frozen as the letters transformed into:
I am Lord Voldemort
By the time Noah casually blew the glowing letters away, both Harry and Draco were still frozen in place.
Then, Harry suddenly grabbed Noah's arm.
"He's here in the school, isn't he? Tell me, Noah! It's true, right?!"
"Calm down, Harry." Noah looked at the emotional boy and sighed. "Yes, it's him. You really need to read more. You shouldn't be confused about your enemy's name."
"But why would He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named come here? And why target a Gryffindor?" Draco asked, clearly disturbed.
"Who knows?" Noah shrugged. "But I could show you something interesting."
Suddenly, his lips curled into a sly grin.
The Chamber of Secrets?
Now that was interesting.
He'd never really thought about what lay within Slytherin's secret chamber. From what he saw in the movie timelines, it was basically a grimy sewer with a basilisk lurking inside.
Voldemort had once opened the Chamber, released the basilisk, and tragedy followed.
Moaning Myrtle still haunted the girl's bathroom where she died, and the true culprit was never punished—Voldemort, then just Tom Riddle, had pinned the blame on Hagrid.
Since then, Dumbledore had kept a close eye on him, and Voldemort never had another chance to open the Chamber after that.
Which meant...
Slytherin's true treasure could still be hidden in there!
The basilisk was never the treasure. It was a symbol of Slytherin's twisted ideals—cleansing the school of the "unworthy." But the real prize? No one knows what that is...
If the young Tom Riddle had possessed the diary Horcrux and managed to control Ginny Weasley, yet still hadn't found the treasure...
...then maybe he never knew what it was in the first place.
That thought stirred something deep in Noah.
He didn't know what exactly Slytherin had left behind, but there was one undeniable truth: ancestors loved hiding insane, game-changing artifacts.
And as someone who had grown in strength—especially through his system, intensive training, and his experience in the U.S.—Noah wasn't afraid. Even if it was Voldemort himself.
A sixteen-year-old Tom Riddle? Talented, sure. But could he reach Order 3?
Noah smirked.
No matter how skilled Riddle was, he couldn't have reached Order 3 by then.
Noah had the Room of Requirement, the system space, meditation techniques, and much more. He had outgrown any ordinary wizard's limit.
Even if he's Order 3, I'm still Order 3. And he's just a soul fragment now? Please... that's like a snake being scared of a mouse.
As for any leftover magical trials from Slytherin? Noah wasn't worried.
He glanced at Harry.
With Harry's Parseltongue ability, we'll manage. And if we can't... I'll just destroy everything.
"You really know where the Chamber of Secrets is?" Harry asked in a whisper, glancing around nervously.
"It's not hard to guess," Noah said as he led them deeper into the castle. "The basilisk first appeared fifty years ago, and then vanished after a student died. Now, it's returned—this time through Ginny. But what's different?"
"Back then, Hagrid was blamed. But now...?" Harry mumbled.
"The basilisk's dead. Ginny's safe. So what now?" Noah pressed.
"The Chamber vanished both times without a trace..." Draco muttered.
"But think about what controls the basilisk. Remember what you once used to speak to it?"
"You mean... Parseltongue?"
"Exactly. Slytherin was a Parselmouth. The basilisk obeyed Parseltongue commands. Which means, the key to opening the Chamber is...?"
"Me?" Harry asked, startled.
Draco quietly followed, listening intently.
"Yes, you. And the basilisk traveled through the pipes, right? So where are the most pipes?"
"The toilets!"
"Correct. And where did Moaning Myrtle die?"
"The girls' bathroom!"
Everything clicked.
Harry and Draco looked at each other. Their minds echoed the same thought:
How the hell is this guy so smart?!
They were stunned. Noah had pieced together what no one else could. And he wasn't even an Auror. Just a student.
The difference between them?
Massive.
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