Harry Potter: I am the Legend

The icy cold lake water poured into Hoffa's face and body from all directions. The surrounding area was eerily silent. Before long, he sank to a depth of 20 meters, where the light vanished, and he was plunged into total darkness.

Under the water pressure, Hoffa's magical energy quickly began converting into life force to counteract the immense force pressing down on him, but he had no other means of escape.

Holding his breath, tiny bubbles escaped from his mouth and nose, and the suffocating sensation gradually overwhelmed his mind.

In the darkness, something brushed against his back and immediately coiled tightly around his waist.

A sudden, powerful force began pulling him upward.

Ten seconds later.

Hoffa burst out of the water, his lungs near the point of collapse.

He coughed violently, gasping for air.

The frigid air instantly froze his wet hair. Trembling, he clung to the massive serpent tail of Osivia, shaking his head vigorously in an attempt to rid himself of the numbing cold.

The ice was breaking apart rapidly, but Osivia, in her half-serpent form, moved even faster.

At last, they escaped the perilous area of shattered ice. Osivia swam toward solid ice and quickly dragged Hoffa onto the unbroken surface.

Shivering uncontrollably, Hoffa crawled onto the ice. This was his first experience of winter swimming, and the subzero temperatures of over -20 degrees left him drenched and shaking so hard his teeth chattered uncontrollably. The difficulty of enduring it was beyond description.

At that moment, in the center of the Black Lake, large chunks of ice were breaking and falling away. A faint mist rose from the surface, making the lake appear almost like a hot spring.

"W-What...what the heck? This...this ice...how can it just collapse like that?" Hoffa stammered, his teeth chattering as he trembled violently. Even the strongest individual seemed powerless against the merciless cold of nature.

Osivia did not respond. She quickly drew her wand and tapped it on Hoffa.

"Evanesco!"

In an instant, the water on Hoffa's body was absorbed by the wand, and his clothes and hair dried out. While he felt somewhat better, the loss of body heat and energy wasn't something that could be recovered so easily.

Osivia then cast the same spell on herself. The water on her nearly frozen body evaporated immediately.

Her brows furrowed deeply as she gazed at the collapsing ice in the center of the lake.

"How could this happen?"

After a moment, Hoffa regained his composure. Looking at the steaming water, he rolled over and dipped his hand into the lake. The temperature was approximately zero degrees—typical for ice water—and by all accounts, it shouldn't have melted through ice half a meter thick.

"Does Scotland have geothermal springs?" Hoffa asked.

"No," Osivia murmured. "Look at the edges of the ice."

Hoffa lowered his gaze. The edges of the broken ice bore a fine, fiery red line etched along their surface. This line extended further ahead, and wherever it reached, the ice had fractured and collapsed.

"It's caused by magic," Osivia said softly.

"Who cast it here?"

Hoffa was puzzled. Judging by the scale of the ice collapse, it couldn't have been the work of a single wizard. It would take at least dozens of wizards working together to achieve this.

"I'm not sure," Osivia replied.

She pulled out her wand and tapped the lake water.

Cold air gathered at the tip of her wand, and the lake water quickly froze and morphed into a slender, transparent ice boat.

She extended her hand to Hoffa. "Let's go. Whatever is happening, we need to find the library first."

After getting onto the ice boat, Hoffa continued to shiver for a while before his core temperature gradually started to recover. Fortunately, he had eaten something earlier, so he had a bit of energy stored.

Osivia tapped the ice boat with her wand, and they began gliding quickly and silently across the surface of the lake where the ice had broken.

Before long, Hoffa glanced to the side. By now, they were far from Hogwarts Castle. Looking back, all he could see was a vast mist over the water, obscuring everything.

Looking ahead, the small island in the middle of the lake had also vanished from sight.

"Do you remember the direction?" Hoffa asked Osivia. He knew his senior's sense of direction wasn't very strong, and with the dense fog, he wasn't sure she could stay on course.

"I'm familiar with this area," she replied.

After a pause, she added, "When I was at school, I swam in the Black Lake every night."

Hoffa exhaled a puff of mist, rubbed his hands together, and said no more.

After unexpectedly falling into the icy lake, Hoffa kept his psychic field active as a precaution while they were on the boat.

Before long, he sensed a group of creatures entering his awareness.

Looking down, he caught a faint glimpse of something moving underwater through the rippling lake. The view was hazy and unclear.

One of the underwater creatures seemed to sense Hoffa's psychic field and slowly swam to the surface.

At first, it appeared as a faint white dot, gradually growing larger and forming into a graceful S-shaped curve.

As it approached the surface, the creature flipped silently, transitioning to a backstroke. With a splash, the figure broke through the water—a strange, captivating being emerged.

She clung to the side of the boat, slowly straightening her body, revealing a stunningly beautiful young woman's face. Droplets of water trickled down her features as she lay against the boat's edge, turning her head slightly to smile at Hoffa.

Her damp brown hair clung to her, and a thin, sheer veil covered part of her chest. Her exposed arms bore raised fish fins, and translucent scales dotted her collarbone.

In the darkness below, Hoffa could see a large, swaying fish tail.

She was a mermaid.

The scene was indescribably eerie.

The mermaid clung to the ice boat, staring at him unblinkingly.

Hoffa could see a trace of longing and allure in her eyes, as if she were silently inviting him to join her in the water.

An inexplicable sense of familiarity surged within him. Suddenly, Hoffa remembered—this seemed to be the same little mermaid who had wrapped around his finger and sprayed water on his face during his first year at Hogwarts.

How did she get so big?

"Are you ready?"

The mermaid's voice was soft and barely audible.

Hoffa almost didn't hear her. He rubbed his ear. "Huh? Are you talking to me?"

Osivia frowned and gave the mermaid a cold look. "This is not a place you should be."

The mermaid seemed somewhat frightened. She whispered to Hoffa, "Be careful."

Then she turned and, with a splash, dove back underwater. Her tail flicked a few times, and she disappeared from Hoffa's psychic field.

"Scottish Lake Spirits," Osivia said. "4X-rated magical creatures. They only live for about ten years. When I was in school, I often swam with them. Their saliva is an ingredient for love potions. If you kiss one, you'll be enchanted and dragged underwater."

"How do you know that? Have you kissed one?" Hoffa murmured.

"No. Only mentally weak wizards are lured by mermaids. Besides, they're not interested in female creatures."

Osivia paused, a hint of doubt in her voice. "Something's off. Lake spirits don't appear in winter. What's going on?"

The lake gradually narrowed, and the broken ice formed a narrowing waterway.

Hoffa, who had been tense, noticed some movement on the ice through the hazy mist.

He immediately wanted to alert Osivia, but she quickly covered his mouth, signaling him to stay silent.

Hoffa, unable to speak, could only glare at her.

Osivia took out her wand and tapped her arm. "Disillusionment Charm."

In an instant, she and Hoffa disappeared from sight.

The mist began to thin, and Osivia stopped the ice boat.

They could now clearly see the shadows moving within the fog.

The creatures were part-human, part-fish, tall and burly.

They were lake monsters.

But they were nothing like the young, delicate lake maiden Hoffa had seen earlier.

Though these creatures also had human torsos and fish tails, they were hideously grotesque, covered in spikes, and carried rusted yet sharp anchors.

Some of the lake monsters had hunched spines and carried wooden sticks covered in barnacles and algae, dragging them across the ice. Wherever the sticks touched, faint red lines were etched into the surface.

The broken ice layers they had encountered earlier turned out to be the handiwork of these creatures.

The lake monsters seemed unaware of the intruders, Hoffa and Osivia. They continued carving red lines while conversing in an incomprehensible lake-monster language.

Surveying the surroundings, Hoffa noticed that, as the mist dissipated, the ice was teeming with hundreds of male lake monsters.

Hoffa swallowed nervously, feeling his lips go dry.

He had never seen anything like this before. Recalling the warning from the lake maiden, he could easily guess these creatures were plotting something dangerous.

The situation was deteriorating rapidly. In the Black Lake, Hoffa's combat abilities would be reduced by at least ninety percent, and he didn't know any transfiguration spells suitable for fighting underwater.

The mist was thinning fast, and it wouldn't take long for the lake monsters to notice the two of them on the ice boat.

Hoffa looked at Osivia, who shook her head. She pointed toward a distant section of the ice and then to the water, making a swimming motion.

Hoffa's eyes widened. He understood her intention—she wanted to swim across.

He pointed to the boat in protest.

Osivia shook her head again, pointing to her ear and waving her hand.

She meant that the boat's noise would attract the lake monsters' attention.

Grinding his teeth, Hoffa gave a reluctant nod.

Without hesitation, Osivia placed her hands under Hoffa's ribs.

Immediately, the ice boat beneath them melted into liquid.

The two of them silently plunged into the Black Lake. The icy cold water engulfed Hoffa once more.

About a meter below the surface, Osivia's serpentine tail undulated as she pulled Hoffa deeper. They slipped beneath the thick layer of ice, dodging chunks of floating ice as they descended.

All around, there was only muffled, thunderous water sounds.

The biting cold numbed Hoffa's brain.

He felt certain he would develop a phobia of swimming after this.

Life's madness never ceased to surprise him. An hour ago, he had been enjoying Christmas turkey in the Great Hall. Now, he was being dragged under the half-meter-thick ice of the Black Lake by someone else. Above him was an unyielding sheet of ice; below him, an unfathomable abyss.

If Osivia made even the slightest mistake—if she cramped or faltered—they would both be doomed.

Thankfully, the Transfiguration professor made no errors. After about a minute of swimming, just as Hoffa was nearing the limit of his breath, Osivia covered his mouth with one hand, took out her wand with the other, and carved a circle into the ice above them.

The ice circle detached.

Osivia pushed Hoffa upward. He shot through the hole like a seal, collapsing onto the ice.

Hoffa's face was pale and blue. The cold left him unable to speak, his teeth chattering and his bones rattling.

Struggling, he pushed himself up and began doing frantic push-ups on the ice, activating his vitalization state to repair the frostbitten cells in his body.

Osivia climbed out of the ice hole after him. She was no better off—her lips were purple, and her trembling hands barely managed to hold her wand as she tapped herself and then Hoffa, drawing out the frigid water from their bodies.

Afterward, she hugged herself with one arm and used her free hand to trace a green magical array in the air. The intricate diagram glowed with detailed markings.

Once the array was complete, she pressed it with her hand, causing it to spin and vanish into the air.

She stared intently at the thick mist in the distance.

Half an hour later, when Hoffa regained his senses, the first thing he did was ask Osivia, "What was that? What were those lake monsters doing?"

Osivia shook her head. "I don't know. This is highly unusual. I've alerted the Aurors at the school. They'll be on full alert, and if anything happens, help will arrive immediately."

"The Aurors guarding the hunting grounds… are they under your command?" Hoffa asked with a frown.

"Strictly speaking, they're colleagues of my father in the Wizengamot," Osivia replied.

Standing up, she added, "There's no time to waste. Let's move."

Osivia grabbed Hoffa's arm, and the two of them set off swiftly toward the small island in the center of the lake, skating over the ice with magical blades.

(To be continued.)

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