In the near-empty room, the only sound was the heavy, labored rhythm of breathing.

  Edward had just learned something dangerous — something that was never meant to reach his ears. And the knowledge had shattered him.

  His hands trembled. His eyes darted from corner to corner in restless, compulsive sweeps, as though the shadows themselves might be watching. Deep within his chest, an unshakeable feeling had taken root — the crawling sensation of being stalked, of being prey already marked.

  This was information that had reached him from another world entirely. He understood, on some level, how extraordinary it was that he had traveled into the world of the book. But what horrified him even more — what truly split something open inside him — was the possibility that everything had been constructed. Arranged. Engineered.

  That famous phrase — "The Boy Who Survived" — might be nothing more than the opening act of someone else's conspiracy.

  The thoughts came at him in an avalanche, relentless and merciless, until at last they forced him to confront the single most terrifying conclusion of all.

  Dumbledore.

  The name alone drained the strength from his legs. He sank to the floor.

  If Dumbledore was entangled in any of this — even peripherally — then the danger exceeded anything Edward had the capacity to survive. Right now, Dumbledore was closer to him than anyone else. He wouldn't use Legilimency without cause, but if he ever did — if he ever looked and found what was there — it would be over. Because Edward already knew things he was never supposed to know.

  And yet, from another angle: if the figures behind the curtain were powerful enough to manipulate Dumbledore himself, then Edward would have already been dealt with. Silently. Swiftly.

  "Damn it... damn it, damn it..."

  He pressed the heels of his palms against his temples. Could he simply choose to forget? Walk away from Hogwarts entirely and disappear into the Muggle world — quietly, anonymously, safely?

  But his very existence had already shifted certain things. If fate was real — not conspiracy, but genuine fate — then Harry still had some path to defeating Voldemort. But if the conspiracy was real... everything could collapse. And even if Edward ran, even if he hid for years, they would eventually come for him.

  He sat there, shaking, cradling his own head in trembling hands, still desperately searching for a way to survive. He had no remarkable talent. His confidence had already fractured the moment he watched others around him grow — progress flowing through them like water while he stood dry and still. Without strength, his knowledge from another life would be more curse than gift. And now, on top of everything, this.

  The Rubik's Cube that had been in his hands sometime earlier now lay on the floor. Like clockwork — like something with a pulse of its own — it rose into the air, rotated, rearranged itself, and dropped again.

  In the silence of the room, the sound was surprisingly loud. Edward flinched.

  "Okay. Stop. Calm down. No one knows what I know. And besides — I'm weak."

  He murmured the words under his breath like a mantra, trying to press the trembling down, force it still. It worked only barely.

  His gaze drifted from the floor to the cube. That little object — it might offer him something, some kind of path. Or it might destroy him. He had no idea what its effect truly was.

  If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

  But as he watched it rise again, rearrange again, fall again — he set his jaw.

  "Maybe this is insane. Maybe it's stupid. But maybe it's the one thing that's still unknown."

  His fractured mental state was warping his judgment, pushing him toward a decision that hadn't been thought through. But he made it anyway.

  He waited. The moment the cube rose again and began its transformation, Edward snatched it from the air.

  Then, with frantic, trembling fingers, he began turning the faces — fast, haphazard, desperate.

  It had clearly been a long time since he'd solved one. His progress was agonizingly slow.

  The first attempt failed. The second. The third.

  It was only on the tenth that the realization struck him — he didn't actually know what pattern was supposed to appear. He didn't know what solved looked like on this cube.

  He exhaled slowly. Steadied himself — just slightly.

  He waited for the cube to complete its next transformation, then spread a fresh sheet of parchment on the desk, dipped a quill in ink, and began carefully tracing the patterns from each face.

  It took several full cycles before he had enough.

  Finally, after separating and reassembling the drawings side by side, the image revealed itself. The fragments joined together. Each face of the cube bore a piece of a larger symbol — its edges connecting seamlessly across the adjoining sides, forming a single cohesive figure, as though the whole cube were one unified inscription.

  The symbols themselves were unfamiliar to him — something ancient, a language he couldn't name and couldn't read.

  He returned to solving it. Verification. Adjustment. More attempts.

  It took the better part of several hours.

  But finally — the next time the cube took flight and began its rearrangement — Edward had the answer. He moved with precision this time. The cube lifted from his hands and hung suspended in the air.

  When Edward didn't react further, it began to dissolve — breaking apart into fragments of luminous light that slowly, silently sank into his body.

  He had already braced himself. He squeezed his eyes shut, expecting pain, a burning, something.

  A minute passed.

  Nothing.

  Absolutely nothing.

  "What...?"

  He examined himself carefully — turned his hands over, even pulled off his robes to check his skin. There was no mark, no wound, no sign of anything at all.

  And then, at last, the exhaustion arrived.

  "Maybe it's just... hollow. Or some form of magic that doesn't manifest visibly. But if it caused no harm, then at least that's something."

  His voice was quieter now. The psychological weight of the night had finally begun to press down through the numbness.

  He exhaled — long, slow, releasing something unnamed — then left the room and descended the stairs. He had found a secret place for himself, at least. That was something. But beyond that hidden room and the fragments of knowledge he carried, he had gained nothing of power. Only a greater burden than he'd had before.

  He pulled the Invisibility Cloak back over his shoulders and melted into the darkness of Hogwarts' corridors. But no matter how he walked, the feeling remained — faint, persistent, like a fingerprint on glass.

  Someone is watching me.

  The paranoia was too strong to reason away.

  He fell into his bed without knowing it, and sleep claimed him before he could resist.

  But while his body rested, his eyes opened.

  Above him, instead of the familiar ceiling of the dormitory, there was only absolute darkness.

  He turned his head sharply.

  To the side: a broken segment of wall, its crumbling surface faintly flickering with a symbol he recognized immediately.

  The symbol from the cube.

  His pupils contracted.

  He pushed himself upright and looked around. His mind lurched — disoriented, reaching for footing it couldn't find.

  The longer he looked, the sharper the panic grew.

  This was not Hogwarts.

  He stood within four half-collapsed walls, each one pulsing with the same symbols he had spent hours tracing onto parchment. But the colors were wrong — not the warm, familiar tones of the world he knew. Here everything was a dull, suffocating shade of blue, faintly luminous, as though the light itself were some deep and sourceless glow emanating from inside the ruins.

  This isn't real. This can't be real.

  He raised his hands to look at them.

  They were pale. Faintly radiant. Dim and white as illness, shimmering like a projection rather than solid flesh.

  The thought that arrived needed no ceremony.

  Soul.

  He was in the form of a soul. Standing in the middle of ruins, untethered, glowing faintly in a world that was not his.

  The panic that had been large before became something larger still.

  He forced a slow breath. Swallowed. And stepped toward the gap in the broken wall, peering through the opening into whatever lay beyond.