Harry walked through a passage about ten feet wide, with patchwork walls and ceilings on both sides, at the same height.
It was even darker here than it had been before. The only light was barely enough for Harry to make out the tips of his fingers. Only when he bumped into a wall on the turn did he remember that he could use his wand to produce some light.
The surroundings were so quiet that one could hear their own heartbeat. In the dimly lit, seemingly endless corridor, there was an occasional drifting of a luminous, milky mist, which seemed to resemble the faint glow emanating from a ghost.
This maze was like a deep underground magical ruins buried for thousands of years. The moisture from the walls nourished the lush green moss growing in patches along the corner, making the dark brown bricks slippery. To avoid falling, Harry had to move sideways and step carefully, as if he were a crab.
The path he had just walked was soon swallowed up by the darkness, and the road ahead was still obscure. Pale-faced Harry had to admit that this maze, as eerie as a cemetery, was the most terrifying place he had ever seen in his life!
"Did Professor Brian ever personally explore this maze?"
The eerie silence and terror made the passage of time difficult to gauge. Harry felt like he had been wandering through what seemed like an endless maze for an hour, but in reality, he might have only been in it for less than two minutes.
"At least, I can't lose to Malfoy..."
Harry pursed his lips and tried to suppress the unrelenting urge to turn back and continue exploring.
Under the fluorescent glow of the wand, the scene was monotonous. However, this kind of dull and boring picture stimulated a person's imagination of the fearful scene to its extremity in a subtle way. Harry could not imagine how Ron or Hermione would behave after entering this maze, and Naevius might faint here...
"This kind of spooky place... Does that mean Professor Brian deceived everyone... He just wanted to scare everyone with this eerie maze?"
Harry continued to trudge forward, biting his teeth, but he never encountered any living creatures along the way. The idea crossed his mind that Professor Brian might have deceived everyone and was just trying to scare them with this eerie maze, but as he thought about the professor's behavior, he felt that this possibility was unlikely.
The surroundings became even more eerie. With the help of the fluorescence from Harry's wand, he could see every puff of air he exhaled, forming into mist that lingered in the air. It felt like he had stepped into a refrigerator.
Tick... tick...
The further they went, the greater the humidity became. Harry's hair was soaked with countless tiny water droplets.
Finally, the road ahead presented a different sight, and Harry's heart pounded. The only thing that could offer him a sense of security now was the wand in his hand and the cold, hard walls.
"Huh... It's just a small river..."
Only after Harry finally saw what was on the ground did he finally relax his heart.
In the not-so-wide passage, a channel that was ten feet wide across blocked Harry's path completely.
Why would Professor Brian dig a small canal here?
In the dim light, Harry stood on the embankment and looked at the river with caution. The surface of the water was covered with deep green algae, and a decaying piece of wood floated in the middle. The river also had a bad smell like a drain. A question arose in his mind.
The way back was still shrouded in darkness. Harry had a premonition that Snape was standing somewhere out of sight, waiting to see him fail. As soon as he took a step back, Snape would leap out with that annoying expression and mockingly announce his defeat in the 'courage duel' against Malfoy!
Gryffindor, the symbol of courage, had lost to Slytherin in the courage contest. Harry felt he would rather be drowned in the river before him than face such a 'terrible' ending.
Huh!
Harry exhaled heavily, determined to not stop here.
Ten feet was not an easy distance to leap, but for Harry, who was the youngest Seeker in Hogwarts in nearly a century and full of athletic prowess, it wasn't a difficult task either. He fixed his gaze on the piece of decaying wood that was pushing through the algae in the middle of the channel.
"Professor Brian put this piece of wood here to help us cross the river--"
Harry thought so, retreating two steps and taking a deep breath, he gathered all his strength and jumped into the air. In mid-air, he firmly stepped on the 'wood' and effortlessly jumped over the channel.
It was colder here than in the corridors they had explored earlier, perhaps due to the proximity to the water flow. Moreover, Harry had a strange feeling that danger was stealthily approaching. So, after reaching the other side of the channel, he didn't even look back and continued on his way without pause, his figure quickly disappearing into the distance.
Tick... tick...
The moisture in the air turned into water droplets when it encountered walls as cold as ice. The droplets fell into the channel one by one, disturbing the 'wood' that Harry had used as a stepping stone. In the ripples, the 'wood' drifted to one side and soon touched the bank of the channel.
No one noticed, in the boundless darkness, a hand the color of pure white marble suddenly emerged from the water and landed firmly on the ground...
The environment in the maze wasn't constant. In addition to the winding and twisting passages, there were some small rooms with semicircular high vaults that were approximately the size of a large classroom. It's unclear what their purpose was.
With the initial hurried glance when they first walked into the classroom, and a vague memory of the path they had taken and their direction, Harry judged that he was probably at the center of the maze. This made him slightly happy, because at least from the perspective of speed, he was slightly ahead of Malfoy!
Now in front of him was a straight corridor. Harry raised his wand to let the tip's fluorescence extend further, but within the thirty-foot range, there was nothing new. Only a few steps away, there was a large broken hole in the ceiling, and it was also dark inside the opening.
"Professor Brian found this place exactly where?"
Having walked this far, Harry was almost certain that Professor Brian had recreated the region he once visited himself. Such a complex and detailed maze could not be created purely through imagination.
Thinking of this, Harry's mind conjured up Professor Brian's young and handsome face, and the seemingly undisturbed smile that often graced it. Realizing that he had never truly seen through the veil of his mystery, Harry suddenly felt that he had never truly understood him.
Compared to before, Harry's steps were much lighter now that he had gradually adapted to the darkness and silence.
He increasingly believed that Professor Brian had gone to great lengths to create this eerie maze simply to test everyone's courage. The words he had spoken in the corridor earlier, as well as the magical contract he had shown them, were just meant to make them nervous.
It's true, the Slytherin heirs so far had only petrified the Fang's cats and Colin and Justin, but even that caused every teacher, from the headmaster to the professors of each subject, to be extremely nervous. If Professor Brian's words were truly meant to scare them, the young wizards might suffer serious injuries. No one could bear such severe consequences.
With this realization, the oppressive and chilly atmosphere around him became much friendlier. Harry wiped the sweat from his forehead and even smiled at the corners of his mouth,
"Cunning Professor Brian!"
Harry muttered, "He's tricky, Professor Brian!" He didn't forget that Professor Brian had set a time limit of ten minutes for each group to 'survive the maze'. If he wasn't out of the maze before that time, he would be declared a failure together with Malfoy. Even if his progress in exploring the maze was higher than theirs, it wouldn't be worth bragging about.
Harry's mind flashed with various thoughts, such as why he couldn't see any sign of Malfoy, or whether Snape might break the rules and secretly point Malfoy towards a more convenient path to navigate through the maze... Based on his understanding of Snape, this was not an impossible possibility.
Thinking of this, Harry became a bit impatient. He massaged his sore right shoulder and prepared to speed up to leave as soon as possible. But just as Harry was about to take a step forward, a sharp, terrifying scream filled with fear suddenly echoed from the dimness ahead, causing Harry's face to pale once more!
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