"What... is this...?"
After a flash of bright emerald green, Grindelwald felt energy coursing through his body and looked at his hands, which had regained some of their color and flesh. He was so astonished that he could barely speak.
"I've told you before, Fish is the most gifted child I've ever seen, even you and I are inferior," Dumbledore said with arrogance, boasting to his former love.
"Well..." Grindelwald suppressed his surprise and looked at Fish with a smile. "Suddenly, I'm interested in a duel with you... hmm... a duel."
Fish felt his opponent's vital breath, making sure that he wouldn't accidentally kill him, and immediately retrieved his wands.
"Which one do you want to use, nya? Do you need Fish to tell you what they're made of?"
(?ω?)
"I think Gellert would be more comfortable with this wand." Dumbledore retrieved his wand.
"Are you really going to give it to me?" Grindelwald had already been surprised enough times today, but this was undoubtedly the most surprising.
You see, when he and Dumbledore had wanted to "do something great," one of the main preparations had been to gather the Deathly Hallows, and the Elder Wand was the highest priority among them all.
"Of course," Dumbledore shrugged indifferently, handing him the old wand while saying, "If you're worried about using it, you can do so after you've 'defeated' me first."
Grindelwald took the Elder Wand, caressed it with nostalgia for a moment, and then returned it, saying, "No, it no longer belongs to me, and it would be a shame for me to have to use it in a wizard's duel with an ungraduated wizard."
"If Voldemort heard you, he would have a lot to say," Dumbledore inexplicably said as he reclaimed the Elder Wand.
Grindelwald raised an eyebrow, immediately guessing that Voldemort had probably suffered a defeat at Fish's hands, but he didn't care.
Although Voldemort was said to have replaced him as "the darkest wizard of all time," Grindelwald didn't believe he was any less powerful than Voldemort or, at best, any less cruel.
In his eyes, Voldemort was nothing more than a powerless fool.
But if he had fought Dumbledore for so long, he had strength, and Grindelwald, who had been negligent for a while, took him a little more seriously.
In his mind, Fish was probably taking advantage of Voldemort's carelessness or lack of power to sabotage his plans... just like Newt Scamander had sabotaged his.
As for the fact that Fish had defeated Voldemort after Voldemort took matters seriously... Grindelwald hadn't even considered it.
Grindelwald, who had intended to grab a wand at random, carefully chose among the pile of wands that Fish handed him, and he was already convinced of Fish's strength.
"Let's go to the sixth floor, where there is more space." Grindelwald chose the wand that was most compatible with him and stepped out of his cell for the first time.
As the builder of Nurmengard, he still knew the surroundings like the back of his hand after so many years.
The three of them arrived at the sixth floor, which, as Grindelwald had said, had a reduced number of cells and a large empty space in the center, which was its original design.
"Shall we begin?" Grindelwald said, moving his arms and legs, feeling a bit restless.
It had been tough staying in the cell, and now that he was in much better mood and condition, it was natural for him to want to get moving.
"One moment," Dumbledore waved his wand and cast a spell around him.
Reinforcement spell, blocking spell, Undetectable Extension Charm...
With Dumbledore's manipulation, the sixth floor had expanded several times in size, and the surroundings became much more resilient.
"Is this necessary?" Grindelwald asked curiously.
Knowing Dumbledore, he wouldn't have done anything pointless, and Dumbledore was so serious that he obviously believed Fish had the strength to fight him for a while...
Grindelwald had once again reassessed his estimation of Fish's strength but still believed that Fish wouldn't be able to trouble him.
"Perhaps Albus wants me to play with Fish?" Grindelwald thought he could guess Dumbledore's intentions, and a slight smile appeared on his face.
And Dumbledore, with the same faint smile, said, "You'll see if it's necessary." With that, he put away his wand and took a step back.
Grindelwald had a vague sense that something was amiss, but in any case, he never entertained the thought of losing, of being matched by Fish.
So, even though Dumbledore's smile seemed somewhat boastful, he still didn't take it entirely seriously.
"Well then, let's begin," he told Fish, spinning his wand in his hand.
"Watch me!"
(ΦωΦ)つ━☆*.
Fish, who had been impatiently waiting, raised his wand and cast a Disarming Charm at Grindelwald.
Grindelwald dodged the spell without much surprise, as at Fish's age, he was capable of casting silent and non-verbal spells.
As a competent sparring partner, Grindelwald didn't employ his full combat abilities right away but rather engaged in a back-and-forth battle with Fish using the same lack of spells.
However, it didn't last long, as Fish was much more agile than Grindelwald, despite both of them using the same spells.
Not even a young Grindelwald would have been able to match Fish's speed, not to mention the fact that he had only regained the best of his former body thanks to Fish, so soon the Dark Lord found himself at a disadvantage, forcing him to employ more tricks than usual.
As Grindelwald continued casting spells with his wand, his empty hand began to move through the air.
It was a double game of wandless and non-verbal spellcasting, something Fish had already seen before with Professor McGonagall but had never learned himself because it was easy for him to get distracted, making it difficult for Fish to focus on both aspects simultaneously.
However, clever Fish found his own solution: he relied on his superior reflexes and speed to quickly cast a wandless spell in a fraction of time and followed it up with another using his wand.
Grindelwald didn't even see it coming, thinking that Fish had mastered such an advanced fighting style at such a young age.
This surprised Grindelwald a little, considering he was almost thirty when he mastered it.
So the two battled back and forth for about ten rounds, with Grindelwald constantly adding and changing his fighting style. But Fish was able to keep up quickly, even if he didn't employ the same techniques. Fish found other ways to fight against Grindelwald.
Eventually, Grindelwald was forced to use the Apparition Charm.
Originally, Nurmengard, like Hogwarts, prohibited the use of Apparition, but Dumbledore knew that Fish wanted nothing more than to fight someone using the Apparition Charm. So when he was setting the stage, Dumbledore used a spell to temporarily lift the anti-Apparition enchantment on the sixth floor.
Grindelwald was truly amazed by Fish's ability to stand against him with the Apparition Charm, a technique that required not only a high level of magical skill but also a strong sense of combat and spatial awareness to use it effectively.
Without that talent, employing this technique would only result in dizziness, and you wouldn't even be able to locate your enemy.
However, Grindelwald also realized that Fish wasn't very skilled with this technique, as he took slightly longer than him to cast the Apparition Charm, whether it was because Fish needed time to orient himself or because he wasn't entirely accustomed to the dizziness of rapid Apparition.
It was this slight delay that gave Grindelwald the opportunity to gain an advantage, and he continued using the spell to force Fish to increase the frequency of his Apparition Charm usage, causing Fish to become dizzy in no time.
"Wait a moment, nya!"
(@Д@)
Fish leaned against the wall, clutching his head and shouting, "Give Fish a break!"
"A true enemy wouldn't give you that chance," Grindelwald said, but his hands immediately stopped, and he gave a genuine compliment, "But you're quite good. I didn't have your strength when I was younger."
However, Fish, having quickly recovered from the side effects of Apparition, pocketed his wand and stood in front of Grindelwald once again.
"Let the second round begin, nya!"
As soon as Fish finished speaking, he transformed into a massive white tiger and roared as Grindelwald looked on in astonishment.
"Roar~!!!"
(=`Д´=)