Chapter 108

[An hour later.]

Lying on the bed, Severus looked rather thoughtful, he was rather surprised by the snake's story, although he embellished it "a little", but it was not difficult to separate truth from fiction, especially when Severus could easily read the Snake's superficial thoughts by looking straight into its eyes. 

The story was quite entertaining, because the Snake was born not in the outer part of the magical jungle, but in the forbidden, but as a cub, it was kidnapped by people and was going to be sold, but on the way, crossing the outermost part of the forest, they were attacked by other wizards and the artefact in which they held the snake broke. The snake was thrown out and without hesitation it immediately crawled away.

Thanks to its strength, poisonous breath, as well as weak animals inhabiting the area, it was able to survive and eventually stumbled upon the very cave where it lived for about ten years, constantly eating fruits from trees, and when the snake finally got stronger, it went outside and began to try to overcome the barrier in order to return home, but it was impossible, the barrier was too strong, it could not even leave scratches on the barrier. 

And after another five years of fruitless attempts, the snake gave up, and it didn't even think about asking people for help, because it understood that if it allowed itself to be stuffed into such an artefact again, then it would definitely not see freedom anymore. 

The Snake then began to capture the entire forest from banal boredom, as well as the need for nutrients, because a few months ago it felt that its evolution had begun, and the turtles, who refused to obey him, became his first victims. 

The reason for this "evolution" was the blood of the ancestor of all snakes, who was able to become a true dragon at the end of its life. And in order to give a similar opportunity to its descendants, it created a pool in which the water was replaced by its blood, and as a confirmation of this legend, a huge dragon skeleton lay at the bottom. 

The snake did not know much, when it was kidnapped, it was only a year old, and over time, it forgot almost everything, with the exception of especially bright moments from childhood. 

Still, when you are thrown into a bloody pool, it is very hard to forget, and the legend of the ancestor of snakes was told almost every day, like a bedtime story. 

There was only one problem, on the map that Brew gave him(Severus), there was no mark on the territory of the snakes, and on other similar maps, which he found in the shops, there was also no mention of this place, and Snape did not truly believe in them, for the reason that they differed from the Brew's map, which he did not doubt, which could mean that: it is a fake or, at worst, a trap. 

Although Severus wanted to avoid problems and calmly leave this "safe zone", but apparently not this time, because he needed the most correct and complete map as possible, and such a thing could only be kept by the leaders of the local groups. 

And ten minutes later, with a heavy sigh, Severus got up from the bed and threw on his cloak. "Still, I'll have to work a little more today, and a more complete map will definitely help with my search," touching the chest, dark, leather armour was replaced by simple clothes in grey tones, and Severus himself grew long, blond hair and put on a white mask, the mantle shortened a little and became a few tones lighter.

"Today you are staying here," noticing how Nagini crawled towards him, Severus said, in a much more mature voice and a bottle of potion appeared in his hand, " Nellie, today you will impersonate me if someone suddenly comes here."

"Yes, master," the little house elf, who was soldering nearby, nodded cheerfully, taking the vial.  "Nagni, she needs to be convincing and Tobbi is not here with us to replace you, that's why I can't take you with me."

Finally stroking her head, the wizard disappeared and after a few seconds another "Severus" appeared next to her ... but completely naked, at the sight of which, the snake "flared" and put its tail to its eyes, completely forgetting that the polyjuice only changes the appearance and it doesn't affect clothes… 

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After a few seconds, Severus, who left the tent, was already standing near another tent, this one was many times larger and it was being guarded by five wizards, whose uniform had noticeable differences from that worn by those who stood at the entrance to the "safe zone". 

They were in light, grey, leather armour, with sabers on the belt and on the forehead, they had bandanas tied, with a sign in the form of a diving eagle. 

Passing by was not such a big problem, with a small mental attack in the direction of one of them, Severus forced him to move a little to the side, creating a gap, through which he entered without any problems. 

As soon as Severus was inside, he almost immediately almost ran into one guard standing at the exit, but Severus still managed to step aside and finally, having better examined the opened view, he saw three doors standing a few metres from him, and in one of the room in which Severus turned to, an elderly man was sitting on a sofa and writing something.

Of course, in addition to the guards, there were a wide variety of charms at the entrance and throughout the room, which should have immediately reported the intrusion, but Snape clearly saw them, so it was not difficult to pass by. 

And then, rummaging through the old man's head, Severus quickly managed to find the right path to the leader, and he also figured out the layout of the tent. 

The biggest door, which was adorned with gold, led directly into a trap, where the guards were ready at any given second to shower spells on the unfortunate killer or spy, if they did not know the password. 

Behind the right door, there was a dining room and sleeping quarters, and behind the left, through two rooms, there was the leader himself, but in order to get to him, it was also necessary to go through two security posts. 

But something alarmed Severus, everything turned out too simply, the old man was only an ordinary member of the gang, but he knew too much, therefore, Severus decided to act differently, suggesting to each guard that they should go to the boss and at the same time, sending them to different doors he began to observe. 

By this, Severus, of course, will immediately give himself away, but because of the doors, he would not have been able to go unnoticed anyway, and Severus could not wait a whole year for someone to open them. 

As soon as three of the five guards approached the door and knocked correctly, and then pulled the handles, they were immediately shocked and thrown back, and behind them other guards "flew out" from the two outermost rooms.

Severus in turn, calmly passed through the half-open, gold-decorated door from which a middle-aged man, in a black robe, with simple features, but at the same time, with a "Master" level core, looked out, which indicated that he was not the last person in the group. And as soon as Snape was inside, the door closed almost immediately. Even though the room was quite gloomy, Severus could easily detect all the hiding mages. 

"Go check what happened there," ordered the "Master" in an emotionless voice and several wizards, under invisibility cloaks, ran out.

"My intuition did not let me down," Severus thought with a grin, calmly following the man, but at the same time, not relaxing one iota. 

Behind the door was a fairly spacious office without any frills, in which, apart from two drinking men sitting opposite each other, there was no one else. 

"Oliver, what is it?" asked a brunette with short hair in black sunglasses with a smile, holding a glass of cognac in one hand and a cigar in the other.

"Three guards tried to enter the premises using passwords, but I already sent the eagle owls to check everything."

"Is that so... it means he may already be here …" grinning, the second one stretched out, stroking his beard, while not even reaching for the wand lying on the table, "And who sent you?" he added calmly, looking towards the empty part of the room. 

"What a quick-witted fellow … Now I understand why they are they so calm," the gaze of Severus, who was standing on the opposite side of the room, fell on their hands, or rather, on fingers with silver rings, which are nothing more than substitutes for a wand, 

"An interesting little thing, instead of a core, it has a unfamiliar alloy, and Silver as a case, which has good magic conductivity, of course, you can't conjure something particularly powerful with this, but it's quite possible to catch the enemy by surprise," raising his gaze higher, Severus noticed the necklace," And this too is not an easy thing, you should be careful…" 

In the next moment, a surprised sigh escaped from the lips of one of the men when he felt the loss of the artefact, and then noticed the sword appeared right in front of his colleague's neck. 

"Since you are ready to talk, then I have nothing against it,"

Both of the men, almost immediately they concentrated their attention on the "guest" who appeared, one pointed his wand, and the second almost "did not react", putting his elbows on the back of the sofa and pointing his hands with rings directly in Snape's direction. 

"Calm down, Oliver, don't you see, he wants to talk," the bearded man said calmly, laughing, as if not noticing the blade of the sword at his throat, "Do you want a drink?" 

"I'm a little busy today." 

"Sorry, so what brings you to us?" Although on the outside they looked cheerful, inside all three were extremely tense, preparing to attack at any second. 

Still, they did not expect such a skilled wizard to come to them and immediately destroy their communication facility. 

"I need a map of the forbidden part of the jungle, nothing more, if you give it to me, I will immediately leave and won't cause trouble," after Snape's words, the smiles disappeared from their faces. 

"Do you realise how important this is? Hundreds of my people died to draw it, and you are proposing…"

"Not just like that, I'm not a thief, if you give it to me, then I'm ready after returning to give a more complete version, nevertheless, I doubt that you could discover what I'm looking for, I also don't mind entering into a magical contract," and only after the last phrase, they relaxed a little and smiled again. 

"It was worth starting with this, with your skills, you can definitely go far, but maybe you should remove this first…" From the lips of the bearded man, to whose throat a sword was put, a nervous laugh escaped, although inside he was almost spitting poison, and his colleague took out a black parchment and handed it to Oliver, who silently nodded in response and left the office. "He mostly does this kind of work here, so we'll have to wait until he writes it, maybe…" 

"I'm not in a hurry." Severus replied.

"Alright, let's wait…"