Ch 23 Heaven's Wrath Part 1

Sirius crouched down beside Celine, who was engrossed in studying the map of the forest that he had bought. "So, care to tell me," he asked, his voice filled with curiosity, "Why did we have to come all the way to the other side of the Forest?"

Celine's eyes darted between the map and their surroundings, her focus divided. "Wait a second," she replied absentmindedly, "Yes... I think we're in the right place. Alright—" Her eyes lit up as she turned to Sirius. "I need you to go a couple of hundred meters straight in that direction. If I'm right, we might just find the answer to our question soon."

"What!" Sirius exclaimed in surprise, "You think Herpo's tomb could be here,"

"No. But something very close to that," Celine said before she started pushing him with a playful smile, "Now Go!"

"But Why do I have to do it alone?" Sirius asked sullenly, his earlier encounter with the giant snake was still fresh in his memory so he was a bit hesitant at the thought of venturing into unknown territory alone.

"Because it may be dangerous," Celine admitted truthfully with a careless shrug, "And I am too young to die yet,"

"You're a bitch you know that,"

"I do," Celine said with a shameless smirk, "Come on, you're the big bad, Sirius Black, the infamous notorious Right Hand of Voldemort. Witches all across Great Britain put their children to sleep with your name among other things... I am sure you'll be alright,"

"The obvious flattery is disgusting and insulting—" Sirius said before he snorted haughtily, "But I am in a good mood so I shall allow it HAHA," He laughed out loud to boost his confidence, but Celine only looked at him like he was an idiot.

Sirius coughed in embarrassment, before he immediately cast a disillusionment charm on himself, blending into his surroundings, along with the rest of his usual sneaking spell. Taking a deep breath, he started making his way towards the location Celine had indicated.

Left behind, Celine paced back and forth anxiously, her desire to accompany Sirius evident. However, she knew that her skills at remaining hidden were inferior to his. Besides, Sirius had an uncanny sense for danger that she lacked so she didn't want to unnecessarily complicate things by going along.

Fortunately, Celine didn't have to wait long as she heard Sirius arrive, huffing and puffing. As he dispelled the spells and solidified, Celine immediately noticed that something was wrong when she saw that his face was even paler than the time when he saw the Basilisk.

"Y-You!" Sirius pointed a shaky finger toward Celine and said in an accusatory tone, "You told me I would find the answer to our quest there, but you know what I found instead?,"

"What?" Celine asked, her curiosity piqued.

"NUNDU! A Fucking NUNDU!"

"I knew it," Celine breathed with a gleam in her eyes.

"You knew it," Sirius asked incredulously, his voice going high pitch, "You knew it and you still sent me. Are you out of your freaking mind? I almost walked into the Nundu's deadly invisible poisonous field and died and you're saying that you KNEW ABOUT IT!"

"Calm down, Sirius. Take a deep breath," Celine said in a soft voice while rubbing his shoulder soothingly, and when she saw that Sirius had relaxed a bit, she continued, "Now let me explain,"

She broke a small stick from a nearby tree and started to draw on the ground to illustrate her point, "While I didn't know you would encounter a Nundu specifically, I had a hunch that you would encounter a creature similar to the ones we encountered before—the Dragon and the Basilisk. You see, I believe this entire forest is... HERPO'S TOMB," she said, emphasizing her words as she finished her drawing.

"What?" Sirius asked, his bewilderment evident as he looked at the drawing. Celine had created a large circle on the ground and marked three equidistant points within it, labelling them as D, B, and N. In the centre of the triangle formed by these points, she had drawn a small box-like shape, "What do you mean?"

"Imagine this circle represents the forest," Celine explained, gesturing towards the drawn circle. Sirius nodded, urging her to continue. "The locations where we encountered the Dragon, Basilisk, and Nundu are marked as D, B, and N respectively," she said, pointing to the letters. "Now, if you connect these three points, you create a perfect..."

"Triangle," Sirius interjected with a realisation.

"Exactly," Celine affirmed. "And that means the place we are looking for, Herpo's Tomb, is smack right in the middle of the Triangle... Right Here. The Treasure Chest," she said pointing to the ugly box in the middle.

"And how do you know that?" Sirius asked after a while.

"Do you know about the Fidelius Charm?" Celine asked, observing Sirius closely. He nodded, prompting her to continue. "Well, the early version of the Charm was quite different from the one we know today. Back then, it wasn't as well-known or refined. The secret would be hidden in multiple places or objects, often in groups of three or seven, to enhance security—or so they believed Anyway I think the Tomb is hidden using that Fidelius Charm,"

Sirius raised an eyebrow, intrigued. "So you believe the secret is hidden with the three magical creatures we encountered?"

"Exactly!" Celine affirmed, a smile playing on her lips.

"And how do you suppose we get the "secret" out of them," Sirius spoke slowly as if explaining to a simpleton, "Because I don't know if you noticed or not but the Dragon wasn't exactly talkative when we woke it up and somehow I don't think it'll be amicable enough to just tell us the "secret" even if we could understand it,"

Celine's eyes narrowed, her irritation evident. "Stop air quoting," she retorted, "And as I told you the earlier version was a lot different and in those times the secret wasn't something like the name of the place like it is today, instead it would manifest as a physical object, like a key or a plate,"

Observing Sirius's puzzled expression, Celine sighed and rolled her eyes. "Let's say, for example, you have a flat rock that serves as the key to your home. Now to cast that charm you would divide it into three pieces and hide them in separate locations, each protected by different enchantments and magical creatures. Only when all three pieces are brought together can anyone access your home or even see it, for that matter."

"But you remember that I searched the whole place around that Dragon thoroughly," Sirius said insistingly, "And I can assure you, I didn't find a single item there that even had an iota of magic in it,"

"Well I did think about that and the conclusion I came to is that...um..." Celine hesitated for a moment before she said, "That is because I think the secret is inside of those monsters so the only way I see of getting what we want to find the key is to..."

"Kill them?" Sirius asked incredulously.

"Yep," Celine said with a sheepish smile to a very speechless Sirius.

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