Chapter 400

A/N: Do you want to finish reading the book today? Do it! Now you can ;)

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George reacted in time and placed a transfigured steel tray under the beam, which collapsed, but also stopped the spell.

"Look, Barty," Bellatrix danced joyfully around her comrade, causing Harry a painfully persistent déjà vu. "They're still holding on! It's great, isn't it?"

Another spell from one of the Death Eaters flew into the defense again, smashing and collapsing the dome as if it were made of glass.

"Protego Totalus," Ginny restored it immediately, still leaning her back against the pedestal.

"Fianto Duri," Luna Lovegood strengthened the defense but suddenly looked up somewhere. "Darkness... is coming."

"How much worse can it get?" thought Harry. If it hadn't been for Max's advice, they might have been killed even sooner - Crouch Jr. was acting too tough.

Suddenly one of the doors to the hall swung open. Another black smoke flew through the opening at an incredible speed, in which the Death Eaters fly. It was flying so fast that Harry couldn't follow it with his eyes. Suddenly, this smoke erupted into a whole fan of incredibly fast blue spell arrows rushing towards the Death Eaters, and behind Crouch, the floor rippled and exploded, scattering the stones.

A split second, and the black smoke flew up to Crouch and Sirius, again bursting into a heap of multicolored spells and splitting into two - one grabbed Sirius and rushed to the protection of the guys, smashed it casually, immediately turning into Hermione. She threw Sirius on the floor and, spinning on the spot, put a triple Protego Totalus, adding some more spells that Harry didn't know.

The Death Eaters didn't stand still either and began to spread out, flying up and sideways in the same black smoke, spewing out dozens of beams of spells. For a couple of moments, Harry could see Max, but he was moving jerkily and so fast that he disappeared from sight. Sometimes he turned into black smoke, and the speed with which he moved his wand arm, now blocking and now reflecting back beams and clots of spells, alternating between the familiar Protego and unknown reddish shield films, was astounding.

The world around them was mired in an endless and uninterrupted series of pops, explosions, flashes. Every now and then, benches and floor exploded, scattering fragments around, jets of flame from the Death Eaters' spells blazed, melting the stones and stairs of the hall into red lava, and the pile of multicolored arrows had no end at all.

Hermione leaned over Sirius without further ado, starting to conjure something, instantly straightening broken bones, applying splints, and so on. And Harry, like the rest of the guys, were in silent surprise, not forgetting to strengthen the defense, against which the fragments from the explosions knocked with an endless fraction.

One of the Death Eaters tried to directly break through to the defense. Harry managed to see him and began to raise his wand. However, he did not know how to knock the wizard out of this black smoke when suddenly Max, not even really paying attention to it, just waved his wand. A damn fast translucent clot turned the black smoke of the Death Eater into a bloody fountain, instantly splattering the dome of protection. There was a sound of vomiting from the side.

Several powerful spells hit the floor under Max, exploding in a column of flame and leaving craters. Still, Max dodged, covering himself with protection, and again responded with a translucent clot, but missed, and the clot literally dug a spiral-shaped crater three meters in diameter and at least a meter deep in the wall. At least a dozen clots of rotting colors, ranging from green to purple, rushed toward Max.

Suddenly, small black flat disks appeared all over the hall. Rotten-colored clumps of spells fell into them, disappearing but appearing from completely different ones, and some even managed to return to the senders — two Death Eaters, not expecting this, accidentally fell under them, disintegrating into bleeding pieces of bodies.

The cries, shouts, and commands of the Death Eaters were drowned in an endless stream of spells. Max suddenly disappeared, appearing in the air between two clouds of smoke, and it seemed as if he himself exploded into impenetrable darkness, which immediately spat out the bloody bodies of two Death Eaters.

Several particularly powerful beams hit Max from above and exploded in a bright flash, sending the guy with the speed of a projectile fired from a cannon to the platform's edge with a pedestal. Stone chips and dust flew up from the fall, and a couple of benches scattered into splinters. Everything froze, and the remaining death eaters took their form again, landing and holding the place of Max's fall at gunpoint. Harry, to his surprise, realized that no more than ten seconds had passed since the start of the fight.

"This is the end," Potter whispered quietly, noticing to himself that Hermione, even though she was already conjuring over Ginny, had seen the entire battle, as well as all the bloody pieces flying here and there across the hall.

No one said anything, and even Bellatrix, who was always laughing mockingly, was looking extremely serious at the spot where Knight had fallen.

"We've caught you at last. You piece of shit." Barty Crouch spat blood, adjusting the sleeves of his black drape jacket.