"HP: Too Late, System!"Chapter 388: Douglas—So, It's My Old Acquaintance Behind All This
"Welcome to my holiday cottage."
Douglas's tone was light, as if he were inviting a friend over for afternoon tea.
"It's a bit rough around the edges, I'll admit, but it's quiet—and, more importantly, it keeps out certain... unwanted eyes."
The cellar was dry, stocked with food, water, and a modest supply of basic potion ingredients.
Lupin sank onto a wooden cot, let out a long breath, and managed a wry smile. "I feel like a slab of butter dropped in holy water. Douglas, they were after you."
"Obviously."
Douglas was busy checking the cellar's protective enchantments, taking the opportunity to upgrade the security—after all, he'd built this place just after graduation.
His fingers traced patterns in the air, weaving silver runes into the stone walls, where they shimmered briefly and vanished.
"But I'm sorry you got dragged into this. I did expect the Vatican would take some action against me..."
He paused, turning to face Lupin.
"Remus, think back on their tactics—the holy light cage, the silver powder mist... Every arrangement was designed to restrict and weaken you, not kill you outright.
Their encirclement closed in with surgical precision, driving us toward the center—yet always maintaining a safe range for attack."
He raised two fingers, a sharp glint in his eyes.
"They had two objectives: first, to capture us alive. Second, to test.
That female knight—Agnese Vieri, the youngest commander in the Order of Saint Sebastian—she's famous for her ruthless tactics and unshakable faith.
Her commands were textbook-perfect. So perfect, in fact, that it felt less like a real hunt and more like... a carefully staged exercise.
She was waiting for me to make a move, testing how far I could go when faced with a classic holy light encirclement."
"Testing?" Lupin frowned.
A cold, knowing smile tugged at Douglas's lips.
"That sort of data-obsessed, cost-be-damned approach? I've only ever seen it in one place—years ago, under that Vatican cardinal who dabbled in dark magic.
Looks like my return's rattled his successor. And I'd wager this successor is someone I know all too well."
Lupin asked, confusion written across his face. "What exactly did you do last time?"
Rome, Italian Ministry of Magic Headquarters.
The tension in Piero Rossi's office was thick enough to choke.
"Project Adam! Bloody hell!"
Piero slammed his fist onto his heavy oak desk, sending the inkwell leaping.
"Director, we... our knowledge of the project is extremely limited," a senior Auror reported, voice strained.
"The Department of International Affairs and the Minister himself have both issued gag orders. All we know is, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith refuses to share any intelligence, citing 'internal purification.'
We only know that, in the last twenty years, they've taken at least fifty werewolves from various packs under the guise of shelter and treatment... but none of those people were ever seen again."
Piero forced himself calm, his voice icy. "I'm the Director of Law Enforcement, and I'm not even allowed to know what's happening in my own jurisdiction? And I'm told not to ask questions. How long does he plan to shield those maniacs... The Sacred Shield of the Order of Saint Sebastian has been deployed, and all I know is a codename and a vague purpose."
It was clear he'd just come from briefing the Minister—who'd patted him on the back, told him he'd done well, and to handle any future "Project Adam" matters the same way.
Only now did he realize: the Minister's order to monitor Douglas had been a test from the beginning...
With the official channels blocked, he had no choice but to take the back alleys.
Half an hour later, in the damp, shadowy archives below the Ministry.
Piero faced Gianluca, the elderly, bespectacled supervisor of the Department for Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures' records.
"Director... those files are forbidden. The previous Minister personally ordered them sealed. I... I don't have clearance..." Gianluca couldn't meet Piero's gaze.
Piero took a step forward, pressing his wand to the man's chest, his voice as cold as steel.
"Gianluca, tell me where they are, or I'll have you thrown onto the prison island in Sicily for obstructing a dark wizard investigation. You can keep the werewolves company yourself!"
The old wizard went white, trembling as he pointed to the deepest, cobweb-choked corner.
Piero blasted open the rusted lock with a single spell, dragging out a file whose cover was stained black with age.
On the cover, written in ancient Italian: Project Adam – Risk Assessment.
"This is the file the previous Minister ordered sealed twenty years ago," Gianluca said, pushing up his glasses.
"At the time, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith first proposed Project Adam and wanted to partner with us. They claimed they could eradicate the werewolf curse. One of our researchers joined the initial evaluation but... he went mad."
Piero flipped through the file. The contents were chilling.
The report described the so-called "treatment" in detail:
Through a ritual combining holy water, unicorn blood, and some unknown form of mental branding, they forcibly stripped the beast nature from werewolves. The success rate was less than five percent.
Failures either died on the spot, or had their minds destroyed—reduced to soulless shells that only obeyed orders. The report called them "Saints' Hounds."
But what truly made Piero's skin crawl was a scrawled note on the final page:
The true purpose of this project is not to cure, but to screen—to find those who can withstand the transformation by holy light and serve as super soldiers... and the targets are not limited to werewolves.
Piero slammed the file shut. Now he finally understood the madness behind Agnese's words: "Purification itself is sacred."
A photo in the file's appendix made his pupils contract—a magically altered creature, its body marked by holy light burns and branded runes.
He instantly recalled the notorious case from years before, when Douglas Holmes had dismantled a dark wizard ring tied to a cardinal.
The magical creatures the Aurors recovered from that scene bore the same inexplicable marks.
"So that's it..."
Piero murmured, cold fury burning in his chest.
"They never stopped the research. They just moved it underground!
Holmes isn't being hunted because the Vatican was embarrassed by that cardinal's death. He's being targeted because—by accident—he stumbled onto the tip of Project Adam's iceberg!"
Vatican City, deep within the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, in a windowless chamber.
Agnese knelt on one knee beside a pool of holy water clear as glass. Reflected in its surface was not her own image, but that of an elderly man in deep crimson cardinal's robes, his face hidden in shadow.
"I failed, Your Eminence." Agnese's voice was utterly flat. "Douglas Holmes is stronger than our records suggest. His magic... carries the shadow of Grindelwald."
"Shadow?" The cardinal in the shadows let out a low, ancient chuckle, as if from another age.
"No, my dear Sacred Shield—not a shadow. An echo.
Grindelwald's arrogance, Dumbledore's finesse, and his own cunning... Before God selects His vessel, He must test its mettle. Your task was never to capture him."
Agnese's head snapped up, her fingers whitening around her sword hilt, humiliation and disbelief flickering in her eyes.
She and her knights—just bait?
"You did well, Agnese."
The cardinal didn't care about her reaction; in fact, there was a note of approval in his tone.
"You made the sleeping beast bare its fangs. That confirms my suspicion—Holmes, this blade too sharp for comfort, has chosen a path that will cut us."
His voice turned glacial.
"And now he's sharper than ever. As for you, my child, I have a far more sacred task for you."
As he spoke, the surface of the holy water rippled, revealing a vision that chilled the soul.
A werewolf, bound in runic chains to a cross-shaped altar, howled silently in agony as blood-red light tore the life from his body, gathering it into a pulsating heart.
Below the altar, a devout knight stood with arms wide, as the crimson heart slowly merged into his chest!
The knight's body convulsed violently, golden holy fire blazing across his skin—but beneath the flames, his flesh split open, and savage bone spurs erupted from within.
His eyes—half burning with divine fanaticism, half wild with bestial hunger!
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