A giant clay bird gripped Hagrid tightly with its claws, while Fred and Cedric rode atop another giant clay bird.
Kyle scrambled up a tree in two or three steps and leaped toward the clay bird that had already taken flight.
However, just as he was about to grab the bird's talons, a sudden curse forced him to retract his hand.
Missing the giant bird, Kyle began to plummet toward the forest below.
George rushed over, intending to catch Kyle, but unexpectedly, a flash of red light struck him.
George instantly crashed into the dense forest below like a bird with broken wings, snapping an unknown number of branches along the way.
"Damn it! Go back and help them!" Fred immediately turned the giant clay bird around.
Cedric was even faster; he had already leaped from the bird's back, chasing after George.
The falling mecha plowed a deep furrow into the ground. Following the trench, Cedric soon found George.
He was struggling to climb up from the ground.
Fortunately, when designing the battle armor, he had followed Kyle's suggestion and solidified a significant number of Cushioning Charms inside it. This was the only reason he had escaped injury from the crash.
On the other side, Kyle was facing off against Voldemort once again.
"Fire Release: Majestic Destroyer Flame!"
Standing on a tree branch, Kyle spewed a beam of fire violently toward Voldemort below. The moment the flames neared the ground, they expanded into a monstrous sea of fire.
Unfortunately, Kyle had not yet mastered Fiendfyre, and ordinary fire was completely ineffective against Voldemort.
Using the glare of the fire as cover, Kyle rapidly charged forward.
He pulled an explosive tag from his ninja tool pouch.
Several curses shot out from within the flames, but because his vision was obscured, Voldemort's spells merely blasted the trees in front of him into powder.
When the flames dissipated slightly, Voldemort was surprised to find that Kyle was close at hand.
A sinister grin surfaced on the corner of his mouth.
He instantly seized control of the surrounding fire, and crimson flames erupted around his body.
Withstanding the scorching heat of the flames, Kyle forcefully slapped an explosive tag onto Voldemort's body.
An earth wall abruptly rose up, instantly separating Kyle from Voldemort.
After stomping heavily on the wall to propel himself away, Kyle fiercely formed a hand seal, detonating the explosive tag on Voldemort.
"Ninja Art: Mutually Multiplying Explosive Tags!"
Accompanied by the deafening roar of the explosion, a ball of fire swallowed Voldemort's body.
The earth wall was also shattered by the exploding tags.
Kyle didn't have time to cast the Super Armor Charm from his scabbard before he was blown backward at an even greater speed by the shockwave.
The explosions were still continuing. While Voldemort was hindered, Kyle checked the injuries he had just sustained.
Luckily, Voldemort hadn't had time to convert the fire into Fiendfyre, so the burns weren't very serious.
The explosion just now had also been significantly dampened by the earth wall, so it wasn't an issue at all.
Kyle didn't expect the Mutually Multiplying Explosive Tags to kill Voldemort.
Since he hadn't developed his Paper Release yet, he couldn't use it to mass-produce explosive tags. Each tag took him two or three minutes to draw by hand.
He couldn't waste precious time drawing tags, so he had only produced a few hundred so far.
This small amount of explosive tags was obviously not enough to kill the legendary Dark Wizard before him.
Even though Voldemort's current strength was not even one percent of his peak, Kyle dared not underestimate him in the slightest.
The continuous sounds of explosions soon ceased.
"Boy from the Dumbledore family, you are good," Voldemort's voice sounded much weaker than before, but also much angrier.
Originally, he hadn't wanted to kill this brat from the Dumbledore family.
Voldemort's current goal was solely to obtain the Philosopher's Stone to reconstruct his body. Even killing Harry Potter, his lifelong enemy, was only ranked second.
As for Dumbledore, he had to be ranked even further back, because the current Voldemort couldn't defeat Dumbledore.
Although Dark Magic had eroded his sanity, it hadn't turned him into an idiot yet.
Setting aside what kind of status Kyle, a brat named Dumbledore, held in Dumbledore's heart...
If he wasn't important enough, killing him would be meaningless.
If he was important enough, Voldemort definitely couldn't withstand the crazy pursuit of that old bee.
But now that Kyle had severely injured him twice, he really couldn't tolerate it anymore.
Voldemort drew upon all the power Quirrell's body could unleash. His exposed arm instantly withered and turned black.
Separated by more than ten meters, Voldemort raised his wand.
"Avada Kedavra!"
A beam of green light, fully as thick as an arm, burst from his wand. With no way to dodge, Kyle hurriedly raised his wand to engage in a beam struggle.
"Lightning Release: False Darkness!"
Blue and green lights collided, and a ring of white airwaves erupted from the point of impact. A thunderous boom exploded within the Forbidden Forest.
Pouring his magic power out frantically, Kyle held on bitterly, but the arc of electricity was still being pushed toward him, inch by inch.
If he hadn't just critically injured Voldemort twice—forcing Voldemort to use most of the energy provided by the unicorn blood to repair his body—Kyle would have been defeated even faster.
Fortunately, Cedric and Fred arrived at this moment.
The two immediately raised their wands and joined the beam struggle, allowing Kyle to barely maintain the stalemate.
George, who had to walk in his heavy armor because the thrusters were damaged, appeared beside them a moment later.
"Hold on, guys!" The rocket launcher on George's left shoulder aimed at Voldemort. "Let me use the Ex-Wife to blast him!"
An ominous premonition rose spontaneously in Kyle's heart.
This scene felt intimately familiar.
Scorching flames sprayed from the tail of the rocket. Propelled by its wake, leaving a long white trail behind it, the rocket lunged toward Voldemort with extremely ferocious momentum.
Voldemort was also startled by the imposing power of this attack. His left hand, casting without a wand, erected a silver barrier in front of him.
Clang!
The rocket collided with the barrier, making a crisp sound of metal striking metal.
Then, this so-called "Ex-Wife" fell to the ground, landing in the stream by Voldemort's feet.
The rocket, which had been spewing a stream of fire, hissed like a match dropped in water, made a final dying struggle, and then extinguished.
George silently retracted the rocket launcher to his back. The air was awkward for a moment, leaving only the slight crackling sounds of the clashing spells.
"Did you modify it?" Kyle's words broke the awkward silence.
George nodded and didn't speak.
On the third floor of Hogwarts Castle, Hermione stood panting in front of a stone gargoyle.
Shortly after leaving Hagrid, she had run into Kyle and the others.
The scorching stream of fire ejected from the thrusters of George's armor was simply too eye-catching in the dark night.
She had fired a signal spark to attract their attention.
After meeting up with them, Kyle threw the Nimbus 2000 to her and told her to go back to the castle to find Dumbledore.
Meanwhile, the four of them went ahead to rescue Hagrid.
Hermione took the spiral staircase to the Headmaster's office and told Dumbledore everything that was happening in the Forbidden Forest.
"Hagrid is in danger again?"
Wait, why did he say "again"?
Dumbledore looked toward the window. The distant Forbidden Forest was lit up with soaring flames, and arcs of lightning flashed occasionally.
It seemed the battle was very intense.
He pulled out a wand that had several ugly knots, resembling a stick of candied haws.
A Patronus formed of silvery-white mist passed through the wall of the Headmaster's office and flew toward a certain part of the castle.
After doing all this, Dumbledore looked at a certain Scottish long-tailed turkey squatting on its perch. "Fawkes!"
A loud bird cry rang out in the Headmaster's office, and Fawkes the Phoenix disappeared with Dumbledore in a burst of fire.
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