The God of Nightmares’ face turned completely cold. He flung Hoffa aside, speaking with emotionless finality, "A mortal courting death. Go to hell with your stubbornness."

  Hoffa remained silent.

  "There are countless people in this world more capable than you. I must have been blind to choose you as my avatar."

  With that, he turned away, abandoning Harry Potter's body, vanishing into the endless fmes.

  Six thousand cycles of reincarnation reached their end, plunging everything into complete uncertainty.

  As if history repeated itself, Grindelwald sighed, gazing at his student before him, his expression a mix of joy and sorrow.

  "It's all over, Hoffa. Like me, you are unchanging. You will never be my equal.

  However, I must admit, you're unlike anyone I've ever met. It is your existence that has illuminated my lonely life, making it less tedious. Perhaps when we awaken next, we can be harmonious teacher and student."

  "Why waste so many words?"

  Voldemort, sprawled on the ground, burst into ughter. "It's useless, Bach. You're doomed. Hahaha! This time, you will lose without a doubt. Accept your fate."

  "Farewell."

  Countless illusions of Grindelwald spoke in unison.

  They stretched out their hands simultaneously, each arm transforming into a sharp tentacle, numbering in the thousands. If they pierced Hoffa, he would be riddled with wounds, beyond any hope of recovery.

  "Run, you fool!"

  Agea's soul screamed at him.

  "Go... just go," Nicos Fmel rasped weakly in his arms. "There's nothing more to be done. You... you must survive."

  Everything was unfolding as it had before, but this time, Hoffa rejected the fate id out for him.

  Hoffa slowly raised his head, looking through the thick smoke toward the sky.

  The night sky burned crimson, the moonlight flickering above. Dawn was far off; darkness stretched endlessly. When would the light break through?

  He sighed, but his gaze grew sharper. He was still alive, and he would fight until his very st second.

  Naniji was the first to sink its fangs into his neck. The endless tentacles from Grindelwald's illusions closed in, and Miller's summoned meteor hovered less than ten thousand meters above the ground.

  Hoffa clutched Nicos Fmel and stepped into the Shadow Realm.

  Thirty-one seconds.

  Just ten more seconds. Once he left the Ghost Walk, he wouldn't withstand the overwhelming assault.

  Three forces pressed him to the brink, yet Hoffa's eyes grew clearer. Since rejecting the God of Nightmares, his mind was unburdened. His thoughts raced faster than ever, ideas surging through his brain.

  What else can I do? What else? Time is running out.

  Hoffa looked at the barely conscious Fmel in his arms.

  Suddenly, a faint, almost imperceptible possibility fshed through his mind.

  Wait. Time. Time?

  Time!

  In the Shadow Realm, Hoffa shook Fmel's head vigorously, shouting, "Fmel, do you still want to resurrect Chloe?"

  Nicos Fmel's dim eyes fluttered open with great effort. "Do you... do you have a way?"

  "No, it's beyond my expectations. Right now, I'm just a pitiful fool who can't turn the tide," Hoffa admitted, his voice raw. "Fmel, I'm sorry. I overestimated myself. I can't bring anyone back anymore."

  "You did your best."

  Fmel sighed, as if exhaling all his remaining strength. He offered a faint, sorrowful comfort. "That's enough. We both tried our best. I don't bme you."

  But Hoffa quickly cut him off. "However, this failure is only temporary. We can still hold on to hope."

  Fmel looked at him, puzzled. "What do you mean?"

  "You may die, but I still have hope to resurrect Chloe. Her soul is intact, but I'll need your final cooperation. Can I ask you a question?"

  "What is it?"

  "Will you become my servant?"

  As he asked this, Hoffa struggled to breathe, his fingertips trembling with excitement.

  A wild, impossible idea had taken root in his mind, and it was irresistible.

  Fmel, infected by Hoffa's fervor, coughed up a mouthful of blood, his aged, pallid face suddenly filled with intensity. His eyes widened. "Could it be...?"

  Hoffa knew the old man understood.

  He nodded.

  "I will," Nicos Fmel replied without hesitation.

  Thirty-five seconds.

  Hoffa disappeared, vanishing into the Shadow Realm with a flicker of apparition.

  Nagini snapped at thin air and crashed to the ground, her endless tentacles piercing the surface like a sieve.

  "He ran!?"

  The infant Voldemort shouted uneasily, "Did he escape?"

  "Shut up!"

  Countless Grindelwald illusions roared in anger. Smirking confidently, he decred, "He won’t run. The thing he desires most is still here with me!"

  He turned his gaze to the silver-haired specter kneeling on the ground. Agia's ghost knelt there, but she had removed her face from her hands. Her expression was one of confusion and bewilderment.

  Thirty-seven seconds.

  Hoffa arrived in London, at the old home where the elder Hoffa had once brought him. With a loud bang, he pushed open the door and rushed to the second floor. In the darkness, he immediately pinched his nose.

  The old man still slumped in the chair where he had blown a hole through his own head. But after nearly a year, his body had decayed beyond recognition. Amid the putrid stench, maggots crawled out of his hollowed bones.

  But Hoffa had no time to be disgusted. He grabbed a fragment of "his own" arm bone, stuffed it into his cloak, and apparated away.

  Thirty-nine seconds.

  He reappeared at Nicos Fmel’s old house. Taking the stairs in leaps, he rushed to the basement and yanked open the door of a freezer set to minus thirty degrees. Amid the swirling cold light, Mance’s emaciated, monkey-like body still y silently inside.

  But Nicos Fmel had already extracted the st of Mance’s blood, sealing it inside a gss vial. Hoffa reached out, seized the vial, and vanished once more.

  Forty-one seconds.

  Nicos Fmel fell out of the Shadow Realm.

  Hoffa apparated back beside him, catching him just in time.

  Seeing Hoffa reappear, countless Grindelwald illusions wasted no time, their tentacles shing forward once more. But this time, Hoffa did not dodge. Instead, he ran straight into the endless appendages.

  Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!

  In less than a second, he was impaled, turned into a ragged, perforated doll.

  Grindelwald abruptly withdrew his tentacles, his eyes locked onto Hoffa. Something was wrong. There had to be a trick—he refused to believe that Hoffa would simply throw his life away at this moment.

  Agia was petrified by the sheer madness of the scene. She clutched at the heart she no longer possessed, staring bnkly at the bloodied, one-armed man before her.

  Fifty seconds.

  Though riddled with wounds, Hoffa did not die. Blood poured from his body, but under the night’s influence, his regeneration was terrifyingly strong. His wounds rapidly closed, desperately trying to preserve his life.

  Yet he paid no mind to it. Instead, he dragged Nicos Fmel toward Voldemort’s resurrection pool.

  Voldemort was so horrified by the blood-soaked Hoffa that he was left speechless. In his eyes, the man no longer resembled anything human. But Hoffa did not attack him. Instead, he walked up to the seemingly lifeless Wormtail and drew his silver dagger.

  Nagini coiled around his leg, but he felt nothing. With a swift motion, he severed his own leg, acting like a true madman.

  And it did not stop there.

  Standing on one leg, he raised the dagger high and plunged it straight into his own heart.

  Squelch!

  A sharp, beast-like scream tore through the air as he coughed up a mouthful of blood.

  But the scream was not his.

  His chest—his heart—had opened into a grotesque mouth, cmping down on the dagger, refusing to let him destroy himself further.

  Fifty-five seconds.

  Yet Hoffa did not stop. His face was cold, merciless. With brute force, he tore the dagger free and repeatedly hacked at his own heart, sshing and ripping until it was completely ruined, beyond any possibility of healing. The dagger slipped from his lifeless fingers, caught at the st moment by Nicos Fmel.

  Voldemort stared at him in stunned silence. Then, after a brief pause, he burst into maniacal ughter.

  "Mad... absolutely mad! You’ve completely lost your mind!"

  But Grindelwald did not ugh. He watched Hoffa mutite himself, his expression shifting through countless changes. And then—when he finally saw the fragment of bone Hoffa had hidden in his cloak—his eyes widened in realization.

  He finally understood what Hoffa was trying to do.

  "Destroy him. Destroy this lunatic," he murmured.

  Fifty-nine seconds.

  A massive meteor, summoned by Miller, plummeted from the heavens.

  Thick smoke bnketed everything, and waves of searing heat and energy surged like an apocalyptic tide, threatening to obliterate all in their path.

  But it was too te.

  Nicos Fmel, using the st of his strength, raised the silver dagger and sliced off a piece of flesh from his arm, letting it fall into the resurrection pool.

  "Destroy him!!"

  The Grindelwald illusions shrieked in unison, lunging toward the blood-drenched man standing at the edge of the pool.

  Final second.

  Covered in blood, barely clinging to life, Hoffa threw his head back and ughed wildly. He raised his middle finger toward the sky.

  "F*** YOU!!!"

  Then, clutching the bone and the blood, he leaped into Voldemort’s resurrection pool.

  (End of Chapter)

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