Wade stayed in the school hospital for two days before being discharged.
He had wanted to leave on the very day he regained consciousness, but Dumbledore insisted that he remain under observation in the school hospital for three more days.
Wade had no choice but to stay.
However, with an Obscurus tucked away on his person, along with more than a dozen goblin containers filled to the brim, how could he possibly sit still?
So he did not wait until the third day. By the evening of the second day, he made a decisive escape.
Inside the Chamber of Secrets.
Slytherin's ghost looked at the Obscurus before him, now stripped of consciousness and instinct, and could not help letting out a sigh.
"You are saying that you saved an Obscurial and extracted the Obscurus from within them?"
"Yes." Wade prodded the mass of black mist before him with his wand. "The power of ancient magic seems particularly adept at dealing with these difficult and obscure conditions."
Slytherin said, "Then you should now understand why the ancient sages of our era were called sages. The title of sage was never something one could bear simply by being powerful."
Those words sparked Wade's interest.
"You mean that in your time, the ancient sages also saved many patients like this?"
"Yes, that is one of the reasons he was called a sage," Slytherin said as he spoke, extending his hand toward the mass of mist.
However, he was a ghost. Even though the Obscurus in its black mist form was somewhat intangible, he still could not touch it.
As expected, Slytherin's hand passed straight through the dark fog.
"What formidable magic…" Slytherin said with emotion. "Obscurials may all meet early deaths, yet the Obscurus grants them immense magical power. Whenever I think about such matters, I cannot help but marvel at the wonder of magic."
"You had seen Obscurials before?" Wade asked.
"How could I not?" Slytherin replied. "In that era, Muggles feared wizards and believed them to be evil. So once a witch or wizard was discovered, they would be seized and burned at the stake. As a result, many Muggle-born wizards were terrified of showing any abnormality when their magic awakened. Suppressed like that again and again, Obscurials were born."
"Hm. Thinking about your experimental journals, the idea that Muggles considered wizards evil does not seem entirely unfounded," Wade said with a smile.
Slytherin snorted unhappily. "Hmph. If not for Godric and the others insisting, I would never have allowed Hogwarts to admit a single Muggle-born student."
He paused, then added, "Back then, I conducted quite a few experiments on Obscurials as well."
"Human experiments, I presume? Tsk, you really are vile," Wade said with undisguised disdain.
Slytherin ignored Wade's rudeness. He had long since grown accustomed to the boy's lack of propriety.
"Those Obscurials were going to die soon anyway. What is wrong with letting them contribute to my experiments before death? What if I had discovered a way to cure Obscurials?"
Wade shook his head. "I thought my own shamelessness was already impressive, but it turns out there are true masters out there…"
"You are truly hypocritical!" Slytherin snapped angrily. "If you put yourself in my position, I refuse to believe you would not have done the same!"
"Alright, alright… so what exactly did you research on those Obscurials?" Wade asked with great interest.
That portion had not been recorded in Slytherin's study at all, so if he could freeload some of Slytherin's experimental results now, that would be delightful.
Slytherin, of course, knew exactly what Wade was scheming.
However, perhaps out of a desire to show off, or perhaps because he wanted to prove that his research had not been entirely meaningless, Slytherin did not conceal much about his work from back then.
"After losing control, Obscurials turn into Obscurus and wreak havoc everywhere… so I was very curious about how an Obscurial transforms into an Obscurus."
"What changes occur in the body after becoming an Obscurus, and so on… in any case, my students and I conducted research in many different directions."
"I recall that my primary focus at the time was studying how a wizard might transform their body into a black mist state, like an Obscurial…"
Wade hurriedly asked, "And the results?"
"No results," Slytherin said, spreading his hands.
Wade immediately grew anxious upon hearing that. "How could there be no results? You mean you did not figure anything out at all?"
"What could I do?" Slytherin said through clenched teeth. "The research was only halfway through when that brute Godric showed up. He opposed our use of those Obscurials as test subjects, so we fought…"
"So you lost?" Wade asked with curiosity.
Slytherin roared in fury. "Nonsense! How could I have lost?"
"Then how else do you explain the lack of results? You must have lost, which is why you could not continue the research," Wade said. "That is a perfectly reasonable deduction, is it not? Hardly nonsense."
Slytherin let out a sigh. "I fought Godric, and neither of us could gain the upper hand. But when I returned to the laboratory afterward, all the test subjects had been taken away by Helga and the others… At that point, I could hardly fall out with the three of them outright, so the matter ended there. Hmph. Had I known we would eventually fall out anyway, I should never have conceded back then!"
Wade rubbed his hands together with a grin. "Even if there was no final conclusion, you and your students had already researched halfway through… and other students were working on different aspects as well… so does that mean…"
"Enough, boy! I know exactly what you are getting at!" Slytherin said irritably. "Since I have agreed to help you, I will do so properly. Take out some paper and a quill. I will speak, and you will write."
"Ha, that is wonderful," Wade said, quickly taking out his paper and quill.
After that, Slytherin recounted to Wade all the experimental procedures and the preliminary findings from his past research on the Obscurus.
An hour later.
Wade looked blissfully at the densely packed parchment before him, stretching a full three metres in length. Another meal secured, keke.
With these materials as a foundation, his research into the Obscurus became much simpler.
He no longer had to worry that just as he was getting started, the Obscurus would dissipate.
The sight of Wade's expression made an inexplicable anger flare up in Slytherin's chest.
This junior possessed outstanding talent and should have been exactly the kind of student Slytherin favoured, even if he was Muggle-born.
Yet every time Slytherin finished speaking with him, he always felt an irritation he could not shake.
Petty. Far too petty.
When taking advantage of others, he looked exactly like those greedy goblins.
However, when Slytherin recalled his own past self, he grew even more agitated.
Because he realised that his own attitude toward experiments back then seemed remarkably similar to that of this brat Wade.
_________
o(*￣▽￣*)ブSupport and read 12 Chapters ahead of WN at-
Patreon/Captain69