St. Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries, Curse Damage Ward.
"What exactly happened?" Sagres broke the silence first, his expression grave.
Nightingale frowned deeply. "How could such a powerful curse have been contracted?"
"I... I was just brewing some Calming Potion..." Kestrel's voice trailed off to a whisper.
"Calming Potion?" they repeated together, both frowning harder.
"Why brew that?" Thunderbird asked, confused.
"I saw how anxious the students were about their revision—they all looked so worried..." Kestrel explained quietly.
"The recipe?" Nightingale pressed. "Tell me the exact brewing steps."
"The recipe's on my desk, but I remember it," Kestrel said, then recited the Potion's formula honestly. After listening, Nightingale confirmed that the recipe itself was correct.
"The brewing process?" Nightingale continued, probing further.
Kestrel described it again in detail.
As she spoke, everyone could see Nightingale's expression growing darker and darker.
"You added the Armadillo Bile in the wrong order," Nightingale said flatly.
"Ah?!" Kestrel was startled.
"But if it was just the wrong order, it shouldn't have caused such severe consequences..." Nightingale murmured, her gaze suddenly sharp as she fixed it on Kestrel. "Did you... do anything else?"
"..."
Kestrel's eyes flickered nervously. Her lips moved faintly, clearly struggling to hide something.
Sagres immediately caught the hint of guilt in her expression. Narrowing his eyes, he said quietly, "You'd better explain everything clearly. If you want to be free of the curse sooner, don't hide a thing."
The air in the ward seemed to freeze. Everyone's gaze turned to Kestrel, the pressure pressing down on her like a weight.
"It's just..." Her voice was barely audible. "It's just that... at the end... I added a drop of Felix Felicis..."
Nightingale's eyebrow twitched violently.
"I... I thought... if the students drank it, maybe they'd have... better luck during the exams..."
Kestrel's voice grew softer and softer until it vanished completely beneath the covers.
A few helpless sighs filled the ward.
Everyone raised a hand to their forehead and took a long breath, trying to digest this exasperating "stroke of genius."
Sagres reached into his robes and took out a vial—the "failed potion sample" he had collected earlier from Kestrel's office.
"This one?" he asked.
Kestrel glanced timidly at the ominous-looking liquid in the bottle and nodded with difficulty.
Nightingale took the small vial with a solemn expression, lifting it to the light for a closer look. The potion shimmered with a dark, bottomless hue under the glow.
"An unknown, extremely rare, and highly destructive potion variant," she murmured, her eyes fixed on the swirling blackness. "A Curse Potion."
"What exactly does it do?" Thunderbird asked.
"Not certain yet, but I'd guess... it brings misfortune," Nightingale said quietly, giving the vial a gentle shake. "If Felix Felicis is a luck potion, then this... might be a misfortune potion."
Everyone's faces darkened immediately.
They stared at the small black bottle, a chill creeping up their spines. Thunderbird muttered under his breath, "I can't tell whether that's good luck or bad..."
Nightingale set the vial carefully on the table, her expression grave. "A Curse Potion—unknown properties, unknown effects, and no known countermeasures. Our top priority is to analyze its curse-triggering mechanism."
She turned to Sagres. "I need to return to Beauxbatons. The school's alchemy workshop has the necessary testing equipment."
Sagres nodded.
Swift leaned closer, peering into the dark, opaque liquid, his brows furrowed. "Just this tiny black bottle? Can it really be that dangerous?"
He didn't doubt Nightingale's judgment; he had simply never heard of such a thing.
Absentmindedly, he picked up the bottle, weighing it in his hand before shaking his head slightly. He looked at Kestrel with a mix of disbelief and confusion. "With a color like this... how did you even dare to drink it?"
"I didn't drink it—" Kestrel said dryly, staring straight at the ceiling. "I just smelled it."
Swift froze instantly—because at that very moment, he had been unconsciously leaning closer to the bottle's opening.
Sagres reacted quickly, raising his wand. "Shouldn't It be the first thing you told us before he picked up thevile?!"
A flash of light burst forth, and the stopper was immediately sealed shut by an invisible force.
Everyone's expressions tensed, and they exchanged uneasy glances. The ward fell completely silent—so quiet that even a pin drop could be heard.
"...Did you smell anything?" Sagres asked in a low, steady tone after a brief pause.
"Uh," Swift frowned, thinking carefully. "There was... a faint rotten-egg smell?" He hesitated, then added, "...Maybe mixed with something like cheap perfume?"
Kestrel looked at him, puzzled. "That's strange. It didn't smell like that when I—"
Swift started to reply, but Sagres raised his hand, cutting him off.
Nightingale spoke slowly, her tone carrying a faint chill. "The scent of Felix Felicis differs for each person—it always takes on the drinker's favorite fragrance. Therefore, its opposite... the scent of a Misfortune Potion, is most likely—"
"Everyone's most hated smell?" Swift finished tentatively, his face beginning to pale.
"Exactly," Nightingale confirmed.
"Then... does that mean I'm already affected?" Swift swallowed hard, his voice trembling slightly.
No one answered, but the heavy silence itself was enough of a response.
"Nightingale," Sagres said at once, "you must return to Beauxbatons immediately and research this potion's specific effects and any possible counter-curse as quickly as you can."
He paused, a faint, wry smile tugging at his lips. "Because I might already be affected too."
"What?" Everyone's expressions shifted to alarm.
"When I went to Kestrel's office," Sagres said calmly, though with a trace of resignation, "I smelled a strong scent of car exhaust."
"That..." Thunderbird spoke hesitantly, recalling the moment Swift had opened the bottle. "When he unsealed it, I was standing close. I think... I might have inhaled a faint trace too—it smelled a bit like dust."
All eyes immediately turned to Hummingbird and Nightingale.
Hummingbird's expression changed slightly, and she admitted in a small voice, "Uh... I think I might've smelled something unpleasant too..."
Nightingale, however, let out a quiet sigh of relief. "Thankfully, I was farther away, and I cast a Bubble-Head Charm the moment the bottle was opened. So, I didn't smell anything."
"So…" Sagres glanced around and concluded, "Aside from Nightingale, the five of us—Kestrel, Swift, Thunderbird, Hummingbird, and myself—have all 'won the lottery,' then?"
"Will the effects last different lengths of time depending on how much we inhaled?" Swift asked, a faint note of hope in his voice.
"Possibly," Sagres said, his gaze landing on the disheartened Kestrel lying in the hospital bed. "But I doubt it'll last less than forty-eight hours."
Nightingale looked at her companions—each of them now facing a streak of bad luck—with sympathy and a touch of warning in her voice. "For the next few days, you'll probably have to… live very 'low-key' lives."
Several sighs, heavy with resignation and dread, echoed through the ward.
They all understood what Nightingale's "low-key" really meant: for the next few days, they would have to be extremely careful—even while walking or drinking water.
~~~~~~~
o(*≧▽≦)ツ💫 Read up to 12+ chapters in advance on P@treon/DarkDevil1