The pipe was incredibly long and featured a remarkably steep incline. It felt exactly like plunging down a terrifyingly long, pitch-black water slide.
As a brief side note, Maurise had already recalled his undead cat, back into its summoning array for safekeeping.
Upon landing, Maurise dusted off his robes and quickly surveyed his surroundings. He found himself standing in a dark, damp stone tunnel. It wasn't overly narrow, nor was it particularly wide; it was just spacious enough for three or four people to walk shoulder-to-shoulder.
Draco lay a few feet away, sprawled face-down in the muck, completely motionless.
"Stop playing dead," Maurise strolled over and gave Draco's shin a light kick with the toe of his boot.
Draco violently jolted upright. His pristine robes were entirely caked in a thick layer of slime and dirt, making him look exceptionally pathetic.
"Black! You absolute—" Draco ground his teeth in fury. However, upon noticing the wand resting casually in Maurise's hand, he wisely swallowed the second half of his curse.
"I am delighted to see you survived the fall," Maurise nodded, looking deeply satisfied. "I am absolutely thrilled you decided to accompany me on this little expedition. From this moment onward, we are official exploration partners."
'Partners? Expedition?'
Draco genuinely wanted to cry. Who in their right mind wanted to explore a dark, slimy tunnel with this lunatic? This was blatant kidnapping and coercion!
"You should really try to smile more, Draco," Maurise continued, using the boy's first name with mock affection. "You are currently standing inside the legendary Chamber of Secrets! Aren't you simply buzzing with excitement?"
Knowing full well that escape was impossible, Draco asked in a trembling voice, "Is this... is this really the Chamber of Secrets?"
"Without a shadow of a doubt. And if we are lucky, we might even get to meet the legendary monster lurking within."
Maurise swished his wand gracefully, casting a silent Scouring Charm to clean the worst of the muck off both himself and Draco. He then cast a Lumos, sending a soft, glowing orb of light hovering above them. The gentle light pushed back the suffocating darkness, perfectly illuminating Draco's bloodless, terrified face.
"M-monster?" Draco repeated the word in a weak whisper, staring at Maurise with wide eyes, desperately hoping it was a sick joke.
"It is highly likely a Basilisk," Maurise replied, his tone as casual as if he were discussing the weather. "A little pet Salazar Slytherin left behind. According to the texts, it can kill a full-grown wizard with a single glance. A truly fascinating creature, wouldn't you agree?"
Maurise turned his gaze down the dark tunnel. "We should keep moving, Malfoy. Let us venture a little deeper."
Simultaneously, the black notebook finally slid out of the pipe, hitting the damp floor with a soft splat before immediately levitating into the air to follow Maurise.
Draco's legs completely gave out. He stumbled backward, his back hitting the cold stone wall. He slid down until he was sitting in the muck, pulling his knees tightly to his chest and burying his face in his arms.
"No. I want to go back," he sobbed weakly, his voice cracking with genuine, unadulterated panic.
Maurise let out a soft, dark chuckle.
In reality, his motive for dragging Draco Malfoy down here was incredibly simple and straightforward: he wanted to thoroughly terrorize the boy.
Ever since they had first crossed paths, this arrogant little Slytherin pureblood had constantly tried to make trouble for him, though every attempt had failed miserably. To ensure Draco never dared cross him again, the most effective method was simple: completely shatter his courage and leave him with a deep, bone-chilling fear of Maurise Black.
Judging by Draco's current, pathetic state, he had definitely achieved his primary goal.
But it wasn't quite enough.
He needed to leave the boy with a truly unforgettable memory. This was simply Maurise's own dark, twisted little quirk. He genuinely enjoyed watching people succumb to raw terror. Especially when it was someone he actively despised. Watching them slowly lose all their arrogant pretensions and break down in the face of genuine fear... ah, it was an incredibly satisfying spectacle.
A slightly evil little hobby, perhaps.
Heh heh heh.
Maurise looked down at the trembling boy and spoke in a light, airy tone. "If you wish to stay here, by all means, be my guest. But if the monster happens to slither down this tunnel and spots you sitting there in the dark, you will be dead before you even realize what happened. If you follow me, you at least have a marginal chance of survival."
With those parting words, he raised his glowing wand and began walking steadily down the dark passage.
As the light moved further away, the oppressive shadows crept back in from all sides, threatening to swallow Draco whole. The rhythmic drip, drip, drip of water echoing through the tunnel sounded like a countdown to his imminent death.
Finally, Draco's nerve completely broke.
"Wait! Wait for me! Black!"
Draco scrambled to his feet, stumbling and slipping wildly in the muck as he desperately sprinted after the receding light.
Hearing the frantic splashing behind him, Maurise did not break his stride.
'See? Fear is always the most effective motivator.'
"Keep up," Maurise commanded without looking back.
The two boys ventured deeper into the damp earth. The tunnel seemed to stretch on endlessly, winding and twisting like a massive serpent. The air grew progressively colder and more humid with every step.
The most unnerving detail was the floor. It was heavily littered with the tiny, brittle bones of rats and other small animals, which crunched sickeningly beneath their boots.
Draco kept his eyes glued to the floor, muttering a frantic mantra under his breath. "I am a pureblood... I am a pureblood... the monster will not attack me... the monster will not attack me..."
Maurise, on the other hand, was completely relaxed. He was in such a good mood that he even used his wandlight to playfully startle the massive spiders scurrying along the walls, watching them scramble frantically into the dark crevices.
During their walk, Maurise also noted that the structural integrity of the tunnel was highly questionable. Whenever he brushed against the walls, loose fragments of stone and dirt crumbled away. It was entirely logical; the passageway hadn't seen proper maintenance in a millennium.
After rounding a particularly sharp bend, both boys abruptly stopped dead in their tracks.
A colossal, terrifying shadow loomed directly in their path.
Maurise instantly intensified the brightness of his Lumos spell, banishing the shadows.
Lying across the tunnel floor was a massive, semi-transparent husk adorned with faint, dark green patterns. It was a completely intact... snakeskin?
"Wow," Maurise breathed, genuine awe coloring his voice.
"Sweet Merlin." Draco sucked in a sharp breath, nearly choking on the damp air.
Maurise slowly approached the massive husk and ran his hand along the scales. It felt freezing to the touch and possessed a bizarre, rubbery elasticity.
It was a perfectly preserved shedding, stretching from the blunt head all the way down to the tapered tail. It had to be at least twenty feet long.
"Incredibly fresh," Maurise noted approvingly. "And the material is quite thick. This would actually make a magnificent upholstery for a sofa."
'A sofa?'
Draco genuinely thought he was hallucinating, or perhaps Black's mind had finally snapped under the pressure of this cursed place.
Ignoring Draco's incredulous stare, Maurise continued to stroke the snakeskin, a look of pure delight on his face. Once they finished dealing with Tom and the actual Basilisk, he fully intended to pack this entire shedding up and take it with him. Leaving such high-quality, exotic material to rot down here would be a catastrophic waste.
"Let us keep moving."
Maurise beckoned Draco forward. The blonde boy practically glued himself to Maurise's side.
At this point, the sheer despair on Draco's face was painfully obvious. If the actual monster was genuinely that massive, ten Draco Malfoys wouldn't even count as a light snack.
The tunnel continued to wind deeper and deeper beneath the school. Maurise maintained a steady pace, though he noticeably slowed down, frequently pausing to listen intently to the oppressive silence. While his wand was held casually at his side, his grip was vice-like.
Any experienced duelist would instantly recognize that Maurise was currently in a state of hyper-vigilance, ready to react with lethal force at a moment's notice.
Finally, they reached the absolute end of the tunnel.
Blocking their path was a solid wall of stone. Carved into the surface were two massive, incredibly lifelike serpents intertwined with each other. Their eyes were set with enormous, glittering emeralds.
It was glaringly obvious that bypassing this final barrier required a highly specific, magical password.
Maurise turned his gaze toward the black notebook hovering silently behind them.
Tom's spectral figure materialized once more. He approached the stone wall and let out a series of low, sinister hisses.
As the chilling sound of Parseltongue echoed through the damp tunnel, the solid stone wall groaned deeply and slowly split down the middle, the two halves sliding smoothly into the darkness.