Became good friends with the Boy Who Lived

After Lockhart entered the cave, Aeris dispelled the barrier spell. Just as Harry was about to enter the cave, Ron stopped him, "Me first!" Ron said.

"Let me go first..." said Harry.

Before Harry could finish, Ron interrupted, "My sister is in danger. As a brother, how can I not rush to the front? Of course, except for that scumbag Lockhart."

Harry nodded, Ron took a deep breath and jumped into the cave. Harry and Aris looked at each other and nodded slightly, then Harry also jumped into the cave.

Aeris followed closely behind. Fortunately, there was a pipe behind the cave. It was not straight up or down, but like a slide. It was very winding, and when sliding down, it was like a "human roller coaster".

After sliding down for a long time, Aris fell to the ground in a mess at the other end of the cave. He was a little dizzy. When he got up, he saw Harry and Ron wrestling with Lockhart.

"Split left and right~" Aris pointed his wand at the three people who were wrestling with each other, and the three people separated in three directions. Ron covered one leg and collapsed on the ground, "groaning" in pain. Harry quickly stood up and went to check on Ron. Lockhart also quickly climbed up, holding a wand tightly in his hand. Lockhart pointed his wand at Aris and the other three, with an expression of victory on his face.

"This despicable guy," Ron said painfully, "As soon as I landed, he kicked my leg and snatched my wand..."

"I'm very sorry about this, children," Lockhart said with a relaxed look, not seeming to feel any guilt at all. He continued, "Well, children, the adventure game is over. Just now, the framework of my new book has been conceived: how I was a step late and failed to save the life of the child kidnapped by the basilisk, and how you went crazy because of excessive grief after seeing the body..."

"Um... Professor..." Aeris said sincerely, "After all, we have been together for a year. If possible, I hope you can make the right choice..."

"For me, my choice now is very correct," said Lockhart. "Mr. Grindelwald, how about you start with it? Say goodbye to your memories? Oblivion..."

Ron's wand, which was originally intact, exploded in an instant, and the brilliant light bounced back to Lockhart. Lockhart screamed and was knocked away, falling straight into the cave opposite.

Finally, Aeris had time to observe the surroundings. It was not dark here. The luminescent moss on the wall illuminated the place. It was a small square space. Opposite the hole where they came out, there was another hole that continued downwards. Lockhart fell into that hole that continued downwards. This place was like a buffer zone, and the ground was full of rodent skeletons.

"How are you, Ron?" Harry asked concernedly.

"It should be fine," Ron said, but it wasn't. There was bright red blood running down his trouser legs.

"Let's rest here for a while," said Aris. "Harry, help Ron lie down, I'll help him..."

Aris gently touched the injured part of Ron's leg, and Ron cried out in pain again. Aris pointed his wand at Ron's injured leg and murmured, "Recover quickly...recover quickly...recover quickly..."

After a while, Ron was able to stand up. Aeris suggested, "Why don't you stay here, Ron? I don't have much confidence in healing magic. I just stabilized your injuries. If the next passage is the same as the previous one, your injuries will get worse..."

"No!" Ron refused without hesitation, "My sister...my sister is still down there...how can I..."

Ron shuffled to the next passage and went in without hesitation. Harry quickly followed, and Aries followed closely behind.

The second slide... uh... no, the second passage was relatively stable, and the three of them really slid down it like a slide, and after a while, they landed on the ground. There was no gap between this exit and the ground at all.

Harry helped Ron up, and Ron picked up the skull of an unknown animal on the ground and looked around alertly.

In front of them was a long corridor, the other end of which was engulfed in darkness, as if there was no end. As the three of them landed, the torches on the walls on both sides of the corridor lit up automatically, and Lockhart lay motionless on the ground not far from them.

"Is he...dead..." Harry asked uncertainly.

"Who cares!" Ron said gritting his teeth.

"The Oblivion Charm won't kill him..." Aeris said, "But after all, he fell from such a high place. Even though this section of the pipe is stable, it will definitely knock him unconscious."

"Forget about him!" Ron said anxiously, "Let's keep going forward, we still have to rescue Ginny..."

Aeris and Harry looked at each other, and Harry understood. He said to Ron, "Ron, you are in a very bad condition...very bad. Aeris and I will go ahead, and you stay here to take care of Lockhart. We can't let him really die. Besides, we need support, and someone has to stay to find another way out."

Ron hesitated for a moment, knowing that now was not the time to be pretentious, "Then you two be careful..." Ron said.

The three of them separated, Aris and Harry continued to move forward, leaving Ron and Lockhart behind. As Aris and Harry moved forward, the torches on the wall automatically burned one after another.

Both of them were silent. Perhaps it was because they both knew they were about to face a basilisk and were unsure of themselves, so they tacitly kept silent and just moved forward in silence.

After walking for an unknown amount of time, the torches at the end of the corridor lit up, and a huge, quaint stone door appeared in front of the two. On the door were carved many snake reliefs, and the eyes of those reliefs were inlaid with red gems, making the snakes look like real ones.

"Say something, Harry, in Parseltongue..." said Aeris.

Harry walked forward with a nervous look on his face, and low, hoarse "hiss, ha ha, huh" sounds came out of his mouth. The relief snakes on the stone door seemed to come alive, moving regularly on the door. When all the snake carvings stopped, the stone door slowly opened inward.

Aeris and Harry walked in cautiously. The space inside the door was very large, with all kinds of huge snake statues standing in this space. At the innermost part of this space was a huge human statue with an unclear face. It sat on a throne, and all the snake statues bowed their heads in the direction of the human statue, as if the human statue was the king of all these snake statues.

In the open space in the center of the room, there was a thin figure lying, with fiery red hair and a black robe. It was Ginny Weasley.

Harry quickly ran towards Ginny, and Aries quickly followed. Even though the door of the Chamber of Secrets slammed shut at this time, it did not attract the attention of the two.

Before Aeris and Harry could get close to Ginny, a handsome boy with black hair blocked their way. The boy was wearing a wizard robe with the Slytherin snake logo on it.

"I've always wanted to meet you, Harry Potter!" the boy spoke, his eyes fixed on Harry.

"Then what should we call you?" Aerys asked faintly, "Tom Riddle? Or Voldemort?"

Tom Riddle looked at Aris in surprise and said in a faint voice: "You must be... Grindelwald? Ginny told me about you. She is very jealous of you for being able to stay with Harry Potter, whom she loves. As the dirty descendant of the former Dark Lord, what qualifications do you have? These are her exact words." Tom Riddle's smile was extremely sinister.

"You're lying!" said Harry fiercely. "Ginny couldn't possibly say anything like that..."

"Don't tell me how well you know Ginny," Tom Riddle said. "You can't imagine how sensitive and fragile a little girl of this age is. She feels ashamed of the excellence of her three older brothers. She can't hold her head up because of the occasional pranks of her twin brothers. Her old robes and old textbooks make her feel inferior in front of her classmates. She feels very lost because her love for the great Harry Potter is not reciprocated. Especially her disappointment with her last brother..."

"Shut up!" Harry yelled, and his roar echoed in the space.

Tom Riddle was not angry, and continued to talk to himself, "I only need to push her gently when she is most vulnerable, and she will perfectly execute any of my instructions. Look how well she does! I am very good at listening to other people's voices, even if that person is a sentimental and stupid girl, even if that person becomes defensive against me afterwards."

"But you're not as capable as you think," Harry said in a mocking voice, "You didn't kill anyone. Even the cat was able to recover from its petrified state after the mandrake matured."

Tom Riddle laughed a sharp laugh and said, "Killing the mudblood is just a side job for me. The person I am really interested in is you, the Boy-Who-Lived. Some things puzzle me. Why can a mediocre baby defeat the greatest dark wizard in history? Why did the Dark Lord's power disappear, but you are left with only a scar?"

"What we are actually interested in is," said Aeris, "what exactly are you?"

"Watch your tone, Mudblood!" Tom Riddle said fiercely, "What qualifications do you have to talk to me like that?"

"Haha, Mudblood?" Aeris said disdainfully. "During the two years I have been studying at Hogwarts, I have read a lot of books. I have also studied the origins and genealogy of wizards. Among the many wizard surnames, there is no surname like Riddle. I come from a non-magical family and have been abandoned by my own father. What qualifications do I have to say that I am a Mudblood?"

Tom Riddle stared at Aris with a sinister look for a while, then chuckled and said, "You are really sharp-tongued, but since you are dying, I won't bother with you. Besides, that stupid girl is dying too. The Dark Lord will live forever on her corpse and be full of vitality. Next, I will show you the great power of Slytherin..."

A low, hoarse "hiss" sound came out of Tom Riddle's mouth, and a black and green snake at least fifty feet long swam over, bypassing many snake statues. Its body was covered with scales, and the fangs in its mouth were as densely packed as sharp knives.

"You can't control it, Harry Potter, even if you can speak Parseltongue," Tom Riddle said proudly. "It only obeys my orders."

"Close your eyes, Harry!" said Aeris. When Harry looked at Aeris, his pupils had changed. One pupil turned scarlet, like a dancing flame, and the other turned scarlet gold, like the scorching sun at noon.

Harry didn't have time to think about it and closed his eyes immediately. The basilisk looked at Aes with human curiosity, and Aes looked at the basilisk without hesitation.

"Tsk, tsk, tsk..." Tom Riddle smacked his lips and said, "Protective magic for the eyes? But how can you deal with the power and poison of the basilisk?"

Aries waved his wand and shouted, "Fire shield!" Ice-blue flames rose and formed a ring of fire, protecting Aries and Harry. Aries, who was holding the wand in his right hand, moved the fingers of his left hand slightly, as if he was outlining something.

"God of Fire, make a way~" Aeris shouted again, and a huge red fire curtain appeared. A giant fire bird that was no smaller than the basilisk flew out and rushed towards the basilisk.

"Call of the Dead~" Aesir's loud shout rang out again, and the red flames on the giant fire bird turned into a pitch-black color, accompanied by the drifting of black flocs. Those flocs turned into huge black ravens one after another, and then the giant fire bird slowly disintegrated, turning into thousands of ravens with black flames burning on their bodies.

The ravens cawed, like a black cloud, covering the basilisk. After a while, a huge basilisk skeleton fell to the ground. The ravens were still unsatisfied and kept landing on the skeleton, pecking at the remaining flesh on it.

Tom Riddle looked at everything in front of him, his expression as ugly as it could be. Then he smiled softly, as if he was talking to Aeris, or as if he was muttering to himself: "Interesting, really interesting. It seems necessary to let you experience the Dark Lord's methods."

After saying that, Tom Riddle walked towards Ginny, bent down and took out Ginny's wand. Tom Riddle gently stroked Ginny's wand with both hands, then waved it easily. Endless fire rose up, and soon the Black Flame Ravens were burned to ashes. But Aeris still noticed that Tom Riddle carefully controlled the fire and did not let it get within ten meters of Ginny.

Endless fire transformed into all kinds of monsters, which were about to pounce on Eris. The summoning array outlined by Eris with the fire shield was also completed. Brilliant light shone, and a young man wearing a gorgeous green robe, green hair, and emerald green pupils appeared. He had a thin figure and a neutral, feminine and handsome appearance, so that Eris could not tell whether he was a man or a woman.

Seeing the fire monsters rushing towards him, the young man frowned his green eyebrows and waved his hand casually. All the fire monsters dispersed and disappeared without a trace in an instant.

For the first time, Tom Riddle's face showed panic. He spoke incoherently: "You...you are...impossible...how could it be...I don't believe it...I don't believe it..."

The young man muttered to himself, "Soul fragments? Horcruxes? How could a descendant of Slytherin fall into this state? It's really disappointing! Hey! Boy! Where's your main soul? It's been split many times? With your character, are you worthy of being the heir of Slytherin?"

Tom Riddle was like a madman, waving his wand at the young man without caring about anything. The young man snorted in dissatisfaction: "Treason!"

The young man just waved his hand, and a snake fang from the basilisk's skeleton shot out like a bullet towards the diary in Ginny's arms. Not only did it accurately knock the diary out of Ginny's arms, but it also did not hurt Ginny at all, until the diary was nailed to a snake statue.

Looking at Tom Riddle again, a transparent hole the size of a bowl suddenly appeared at the position of his heart, which made him wail uncontrollably. As the hole grew bigger and bigger, Tom Riddle finally disappeared.

The young man turned around and looked at Aris and Harry. Aris was a little surprised that the young man was a natural "Legitimate Mentalist". Harry also opened his eyes. The moment he saw Harry's pupils, the young man was a little dazed.

"Hello..." the young man said, his voice unusually pleasant, "My name is: Salazar Slytherin, which house are you from?"