Regulus of Hogwarts: Lord of the Stars

Chapter 452 The Cleanest Explosion

At 200 times the normal pressure, adding a shell would cause it to break, rendering all previous efforts futile, unless the strength can be increased further.

Regulus closed his eyes briefly, then opened them again, a bluish-white light flashing in his amber vertical pupils.

The protective image of Betelgeuse rose from the depths of the spirit, seeped outward along the magical channel, poured into the wand from the level of consciousness, and merged into the Ironclad Charm.

In addition to the silver metallic sheen on the surface of the sphere, there is an extra layer of blue and white halo, which flows slowly along the surface of the sphere, flowing down from the top of the sphere, gathering at the bottom, and then dissipating back.

The tremors stopped, the buzzing disappeared, and the sphere stabilized.

The boundary formed by the will to protect far exceeds the physical limits of the Ironclad Curse itself.

The wall's load-bearing capacity increased dramatically, and the high-pressure gas inside, which was just hovering around the critical value, was now firmly suppressed.

The following steps are where this magic truly relies on talent.

No more air was pumped into the ball; the opening at the top was closed, and the airflow spell stopped.

As the wind subsided and the surrounding air flow gradually calmed down, the flying grass clippings and dust lost their traction and fell back to the ground.

Then he began to compress, and the walls of the Ironclad Spell began to contract inward under the uniform pressure of magic.

It moved very quickly, and the blue-white halo around the sphere became brighter and brighter as the sphere shrank. In three seconds, the sphere shrank to half a person's height.

The white light of the air inside the sphere suddenly brightened and began to shift towards blue-white. The temperature had soared to several thousand degrees. Air molecules were broken down into atoms, and electrons were stripped from their orbits, beginning to ionize.

The air pressure is tens of thousands of times higher than the outside air pressure.

I continued pressing down, shrinking from half a person's height to the size of my head, and it slowed down noticeably, taking more than ten seconds.

The sphere's blue-white halo was dazzlingly bright, and the blue-white plasma churned and boiled, making the entire sphere resemble a miniature star.

Temperatures continued to climb, breaking 10,000 degrees and soaring to tens of thousands of degrees, hotter than the surface of the sun.

Regulus's forehead began to bead with sweat.

The mental burden is piling up, while maintaining the restraints of the Ironclad Curse, the will to protect, the control of magic, and the mental division caused by the Occupational Spell are rapidly approaching their limit.

A few strands of her long, silvery-white hair were damp with sweat and clung to her face. Her breathing deepened, and her chest heaved more noticeably than before.

But his hand holding the wand remained steady, and the light in his eyes did not waver.

From the size of a head to the size of a fist, every millimeter of progress is a process of grinding.

A blue-white halo emanated from the top of the sphere and enveloped its surface.

A ball of light the size of a fist hovered above the tip of the staff.

The blue-white light of the plasma inside the sphere was so bright that it would be blinding to look directly at it. When it shone through the sphere's walls, it dyed the surrounding wilderness in a cool hue.

The air was distorted and deformed by the high temperature, making the distant castle silhouette appear curved.

A miniature cyclone slowly rotated around the sphere of light, with bits of grass and dust swirling around it.

A miniature sun.

Regulus stared at the ball of light.

The sphere was trembling again, but the frequency was very stable. Betelgeuse's protective will enveloped the outside, locking the ultra-high pressure of the plasma inside tightly.

When compressed to this extent, the air inside the sphere has become a different state of matter.

It is completely ionized, with a temperature of tens of thousands of degrees and a pressure millions of times that of the external atmosphere.

A metastable state, extremely dangerous, but held in check by will.

If the sphere's walls shatter, the energy released from these things would probably be enough to completely destroy the castle.

Regulus stared at the blue-white orb of light above the tip of his staff, a slow grin spreading across his face.

It's done. A bomb more powerful than any explosive spell most adult wizards have ever seen.

Using air itself as ammunition, the cleanest explosion.

It's not over yet, it's not exciting enough, we can keep going.

......

Moody stared at the ball, his grey-blue eyes unmoving.

He had never seen this magic before.

He recognized the Ironclad Curse, the Airflow Curse, and the Compression Operation from beginning to end. He recognized each step individually, but when put together, he recognized nothing at all.

Moody's right hand was already gripping the wand.

His body was urging him to run, but even running on his legs felt too slow, so he used Apparition to get away from here, as far away as possible.

At a distance of about ten meters, given the current concentration of magic in that ball, if it gets out of control, the explosion will spread here faster than anyone can chant a spell.

He had witnessed black magic explosions, Fiendfire going out of control, and the power of Muggle gunpowder detonating in a confined space.

But this thing was white, not black at all, and the blue-white light made the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end.

A line burned through his spine, running from his tailbone all the way to the back of his head, making his scalp tingle.

He glanced at Dumbledore.

Dumbledore stood to the side, not looking at him, his blue eyes fixed intently on the fist-sized ball of light, a slight smile playing on his lips, his expression a mixture of admiration, surprise, and anticipation.

Moody's fingers gripped and loosened the wand handle, but he didn't run away after all.

Albus was still standing there, his face showing an expression of curiosity that had been piqued by something.

What exactly is that ball?

Moody suppressed the rising alertness, his grey-blue eyes refocusing on the ball of light, his lips pressed tightly together.

He wanted to see what this guy was up to.

......

A fist-sized ball of light floated stably.

The blue-white light cast flickering shadows on Regulus's face, his amber pupils revealing a mixture of gold and blue-white.

Her long, silvery-white hair was tousled by the tail gusts of the miniature cyclone, and the dark patterns on her short vest shimmered faintly in the light.

He turned his head to look at Dumbledore and Moody, who were a dozen meters behind him.

Two people stood by the stone wall of the shepherd's path, one with a calm expression, the other with a livid face.

The wind blew from the open field, howling as it seeped into the cracks of the stone wall.

Regulus grinned, the golden light in his amber vertical pupils dazzlingly bright, and raised his voice, drowning out the wind, as he shouted: "Old men! Cover your ears!"

Dumbledore blinked his blue eyes behind his half-moon spectacles.

Without hesitation, he raised his wand, tapped it lightly on the side of his ear, and cast an earplug spell.

Then he turned to Moody, waved his wand near his ear, and said clearly, "You try it too."

Moody's lips twitched.

He glanced at Albus's "you'd better do as I say" expression, then at the blue-white orb of light a dozen meters away, and his muscles twitched.

Since Albus had already done it, he had no reason not to. He raised his wand and whacked himself, then took a few steps back.

Dumbledore thought for a moment and then decided not to retreat.

He looked at the fist-sized ball of light, his blue eyes narrowing slightly.

Even from a distance of about ten meters, the distortion of the air around the sphere was visible to the naked eye. With magic compressed to this density, the impact released wouldn't just travel along the ear.

You can block out the sound of a spell by plugging your ears, but you can't block out other things from hitting you.

He waved his wand again, creating an extremely thin, transparent barrier in front of both himself and Moody, close to their skin.

This barrier absorbs any impact that is unsuitable for the human body, regardless of the direction from which it comes. Whether it is shock or debris, it will be filtered out before it hits the body.

Then he took a few steps back and stood next to Moody.

Moody glanced at him with a puzzled look, then looked at the almost invisible barrier around himself, and said nothing.

Albus always had his reasons for doing things; an extra layer of protection is always better than an extra one.

He turned back, his grey-blue eyes fixed on the white-haired wizard once more.

From the window on the first floor of the castle, the Death Eater who had been muttering earlier glanced out again.

After all that effort, the white-haired wizard managed to create a ball of light the size of a fist?

That's it?

He scoffed, a smirk playing on his lips, and was about to turn back—

Regulus turned back, his gaze fixed on the stone arch above the main gate of the castle, and prepared to throw a spell.

At the same time, deep within his consciousness, the imagery of Betelgeuse's eruption had fully illuminated.

An explosive will surged from the depths of his spirit, flowing through the magical channel into the tip of the staff. The magical structure of the Flame Spell was already in place, awaiting only the moment of impact.

Flight time, distance 150 meters, initial velocity from ejection, air resistance is negligible, approximately 0.4 seconds.

At the moment the sphere strikes the stone arch 0.4 seconds later and the sphere's wall shatters, Betelgeuse's explosive will must arrive simultaneously.

Too early. The ball exploded while it was still in mid-air, and most of its energy dissipated in the air.

It was too late. After shattering, the plasma had already begun to expand freely. Injecting more of the explosive will would only be icing on the cake, and its power would not reach its maximum.

They must be synchronized; the impact and detonation must occur at the same instant.

The requirement for this synchronization precision has gone beyond the realm of pure spellcasting techniques and entered the field of computation.

Flight trajectory, velocity decay, impact angle, and mechanical threshold for sphere fracture must all be calculated before launch.

He figured it out.

The next moment, the wand was swung violently, the Throwing Charm was activated, and a short, sharp explosion came from the tip of the wand.

A fist-sized ball of light detached from the tip of the staff, moving so fast that it left a straight trail in the air.

The withered grass in its wake was blown flat by the trail of air, and a sharp whistling sound tore through the night as the ball of light, trailing a tail of distorted air, crashed straight into the stone arch above the main gate of the castle.

He stared intently at the countdown, which began at 0.4 seconds.

A cluster of dark red flames shot out from the tip of the staff, following the trajectory of the light sphere and flying out along the same path.

They were faster and caught up.

The ball of light struck the stone arch, cracking the wall and revealing a thin, blue-white flash of light leaking out from the crack.

At the same instant, Betelgeuse's explosive will and the heat energy of the Flame Spell surged in from the crack.

A dark red light shone from inside the sphere, and the blue and white halo began to shatter from the point of impact, with cracks spreading outwards, and blue and white fragments intertwined with the dark red light.

The Ironclad Curse's constraints were completely fulfilled at this moment; the Guardian Will withdrew from its outer shell, and the Explosive Will took over from within.

Two stellar wills from the same origin completed their handover at the same point: one guarded the boundary to keep the plasma, compressed to its limit, stable, while the other broke the boundary from the outside to release it.

The moment they collided, the restraints vanished completely, and everything that had been held down was released.

The wilderness fell silent, the wind died down, the chirping of insects ceased, and even the cows in the distant pastures fell silent.

Then, an explosion occurred, and dawn broke.

A blinding white flash exploded from it, brighter than the midday sun.

The entire castle, the surrounding wilderness, the stone walls of the shepherd's trail, and the rolling hills in the distance were all illuminated.

All colors were washed away in that moment, leaving only black and white; the castle's outline became a black silhouette swallowed by white light.

The flash was followed by a shockwave.

At least three layers of protective magic shone on the castle's outer walls, the outermost layer being several overlapping dark green magical barriers that shattered into countless pieces under the overpressure.

The middle layer was a dark gray rebound spell, which held for a moment before being torn apart along with the stone wall it was attached to.

The innermost layer is a structural reinforcement spell, with dark brown light patterns embedded inside the stone wall, barely supporting the main framework.

The protective spell consumed about a third of the energy; the rest was enough.

The stone arch above the main gate shattered into fragments under overpressure, with fist-sized stones mixed with crushed mortar flying outwards, piercing the air and emitting a sharp whistling sound.

The outer wall lost the support of the stone arch and collapsed layer by layer from top to bottom. The dull thuds of breaking bricks and stones rose one after another, and the cracks extended from the main entrance to the second-floor windowsill, and then up to the wall on the third floor.

The entire wall on the side of the main entrance on the first floor collapsed inward, with rubble and broken beams crashing in, and smoke and dust spewing out from the windows and cracks.

The shockwave continued to push outward, overturning rubble, withered grass, and dust, forming a ring of grayish-white air that spread outward and was still rolling a hundred meters away.

On the stone wall of the shepherd's trail, the turf on top was torn off by the blast wave, and gravel rolled down from the top of the wall.

Even from 150 meters away, you could still feel your chest trembling from that extremely deep roar.

Then came the fireball, dark red and orange-red rising from the point of impact, surging and expanding.

The color transitions from a core of white light to an outer layer of orange-red and then to a dark red at the edges, rolling upwards in layers, carrying with it gray smoke and fragments of rock. The top is flattened and diffused, while the bottom is pulled into a column shape by the rising air currents.

A small mushroom cloud rose to a height of thirty or forty meters above the castle, and then the flames began to dissipate.

It has no fuel; it only emits light briefly during the expansion and cooling process of high-temperature plasma.

The fire died down from the outside in, leaving only thick gray smoke swirling upwards, which was then scattered by the night wind, turning into wisps of grayish-white silk that drifted eastward.

As the smoke and dust cleared, the torn section of the castle was revealed.