HP: I Was Reborn as the Dark Lord, But the System Made Me a Saint?! — Chapter 216

Chapter 216: Finding a Sense of Presence

Early morning light bled through the Great Hall’s towering stained-glass windows, casting fractured, kaleidoscopic shadows over a sea of lumpy purple sleeping bags scattered across the stone floor.

A chorus of groans, noisy yawns, and muffled complaints echoed off the enchanted ceiling as students began to stir. Amidst the tangled mess of blankets, Tamara Riddle sat up.

Her expression was so dark it could have curdled milk.

She hadn’t slept a wink. The entire latter half of the night had been spent enduring the relentless, cheerful mockery of that accursed System echoing in her skull.

‘I am Lord Voldemort,’she reminded herself, her jaw locking tight.’A perfect, supreme existence who excised such pathetic, weak emotions decades ago.’

She smoothed down the creases of her slightly rumpled robes, her fingers moving with deliberate precision, emphasizing this absolute truth to herself over and over again. The agonizing six-hour suppression period had finally expired. Deep within her veins, that familiar, intoxicating surge of dark magical power flowed once more, sinking into her limbs and bones.

The return of her magic brought a fleeting sense of security to the Dark Lord, but it also ignited a vicious, burning itch. She needed to wash away the sickening humiliation of last night’s enforced fragility. She needed to use some cruel, obvious method to prove to herself—and to the watching world—that she was still the cold-blooded, ruthless, and decisive Voldemort.

She rose to her feet, preparing to slip out of the Great Hall and return to the damp sanctuary of the Slytherin dungeons to freshen up.

But a shadow fell over her. Several upper-year students shifted into her path, their postures reeking of ill intent. Leading the pack was the captain of the Slytherin Quidditch team, Marcus Flint.

“Look who we have here,” Marcus sneered, looking down at Tamara from his hulking height. A malicious, crooked smile stretched across his heavy features.

Within the serpent’s den of Slytherin, upper-year camaraderie was a myth. The house operated on the most primitive law of the jungle: survival of the fittest. Last night, dozens of Slytherins had witnessed Tamara’s humiliating return—half-dragged, half-carried by Ginny Weasley into the Potions Master’s office, looking as fragile as spun glass.

For these older students, who had spent the last three years suffocating under the heel of a terrifyingly talented younger girl, this was blood in the water. A Tamara Riddle stripped of her power, forced to rely on a Gryffindor for protection? She was the ultimate target for bullying.

“I heard our great Miss Riddle was so terrified of Black last night that her legs gave out,” Marcus drawled, deliberately pitching his voice to carry over the waking hall. “Had to rely on a penniless Weasley to carry her back like a pathetic little ragdoll?”

Harsh, grating laughter erupted from the Slytherin boys flanking him. Emboldened by his own perceived dominance, Marcus extended a thick, calloused finger, aiming a condescending poke straight at Tamara’s shoulder.

“What’s the matter? Not putting on your high-and-mighty Queen act today? Do you need your senior to reluctantly—”

He never finished the sentence.

Tamara didn’t reach for the wand concealed in her sleeve. Her lips didn’t even part to whisper an incantation. She merely raised her chin, her heavy lashes fluttering upward. In the depths of her pitch-black eyes, a suffocating, abyssal killing intent—the pure, unadulterated malice of the Dark Lord—detonated.

Crack.

Marcus’s extended finger snapped backward at a grotesque, impossible angle.

“AHHH—!!!”

A scream like a slaughtered pig tore from Marcus’s throat. He collapsed to his knees, his massive frame trembling as he clutched his mangled hand.

But the Dark Lord was not finished.

Tamara’s index finger traced a lazy, elegant arc through the chilled morning air.

“Wingardium Leviosa.”

It wasn’t a gentle levitation. A surge of violent, compressed magical power slammed into Marcus’s chest like a solid iron battering ram. The burly Quidditch captain, a boy who spent his life weathering Bludger strikes, was launched backward off his feet. He flew over ten feet through the air before crashing down onto one of the long oak dining tables. The thick wood splintered and shattered under the impact, sending him tumbling into the wreckage.

The entire Great Hall plunged into a deathly, suffocating silence.

The jeering upper-years froze, the blood draining from their faces until they resembled wax corpses. Their breathing hitched, terror locking their lungs.

Tamara expressionlessly brushed a speck of nonexistent dust from her sleeve. Her footsteps were crisp and measured against the stone floor as she closed the distance to where Marcus lay twitching amidst the ruined oak. She looked down at the groaning, pathetic lump of meat, her voice as gentle and melodious as if she were discussing the morning dew.

“It seems Captain Flint has developed a rather serious misunderstanding regarding my physical condition.”

She narrowed her eyes. The ambient temperature in a ten-foot radius plummeted, frost threatening to form on the shattered table.

“I hope your broken ribs and that utterly useless hand will grant you ample time in the hospital wing over the next few months. Use that time to deeply reflect on the proper posture, and the proper gaze, one must adopt when facing their master.”

She didn’t spare a single glance for the trembling, wide-eyed Slytherins huddled nearby. With a fluid pivot, she walked elegantly out of the Great Hall, her robes billowing behind her, leaving a wake of absolute, terrified awe.

[Ding! Warning! Host detected engaging in school violence! This is a serious violation of the virtue of Kindness!]

[The System is about to issue a punishment—]

‘Shut up,’Tamara snapped internally, her mental voice dripping with absolute frost.’This is called Slytherin internal management.’She countered the glowing blue interface with flawlessly arrogant logic.’If I do not strike back against that stupid, lumbering pig today, the established hierarchy and authority within Slytherin will completely collapse by tomorrow. As the de facto leader of this house, I am actively maintaining order, discipline, and the dignity of the collective. Doesn’t your broken programming love maintaining rules above all else?’

The System stalled for two seconds, seemingly short-circuiting against the sheer audacity of her argument.

[…System determination: Host’s behavior constitutes legitimate self-defense and excessive means of maintaining collective honor. Do not let it happen again.]

As the perky notification chime faded into silence, a genuine, chillingly beautiful smile curled the corners of Tamara’s lips. In that brief, cruel display of one-sided torment, she had finally reclaimed her equilibrium.

‘Do you see? I am still the Dark Lord who can rule everything with fear.’

As for the minor detail that Marcus’s shattered ribs meant he couldn’t possibly play in the upcoming Quidditch match next weekend? Tamara couldn’t care less about such boring, trivial games.

However, news of a third-year girl casually dismantling the Quidditch captain in the middle of the Great Hall traveled fast. It certainly didn’t escape Snape’s ears.

After breakfast, Tamara, whose magic had only just stabilized, found herself summoned alone to the Potions Master’s office.

Severus Snape sat behind his heavy desk, the gloom of the dungeon casting long shadows over his sallow face. He pushed a crystal vial of steaming potion across the polished wood toward her. His voice was dangerously soft, carrying a lethal edge.

“I assume the brilliant display of violence Miss Riddle just put on in the Great Hall was to prove to me that your magical backlash has completely healed?”

“Just some minor restorative exercise, Professor,” Tamara replied.

She sat elegantly in the high-backed armchair, her posture immaculate. She didn’t so much as glance at the steaming potion. Her tone carried the perfect, measured arrogance of a pureblood Slytherin heir.

“Captain Flint seemed to harbor some… unrealistic fantasies regarding my weakness last night. I was simply correcting his poor perception.”

“Correcting?” Snape let out a soft, dangerous sneer. “Breaking three of a senior housemate’s bones in front of the entire school? Your ridiculous arrogance will bring you trouble sooner or later, Riddle.”

Snape’s dark, tunnel-like eyes locked onto her face. It was obvious that the shrewd Potions Master was not merely annoyed by her morning brutality; he harbored a deep, secret suspicion regarding her abnormal weakness the night before.

“Drink it,” Snape commanded, tilting his chin toward the vial. His hollow black eyes, resembling bottomless, dry wells, met Tamara’s gaze head-on.

Tamara raised her hand. Just as her pale fingertips brushed the cool glass of the crystal vial—

Without a single twitch of a wand, without a breath of warning.

Deep within the obsidian depths of Snape’s eyes, a faint, razor-sharp light flared.

Legilimency!

A hidden, invasive mental probe, striking as fast and silent as a viper’s tongue, stabbed directly into Tamara’s mind through the intersection of their gazes!

‘Heh…’

Deep within Tamara’s own dark eyes, a phantom flicker of utter disdain danced.

Had she still been shackled by the System’s six-hour magic lockdown, she might have actually allowed Snape to glimpse a fatal flaw in her armor.

But not now. Now, she was Voldemort.

Tamara didn’t blink. She didn’t avert her gaze. Her long eyelashes didn’t even quiver. In almost one-ten-millionth of a second after Snape’s probing consciousness brushed against her cerebral cortex, a fortress slammed shut.

Occlumency, instantly erected!

But Tamara didn’t make this defense airtight. After all, her mental shields only operated at a basic level under the System’s lingering restrictions. More, as a master of deception, she knew perfectly well that throwing up a flawless, master-tier mental vault against a casual probe would instantly trigger Snape’s deepest alarms.

Thus, from Snape’s perspective, his consciousness slipped past her initial defenses, piercing the shallowest surface layer of her thoughts.

He found no memories of the Shrieking Shack. No images of Sirius Black. No truth regarding the bizarre magical backlash.

All he saw was a turbulent sea of emotions perfectly suited to a proud Slytherin girl. He felt the burning humiliation of being physically weak, of being forced to lean on a Gryffindor to drag her back to the dungeons last night. He felt the explosive, venomous rage triggered by Marcus Flint’s mocking provocation this morning.

Everything aligned perfectly with the persona Tamara was currently projecting.

Two seconds later, the pressure vanished. Snape withdrew his gaze imperceptibly. A flicker of subtle disappointment crossed his hollow eyes, though the tight lines of tension around his jaw relaxed a fraction.

“It seems you have indeed recovered well,” Snape murmured coldly, waving a dismissive hand. “Get out. If I find you using such cruel magic on your classmates again, I will have you in the dungeons processing toad innards for a month.”

Tamara stood up smoothly. She offered a shallow, perfectly polite bow, turned on her heel, and glided out of the Potions office.

The heavy oak door clicked shut behind her, sealing the gloom of the office away. The instant she was alone in the stone corridor, the polite, respectful mask melted from Tamara’s face, replaced by a chilling sneer.

‘Trying to peer into the Dark Lord’s mind with such a meager, pathetic probe? Severus, you have regressed quite pitifully over these years.’

Her triumphant smirk, however, barely lasted three seconds.

Suddenly, her crisp footsteps halted dead in the middle of the empty corridor. Her pitch-black pupils contracted to the size of pinpricks. A massive, gaping flaw in her flawless plan had just torn itself open.

‘I can perfectly block Snape’s Legilimency,’she realized, her blood running cold.’But…’Tamara’s face darkened instantly, the shadows of the dungeon clinging to her features. Her teeth ground together so hard her jaw ached as she roared in the confines of her own mind.’Can that idiot Potter, whose brain is like a leaky, broken cauldron, block it?!’