Chapter Seventy-Four: The New Dementor

This was a humanoid creature, standing about three meters tall, cloaked in black with a hood, its body a ghastly gray resembling a rotting corpse. Each breath it drew rasped through its throat with a guttural sound, as if it were inhaling more than just the air around it.

Its arms, exposed from beneath the cloak, were the color of faded walls, gleaming ominously as if coated in mucus and flecked with spots, chilling to behold. The face—if one could even call it a face—bore hollow eye sockets veiled with thin, scabbed skin, while its cavernous mouth was pitch-black, like a bottomless abyss.

Just a single glance at this monster made Whistler’s skin crawl; every hair on his body stood upright, and he instinctively rubbed his arms. What horrors had this wizard unleashed?

If someone from the world of Harry Potter were present, they would surely warn Whistler in terror: this dreadful creature was called a Dementor.

Dementors are among the most vile things in existence, haunting the darkest, filthiest places and thriving amidst decay and despair. They suck peace, hope, and happiness from the air around them.

When a Dementor approaches, all the good feelings, all happy memories are drained away. If given the chance, a Dementor will keep feeding until you are left like it—soulless, evil, stripped of everything but your worst experiences and endless pain.

Dementors exist in a realm between being and non-being; they glide along the ground but cannot pass through solid barriers. Blind, they subsist by consuming the positive emotions of humans, forcing their victims to relive their most agonizing memories repeatedly.

They sense nearby presence through emotion and draw light and joy from the air with long, sucking breaths, plunging their surroundings into unending darkness and inflicting intense cold upon their victims.

Thus, wherever Dementors appear, the environment becomes eerily frigid, and the effect intensifies with their numbers. Dementors can even drain the magical power of wizards, making them one of the most troublesome creatures in the magical world, impossible to destroy. The only defense is the Patronus Charm.

In the world of magic, Dementors are undoubtedly among the most terrifying beings.

In his previous life, Gu Zhongyan, in pursuit of returning to the real world, had ventured into countless forbidden magical realms and studied numerous taboo spells. He may not claim mastery of the three Unforgivable Curses, but his proficiency was considerable.

He was arguably the most accomplished Hufflepuff in black magic history. If not for the precautions he took—learning wand-making to avoid trouble from the Ministry—his frequent use of dark magic would have earned him a place in Azkaban.

Countless studies of forbidden magic and frenzied exploration had revealed to him many truths hidden by the Ministry. For example, Dementors—generally believed by most wizards to be natural creatures of darkness—were not naturally formed. Instead, they were products of ancient witch-hunts, born from the terror and resentment of persecuted wizards, shaped by dark magic.

Originally, Dementors existed to shield wizards from church persecution, but after wizards retreated into the magical world and Dementors lost their purpose, they were exiled to Azkaban.

Having uncovered this history, Gu Zhongyan also learned the method of creating Dementors. Yet, the magic was so cruel that he could never bring himself to use it against other wizards; he simply remembered it, expanding his magical repertoire.

However, the emergence of vampires made him realize the spell was not entirely useless.

Pureblood vampires, descendants of the great wizard Varna, possessed innate magical bloodlines, and theoretically could be transformed into Dementors. Furthermore, vampires originated from a magical transformation ritual, akin to the creation of Dementors, sharing certain similarities.

After studying the Vampire Bible, Gu Zhongyan conceived a plan: to use vampires to cultivate an army of Dementors.

This would not only eliminate vampires but also strengthen his own arsenal—why not do it? Using vampires as experimental subjects, he felt no moral burden regardless of success or failure.

Yet, Dementors created from pureblood vampires and the ritual of the Hall of Eternal Night differed significantly from those in the Harry Potter universe.

Although their appearance was similar, the original Dementors were invisible to non-magical people and born of resentment and pain, attacking mainly by absorbing happiness, making them less directly harmful.

Dementors transformed from pureblood vampires, however, possessed physical forms—otherwise, Whistler would not have seen them.

Moreover, their attack method shifted from draining happiness to absorbing the life force of enemies, somewhat resembling vampires’ own blood-sucking.

These Dementors lacked the near-invincibility of the originals; powerful attacks could destroy them. Yet, they inherited vampires’ remarkable regenerative abilities, free from their weaknesses. Unless struck down in a single blow, they could recover from any injury.

In addition, these new Dementors possessed extraordinary strength and speed and could perform spells such as vaporization, invisibility, and freezing—akin to weakened versions of Dracula.

As vampire killers, these new Dementors wielded lethal power against vampires, just like sunlight and silver. They could also enhance their own strength by absorbing vampires’ life force.

Most crucially, these Dementors, crafted by Gu Zhongyan himself, were not mindless like the originals, but entirely under his control, like armored suits of darkness.

With the collapse of the first blood-red cocoon, the remaining eleven soon shattered as well.

In no time, twelve three-meter-tall Dementors crowded the Hall of Eternal Night, the already cold chamber now frosted over with a pale sheen, making Whistler shiver uncontrollably.

Surveying the Dementors encircling him, Gu Zhongyan’s eyes gleamed with satisfaction.

Each Dementor’s power rivaled that of street-level heroes like Matt and Jessica; twelve together formed a force not to be underestimated.

Moreover, he had captured more than twelve pureblood vampires; by his estimation, with his resources and the magic contained in Blade’s blood, he could create about seven batches of Dementors.

Such power would rival the scale of an Avengers film.