Nero exhaled sharply, his gaze sharpening. "Are you saying Bullock was just a puppet? That soone, so mastermind, was pulling the strings from the shadows?"
Dumbledore didn't answer imdiately.
Instead, he reached into a small, locked drawer within his desk and withdrew a parchnt.
He unfolded it, revealing an aged, almost crumbling page written in an archaic script.
"This," he said softly, "is the only known personal account attributed to Owle Bullock."
Nero leaned closer, reading the passage.
'To possess a piece of one's soul, to anchor oneself beyond the veil... such is a power that transcends mortality. But beware, for the soul is not a thing to be trifled with. When it is torn, it does not rely shatter, it cries out. And in the void, sothing listens.'
A weight settled in Nero's stomach. He slowly looked up at Dumbledore.
"Sothing listens?"
Dumbledore's expression was unreadable. "That, Nero, is what I fear most. If Herpo the Foul was the first, if Owle Bullock docunted and expanded upon the thod... then Tom Riddle may not have been acting alone in his quest for immortality. There may have been... influences."
Nero felt his blood run cold. "You an Voldemort might not be the only one out there?"
Dumbledore's silence was answer enough.
For a mont, neither spoke. The weight of the conversation pressed heavily upon them.
Nero clenched his fists. "Then we have to find the Bullock family. We have to figure out what Tom learned, what he used to make those new types of Horcruxes."
Dumbledore sighed, his gaze sharpening with resolve. "The path ahead grows darker, Nero. I will follow this lead myself... for now. But should the need arise, I may call upon you."
Nero t the old wizard's gaze and smirked slightly. "Grandpa, you should know by now: I wouldn't miss this for anything. We share the sa goal."
Dumbledore chuckled softly, though the mirth didn't quite reach his eyes. "That, my boy, is both a comfort and a cause for concern."
"Do you have any leads towards finding the Bullocks?" asked Nero.
Dumbledore's lips curled into a small, knowing smile before he stood, moving toward a large bookshelf at the far side of the room.
With a gentle flick of his wand, several books floated aside, revealing a hidden compartnt.
He reached inside and pulled out an ancient, leather-bound to, its cover worn with age.
"I suspected that, one day, I would have to trace the Bullock family," Dumbledore admitted, setting the book on his desk and opening it with careful fingers.
"Owle Bullock, the author of Secrets of the Darkest Arts, was an enigma. He vanished centuries ago, and his descendants have taken great pains to erase their existence from public knowledge."
Nero leaned forward, scanning the aged parchnt. "Then how do we even begin to track them?"
Dumbledore's eyes glead, a sign that, despite the gravity of the situation, he relished the challenge. "Every family leaves a trail, no matter how faint. The trick is knowing where to look."
He tapped the book's pages, and the ink began to shift, forming a list of recorded transactions and legal docunts connected to the Bullock na.
"This is a collection of their known dealings. It is sparse, deliberately so, but there are whispers of a hidden lineage that retreated into obscurity after Owle's disappearance."
Nero traced one of the nas on the page. "Aurelius Bullock... last recorded in 1792."
Dumbledore nodded. "Indeed. The last openly acknowledged mber of the Bullock family. However, there are rumors..."
...that they never truly died out," Nero finished, his mind racing. "They just went deeper into hiding."
Dumbledore smiled approvingly. "Precisely. And I believe our best chance of finding them lies in Europe, where traces of their legacy still linger. You see, Aurelius Bullock was no ordinary wizard. So say he was deeply involved in the practice of dark magic, specifically, rituals and spells that pushed the boundaries of what was considered acceptable. Others claim he vanished into the Black Forest, having unlocked a form of forbidden magic so dark it would have driven any sane wizard to madness. So even believe he found a way to manipulate the very essence of life and death itself."
Nero's pulse quickened at this explanation. "You an... Aurelius Bullock, or his legacy could have influenced Voldemort down this path!?"
Dumbledore's eyes grew distant, as if he were peering into a long-forgotten past. "The Bullock family's connection to the darkest arts runs deep: necromancy, rituals that twisted the laws of nature, and curses that haunted their bloodline. There are even whispers that Aurelius, in his desperate quest for immortality, sought to bind himself to sothing far darker than anything we can imagine."
Nero leaned in closer, his voice barely a whisper. "You think they might have found another way to cheat death?"
"Attempted, at least," Dumbledore confird, his voice steady, but his gaze filled with concern. "And there are those who claim that Aurelius, in his final years, experinted with ways to seal mories. So say these mories were stored in physical objects: jars, vessels, containers hidden across Europe. These 'mory vaults,' as they are called, were said to hold fragnts of forbidden knowledge, secrets that could change the course of history, in worse."
Nero's eyes widened. "So, there are mories sealed away... mories that could tell us everything?"
"Yes," Dumbledore replied, his tone grave. "But unlocking them will be a dangerous endeavor. The Bullocks' power was not just in their knowledge, it was in their secrecy. To uncover their hidden mories is to risk unleashing a force that could rewrite everything we know. It may hold the key to understanding what happened to Owle Bullock, and why his descendants are so desperate to remain forgotten."
Nero exhaled slowly, his thoughts racing. "So, you are heading to Europe."
"Not imdiately," Dumbledore corrected, closing the book with a decisive snap. "I must first verify that our path is correct. Rushing forward without certainty could prove disastrous."
Nero frowned, but he knew the old wizard was right. "So, research first. Then, we find them."
Dumbledore closed the book with a decisive snap. "And when we do, we may finally uncover the true nature of their legacy, and what price they paid for wielding such dark magic."
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