Chapter 281: Salazar Slytherin

Chapter 281: Salazar Slytherin

"Now all that's left is to deal with you sir portrait or should I say Salazar Slytherin?" Nick said mockingly and the portrait took on a cold arrogant expression. "How did you figure me out?" the founder asked calmly but with a slight menacing chill. "I told you already didn't I? I am more knowledgeable about souls than you ever were. That ritual of Herpo the foul's leaves a permanent taint on the users soul that anyone sensitive to spiritual energy could spot from miles away. It also didn't help that the magic used to animate portraits wasn't created until about a century after your disappearance from the school." Nick said with a mocking smile.-

Salazar snorted angrily and much to Nick's amazement stepped out of the portrait and stood before him in the flesh. "It matters not I suppose since you won't be leaving this place alive." Salazar said as he pulled out a long wand from his robe that Nick recognized as a branch of the golden apple tree in the Ravenclaw vault. At first glance it looked like Slytherin had full mastery over it but to nick's magical senses it was a very different story.-

From that moment on he started to set a trap for Slytherin to force him to use his projection leaving his phylactery unprotected. Salazar Slytherin had nothing to blame for having his phylactery destroyed other than his own arrogance. Much like the diary soul shard he had underestimated Nick far too much and paid the ultimate price for it. He couldn't be blamed though since from the looks of things Nick had cheated to a large degree in order to kill the basilisk. Tying it down and have multiple roosters crow at the same time didn't really take much skill in magic after all.-

Unlike with the horcruxes it took quite a long time for the phylactery to be destroyed by the Nazgul ring since it contained a complete soul. Some might think that this victory should have been impossible given Slytherins power and experience but in truth the man made several mistakes that lead to this outcome. The first was already mentioned as his arrogance lead to him underestimating Nick. The second was that his projection couldn't leave the painting for very long as the ambient mana simply wasn't enough to support his existence.-

This meant that by placing his phylactery in such a location he had grown very rusty over the last thousand years since there was no new knowledge available to learn. He had effectively trapped himself in the chamber of secrets until someone came along able to take his phylactery out. The third and final mistake he made was not considering that with his knowledge of souls Nick might have had a way to destroy his phylactery. All of these mistakes together had lead to Salazar Slytherin meeting his end after a thousand years at the hands of a second year student.