1890, 4th of May

Unplottable desert

00:02

-It has to be here, Albus!

A young male voice pierced the tranquil silence of the desert night. The Sun was long gone taking with itself the last vestiges of the day and it's horrid, unbearable heat. The night brought blessed cold, perhaps just as unbearable and stifling as the day's heat, but the young man appeared utterly unbothered by it. His unnaturally golden eyes were shining with such excitement that any lesser soul gazing upon them would have lost itself in desires incomprehensible for it. In all honesty the shine wasn't all that natural also, judging by the faint glow the eyes manifested everywhere they gazed upon. Not perturbed by their glow at all, the young man's companion let a gentle sigh to escape his lips.

-We have talked about this, Gellert! It won't be our first dead end neither it will be our last if it proves to be not here!

Gellert, as he was apparently named, scowled fiercely and muttered something in the crisp night that was strangely sounding like 'kill joy'. He moved his right hand in speed completely unbelievable, a blur in the air that normal sight couldn't hope to follow or anticipate. The graceful ark artfully created upon the canvas of space was followed by a sound not so dissimilar to a small bomb and the closest dune to the two men erupted with such force that the air seemed to implode on itself. From the hundreds of tons of sand the faint form of snake was barely visible, just two meters away from the auburn haired youth named Albus.

-Avada Kedavra!

Unholy green glow for a moment blocked everything else from sight accompanied by a rushing sound somehow carrying imminent death in it's nature. The snake that had opened it's mouth and bared it's fangs in an attempt to bite Albus was dead the instant the green light touched it's body, eyes empty and cold in dead. The saved man simply frowned in obvious distaste and tsked while billions of sand particles were raining around him, strangely not touching either of the two men.

-Let's go, Gellert! The night is young but not eternal.

With these words Albus pirouetted gracefully on the spot and simply vanished with almost imperceptible small pop.

-A simple thank you would have been enough! - Gellert scowled and muttered knowing all too well his companion will be hearing him no matter the physical distance of more than 2 kilometers that separated them in this instant. - Who am I kidding, you are far away from damsel in distress anyway!

Another gentle circle on the spot and Gellert disappeared also with even less noise than his companion if that was at all possible. And reappeared right on top of a poor scorpion that was crushed by his weight.

-Ugh, damn wretches are everywhere…

Albus smirked but didn't add anything knowing full well his friend's attention will soon completely move away from the creatures of the night and refocus on the stone obelisks that stood guard before a dark archway leading seemingly in nothing but darkness itself. The strong light from his wand that was giving enough light to see in the moonless night didn't pierce the dark and gloom of the archway in the least.

-Gellert, if you will? - Albus gently prodded for attention.

The golden eyed man stopped muttering under his breath and looking at the bottom of his boot and the scorpion innards still left there. The moment his attention fell upon the archway his breath left his chest in one go, as if shocked by the secret he already knew it will be here. Raising his hand, Gellert started to trace complicated designs in the air that would have been too hard to remember and recall properly even for the best trained of spies and mutter almost incomprehensibly. The air around them suddenly got a whole new type of chill that raised the hairs of the neck of the watching man.

-Horribilis Obstructum!

A wave of dark energy left Gellert's wand, an impossibly black wave that carried such purpose and malice in itself that even standing whole three meters away Albus felt it rattle his bones with tremendous power and ground his teeth in order to not instinctively make a step away. The moment the dark magic touched the archway a sizzling sound appeared as if the corrosiveness of the counter curse was eating away the obstructing darkness of the entrance. Not more than a few blinks of the eye later with the sound of torn parchment the darkness disappeared and the light from Albus' wand finally pierced and revealed the corridor ahead.

The two men confidently entered the ancient building barely paying any attention to the exquisite pictures and numerous hieroglyphs that littered the walls to the point of leaving no bare stone in sight. Every sense, natural and preternatural alike was strained to it's maximum capacity waiting for the barest of whispers of traps, be it mundane or magical. Thus concentrated the faint sound of shuffling on the stone didn't escape the notice of the two mages. A gentle but completely obstructing the view mist blocked their path the moment they took the turn the corridor laid before them.

-What is with these ancient Egyptians and blocking the view? A man will think they feared blindness above all else.

The humor in Gellert's voice was unmistakable and it made Albus' lips twitch a little. Stealing a glance in the direction of his friend, he asked:

-Inferi?

-Inferi. - Gellert agreed easily. - Such a disappointing lack of imagination, almost insulting really. Let's clear away that 'mighty' protection left for us.

Taking a deep breath enough for a few seconds hold, Gellert stepped into the mist careful to not inhale any of it knowing Albus was doing the same a step behind him. Four, five steps that unnaturally echoed in his ears and the mist parted right before his eyes revealing a cavernous room with epic proportions, a hundred meters in every direction. Not surprisingly a few thousand inferi were keeping them company, the hosts if you wanted to be humorous about the situation. Judging them unchallenging, Gellert turned his back to them to look in Albus' direction. What he saw was the wide eyes on a shocked face and instinctively whirled around to the room he uncaringly turned his back a moment ago. Standing just two meters from him with open gleaming teeth and outstretched hands was an inferius clothed in once expensive clothes that now were barely more than rags on its bony skeleton. His brain stuttered from shock, that was simply impossible! Inferi were so slow and the closest one from him was at least 30 meters away! He turned his back for barely a second, there was no way an inferius could close the distance between them in that amount of time. But there it was, pungent breath of death and empty eye sockets, still moving in his direction.

A rush of wind and bright flash appeared from his right. The inferius combusted in yellowish flames that cracked merrily, eager to consume everything and anything they were released upon. A cursed fire just a step below Fiendfyre.

-What happened? - he asked unwilling to turn his back to the room again and gazing upon the unmoving inferi intently.

-That… that thing moved so fast! - the shock was unmistakable in Albus' voice. Unsettled tone that could seldom be heard from the young but extremely skilled and confident wizard. - We will get the challenge you lamented, Gellert! Prepare your wand and don't play with children's magic, we have to be serious!

All worry evaporated from their faces, their breath evened out and unknown to them synchronized to each other. One beat of the heart, two. Than the two sorcerers exploded in a shower of movement, magic and power. Twin shouts of 'Fiendfyre' echoed in the cavernous room followed by heat so fierce it threatened to steal every last drop of moisture from the air forever. An army of beasts snarling, growling and hissing emerged from the blue and ruby colored flames the mages produced and attacked the undead with vengeance and hunger that could not be satisfied until it burned the whole creation itself.

For a while it seemed to work and the graceful dance of the two men cleared half of the undead army in the span of two or three short minutes. But now standing in the middle of the chamber something shifted in the air and the inferi's faces stretched in grotesque smiles as the cursed and potent fyre suddenly stopped consuming them. For all it's infallibility and hunger the Fiendfyre raged and raged, but the enchanted corpses stood a macabre sight closing in a tight ring around the mages, ever closer and smiling wider.

Beads of perspiration formed on his brow from the effort of completely controlling the cursed fyre lest they be consumed also in it, Albus twirled his wand with purpose and a circle three meters in radius away from the pair raised from the ground. The high to the knees wall found itself rapidly transfigured to pure onyx, a feat many Masters in the art of Transfiguration would find themselves hard pressed to accomplish even in completely safe and calm environment. A bare glance from Gellert in his direction told him his plan was acknowledged and he refocused his attention on the cursed flames. The ruby fyres tripled in size and intensity while the sapphire blue lessened a little and parts of it formed daggers in the air. Moved by invisible hands and iron will the daggers scratched runes in the onyx wall with such speed and precision that the eye trying to follow them would fail in dizzy run to follow even a single of the thousand rows.

Twenty seconds later the wall was completely covered in eldritch symbols, runes and schematics of magics so far out of the regular witch and wizard grasp that a muggle would have had the same chance of casting and understanding them, precisely none. In frightening synchrony the two wizards traced figures in the air, graceful as dance. The dry and burned air wept from the new forces invoked in reality that managed to chill it disregarding the mightiest of cursed flames as if it was a small bonfire. A ghostly hands of blackened flesh with silver veins appeared for a blink of the eye, touched an inferius or a beast of flame and all that they left in their wake was a pile of ash. Not more than ten seconds since the great magic started the only thing left in the chamber were the two panting wizards and countless piles of ash, the last vestiges of magic and enchantments consumed by their combined might.

-Magic to magic, ash to ash… - two whispers uttered the finalizing part of the dark curse. Acknowledgment of destruction hardly matched by anything short of legends and myths of eras long gone.

Gellert scoffed and cracked his neck. Even if his face was showing apathy his eyes were alight with intrigue and respect. Both of the males were intimately aware that what they judged to be an easy challenge proved to be a test that brought them to the very limits of their magical skills. Lesser men would have perished in an instant in this room and perhaps even they couldn't manage the task single-handedly without the support of the other. Infinitely more careful than a few minutes ago they turned to the exit of the chamber with the intention of moving ahead. The movement was followed by surprised curse words falling from Albus' mouth.

Before the gate was standing a creature of the past, a Sphinx.