In LOTR with Harry Potter system

"Confringo!"

A blazing spell shot forward, slamming into the massive boulder mid-air and detonating it in a fiery explosion. The rock shattered into a rain of pebbles and dust.

Sylas stood firmly at the front, wand still raised, eyes locked on the Stone Giants in the distance. "Gandalf!" he shouted in frustration. "Your plan absolutely did not work!"

Instead of calming them down, Gandalf's theatrics had done the opposite, every Stone Giant was now focused on them with childlike curiosity and an alarming enthusiasm.

"Well," Gandalf replied with an unapologetic shrug, "not everything in life goes quite as expected, does it?"

He added with a mischievous twinkle, "But at least Bilbo and the others are still in one piece, aren't they?"

Sylas groaned and rolled his eyes. 'He's really making jokes right now? At a time like this?' 

"Incoming!" Gandalf shouted suddenly.

Several Stone Giants had gathered up boulders again, massive, jagged chunks of rock, and hurled them like catapults. They arced through the air, glowing under streaks of lightning, each one large enough to flatten a hill.

Sylas paled, raising his wand in both hands and channeling as much magic as he could muster.

"Protego Maxima!"

A brilliant, dome-like shield sprang to life around them, glowing with silver-blue energy. It encased them in a magical fortress of light, humming from the strain of the incoming impact.

But Gandalf didn't remain idle. Gripping his staff, he lifted it high and slammed it into the air. A surge of white-hot energy erupted from its tip, blasting the first wave of falling boulders into dust.

Fragments that rained down were deflected by Sylas's protective barrier, cracking harmlessly against it like heavy hail.

The two of them had fended off the first assault, but it only made things worse.

More Stone Giants cheered and clapped their enormous hands, delighted by the unexpected "game." They reached down for fresh boulders with an almost playful glee.

Sylas glanced at Gandalf, who was already looking ahead grimly.

"This isn't sustainable," Gandalf called out through the wind. "We can't hold them off forever. We'll wear out, and they won't!"

"We need a distraction," Sylas agreed. "Something to block their line of sight, buy time to find Thorin and the others!"

"I have a spell," Sylas added quickly, flipping through his memory. "It might work... but I've never actually tried it before."

"Then don't wait!" Gandalf yelled, blocking another boulder. "Try it now!"

Sylas didn't hesitate.

He summoned his Book of Spells, which materialized in the air and flipped open on its own, pages fluttering rapidly until they stopped on a mist conjuration charm.

He remembered seeing this once, a fog spell used by Dumbledore himself, veiling an entire street in London during his meeting with Newt Scamander. It had obscured the city in a swirling mist, rendering them invisible to onlookers.

He scanned the incantation.

"Nebulus!"

The tip of Sylas's wand shimmered, then erupted with a billowing cloud of mist. The fog spread outward in a spiral, thick and damp, rapidly blanketing the mountainside like waves of smoke.

In the blink of an eye, thick fog engulfed the entire High Pass. The mist was so dense that one couldn't even see a hand in front of their face.

The Rock Giants tried to part the haze with their massive hands, searching for the intruders, but the mist churned endlessly, refusing to clear. Confused and frustrated, they let out thunderous roars and hurled the boulders in their hands into the void at random.

"Well done, Sylas!" Gandalf whispered with rare praise.

Guided by the Palantír, Sylas led them swiftly through the veiled pass. Cloaked in fog and moving between the towering giants, they avoided detection and soon arrived at the place where Thorin and the company had taken shelter.

It was a wide, empty cave—eerily quiet. No signs of movement, no traces of anyone having left.

Gandalf frowned. With a sense of foreboding, he raised his staff and struck the ground. Instantly, the floor gave way beneath them, revealing a dark, narrow chute carved unnaturally into the rock.

"A goblin trap," Gandalf muttered grimly. "Thorin and the others must have been taken!"

"Wait," Sylas said. "Let's not rush in blind. We'll use the Palantír to find out what's happened."

He pulled out the orb, its surface shimmering as it responded to his will. Within moments, a vision appeared: Thorin's company stood deep within an enormous underground cavern, surrounded by thousands of goblins. Rope bridges and rickety ladders crisscrossed the chasm like spiderwebs, and the goblins swarmed everywhere, their yellow eyes glowing in the gloom.

Goblins, smaller than Orcs, with dark green skin and hunched, wiry frames, were a vile breed. Cunning and cowardly, they thrived in the dark, building entire cities underground through theft, ambush, and treachery. Unlike the brutish Uruk-hai or Orc warriors of Mordor, Goblins relied on numbers and traps.

The Dwarves had been disarmed and were now being herded toward a crude wooden throne, where the grotesque Goblin King awaited.

Only Bilbo was missing.

"Ah," Gandalf smiled, seeing it in the vision. "Our little burglar seems to have slipped away unnoticed. Good. That'll make things easier."

Sylas watched silently, but just as he was about to close the vision, the scene shifted. A goblin had spotted Bilbo.

The Hobbit tried to flee, but the goblin lunged at him. The two struggled, and then fell, tumbling down a shadowy fissure beneath the cave.

Sylas gasped, but his hand didn't tremble.

Bilbo landed hard but alive, scraped and sore, yet miraculously unharmed. The goblin, on the other hand, lay twisted and lifeless at the bottom of the chasm.

"Protagonist's luck…" Sylas muttered with a helpless smile.

Anyone else would've broken their neck. But Bilbo? He was up again in moments, brushing off the dirt, eyes wide as he looked around the darkened cavern alone.

After confirming Bilbo was still alive, albeit scraped and shaken, Sylas calmly tucked the Palantír back into his enchanted leather pouch and quickly caught up with Gandalf.

He knew what was coming next. If memory served, Bilbo was about to encounter his destiny, the One Ring itsel, thus beginning the long chain of events that would one day lead to the fall of Sauron.

Sylas had no intention of interfering.

He harbored no desire to touch the Ring or lay claim to its power. That path led only to ruin.

Even the mightiest, Gandalf, Galadriel, Elrond, feared the Ring's influence. He did not believe he would be an exception and be able to resist the one ring's dark corrosion.

He wasn't naïve enough to believe he could wear the Ring without consequence. More likely, he'd become a servant of its will, perhaps even a future Nazgûl, twisted beyond recognition.

So he would keep his distance.

Gandalf and Sylas descended into the heart of the mountain. A suffocating darkness pressed in on all sides. The winding tunnels opened into vast caverns connected by precarious bridges and crumbling stairs. The whole place felt alive, buzzing with goblin voices and the echoes of iron tools scraping stone.

It was a sprawling underground city, crude and chaotic, a labyrinth carved from shadow and greed.

The Dwarves stood in the largest cavern, now prisoners before the grotesque Goblin King.

Unlike the small, wiry goblins who scurried through the tunnels, this creature was monstrously tall, nearly three meters, with a swollen, misshapen head and long, fleshy limbs. He leaned heavily on a staff crowned with a ram's skull, and his pale, slimy skin glistened in the torchlight.

But what made him truly terrifying was his expression: a leering smile full of yellowed teeth, and eyes sharp with cruel intelligence.

The Goblin King paced before his captives, eyeing them like cattle about to be slaughtered. He asked questions, but not because he cared for answers, he enjoyed their fear.

When the goblins brought forth the Dwarves' confiscated belongings, his eyes gleamed at the sight of fine Elven-made gear, evidence, he claimed, that they were spies sent by the Elves.

Then his gaze fell on Thorin's sword.

Orcrist.

Upon discovering Thorin's sword, which had killed many Goblins, he furiously ordered his subordinates to kill them all.