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SD: CH134 - Defying a Dark Lord
🕑 Added 2024-11-04 12:26:08 +0000 UTCLord Voldemort prided himself in his intelligence, his knowledge of magic hitherto unknown and untested by most, and most importantly, on his immortality, one that had even withstood the test of time and destiny and held strong. He was feared, he didn’t suffer fools willingly, nor was he patient with egregious failure. His followers were aware of this, and it helped motivate them to complete the tasks he entrusted them with quickly and efficiently. That and the fact that he was absolutely fine with staying calm and letting his plans come true at the correct time, but no later than that.
Patience and collectivism were Slytherin values, and Voldemort was nothing but the penultimate Slytherin.
But neither patience nor collectivism were things he was interested in entertaining right now. Not after how things had ended.
How could things have gone so wrong?
Lucius’s plan had been quite ambitious, far more than Voldemort himself might have anticipated the man to take up. He had expected him to demonstrate the resurgence of the old crowd, torture some muggles, perhaps kill some blood-traitors and leave messages of pureblood extremism behind. Seeing the old message after all these years would induce fresh terror in the mob’s hearts, something Voldemort could use very effectively.
Instead, Lucius had set up a grand holocaust the likes of which had happened just once during the last war, and even then, the consequences had been limited to Wizarding Britain alone. But Lucius had used other’s personal ambitions, agendas, old feuds and economic needs to fuel his grand master plan that would cripple Britain for good.
And cripple it had. Britain had lost more than half of its DMLE in a single night, along with hundreds of civilians, in an attack that shocked not just Britain, but left entire Europe scarred like Gellert Grindelwald had done at the Lestrange mausoleum in Paris during the Great War.
And Lucius had done it with just economics.
Even Voldemort had to admit that the man’s plan had left him humbled.
So why, oh why had things gone so wrong?
Macnair was dead. The Carrow twins were dead. Yaxley was dead. Selwyn was imprisoned, as was Gibbon and many others. The official news on Lucius was that he was on the run, and for some reason, the Dark Mark on his arm wasn’t responding either. He could have been dead for all Voldemort cared for, but his ‘official’ fugitive status meant an ever-active DMLE scouring every potential hideout for Lucius in and out of the country, making things even more risky for Voldemort to cross borders and get to this place.
His best man was officially a fugitive and in the wind.
The rest of his Inner Circle were either dead or in Azkaban.
A major chunk of the lower-ranked Death Eaters were either killed, or captured or lying low. And he’d be a fool to even consider revealing his current form to any of his sympathisers.
And then there was the way Harry Potter had risen up through the situation. He had met the boy three years ago, and even then, he had demonstrated extraordinary defiance if not skill. No doubt Dumbledore had been training him in secret for all this while. The Malfoy fortune was lost to the DMLE, and Harry Potter had supposedly taken over the mantle of House Black, and gained several acquaintances of political and economic affluence.
Voldemort would have been impressed if he hadn’t been so pissed. The more he interacted with the boy, the more he was convinced that there might have been something to the Prophecy after all.
Another piece of the puzzle that he was wanting, but had no way to get.
Only if he had someone serving him other than the pathetic rat…..
Speaking of…
“CRUCIO!”
The curse lasted for two seconds before he released it, but Wormtail screamed and flailed, as if his brain had caught fire within his skull, spasming violently. It was a pity that the unforgivable required true hatred to fuel it, and despite his tantrum, Voldemort instinctively knew that he needed the rat alive and functioning to continue his plans. Such dichotomy in his emotions weakened the effect of the curse, and while it still hurt like hell, it left Peter breathing and flailing but still very much alive and in full control of his mind and senses.
He scowled. He shouldn’t have had to find himself in this position. After years of wasting away as a wraith, only to be found by Pettigrew and Lucius… Voldemort had truly believed that his time of resurrection was finally at the door.
Lucius. That infuriating idiot. He had truly gone far and aboard to please his Master, but in doing so, had doomed Voldemort to a setback that could potentially take years to rebuild.
A half-arsed ending for a half-arsed effort.
Sloppy. Incompetent. Reckless. Ignorant. Useless…
He swallowed the bile that was rising up his throat. His left hand went up and grabbed the breasts of the muggle woman Wormtail had placed under the Imperius to serve his weird needs. He had no idea why it was important, just that his body did.
“We need more support,” he said at last, letting the rat, now a quivering wreck, to stand back up, his body shaking as he did. “My Inner Circle is locked away in Azkaban, and as I am now, it is difficult to find if Lucius is alive or dead. I need help. Competent help,” he added, as the rat looked like he was going to volunteer himself.
But who should he ask? Who could he ask?
After what happened to Lucius, asking Nott to step in could be a potential possibility. That man had always coveted Lucius’s position, and was consolidating the Dark Alliance in the wake of the Malfoys’ fall. The Selwyns were another option, but Voldemort knew better than to deal with that family without being from the position of strength. Jugson was imprisoned. Parkinson? Gibbon? They were bottom feeders that worked as Lucius’s extensions. With Lucius being a fugitive, the Ministry was likely keeping a strong check on those families.
Avery?
Hmmm. There was a potential option.
Rosier too. Or perhaps, Rowle or Travers? None of those families could boast the financial support as Malfoy, Nott, Selwyn or perhaps Black. The Lestranges were originally from France, before completely shifting to Britain sometime during the war with Grindelwald. Much of their wealth and properties was still in France.
No.
He recollected the news about the French External Affairs Minister. After such an attack, things would be difficult in France too.
Damn it to hell.
No, he needed to look at the bigger picture. The other potential options. With most of his forces decimated, or imprisoned in Azkaban, he would be fighting a far more uphill battle than he had previously estimated. His opponents — Albus Dumbledore, Amelia Bones, and especially Harry Potter were not weaklings. They had their own powers to compete against him.
It was like starting the Death Eaters all over again.
Albus Dumbledore was a known entity. Amelia Bones? Not so much. And Harry Potter? That boy was a mystery wrapped in an enigma, with luck enforced by Prophecy and Destiny.
He needed to know more about his enemies. Needed to counter their strengths, exploit their weakness, attack from the shades and strike at their core with the least resistance possible. Literally.
And that meant finding a new way to operate, a new location to operate from, and new resources to use for his future operations.
Britain was out of the picture. At least for the current situation. France was risky too. Ireland, less but Hogwarts was in close proximity. No, he couldn’t touch it either. The dementors were more likely to attempt to feed on him than join him if he called for them right now. The werewolves would go out of their way to avoid attention after the recent massacre. Not even Greyback would be useful. The vampires…. Well, he’d need the Selwyns for that. That left —
Nagini hissed loudly.
Voldemort turned around. There was… there was someone at the door. And right then, someone knocked on it.
“Who’s — Who’s there?” asked Wormtail, getting up slowly.
“Thousand-pound yenaldooshi.”
Voldemort narrowed his eyes. That voice… It didn’t sound like the Carrows, or Lucius.
“Thousand-pound… Who?”
Eyes narrowed, Voldemort extended his magic like a tendril to sense the intruder….
And then everything began to go wrong.
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Shock was always the most important aspect of warfare. From ancient to modern history, it had always been the crux upon which battles changed from utter defeat to overwhelming victory. In the mediaeval ages, it would be provided by the cavalry arm of each faction. Armoured warriors, covered in enchantment, holding accursed weapons, riding abraxans, charging straight ahead at the enemy, while witches and wizards hurled spellfire from behind as the support staff, thundering down upon the poor, unfortunate fools that made up the infantry line. The initial impact of thousands of pounds of abraxan flesh and rider inflicted such horrendous damage, such psychological shock, that entire formations of men would break and run.
It would be followed by druids activating long-ranged traps for the escapees, while the mages ran lightning and fire from the heavens.
The modern world had changed from cavalry and mages to wards, wardbreakers, and duelists. Lines of people standing along the periphery constantly bombarding against the wards, causing damage to the entire territory, while killing curses ran loose once inside the victim’s house. Transfigured attackers, defensive enchantments, blasting hexes and exploding curses. The methods were new, but the psychology behind them was the same.
Shock the enemy into inaction.
So when a nine-foot tall, and about half a ton of supernaturally powerful muscle blasted the door along with the hinges and half of the wall, and smashed inside, Amelia knew things were on the track. The person on the other side went rag doll, flying back from the impact in an explosive cracking of breaking bone — only to hit the wall on the other side, and dropped down, unmoving.
“AVADA KEDAVRA!” yelled a cold, furious voice.
A disillusioned Amelia levitated a piece of broken plaster to intercept the curse, but it was barely needed. The massive hulking shadow simply leapt to the side, then to the top, and then to the right wall, as if gravity were merely a suggestion, throwing whatever it could find at the twisted abomination that sat on the chair, in the lap of a naked woman that was clearly under the Imperius curse.
My turn, thought Amelia, and twisted her wand.
The imperiused woman instantly rose up in a shriek, the effects of a frenzy hex, hurling the baby off her. The serpent slithering next to her was already snapping at the massive hulking beast which it registered as the most dangerous opponent, and belched out a fog of poisonous venom out of its mouth.
It might as well have tried scolding it.
The behemoth came down from the ceiling, avoiding yet another killing curse, and brought its claws— larger than Amelia’s entire arm down at the serpent, slicing it into five parts with a single slash. Magic surged out of the hacked serpentine form, and a shockwave of magical force exploded out of its body, accompanied by a hideous screech that echoed in both the inside of her skull and outside. The baby-Voldemort screamed in horror with the force of an exploding bomb, and the beast was sent flying against the wall. The abomination levelled its wand at the beast and yelled —
“CRUCI—”
“Vespertilio Mucosus!” snapped Amelia, as boogers erupted out of Voldemort-baby abomination’s nose, and formed into tiny, aggressive bats and viciously swarmed all over its face mid-casting. And right then, Emmeline, who had been equally disillusioned, cast a gouging hex upon the baby’s head, exploding it into gore.
“NOOO!” roared the beast.
Too late.
The sound that erupted out of the headless torso was enough to drive an Occlumens mad. Amelia couldn’t have said what it sounded like, for it was too huge a noise for that. All she could remember was seeing the torso glow with an intense crimson light, and the hairs on the back of her neck rising all at once, and her encasing herself and Emmeline with her strongest shield. The beast simply brought its titanic claws before its head and face and curled into a ball.
It was all that saved their lives.
The shields lit up like a flood light, as a cataclysmic shockwave erupted, and Amelia’s shield orb was hurled into the atmosphere like a cannonball through the walls. She could hear the animalistic roar from inside the flaming dome below, followed by it rising up and expanding into a firestorm of epic proportions, forming a singular face, gigantic and terrifying, carved from the hellish flames.
It was the face of Voldemort.
Her shield orb hit against an invisible barrier, and Amelia had the sensation of being smashed to paste, as the raw energy from the explosion washed over her from every side. Both of them were screaming in pure reflexive protest against Voldemort’s roar, though her voice was lost in the dim.
Her shield orb kept buckling and pushing against the barrier behind her, but to no avail.
For the invisible barrier she had erected right before the attack didn’t so much as flutter.
“DAMN MY ANCESTORS!” Amelia yelled. She had given the Serratura, an artefact capable of erecting a ward more powerful than anything she had seen. Unlike other wards that were employed by wardstones, the Serratura had its origins in blood-based and ritualistic magic, imitating a death-match and offering the sacrifice to the ancient Canaanite god Moloch, who would bless the victor in quality entertainment. As a Bones witch, Amelia had twisted the functions to fit it as a deathmatch between two parties rather than all-in-one massacre.
So long as she, and the invoker, that was Harry Potter, was alive, the shield would not break.
That knowledge however, would not keep both of them from being sandwiched and scorched. Amelia hissed in pain as her hands began to blister and scald from the raging heat, and Emmeline had to switch from supporting the shield to cast freezing charms and keep themselves from being barbequed. Trapped between the invisible barrier behind, and Voldemort’s rage before them, they might as well be two muggles seeking shelter behind a stone against an incoming hurricane.
She could feel the power of Voldemort’s wrath as it touched her shield; feel the raw, undiluted hate driving it. It wasn’t any mortal emotion. It was hate of the original vintage, hate as old as the universe itself, hate as hard and sharp and cold as steel, hate as hot as the flames of Hell, hate so vital, so vicious, so vitriolic, that it surpassed the understanding of her merely mortal mind.
Voldemort hated her. Personally, and on a level that she couldn’t even begin to understand. That she walked the Earth and drew breath was enough to earn his everlasting fury.
But that was just a shadow of what he felt towards the beast, towards Harry Potter.
That was personal.
Ever since the night of her resurrection, Amelia had been able to feel a strange sense of connection to Harry Potter, one that had nothing to do with the romantic or sexual interests she had in him, or the Potter-Bones contract for that matter. Maybe it had something to do with the fact that it was his magic that had dragged her soul from the Afterlife, reforged it, and put it back into her mortal shell, but she could feel him. Feel him on a level that she couldn’t really comprehend, much less explain.
A connection that was currently allowing her to see things directly through Harry’s eyes.
And yes, Harry’s eyes, not the nightmarish beast he had transformed into. She watched him raise his wand against the deluge of flame and whisper.
“Devour.”
It was like a command upo the world itself, imposed by the will of an impossible force. Fumes as dark as midnight surged out of Harry Potter, cloaking his entire form so densely that he might as well be a dementor, while wintry fumes formed all around him, covering the immediate terrain with genuine sheets of ice, another similarity with the dementorish aura. The freeze extended, stretching and thickening, coating everything in near inch-thick sheets of frozen shelling, with ice erupting with violent force at points, forming stalagmites. Within a second, the entire area around him mimicked a veritable ice-age.
And then the powers collided.
Wherever the red energy touched, the ground melted and flaked away, scorching at the edges and bursting into flame. It was like the wind itself was on fire. The house had already erupted, the terrain itself crackling, and Amelia was certain that the Serratura’s invisible barrier was now visible to anyone within sight as a red dome shining with malevolent light, ready to explode. The flaming Voldemort-face roared again, a tsunami of pure force, and smashed against Harry Potter.
But his defence head.
His barrier of fumes held strong.
Amelia watched in fascination and disbelief as a cold, tranquil darkness formed around her, a sphere of black radiance that deflected the incoming wrath, like an obdurate stone standing strong against an angry tide. And in that crash, Harry stood, a being of pure defiance, a silhouette, unbreakable and unmovable against the tide.
In that moment, Amelia Bones understood why Harry Potter was revered as the Boy-Who-Lived.
And then it was over. The blast ended. Harry had done it. He had stopped it. With his necromancy. Amelia could see the smoke arising from his body, remnants of black soot forming all around him, held back by an armour of true blackness.
And then he dropped down to one knee, and a surge of agony shot through her, and the connection was interrupted, and the next moment, she was falling down to the ground. She sensed her fellow compatriot cast anti-velocity spells to slow their descent until both of them were safe down on the ground.
That didn’t mean it was over yet.
Not while the Dark Lord was properly dealt with.
“USELESS! YOUR ATTEMPTS TO KILL ME ARE USELESS, HARRY POTTER!” boomed Voldemort’s voice again. “YOU WILL DIE JUST LIKE YOUR MUDBLOOD MOTHER AND USELESS FATHER, AND THESE BLOOD-TRAITORS WILL SHARE YOUR FATE!”
Lord Voldemort, now reduced to a wraith with malevolent red eyes, staring at them with undisguised hate. Before that gaze, Amelia felt small and wanting. But knowing that the man had lost the power to affect her in any way that she didn’t allow herself, she glared back.
“Really?” said Harry slowly, pulling himself back up. “Because the way I look at it, we just kicked your arse.”
“Dark Lord Voldemort,” said Amelia, feeling a surge of satisfaction at the shock in the wraith’s face at her lack of hesitation at speaking his name. “We have come to put you in the past where you belong. For your crimes, I sentence you to oblivion.”
She raised her wand.
The wraith threw his head back and laughed. “FOOLS! I CANNOT BE KILLED! I AM LORD VOLDEMORT, AND HAVE LONG PAST SHREDDED THE SHACKLES OF MORTALITY! I AM—”
“A mouthy piece of shit,” said Harry Potter, flicking his wand and drawing entire rune sequences in mid-air at a speed that made her jealous. She could spot a generous use of the Othila rune, signifying separation, Nauthiz, the rune of constraint, and Thurisa, the rune symbolising gateways. At the back of her mind, she could instantly tell that whatever he was crafting, it had to be something related to confinement. A trap.
For Voldemort.
With a rash sideward flick, he completed the entire sequence with the Kano rune, creating an opening, and levelled his wand at the wraith.
“Now, Accio Lord Voldemort.”
The shock in the wraith’s eyes was almost hilarious as it was physically pulled towards Harry, who directed its trajectory directly into the rune sequence. With a control that was impossible for someone like her, much less a sixteen-year-old, Harry safely pushed the runic scheme, as well as the entrapped Voldemort inside it, directly into an ornate ritual dagger fallen on the ground at his feet.
And then it was done.
And then, for the second time, Harry was down on his knees.
“Harry!” screamed Amelia, and rushed towards him, with Emmeline right after her. She hastily checked him for injuries but found none. Emmeline on the other hand, magically levitated the dagger and was observing it, checking from potential psychic leakage. It would not do for the spirit entrapped inside to psychically manipulate an unsuspecting observer into unsealing it in any way.
“Don’t worry,” said Harry. “He won’t get out. And even if it tries…. Well, DOBBY!”
Instantly, Harry’s batty elf popped in, ready with a thick and heavy-looking chest. With a snap of his fingers, the elf opened it, showing that the insides were paved with thick slabs of lead. Emmeline lowered the dagger into the box, and Dobby sealed it back, and added physical locks on all sides.
“I want to make the box as magically-inert as possible,” said Harry.
“Where are you going to put it?” Amelia asked.
“Ideally, I’d like to sink it to the bottomless depths of the ocean, but we might need to perform inspections on it from time to time. At least until we are certain he’s gone for good.”
“Gone for good?” asked Amelia. “We just destroyed his body and trapped his wraith.”
“There are ways in which he can return, Director,” said Emmeline softly.
Amelia noted the look in the Obliviator’s eyes and scowled, not liking the fact that Harry had entrusted Emmeline with information he had hid from her.
Then she regarded Harry.
“I have questions.”
“I know,” said Harry blearily. “You and everyone else. Just wait until the party Hermione and Hestia are setting up. I’ll answer all your questions. For now, take my word that we are not quite done with Voldemort. Not yet at least.”
He looked at the chest, and smiled. The look on his face, the satisfaction, it didn’t belong to a sixteen-year-old, but a war veteran, someone that had been through the grinder for far too long, only to see it end.
It was such a smile.
“Goodbye Lord Voldemort,” said Harry Potter. “I hope you enjoy your immortality.”
He looked at the elf.“Dobby, go ahead with the plan.”
The elf made a funny little salute and popped away with the trunk.
“Where did you send him?”
The smile didn’t vanish from Harry’s lips. “Somewhere he’d finally get a bit of rest. And perhaps, appreciate a bit of irony.”
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Hundreds of miles away, an elf appeared in the middle of St. Mary’s Catholic Cemetery, located in Kensal Green in London. The burial ground, apart from being the resting place of over a hundred and fifty thousand Roman catholics, was also the closest cemetery to Wool’s Orphanage, a place where Tom Riddle grew up as a child. The elf snapped its frail-looking fingers, and the earth near its feet rose up. Scrunching his face, the elf waved his left hand, and dropped the heavy chest into the ground, seven feet below, and covered it with the floating earth. Another wave of his hands, this one more meticulous, and the ground was morphed into a proper burial, complete with a headstone.
Dobby glanced at the tomb next to it, the one marked MEROPE GAUNT, and scrunched his face thoughtfully, remembering the words his master had told him. A curious movement of his fingers later, an ornate epitaph formed on the headstone, complete with the name. It read…
TOM MARVOLO RIDDLE
1926 - 1996
Safe from Death, at last.
Comments
Penthuisiast
Don't worry, this chapter isn't even the End of Book 3. And there's a ton of story content left.
Hadrian v.E.
So is this like the near of book 1, so to speak? Because I feel there's still a lot of story to tell. Maybe the story will increase the rate of plot for the next several arcs, starting with the TWT, where the public will really starting to understand that this is Harry 2.0. Also, Daphne and Fleur haven't fully fallen into his orbit yet, so I can't imagine the story from being over.
Elton2K Dre
Cool chapter. Thought Harry was going to chuck him through the veil.
HotSauce
Wow. Kind of an abrupt end to the story but can’t complain after 100+ chapters
Alkole
Maybe even found a ritual he can use his soul in to absorb or something
Alkole
I mean idk personally I wouldn't leave him somewhere where it's possible for someone to stumble upon him. Shoulda just chucked him into a gringotts vault or something
jp9901
So... I don't... did Voldemort's reign end before it even got started? Is this the end of this story? I love how Harry essentially reburied Voldemort but now I'm wondering what's next!
allen pellissery
Karma has come for lord voldemort
