Hello, guys!
Because of the holiday season, I want to celebrate with you in two ways.
The first is that, starting today, Monday the 22nd until Sunday, January 4th, I will publish daily chapters so you have plenty to read during these holidays.
After that date, I will return to my usual schedule.
The second surprise is that, starting December 24th, I will activate a 50% discount on all tiers of my Patreon.
The promotion will be active for 2 weeks, ending on January 6th.
If you wanted to read the advanced chapters, this is your chance.
Merry Christmas!
Mike.
Patreon / iLikeeMikee
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Chapter 50: Ravenclaw's Diadem
The library was silent, but Timothy's mind was thunder.
His obsession, which had been temporarily satiated by his trip to France, had returned with renewed fury. He was sitting in his usual corner of the library, but he wasn't studying. He was staring at a blank page in his notebook, his passion burning.
The failure to archive Harry's Invisibility Cloak had been a wound to his intellectual pride. It was irrefutable proof that his knowledge, his Archive, was incomplete. The notes from Flamel that Dumbledore had provided were a revelation: the Hallows were "Conceptual Anchors". Magic that was the concept, not merely using it.
His logical mind, now passionate about this new paradigm, devised a new plan.
'I cannot archive the Cloak', he thought, his quill tapping the parchment. 'Not yet. The concept of "Death" or "Negation" is a void my Archive cannot comprehend. But... what about the other artifacts?'.
If he couldn't understand the Hallows, then he would collect and analyze other objects of similar conceptual power. He needed more data. He needed specimens. His mind went to his Archive of the original story. Voldemort. The other wizard obsessed with mastering Death. His Horcruxes.
They were the antithesis of the Hallows. If the Hallows were pure conceptual magic, the Horcruxes were corrupt conceptual magic. They were broken souls, forcibly anchored to mundane objects. They were the perfect study specimen. He already had one: Riddle's diary, archived and neutralized. And thanks to that diary, and the memories of his past life, he knew exactly where the second one was.
It was here. In the castle. Less than a hundred meters from where he sat.
The Diadem of Rowena Ravenclaw.
An excited smile touched his lips. A Founder's artifact, imbued with the magic of "Wisdom", corrupted by the magic of Riddle's "Broken Soul". Two layers of conceptual magic waiting to be dissected. It wasn't a "maybe". It was a fact. It was no longer just about archiving knowledge. It was about collecting power.
He closed his book. The "Ki" Project could wait. Tonight, he was going hunting.
Timothy left the library, his mind burning with a new purpose. He moved through the corridors of Hogwarts with controlled haste, his Ravenclaw robes billowing behind him. Other students were heading to their common rooms for curfew. He was heading to the seventh floor.
He reached the stretch of bare wall opposite the tapestry of Barnabas the Barmy. The corridor was empty. He stopped, his mind focused. He knew this place better than his own bedroom. The Room of Requirement had answered his will for two years, but tonight he didn't need his usual laboratory. He knew from the memories of his past life that the Room had another function: a storehouse for a thousand years of Hogwarts secrets.
'The place where everything is hidden', he thought.
He began to walk. It wasn't a casual stroll. Every step was intentional. His Occlumency closed in to focus his will on a single concept. He passed the wall three times, his intent sharpening with each turn. I need the Room of Hidden Things.
On the bare stone wall, a door began to form. It wasn't his usual door. It was rough, made of old, weathered wooden planks. It looked like the door to a forgotten shed. Timothy placed his hand on the cold, rusted doorknob. He opened the door.
The air that rushed out of the room hit him first: stale, thick, smelling of thousand-year-old dust, rotting parchment, and the faint, sickly scent of stagnant dark magic. He took a step inside, and the door closed behind him with a dull thud.
He stopped, his mind taking in the scale of the place. It wasn't a room. It was a cathedral.
The ceiling was so high it was lost in darkness, and the room stretched into the gloom further than his Lumos could illuminate. It was filled, floor to ceiling, with the detritus of a millennium of teenage magic. Mountains of broken furniture, alleyways of banned books, and thousands of expired potion bottles.
"Incredible", he whispered. His passion for knowledge skyrocketed. This wasn't a warehouse; it was the physical archive of Hogwarts.
His first reaction was to activate the perception Luna had helped him unlock. He unfocused his gaze, turning off his analytical mind and simply viewing the magical spectrum.
It was a mistake. He almost drowned.
The Room wasn't just physical chaos; it was conceptual chaos. If the Ravenclaw common room was a hum of auras, this was a tidal wave. He saw the miasma of a million failed spells, the sickly green glow of forbidden dark artifacts, the sticky pale pink of love potions expired centuries ago. It was a graveyard of residual magic, a psychic noise so dense it was impenetrable.
'Too much noise', he realized, closing his eyes and rubbing his temples. His new ability was useless here. It was like trying to hear a whisper in the middle of an explosion.
He stepped back, his mind searching for a different method. He couldn't use Luna's perception. He had to use his own Archive. He didn't need to see the Diadem's magic. He needed to feel Riddle.
He stood still again, this time with his eyes closed. His Occlumency activated, not as a shield, but as a filter. He ignored the noise, the chaos of dead auras. He searched for a specific signature, a frequency he knew intimately: arrogance, cold hatred, the broken consciousness of Tom Riddle. He felt the echo of the diary.
His mind expanded, combing the vast room. And then... he found it.
It wasn't a scream, like the diary's. It was a whisper. A weak, lethargic, but unmistakable pulse. It was the same sour, arrogant note. A dormant soul fragment. It was at the back of the room, to the left.
He opened his eyes, his heart now beating with the thrill of the hunt. He moved with silent purpose, climbing a mountain of broken chairs, sliding through a narrow alley of forgotten wardrobes. The smell of dark magic became stronger, the air colder. He followed the sensation, the familiar repulsion he now associated with Voldemort's magic.
He stopped in a small clearing amidst the junk. And there it was. An ugly stone bust of a wizard wearing an absurd wig. And on top of the wig, like a forgotten joke, was a small, delicate tiara.
It was tarnished by time, covered in a thick layer of dust and grime. It looked worthless. But when Timothy activated his "vision" again, now knowing where to look, he saw the truth.
The object was screaming.
A thick purplish-black aura clung to the diadem, twisting like oily smoke. It was the corruption of the Horcrux. But beneath that... he felt something else. It was a pale blue light, so faint it had almost been extinguished. It was magic of astounding purity and complexity. Wisdom. It was the magical signature of Rowena Ravenclaw herself.
He was looking at a perfect specimen: a Founder's artifact, defiled by the darkest soul magic known.
Timothy reached out, his fingers brushing the cold metal of the diadem. There was no fear. There was no hesitation. Only the focused passion of a collector about to acquire a priceless specimen. He took the Diadem from the stone bust.
The instant his skin made full contact, the soul fragment inside screamed. It was a psychic shriek of terror and rage, an echo of Tom Riddle's arrogance feeling violated. The dark magic lashed out at him, trying to corrupt him, possess him, destroy him.
It was completely pathetic.
Timothy didn't even flinch. His Occlumency was a fortress of steel, and this weak replica of consciousness was a baby crying outside his walls. It was much weaker than the diary.
"Noisy", muttered Timothy.
He didn't give the fragment a chance to fight. His mind, his secret Archive, imposed itself. It wasn't a negotiation; it was an acquisition. His intent was absolute. "Archive".
The effect was instant. His Archive didn't just copy the soul fragment; it absorbed it. It was like a conceptual vacuum cleaner, ripping the echo of Riddle's soul from the metal and deconstructing it into pure data. The psychic shriek cut off, silenced instantly.
The soul fragment was cataloged.
And with it came the memories. His Archive updated. He saw a younger, more arrogant Riddle, charming the Grey Lady. He saw Riddle entering this very room, hiding the Diadem. And he saw more. He saw the other anchors. He saw a dark cave by the sea, full of Inferi. He saw a decrepit shack on a hill. He saw a gold ring with a cracked black stone. He saw the flash of pride as Riddle created the Gaunt Ring Horcrux.
In a second, the location of two more Horcruxes (the Ring and the Locket in the cave) was neatly cataloged in his mind.
Timothy opened his eyes. He held the Diadem in his hand. The horrible purplish-black aura was gone. Riddle's stain had been erased. What remained was the original artifact. But it was dirty. A thousand years of dust and grime clung to it.
"Unacceptable", he whispered.
With a lazy gesture of his free hand—a stylistic gesture he liked, completely unnecessary but aesthetically pleasing—he cast a series of complex cleaning and restoration charms.
The dust evaporated. The grime vanished. The tarnished metal shone, revealing an almost white silver. The central stone, which had looked like a piece of opaque glass, now glowed with a soft, deep blue light. The magic of Rowena Ravenclaw's Wisdom sang in his hands.
It was beautiful. A wave of pure possessiveness washed over him. Destroy it? Like Dumbledore undoubtedly would? 'What a waste'.
Destroying it would be a crime. It would be destroying data. It was a Founder's artifact, now purified. And, more importantly, the concept of a Horcrux, the magic of soul splitting, was fascinating. He now had two specimens to study: the "conscious" diary and the "sleeping" diadem. He was a collector, and he had just acquired a masterpiece.
With extreme care, he stored Ravenclaw's Diadem in his seven-compartment trunk, next to his growing collection of impossible artifacts. His second collected Horcrux.
He left the Room of Hidden Things, the door disappearing behind him. His mind was already working. His alliance with Daphne Greengrass would give him the blood magic books he needed to study the soul.
And his Archive now had a new target for the next Hogsmeade weekend: a visit to the ruined Gaunt shack in Little Hangleton.
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Mike.
Patreon / iLikeeMikee