Nott a Problem

After Harry asked Dudley to look into the book of Sacred Gears to find any new information about Daphne's, he had the Knight Bus drop him off in the area, and walked the rest of the way to the Nott estate while his Invisibility Cloak was active.

The wards around the property were so incredible, they even put Grimmauld Place to shame. Despite how suspicious the lengths the Nott's went through to protect their home, they were still wizarding wards.

He could have blasted them with his powers as a devil, but he was able to slip by, undetected, with the Hallow that he knew best.

When he finally entered the manor, Harry was struck by the rank sense of death underneath the house. He scoured the house for any means into the basement but found none. Eventually, Harry gave up and blasted a hole in the floor.

Only to gag and fight the urge to vomit his last meal onto the floor.

Blood splattered the walls, people lie scattered across the room in a ritualistic configuration. Harry recognized them from Voldemort's knowledge and learned why it was so difficult to find this place.

There was a ritual that set up protections one step below a Fidelus charm that relied on regular human sacrifice to retain. If not for Harry's power over death, he would have completely missed it. Even if someone was to use an Imperius curse or Veritaserum on Nott, these rooms existence would still remain hidden.

Harry looked around, expecting a phylactery, an extremely dark object, or something that warranted the protections, but found nothing!

Just a decent pile of gold which was probably the entire contents of the Nott vault, some family heirlooms, some materials that seemed to be set up for body enhancements like the ones Voldemort used, and an array of lower and mid-tier dark artifacts.

He concluded that the protections were far from necessary and only existed because muggles meant nothing to the young, wannabe Dark Lord.

The devil fought back his rage and checked on the prisoners. Three of them were far too gone. Signs of rape and Cruciatus exposure appeared to be the culprits of their broken bodies and minds. The other four, he found were in better shape. One or two would probably have permanent psychological damage, but the others should make a full recovering.

Any thoughts of leniency were long gone by now. Harry used Legilimancy to learn where they lived and had Dobby bring them to hospitals he Obliviated and hypnotized them to forget the experience as much.

Harry ground his teeth as he walked to the living room and sat in the dark, skimming some of the books and notes he found in the chamber as he waited for the guest of honor.

============

Theodore Nott entered his manor, flanked by three muggles under his Imperious. He had to replace the damaged goods after all.

He removed his coat, held it in the air, and called for his house-elf, but nothing happened.

"Varmy! Do you want to be replaced as well, get over here!"

"I highly doubt you'll receive an answer, Nott."

A man was sitting on a chair in his room, reading a book, completely ignoring him. He wore muggle pants and a button up shirt. The only thing that suggested he was a wizard was the black cloak draped over his shoulders.

Theodore drew his wand and pointed it at the intruder, "What are you doing here, trespassing in my house, I should kill you!"

"Hmm," the man hummed before he pointed over to the side. "And I shouldn't kill you for that?"

There was a crater, no, a hole in the floor! His ritual room was discovered? Was he an Auror or what?

"Avada Kedavra!"

A green blur shot across the room and the man raised his empty hand in defense. Theodore smirked as the curse was caught in his hand.

Until the man hummed out loud again. And then he turned a page of his book. The AK hit him, how's he alive?

"Avada Ke-"

He felt thrown across the room, into the wall.

"Dobby, please help the innocent people back to their homes without any recollections of the day."

"Yes, Master Harry Potter Sir."

Harry Potter?

The man got up and his footsteps echoed as he walked.

Theodore hurried to his feet and lifted his wand to defend himself, only to find himself upside down, his foot wouldn't fall down as gravity usually demanded.

"P-P-Potter? Stop this, please. What are you even doing?"

"Would you like to be a Dark Lord, Theo? This is how Voldemort saw the world as he died. With those rituals you have laid out downstairs, I can only guess that this is what you wanted."

"No! I don't want to be a Dark Lord, I just want to be left alone! The Ministry is cracking down and my father is about to be left out of Azkaban, I can't let him back into the house, he'll kill me, please, help me and I'll stop everything! It was just muggles, I didn't harm any wizards!"

Theodore slowly opened his eyes and saw green.

His assailant's eyes stared down, glowing just like the Avada Kedavra he attempted to kill him with. Those eyes were not hate-filled, nor did they have any sympathy. Those green eyes looked at him apathetically, weighing his life.

"I hoped for better of you, really. You were a bit like Zabini. You didn't condone the actions of your peers, but you were able to stay outside of them. At least, that's what I always thought."

"Look," he begged, "I told you, my father-"

"Enough," Potter's voice echoed out again. "I've heard enough of fathers and blame. I should have started with this, really."

He raised his empty hand and spoke a single word with his apathetic voice.

No, Theodore knew he was wrong. That wasn't apathy. That was nothing but rage. Rage colder than his father's when he pushed his mother down the stairs to her death.

"Imperio."

A blank look covered Theodore's face and his tongue loosened out of his mouth as the blood rushing to his head as he hung upside down went from an annoyance to a nonfactor.

"Why did you hide the basement with that charm?"

Theodore repeated the same reasons he already used and told him of the list of body enhancements he was planning. They weren't anything near what Voldemort used, but they were nasty, relied on heavy sacrifice, and would have made his body 'more than human.'

"Did you kill your older brother for your status as head of house?"

"Yes."

"What were your plans with Daphne Greengrass?"

"Get her pregnant before my father got out of prison so I could claim myself as Lord Nott at the Wizengammot and disown my father."

"What were your plans with her after you got her pregnant?" the man couldn't help but ask.

"She would bare me an heir and be allowed to live if she behaved herself."

"You made claims that your family has an heirloom that will help her younger sister's condition, is that true?"

"No."

"Hmm. If it's a lie, how did you get Lord Greengrass to agree to the marriage contract?"

"I nearly emptied my family vault as a dowery and told him I would name our second child a Greengrass."

"But you never planned on having a second child, did you?"

"No."

============

Harry clicked his tongue in annoyance. Frankly, he didn't know why he kept asking questions. Theodore just seemed like another kid. His father was an animal and he was right to be afraid. He couldn't help thinking like how he was taught for his entire life either.

He couldn't help it if he-

The ritual room. Killing his own older brother that had gone to Durmstrung and never participated in the last war. The casual admittance that he didn't see muggles as people. Theodore Nott didn't deserve to live.

Harry swallowed the spit in his mouth, focused on the feelings that the basement evoked. The sickening way the notes were written and the things he enchanted muggle's organs with while they were alive and cut open. He may have been a product of the society and his father, but he deserved everything he had coming to him.

A magic circle formed around his arm as his hand sparkled with the green light he had seen in his nightmares since he was first exposed to dementors.

"Avada Kedavra."

It wasn't a small ball like when the curse was shot through a wand. The power formed the size of a basketball.

Harry could see, at the center of the ball of green that silently crackled as electricity did, there was a grey core. The familiar grey color and feel that he had gotten used to and known as his power over death.

The devil released the ball of energy and Nott's body was thrown backward, shattering bones while his body slumped over. Harry watched as the grey energy made a manifestation of Nott's soul visible before it jumped with a start, flying into the sky, through the house, nearly too fast for Harry's eye to see.

Whatever the wandless killing curse with his power over death did, it sure sent Theo's soul for a ride.

Emotionally drained, Harry felt bittersweet about the revelation. On one hand, everyone struck by killing curses throughout history still had an afterlife of some sorts and Harry didn't condemn himself by rending a soul apart.

On the other hand, Theodore Nott deserved to have his soul destroyed.

Harry lit the books and notes aflame, walked out of the manor, and summoned Fiendfyre to wipe it from existence.

Watching the sentient flame was incredibly cathartic and satisfying.

============

"I had a feeling he didn't have a cure for my sister. Thank you, Harry."

"No prob-you just said my name!"

Daphne rolled her crystal, blue eyes in response, "I only have a few more questions about devils if you don't mind. What's their general society like, you said we would have to live with muggles?"

Harry felt the desire to roll his own eyes, "I don't really know how the pillars function, but they all bow down to power, and the four Maous have the final say, but their word isn't exactly law. For society, they live like humans do, really. The only big difference is how bloody focused they are on harems. Their birthrates are so low that devil children come out in intervals every several hundred years, nearly every devil trying starts popping out kids. It's like magic, but not a rule, devil children and half-bloods pop up from time to time as well."

"So that's how it is. You didn't want me for my Sacred Gear, you wanted me to join your harem."

Harry refrained from commenting.

"C'mon Daph, you were so excited before, what's the big deal?" Tracey interjected.

"If you really think so little of me, I doubt we'd even be having this conversation. But I had a peerage member research your Sacred Gear, Parallel Selection. Historical references suggest it had been used to cast two or more spells at once. You must have a sub-species to use it to think multiple thoughts at once, but you should be able to train it to act the traditional way or grow it further."

"So she'd need two wands?" Tracey asked?

"Did I forget to mention that, other magic that doesn't rely on our fey blood uses magic circles and is completely wandless. Any more questions?"

"Do you currently have a harem?"

Harry coughed, "Why is that everything that everyone focuses on?"

"So that's a yes?"

"No. I don't have a harem."

"Are you finished flirting so we can turn into devils yet?" Tracey interjected. She basically sat to the side of their conversations so far.

"Oh, one final thing, I'm going back to school in Japan where two heiresses of important devil families go to, so you'll need to brush up on your mundane studies and stop using the word, muggle."

Daphne looked at him like he said the sky was purple.

"It'll be fine, trust me. You can teleport across the world if you need to visit anyone and live as wizards and witches do, but I doubt it'll be much after you see what the other world has to offer. Hiding in plain sight works much better than isolationism. It's what we've been doing since Mesopotamia," Harry explained.

"Fine, let's just get this over yet."

"Oh," Harry said in mock surprise after he pulled out a box with a basilisk fang and two vials of Phoenix tears. "I know I already said one final thing, but this is the final, final thing I need to add."

He looked at both of the prospective devils, "Are either of you adverse to the idea of one of the most painful experiences of your life to gain the power of enhanced regeneration and partial control over a legendary type of fire?"

He explained how it was a secret that he found out, how it worked on Dudley, and after a week of feeling an itching in his veins, it finally went away.

Initially, Tracey refused to follow through with it, but after Daphne guilt tripped her on what would happen if she died one day because she didn't stick herself with a tooth, she finally relented.

Relented by picking up the fang and stabbing herself before Harry was ready.

By the end of it, Harry received a new Bishop and Pawn, as well as finally got some decent rest as he delegated contract work to Daphne.

She told him that they didn't have to do every single contract since his name is already an open secret in Magical Britain and focused on altering the fliers to send a 'Sorry, we're currently busy' message when they didn't feel like taking one.