Ch101: Sarcophagus

Harry pondered the silence from his grandmother. Ever since he gave her access to the Chamber, she had gone silent. He supposed Perenelle was trying to piece together the information about Elysium from the ancient scrolls in the Chamber.

He had an inkling as to why Perenelle Flamel was after Elysium. After all, he had also read the lore of the Hallows, which was vital to unlocking the full power of Elysium to destroy the blood enemy. But Harry seriously doubted the blood enemy the scrolls kept mentioning were muggles.

Because, in the scrolls, there was a different tale of the Peverell brothers. The scrolls talk of three brothers who lived amongst their hated enemy so that they may learn of their plans and bring destruction to their blood enemy. But these same scrolls also spoke as if the enemy was too powerful, technologically advanced and knowledgeable.

That was another thing that didn't make much sense. He could understand why the Peverell brothers would consider the muggles dangerous. But knowledgeable and technologically advanced were not exactly the words he'd use to describe ancient muggles. The more he read from the scrolls, the less it made sense to think Elysium was some magical dimension that spawned all magical creatures.

Elysium was described as the origin of magic and all magical creatures. It was also considered as a place of great power. It was also touted as a place where the wielder of all three Hallows could bring about the destruction of the blood enemy. There were also some ludicrous claims that the three brothers were the creators of all magical creatures on Earth. The more he read, the more Harry felt like it was one of those loony, pureblood conspiracy theories made to stroke their ego.

Or, in this case, a wizarding supremacy story.

His own theory was some hollow earth theory where a separate magical dimension somehow functions inside the Earth's core, spawning all magical creatures. From the inter-species relationships, humans inherited these magical powers. Then, for some reason, this Elysium started to make many elder magical species fade or diminish, leaving the humanoid magical folks like goblins and wizards to dominate the planet.

But Harry was not shouting his theory from the rooftops, nor did he have any particular stake in asserting his theory as the truth.

Harry had even broached the subject with Salazar while in the branch reality. Even Salazar was unaware of most of the stuff relating to Elysium. But the man was a treasure trove of knowledge when it came to drawing magical energy from the planet to power spells and rituals.

It was only thanks to Slytherin that he managed to decipher three specific scrolls written in a different language with some similarities with Latin. Even then, the All-speak charm could only do so much because the translations were wonky and, most of the time, made less sense. The charm worked on the residual magic left on the written word, which carried the writer's intent and the source of knowledge of the language. Since the only source Harry got for the old Latin was from Slytherin, the translations were poor quality.

'I suppose I'll learn more once Perenelle has a closer look at those scrolls. Maybe she has access to this Old Latin to make accurate translations.' Harry mused.

Keeping thoughts on Elysium in the back of his mind, Harry focused on the task at hand. The task was carving runes into a stone sarcophagus to create a device capable of projecting a soul.

In his admittedly humble research into the Horcrux magic and the nature of the soul, he came to one conclusion. A spell to tear off the soul shard from his head could potentially affect his own soul.  The problem he encountered was that a spell designed to tear off a portion of the soul could not be made to specify which soul to slice off.

So, the solution to this quandary was two spells working in conjunction.  One to project the soul in a body and the other to pluck the soul out of the body.

But using two spells in conjunction was very dangerous, especially when his soul was on the line. Therefore, Harry had the choice of charging someone else to perform the spells, but since he trusted himself above anyone else, he came up with the Sarcophagus.

The sarcophagus would project the souls inhabiting his body into a manifestation of its spirit form. An ordinary soul's spirit form could usually be seen in ghosts, but he didn't know what form the horcrux would take. Either way, so long as the Sarcophagus distinguished the soul signature, he could use a spell to shear away the parasitic soul shard invading his spirit without harming his soul.

Then came the most challenging part. Merely cutting away the Horcrux was not practical. He had to bind it to another object and then destroy it. The problem was that shearing off a soul was no laughing matter. Harry suspected it'd be taxing on his spirit and body. Voldemort's soul shard had lived within him for nearly two decades; in that time, the soul shard had rooted itself so thoroughly.

Also, he was up against Voldemort's soul, which had undergone one of the most unnatural forms of magic known to wizardkind. The factor of unpredictability and risk was always high, no matter the precautions he took. But he had no other option but to go ahead with what he had. The alternative was sacrificing himself to Voldemort by following Dumbledore's idiotic plan.

No self-respecting human with even a microscopic sense of self-worth would follow through with Dumbledore's plan. There was no power of 'love' as Dumbledore preached. If there were such a power, then it'd have to be acknowledged that there was also a power of 'hatred'.

If Harry had learned one thing in his study of magical energy, it always liked to balance itself and never play favourites. Magic was power, and it cared not who wielded it or for what purpose. Magic was untouched by emotion; only the wielder was.

Finally, after days of toiling on the sarcophagus, it was finally finished.

Harry audibly yawned and stretched his boy, popping a few bones in the process. He had gone with less than four hours of sleep for the last week to finish the sarcophagus, and now he was ready to take a long nap. But before he fell on a bed and let sleep claim him, Harry summoned a snake using the Serpensortia spell.

"$Stay.$" He hissed at the snake.

The cobra that appeared on the Sarcophagus stayed docile and lay down without a fuss.

Harry charged the runes on the Sarcophagus, and lo and behold, a tiny spark of energy was projected outwards from the snake's body.

"So tiny and fragile but so elegant." Harry whispered in fascination as he stared at the wisp of pure energy that was the snake's soul.

The magical senses he had honed over tireless training and practice became highly alert when he saw the physical manifestation of the soul for the first time. Sure, he had seen ghosts in Hogwarts, but this was a whole new experience. The surge of energy he could feel from the soul was something otherworldly but familiar. It felt inconsequential but, at the same time, endless, as if the universe itself was baring its enormity before Harry.

Even his magic surged outward, mirroring the joy and excitement he was feeling now. It was a profound moment, and Harry understood the gravity of the task ahead. He was more determined than ever to decimate Voldemort, who dared to butcher such a gift the universe had granted the man.

Soul, he realised, was sacred. It was something that should be preserved, protected and revered.

"Anything that subverts the soul should be destroyed." Harry whispered before he depowered the Sarcophagus.

"$Come, little one. I'll take you to your new home.$"

Harry took the cobra into his hands and left the Sarcophagus chamber. He stopped by the door and looked back into the room as if he felt something flicker in his senses. But when he scanned the room, he found nothing. It almost felt like something or someone was watching him, but he could not sense anything when he trained his senses in the room.

Shaking his head, he left the chamber to find some nice juicy mice for the snake whose soul he had seen.

In the chamber where the sarcophagus was kept, the air shimmered as a ghostly figure appeared and stared at the sarcophagus for a long moment before vanishing into thin air.

****

"So, you had a piece of the Dark Lord's soul stuck in your body for all these years, and you want to remove it using this stone bed." Daphne said slowly with a look of utter bewilderment on her face.

"Not a stone bed. I call it the Sarcophagus."

At her pointed stare, Harry shrugged and said,

"But basically what you said."

"So long as this soul shard is not destroyed, would the Dark Lord remain immortal?"

"Yes. He'll just keep coming back."

"And you said the Dark Lord split his soul many times and kept these shards in powerful artefacts."

"Yes. I've destroyed them all except for the last two. The one in his pet snake and the one attached to my scar." Harry answered.

"Okay." Daphne took a deep breath. "Why are you telling me all of this now?"

"What better time is there?" Harry asked.

Daphne looked at him like he had gone bonkers. After all, Sirius and Brigitte were exchanging marriage vows before the assembled guests in the garden of Potter Manor.

It was a relatively muted affair with very few chosen guests. Harry had wanted a large function with a long guest list, but Sirius put his foot down, citing security concerns. Brigitte also wanted a private event with some family and friends. Harry had to cave in when the two of them insisted, and therefore, there were hardly 25 guests in his garden. Remus became the best man, which left Harry to be the overall organiser of the event.

"Are you sure you didn't hit your head recently?" Daphne mocked him.

"Everyone is in their own bubble or engrossed in the ceremony. Besides, I set up a ward around us."

"You've known about this soul shard for a long time, right?" Daphne asked.

"Yes." Harry nodded.

"So why tell me about this now?"

"Well, we're now officially a couple, and you signed that contract last day…" Harry reminded her, which earned him a glare at the reminder of that particular function.

"I also need someone I trust with sufficient skill in healing, and that's you."

Daphne looked mollified and a touch happy at his admission.

"Of course, I'll help you, Harry." Daphne said, smiling at him. "How can I help?"

"First, let's dance, and then you can listen to all of my secret plans." Harry grinned.

Daphne just nodded with a hint of a grin tugging at the corner of her lips.

****

Harry was nervous and thrilled at the same time. He watched Winky float Nagini into the Sarcophagus impatiently. Once she set down Voldemort's pet snake, Harry conjured bindings on the snake, which bound it securely against the Sarcophagus.

"Administer the antidote Dobby."

Winky magically forced Nagini's mouth open, and Dobby poured the antidote into the snake's mouth. Immediately, the giant python wakes from the slumber induced by the Draught of Living Death. It began to struggle against the bindings, but its movements were sluggish. Harry maintained a sense-disorienting spell on the snake to keep it docile throughout the procedure, but he needed the creature to be conscious for the Sarcophagus to work properly.

Before Daphne's watchful eyes, Harry charged several rune sequences, and the Sarcophagus came to life.

"You got the sequence?"

Daphne just nodded silently.

Now came the hard part. He activated the rune that projected the spirit form, and the Sarcophagus worked like a charm. The energy field projected by the Sarcophagus projected two distinct soul signatures. There was the wholesome soul of Nagini, and the reduced, tainted soul of Voldemort projected apart.

Harry placed a gold ring on a table beside the Sarcophagus before he trained his wand on the soul shard of Voldemort.

"Anima apscido."

Tendrils of golden red strings made of magical energy shot out of the tip of his wand and latched on to the soul shard. He could feel the soul shard fight back against the spell, but Harry remained resolute and began to pull the soul out of Nagini's spirit. Slowly but surely, the soul shard came out of Nagini and remained on the tip of his wand. Harry immediately tied the soul shard into the gold ring and bound it with enchantments so that it remained dormant.

"It worked. There is no tainted energy left. The soul remains pure." Daphne said with wide eyes as she stared at the glowing ball of energy now exuding a warm aura.

He watched from the sidelines as Daphne started using diagnostic charms to see whether there was anything wrong with Nagini.

"There seem to be no side effects. But I recommend keeping the snake under observation for a few days before you use the Sarcophagus." Daphne suggested.

"No. I want this thing gone now."

"You've carried it all this time. Just wait a few more days. Don't be a Gryffindor now."

Harry strongly objected to the insinuation that he was thick-headed. But he caved in to her suggestion to wait a few days before using the Sarcophagus. When he eventually came to do so, it worked quite splendidly without any adverse effects.

Once the Horcrux was removed, he felt like something weighing down his neck was removed. He felt like he could battle Voldemort for an entire day without breaking a sweat. Perhaps it was the psychological effect of knowing his soul was whole again and untainted by the soul shard of a psycho. Whatever it was, Harry felt like he was at the height of his power and from that feeling emerged confidence in his victory over the Dark Lord.

That sense of victory was compounded when he used basilisk venom to destroy Voldemort's two soul anchors. Lord Voldemort was now genuinely mortal, and that knowledge made Harry spend the rest of his summer holidays in relative peace.

****

Perenelle poured over the scrolls and books she collected from Slytherin's Chamber.

If her grandson thought she'd be swimming aimlessly in the massive repository of knowledge of Cadmus' descendants, he was mistaken. She was an adept sensor and had the gift of finer aspects of magic. Therefore, she could trace her grandson's signature of magic on the books and scrolls. Those were the first to be examined, and she easily found what she was looking for that way.

The trail to Elysium hadn't gone cold as she had feared. She solved half the puzzle and now knew how to read the map to find Elysium. Her grandson couldn't have pieced it together because he didn't have all the tools. But she had those tools thanks to her connection to Antioch Peverell.

"You see now, Nicholas. My way is not hopeless after all." Perenelle looked at her longtime husband and friend triumphantly as she showed the partial map.

"You'll need the Hallows to complete the map."

"No, Nicholas." Perenelle shook her head. "I need only one Hallow. The Cloak of Invisibility, and we both know where it is."

Perenelle looked at the large map on the stone tablet left by her ancestors. She had searched for a way to read the map for centuries, but now she knew how.

Elysium opens to the transcendent keys

the map of one of three shines the way

see the world through death's skin

the light of ascended shines the path.

"You see, Nicholas. I know I'm one step closer to embracing our destiny."

"The stone tablet had a proximity ward to show the clue." Nicholas said with a thoughtful frown as he read the lines written in the precursor language from which Latin was born.

"Something like that. It's difficult to get a proper read on the magic in the stone. It's beyond our level of magical finesse." said Perenelle.

"But you understand what this means, right?" she asked earnestly.

"The transcendent keys means the Hallows. We've always known they were powerful artefacts and had nothing to do with all that nonsense about Death and the Peverell brothers." Nicholas said softly, staring at the lines intently.

"The map of one of three. It obviously speaks of the stone tablet left by Antioch." Perenelle said, nodding at the tablet in her hands.

Nicholas nodded as they also had two other tablets of the Peverell brothers, but those hadn't so much as twitched so far.

"Seeing the world through death's skin could allude to the Cloak of Invisibility. So we might need Harry's help."

"Yes. But what does 'the light of ascended shines the path' mean?" Perenelle asked.

"I do not know." Nicholas frowned. "We might need to look for any references for this ascended light in our archives."

"Hmm. Let's not waste any more time then." Perenelle said, climbing to her feet and swiftly walking into their library with Nicholas closely following behind.

**** Branch reality ****

An excerpt from Atlantis and Valyria, Myth or Reality? by William Poesy

When Plato brought forth the fictional city of Atlantis in his works Timaeus and Critias, he might've never intended for people around the world to take it literally. Plato's intentions for introducing a mythical city, which was supposed to be a naval power, was purely as an allegory.

However, a considerable number of people started to believe in the tale of the mythical city that was supposed to have sunk to the bottom of the ocean. Kings have spent ships after this fictional city, hoping to salvage the sunken city's remains, but nothing was ever found. Such people believed Atlantis was the cradle of civilisation, ignoring that Plato used Atlantis to enshrine the superiority of Athens, an ideal state in his mind. This little fact is conveniently forgotten by the proponents of Atlantis and its existence.

Similarly, those following the Valyrian faith believed the city of Valyria or the Valyrian Freehold, to be the birthplace of civilisation. Some even claim Valyria is the mythical Atlantis described in Timaeus and Critias. But Plato himself disproves such claims by alluding that Atlantis was near Egypt, while the Valyrian faith claims that Valyria was in the Mediterranean between Greece and Rome.

But centuries of expeditions have disproved the existence of any such islands.

Yet, some people still believe in Atlantis and Valyria's fantastical tales. Thanks to the shortsightedness of 19th-century novice historians, the tales of the mythical cities spread far and wide.

In the Kingdom of Scotland, it became a tradition for a newly crowned king to send naval expeditions to find Valyria. It often resulted in war with Rome and other European states during the reign of Alexander Targaryen and his descendants.

The quest for Valyria also made Scotland the mightiest naval power in the Western hemisphere, eventually empowering them to destroy the Vikings and take control of all the Nordic states. Even the Continental War of Titus Targaryen had elements of a Vlayrian expedition in his fleet.

But to this day, Valyria and Atlantis remain a mystery and a rich source of contemporary fiction.

AN:

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