Last Entry. The 27th of May 2018. Hogwarts ruins.
I have died three times in my life so far. My first time was at age one, on the 31st of October 1981. The second was by choice, or so I thought, on the 2nd of May 1998. The third and by far the worst was a decade ago, ironically the 31st of October 2008.
As I look back on those times, I have to question what led me to make so many stupid mistakes. Was it youth? Naivete? No, IT was an old man named Albus Dumbledore.
This will surprise you, but I don't hate him. No matter how fake his affection was, how misguided his thoughts were, I can't hate a man who was never quite good enough.
Oh yes, the most influential wizard of his time, Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore, was never able to meet his own expectations. He fought, schemed and loved as much as the next man.
An Emperor on an invisible throne, whittled to death by his courtiers, forced to leave behind a legacy of snakes and backstabbers. How the mighty fall when vermin do drag them from their pedestal.
In my old age, after thirty-eight years of tiring life, I have long grown apathetic to present events. Mirrors show me youth, but as they say, the eyes reflect the soul.
Emptiness, much like the world today, all I can do is reminisce. Mortals are often led to believe their lives pass by too soon; as someone who will never die, I cannot help but disagree.
I can't imagine such thoughts occurring to them too often now that they slave away under the oppression of my fellow witches and wizards. What little fertile ground remains needs constant work, and with a population now lower than our own, it is no shock they have become free labour. Human resources are scarce, after all.
Once, before I died for the third time, I might have done something, tried to fix our broken world. Now? Now the world can rot while I sit and watch.
The Dark Lord Potter cares not for the affairs of others; I'll live my life however I wish.
Former Dark Lord Potter, as it is rather hard to maintain a title with no one left alive to spread it.
Life will not leave me, a cruel joke from an old friend, especially since I united those accursed Deathly Hallows.
What absolute bullshit; if I'd never seen those fucking things in the first place, everything would be fine. At the very least, so much suffering could have been avoided.
Redemption. A flicker of hope to me in a bleak and unforgiving world.
The greatest magicians in history had already begun the process. Time turners and the Philosopher's stone were both inventions that showed that time could be frozen and manipulated by the power of magic.
The title of Dark Lord unbound a person from such shackles as morals and the law. Suppose you need help thinking of a solution to your problem. In that case, you can kill enough people and eventually, one of them will have helpful information. Subsequently, I have a repertoire of spells and magical knowledge more extensive than the library of Alexandria.
Dark magic was a complex subject, not necessarily evil, but challenging all the same. The Unspeakable researchers of the Ministry of Magic's Department of Mysteries were the brightest minds in the wizarding world for a reason.
You can't help but ponder what society has come to when knowledge is banned and carefully controlled simply because it is challenging to learn. It says something about educational standards, that's for sure.
Sacrificial rituals were a particular favourite of mine; they still would be if there were anything left to improve. My physical body can only be described as god-like compared to the average man. Although I fear it is impossible to create the perfect indestructible body as long as it remains flesh and blood.
I should explain why the Deathly Hallows remain such a curse to me and yet, at the same time, why they are my lifeline. At the age of seventeen, I learned of a flaw in my magical core caused by housing a Horcrux and sustaining it for the first few years of my life. My magical capacity had finished growing at the time. Nevertheless, it stabilised, well above average and even verging on the levels of Voldemort and Dumbledore themselves.
The flaw can best be described as a sucking chest wound, constantly drawing in more magic to try and recover and expand my already mature core. It was like a terminal illness that would eventually kill me and anyone else. So Hermione, my close friend at the time, recommended I go back for the resurrection stone and see if anyone from the past could help. The bloody thing combined with my cloak and the Elder wand before merging with me. It appears to have been the result of gathering all three together, being their uncontested master and, of course, my cursed Peverell bloodline.
Destiny prevailed; the excess magic that should have destabilised my magical core and killed me found somewhere else to go. True to their nature, the Hallows were a leech on my magic and soul. They needed constant feeding, or they would weaken me substantially, leaving me a squib. The continuous stream of magic lured in by my flawed core became their sustenance.
After more than a decade of practice, I can now wield my powers expertly and those of death's items.
The Elder wand grants me extensive wandless magic. However, more complicated spells require me to summon it into a physical being.
The Invisibility Cloak became my blood, allowing me to disappear at will and avoid tracking spells and curses. My bodily fluids became unusable in any ritual without myself presiding over it; blood unwillingly given would not help Voldemort anymore.
The Death stone was curious; it could summon ghosts and create illusions or mental attacks depending on how much magical power it was supplied. It was the most difficult to control and the one that granted me the ability to manipulate the soul.
The reason I leave this diary here today is not for someone to find it; instead, it is a reminder to myself. After years of searching for a viable solution to turning back time a sufficient amount, a ritual has revealed itself. The sacrifice required is beyond all comprehension, but nothing matters to me more. I cannot bring anything not recognised by my soul as part of 'myself'. So should this survive, I, Harry James Potter, declare this to be the end of my saga and the beginning of Ares Peverell-Slytherin, future Emperor of the Magical World.
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