Hogwarts: My name is the Unforgivable Curse...

Chapter 339 The Soul Weapons Gather!

Harry and Ron soon arrived at the Room of Requirement on the eighth-floor corridor.

As usual, few students chose to stay on campus for Christmas, and no one noticed their uneasy expressions along the way. Meanwhile, the door to the Room of Requirement had appeared on the wall, which should have been empty.

"……let's go."

The two exchanged a glance, then Harry took the lead and pushed open the door. However, he didn't step inside immediately, but instead peeked in to get a general idea of ​​the room's layout.

This was a room resembling a laboratory, with various tables, chairs, and cabinets piled up in a corner, clearly indicating that they should have been arranged in the center of the room not long ago. Now, that space had been replaced by two extremely complex and enormous magical instruments. Avada was standing next to one of the instruments, holding a wand, seemingly adjusting something…

"You're here?"

Hearing the door open behind him, he turned around and waved to Harry and Ron: "Come in quickly. I know you might be a little suspicious of my sudden appearance, but there's not much time right now, so I can only get to the point—close the door first, and don't touch anything here..."

After hearing this, Harry, who had been standing at the door, hesitated before stepping across the threshold and into the private laboratory that Avada had opened in the Room of Requirement, a laboratory that had been idle for over a year. Ron followed him in and closed the door behind him. Together, they examined the magical instrument that Avada was adjusting.

The instrument was made up of several nested rings of varying sizes, resembling a more sophisticated armillary sphere. Each ring had a groove inlaid with all sorts of strange objects—a ring, an ornate pendant box, an antique crown, a black notebook, and a gleaming golden cup…

"That golden cup... isn't it the one Ken gave me two years ago, the one I was tasked with using to trick Voldemort out of his remnants?"

Harry immediately recognized the Hufflepuff Cup he had carried for several days: "And that next to it...that looks like Voldemort's notebook?"

He instinctively took a half step back, and then saw two more familiar objects on the table behind Avada—a black crystal ball with a silver ring and a glass bottle filled with gray mist…

"That is..."

Before Harry could even cry out in surprise, Ron, who was standing nearby, also noticed something amiss, and his already pale face turned even paler: "Is that... Voldemort's soul that was sealed away last time??"

"That's right."

Avada's gaze was fixed on the Hufflepuff cup he was adjusting, and he didn't stop working despite Ron's question: "And it's not just the soul sealed that time, now Voldemort's entire soul has gathered in this room—besides the crystal ball and the glass bottle, these other items also contain a fragment of Voldemort's soul..."

To be honest, he was quite glad that Dumbledore was busy meeting the guy who resembled Grindelwald, so that he left in a hurry after dropping him off and didn't intend to personally supervise his experiment—this saved him the trouble of explaining the Resurrection Stone to Dumbledore.

After all this is over, the Resurrection Stone will return to its ordinary state as the Deathly Hallows, free from the curse and the life it once carried. Avada Kedavra can then be handed over to Dumbledore with peace of mind once the turmoil of this year has passed, thus putting an end to the old headmaster's obsession.

"Every single item contains Voldemort's soul?!"

Harry and Ron were startled: "Can souls just be stuffed into objects like that?"

"This is a dark magic technique known as Horcruxes."

Even Avada frowned slightly upon recalling this, slowing down his work a little: "This technique allows a wizard to split their soul and then place the fragments into a specially made container. In this way, even if the body is destroyed, the soul fragments in the container will still hold onto the original soul, allowing it to remain in the world after death, thus achieving immortality—that's why Dumbledore could only seal Voldemort, but was unable to destroy him for so long."

"After confirming that Voldemort had made Horcruxes, Dumbledore and I have been secretly searching for the Horcruxes he had hidden in various places, and we have only recently completed the collection—and if all goes well, his death will be in less than two days."

"...So that's how it is."

Harry was astonished that such technology existed in the world, and then nodded thoughtfully: "No wonder that diary acted so realistically, as if it were a real, living person... and his ability to control the Basilisk using Parseltongue must also be due to the fragments of Voldemort's soul..."

As Harry recalled the harrowing situation two years ago, Ron beside him was frantically counting the items: "One...two...three..."

"...Six...seven?!"

"Voldemort split his soul into seven pieces?!"

He stared incredulously at Avada, who was still busy at work: "Is he insane?!"

"Yes, he's gone mad."

Avada finally stopped what he was doing, straightened up, and turned to face Harry and Ron: "And to correct one point—Voldemort didn't divide his soul into seven pieces, but eight."

"Eight pieces?"

The two counted the items again, then looked up in confusion: "Where's the eighth one?"

Avada Kedavra silently raised a finger, pointing firmly in a direction as Harry and Ron's gazes shifted from confusion to shock.

"Harry Potter,"

He said softly, "Why can you speak Parsley, a descendant of Slytherin, when you are clearly of Potter blood?"

"How could it so perfectly deceive the diary? And how could it survive being struck by the Killing Curse?"

There is only one answer to these questions...

"Harry Potter,"

He looked Harry into his eyes and said, slowly and deliberately, "Because you are the last Horcrux Voldemort left behind!"

"Am I... a Horcrux?"

Harry looked at his hands, somewhat bewildered, then looked up at Avada, forcing a very strained smile: "This must be fake, right? You're playing a trick on me, aren't you?"

Avada didn't speak, just watched as Harry's face suddenly drained of color.

(End of this chapter)