AN: Yes, I know, it's been a while and all that, and I'm truly sorry that this chapter took so long to get out. I'm not abandoning anything, don't worry about that, but I've not had a lot of inspiration that's focused on my existing stories recently, and I've been fairly busy too. Now onto the story itself; first off, Primate Murder's size in the previous chapter. Yes, I know I had her smaller in the previous chapter, but I thought a massive canine would be far more intimidating, and that I was probably under representing her or something, let's just say that Primate Murder can shrink when she's not in a 'killy' mood or something, okay? Secondly, I'm kind of curious who can guess what/who Sumire was referring to when she spoke to Harry. I'll just say that, in the nasuverse, the being/event/object/location actually exists, so it's not something I'm making up completely off the top of my head, but I've never actually seen it/him/her used in a fic, like, at all.
Also, please note that some of the characters here are cameos, meaning they are not relevant to the story as a whole. They're just there for reference in later sequels, okay? Geez, so many people are flying off the handle about it.
Anyway, please enjoy the chapter.
Beta'd by: NIX'S WARDEN
Chapter 07 – Frustration and Completion
Harry was beginning to think he wouldn't be able to do anything in this world without returning, each and every time, to the place he currently was. He was finding it a little irritating just how much he was being watched, though he admitted to himself that they would likely keep a much closer eye on him if they knew the 'truth' of his past.
Oh, he had expected them to observe him, they would have been stupid not to, but the greater scrutiny he was under in comparison to his birth world, where he was more known - even if he was still 'mysterious and powerful' – was rapidly eroding his patience. Also, even if he didn't have the abilities he did, his 'watchers' – who didn't deserve such a title seeing how easy it was to slip away from or distract them – were almost the opposite of stealthy.
Just why his usually calm demeanour was disappearing so quickly was unknown to Harry, but it was rather curious regardless.
Oh, where was he, you ask? Well, quite simply, he was currently in the Headmaster's office. More specifically, he was sitting in a rather large chair he'd conjured. Sitting next to him, as the chair was really quite wide, was V/V, and in her lap was Altrouge, who had her feet over one of the chairs arms as she laid across both V/V and himself. Len, Nel, and Holly were sat on the high back of the chair, the fairy-like girl between the two 'cats'.
Across from Harry, Dumbledore sat behind his desk, levelling a rather different expression than normal at the vampiric god. He was not playing the role of a 'grandfather' right now, no, this was an altogether far more serious Dumbledore, whose presence weighed on those in the room heavily, showing everyone just why it was Voldemort feared to face him.
Or, more accurately, Dumbledore's 'presence' was affecting everyone but those who had been around beings of far greater strength than one little wizard.
In other words, Harry and his girls were unaffected, as was Sirius.
Harry yawned widely, hiding another grin as he felt the irritated fluctuation in Dumbledore's soul. "Well, how long are we going to just sit here? No matter how intimidating you think your 'silent stare' is, it's got absolutely nothing on most people I know, so let's just get this done with."
"Mr. Potter!" Mcgonagall exclaimed. "The headmaster deserves respect, so show it to him."
"No, he doesn't deserve my respect. If my respect is something he wants, he'll have to earn it, the same as anyone else." Harry replied flatly. "Right now, I have almost zero respect for all of you, and only Lily Potter has earned even a bit of it from me."
Snape snarled at Harry, stalking forward. The tip of his wand, held in front of him, began glowing purple. "Listen here, you damn brat! You are nothing, you insignificant, little – AAAAARGH!"
Snape screamed in pain as he reared back.
The reason for this stood in front of Harry. Jack, taking the glowing wand as a threat to her father, had materialised in front of him and proceeded to... deal with the threat. That her response had her using her knives to turn Snape's arm into dangling strips of meat was simply the way of things.
Harry whistled at the sight. "Nasty, that's not going to be easy to heal."
It was true as well, it seemed that his little assassin had been paying attention when Harry had been giving her those threat identification and response 'lessons'. Wizarding healing could reattach a severed limb, as long as it hadn't been removed by a dark or corrosive spell, and healing cuts and the like was also rather simple. Shredding someone's arm, however...
Yeah, that was a rather serious injury, especially for a Potions Master, as even healed it could easily affect co-ordination, amongst other issues with muscles and nerves.
A few people stepped towards Severus, obviously wishing to help the man, but all he did was hiss at them, before pulling a spare wand from an inside pocket. He attempted to try and fix his arm as best he could, but found there was very little he was capable of doing with it.
He growled lowly, throwing an incredibly venomous look at Harry and Jack, before quickly stalking out the door, almost knocking Granger down the spiral staircase that she had just come up to reach the Headmaster's office.
Harry looked up at Holly, raising an eyebrow in question. Dumbledore had not let her through the gargoyle, Harry would have been able to tell if he had, and he hadn't done it either, which left Holly, who was in control of all of Hogwarts right now, but why had she done it?
"Professor Dumbled-" Granger began to call out, before stopping, catching sight of what was in front of her.
Dumbledore was behind his desk, his teachers standing around him. Harry was sat in a chair, V/V next to him and Altrouge laying across them. Holly and the two succubi were laying on the back of the chair, the latter in their cat forms. Of course, then there was also Jack standing protectively in front of Harry, daggers dripping with Snape's blood.
"Miss. Granger, I presume that you have a reason for coming to see me?" Dumbledore asked. "Forgive me, but we are in the process of finding out some answers to some rather pressing questions." He tried to subtly direct his wand to the new variable in the room, also attempting Legilimency against Jack, but her Mental Pollution simply shoved him out of her mind.
Granger's eyes drifted over to Harry and his girls on the chair, causing her soul to spike massively with... fear? Hmm, what was she afraid of? She wasn't looking directly at him or V/V, the two more dangerous of the three, so... Oh? Had she worked out who Alt was?
"P-P-Professor, I th-think I've worked something o-out." Oh dear, that stutter was as almost as bad as Quirrel's when he was faking being a professor. "I th-think that A-Alt is... ALTROUGE BRUNESTUD!" She had taken a deep breath, gathering her courage, before yelling it out at the top of her voice.
"So, someone worked it out, and so quickly too." Alt mused, reaching up to slip her shades off her face. "There was no need to yell though, we can all hear you perfectly fine when you speak with an 'indoor voice'." The Eclipse Princess smirked when Granger flinched. "What a pity, I was hoping that this deception would last longer, but oh well, I guess you can't have everything."
The tension in the room sky-rocketed at that point, and the fear emanating from a few people increased massively. However, there was also something else mixed in, where was this anger and rage coming from?
"Get. Away. From. My. Son!" James Potter growled out, glaring at Altrouge, his shoulders shaking heavily.
"No." Altrouge replied. "I will not 'get away' from my closest friend, someone who means a great deal to me. I care not if you had a child who was his alternate in this world, and I will state as such as many times as is necessary. Hear me say it; I. Don't. Care." Altrouge replied in a low, serious voice.
James Potter wanting her to get away from her Harry, her Black Wing, had hurt, it had hurt a lot more than she would ever admit. She knew she couldn't hide it, however, especially not when Harry had wrapped an arm around her shoulders, pulling her close to him. She knew he had detected the pain in her soul, it was simply impossible to hide emotions from him, and she felt guilty.
She'd kind of thought, perhaps even hoped, that Harry would have had a good relationship with this world's versions of his parents. She had never known anything like family, not until Harry had started messing up how things were done, and now she had a pseudo-grandfather of her own in Zelretch, a sister in Arcueid, even a strange sort of rivalry with Aoko that neither knew where it had begun or what caused it, just that it was fun, that it felt good.
Now she was the cause of disharmony between him and his alternate's father. She was fully aware that the two weren't close, that they did not have any relationship to speak of, but still, she was the cause of trouble between them. That Harry would take her side every time against him was something she also knew, and the pleasure that thought gave her also made her feel guilty.
Emotions like this were confusing, maybe she should go back to how she was before Harry, when none of this was a problem?
...
Nah. As troublesome as some things were, she couldn't deny that she was also a lot happier since Primate Murder had brought Harry to her, despite how complicated things could be from time to time.
"Calm down, Mr. Potter." Harry sighed. "I am not your son. I have lived my own life, with my own experiences, while he had his own. Heck, I don't even look anything like my alternate in this world." He shook his head, his faded purple hair dancing as he did so.
"You expect me to remain calm when there's a dark creature, a monster, right in front of me, influencing you! It's no wonder you ended up in Slytherin when you hang around one of those things. It's no wonder you're not trying to stop Voldemort, next thing I know you'll be joining up with him!"
"A dark creature?" Harry replied calmly, though he felt anything but. "Are you not acquainted with a werewolf, Mr. Potter? Are you not being a hypocrite here?"
"Werewolves aren't Dark Creatures, Lycanthropy is an illness, a condition. The Ministry is just being stupid, and if they invested money in it then a cure would be found in no time." James Potter replied vehemently.
"Really?" Harry asked, an eyebrow raised over his blindfold. "Does the Ministry actually care enough to invest that money? Regardless of that, werewolves are Dark Creatures, the lycanthropy does cause their magic, their aura, to be tinted with darkness, which does make them dark creatures."
Harry was amazed at how quiet the rest of the room was being. The whole lot of them were watching their exchange, or at least most of them were. Granger was keeping her eyes on Altrouge, said Dead Apostle Ancestor was having fun scaring her, running her tongue over her long, sharp canines, half-lidded eyes focused on the bushy-haired brunette.
"Werewolves are not Dark Creatures!" James yelled again, glaring at Harry. "It's an illness, that's it!"
"It's a transformative condition, and if you think that it has no effect on your magic and aura, you're more of an idiot than I thought you were." Harry dryly informed him.
James went to attack Harry, knocking several things aside to get to him. Harry was a mite bit disappointed that none of Dumbledore's little trinkets were broken, though most would have worried about such ancient relics, as useless as the damn things were for the most part.
The enraged wizard did not get far, before he found his own shadow had sprouted chains to hold him in place. Harry, sighing once again, rubbed at his temples. "Enough already. You believe that Lycanthropy does not make one a dark creature, and I know it does. You do not seem fond of Altrouge, yet I am. Now that we've got that out of the way, sit down and stop embarrassing yourself." Harry snapped at him.
There was a few curious looks, and more than a few surprised ones as well, directed at the chains binding James as they yanked him backwards, pulling into a chair that appeared out of thin air. The man glared angrily at Harry, but seemed unable to speak, as proven when he opened his mouth to continue yelling at Harry. It wasn't a silencing charm either, those were too easily dispelled. Instead, Harry was preventing signals travelling from his brain, through his nerves, and to his voice box.
Complicated, yes, but also far harder to cancel, especially if you didn't know that was what was happening.
"Mr. Potter," Ah, it seemed Dumbledore was finally intervening in this little débâcle. "I believe it's time for you to stop dancing around things and give us full disclosure. Any little thing you hide may be the key to defeating Voldemort, and you, yourself, are central to the entire thing." Oh, it seemed Dumbles wanted answers, and now he was trying to... was that intimidation? If so, it was rather pathetic.
"How about 'no'?" Harry asked. "You can wave your hands about as much as you want, but I'm not a puppet dancing to your tune."
"Harry James Potter!" Mcgonagall cried. "Never in my life have I heard such disrespect for such a great man as the hea-"
"Oh, shut up, you old crone." Alt lazily interrupted the Scottish woman. "He's no 'great man', or if he is then I am massively concerned for the rest of the wizarding population. You lot seem to be labouring under certain assumptions, so let's once and for all erase the confusion clouding the issue."
"Miss. Brunestud." Dumbledore said, nearly choking on her name before hesitating, it was clear to see that he did not know how to handle Altrouge, having never had anything more magically powerful than a wizard to deal with before, and also being far more at home with political power and manoeuvrings. "Please, allow wizards to deal with a wizarding problem. There's no need for you to involve yourself with such a... cultural affair."
"If I'm not involved, then Harry isn't either." Alt shrugged her shoulders. "Neither of us are from this world, so why should we care? We were torn from those we care about and who care for us, dropped in this place a scant few days ago, and you're asking us to fight a war for you? No, worse than that, you're asking Harry, a single unconnected individual, to fight a war on your behalf."
"Calling it a war is bit much, Alt." Harry said, leaning over to plant a kiss on her cheek. "After all, Riddle is merely a terrorist, his core group of followers is no more than thirty strong all told... Well, given just how incompetent and ridiculous these wizards have proved themselves to be, perhaps that is enough to make it a war. How many died in the last 'conflict'?"
"Something like three and a half thousand magicals all told, and goodness knows how many more muggles lost their lives due to Riddle's temper tantrums." V/V was the one who answered, her voice sounding rather sleepy, like she was just about to drift off, using Harry's shoulder as a pillow.
"There you are, not even five thousand dead, what kind of a 'war' is that? I've killed more than that in a single feeding before." Alt huffed, ratcheting the tension in the room up a notch with the casual mention of her past mass-killings.
Dumbledore looked like he was about to open his mouth, but Harry was seriously getting fed up of everything. "Look, you old goat-fucker, you summoned us here, you are not offering anything in return for risking ourselves merely to save your short lives, and now you're trying to pry information out of us."
Harry sighed and shook his head. "Get it through your thick, lemon drop addled, 'for the Greater Good' mind that we're just as likely to kill you as we are Death Eaters. It's simple, if someone pisses us off or attacks us, they die. How brutal and how messy their deaths is either decided by how bored we are, or how much they've pissed us off. Do you want to take a guess at how close you are to joining my top ten list?"
There were sounds of protest coming from their 'opposition', but Harry's voice once more cut through it all. "I'll give you some information right here though, just so you know who you're pissing off. Alt, yeah, she's Altrouge Brunestud, Ninth Dead Apostle Ancestor."
Harry indicated V/V. "She's 'False Angel V/V', or as she's otherwise known 'Type Venus'." Harry laid a hand on Jack's shoulder, getting the young girl to look up at him with fondness clear in her expression. "This is the Assassin Class Servant Jack the Ripper, and someone I'm proud to call my daughter."
Harry then looked directly into Dumbledore's eyes. "I am the Infinite Archive, the Master of Monsters, the Cursed Shadow, the Black-Winged Lord of Nightmares. I am the Tenth Dead Apostle Ancestor, as well as the Master of the Third True Magic, Heaven's Feel. Under Zelretch, my adopted grandfather, I am also a user of the Kaleidoscope, the Second True Magic, and under Aoko Aozaki... another precious member of my strange family, I have learnt applications of the Fifth True Magic, the Blue. Now, let me ask you this, just how badly do you want me to fuck you up?"
That shut everyone up, and with nothing more than a snort of frustration and disgust, Harry abruptly left the room, completely ignoring the form of Hermione Granger. The bushy-haired girl had heard a lot more than she thought she ever would, and – in her mind at least – little of it was even palatable, much less pleasant. She had hidden behind Mcgonagall as Harry had built up his anger, letting the tiniest hint of his curses seep beyond his control, leaving her to quiver in abject terror of him. All of Harry's companions left the room after him, a few glaring at the witches and wizards on their way out.
The room remained silent, until Sirius Black snorted. "Well, that could have gone a lot better. I think I'll see if I can calm him down, at least to the point where he isn't considering killing you." The man rolled his eyes, heading towards the door, before he was stopped by a hand on his arm.
"How... how can you defend something like that?" He was asked.
Sirius slowly turned to see James Potter, an alternate version of his very own best friend, and he sighed.
Were Sirius and James really so different from what they had been before? If James had lived in his own world, would he be just the same as the man stood before him? Had both of them been so naïve back then, when he had been in school and afterwards, in the Order of the Phoenix?
If he was honest with himself, the answer was probably yes. As a kid, Sirius had hated, loathed, everything that was even hinted at being dark. In fact, it had taken quite a bit for him not to hate Remus on principle when he'd first learned about his Lycanthropy, and only years of friendship had allowed him to look past it.
Now, Sirius couldn't believe he was really thinking this, he was more mature. He knew that, unfortunate as it was, sometimes harsher measures needed to be implemented, sometimes - in fact very often - things weren't simply black and white, but endless shades of grey, some lighter or darker than others, but still grey all the same.
"Harry is a thing, yes, but he's also a being in his own right, a someone. He has opinions of his own, thoughts of his own, and a perspective unique to him. One thing that Harry believes in above all else is the ability to choose. You ask me why I can so easily defend him, I wonder why you cannot." Sirius replied levelly, before tugging his arm out of James' grip and leaving the room as well.
xxxxx
Sirius sighed, looking around. Where would Harry go if his mood was like this?
Well, there was always the possibility that he'd jumped worlds – he tended to do that occasionally after all – and if that was the case then it wasn't like Sirius would be able to follow him. However, he didn't think that Harry had done that, not this time at least, he just had a feeling about it.
His nose twitched, trying to identify the scents around the place. Some were easy to identify, Len and Nel for example, no matter the form they were in, smelled of cats, with a sharp, cold scent, like frost, on top of that, with an undercurrent of sexual desire. Altrouge smelled of blood, pine needles, and something a little warmer, like a gentle breath.
He could smell the scent trails heading in different directions, all of Harry's girls, and Harry himself, giving each other some space to work out their frustrations in their own way. Len and Nel seemed to be heading in the general direction of the Owlery, Altrouge's trail lead out of a nearby open window, and V/V's also went that way, likely towards the forest.
Harry's scent, an odd mixture of blood, lavender, something fruity, as well as an enticing, seductive, unidentifiable something, all with an undercurrent of danger and death. It was uniquely Harry, and Sirius knew that if he released his restrictions then his scent would be infused with his magic, increasing its potency immensely. If that happened, Harry's aura would become like a Veela's Allure ramped up to ridiculous levels, so long as he restrained his cursed nature of course. If he didn't restrain that part of his nature, reality itself would corrode around him, bring broken down and devoured by his curses.
Shaking his head to get his mind off the tangent it had went off on, Sirius' nose twitched again. Thanks to his sensitive nose, courtesy of his animagus form, he was able to follow Harry's scent trail, though he had a little difficulty travelling like Harry did.
Sirius' eye twitched as he found Harry's scent going over the edge of a balcony and directly down the wall. Harry's ability to walk on any surface made it more difficult to follow after him, and that wasn't including the fact he could walk on air or water, fly, or teleport all over and between worlds.
Eventually, he tracked Harry down through the school, Harry having taken the shortcut of walking down the wall in the central stairway, and then out the double doors. Harry, it seemed, had headed towards the edge of the lake, specifically where it bordered on the Forbidden Forest.
He found that Harry was not alone, despite all of those who'd been in the Headmaster's office having scattered. He tried to identify the three that were with Harry, but found he couldn't, and thought it likely that they were amongst those Harry had met when he wandered between worlds.
"Sirius..." Harry sighed. "I guess I stirred up quite the hornet's nest with my 'revelations', eh?"
Sirius shrugged. "They were rather stunned when I left, but I'd guess that afterwards was absolute pandemonium." He paused for a moment. "I know that you're... not happy about things as they are, but you seemed to really fly off the handle there, what's that all about, if you don't mind me asking?"
"I don't mind." Harry waved his hesitation off. "Though I guess I should introduce my friends here first, I don't believe you've met them before."
"No, I haven't." Sirius admitted. "But I can guess how you met them. If I'm not wrong, these guys, well, girls actually, are from some of the worlds you've visited, right?"
"Correct." Harry nodded, before gesturing to one of his companions.
This girl looked to be a young teen, perhaps fourteen, maybe even younger, and had straight black hair and blank red eyes. She wore a black kimono with a floral pattern, and she had drawn her knees up to her chest and had her arms wrapped around them.
"Her name is Ai Enma, though she's more commonly known by the moniker 'Hell Girl'. At the price of condemning your own soul to hell when you die, you can cast another into that realm. She is the one who ferries those souls, and the one who regulates the system. One point of note is her absolute hatred of spiders, especially white ones." Sirius gave the girl a smile and a wave, but she didn't react other than to stare neutrally at him, before returning her gaze to Harry.
Personally, Sirius found her more than a little creepy.
"These two are a little more complicated." Harry continued, indicating the others with him. "The dark blueish purple one is named Luna, and the black one could be considered her more devious side. Think of the two of them like me and Shadow of the Heart." Harry explained.
Sirius caught the fact that Harry had specifically used one of his aspects, rather than referencing them in general, and thought he understood what Harry was implying. "People think she's an 'evil' side, but there's more to it than that which people either haven't or don't see?" He asked.
"Yes, that's it." Harry nodded. "Nightmare Moon, which is how people refer to her, is more ambitious than her counterpart, more impulsive too. Her sarcasm, dry wit, and greater aggression are very... out of place where they are from, a place where 'Sunshine and Rainbows' is almost a literal description of things."
"Greetings." Luna nodded at him.
"Hmph, a human. Tolerable, I suppose, more than those damnable ponies at least." Nightmare Moon tossed her mane in a slightly arrogant manner.
Yes, mane. Luna and Nightmare Moon (who will from now on be referred to as 'Nim') weren't human. They looked like some form of magical horses, a cross between unicorns and pegasi, having both horns and wings. What really set them apart from most other equines was their colouring. Like has been said, Luna was mainly a dark bluish purple colour, with parts of her being darker, almost black. Nightmare Moon, on the other hand, was primarily black, but with light blue and dark purple mixed in as well. Both of them had crescent moon markings on their flanks and fronts.
"Am I going to hear a little of your story?" Sirius asked.
Luna and Nim both glanced at Harry, who shrugged, before speaking. "They're part of a world where everything is regulated, including the weather, turning of the seasons, and switching between day and night. The one who controls the sun is Luna's sister, Celestia, where Luna controls the moon. Of course, ponies are diurnal for the most part, so Celestia got a lot more attention and affection than Luna did."
Harry paused for a moment here, thinking about how to word the next part. "The fact that they shared a castle, rather than living separately can't have helped things either, and more than likely exacerbated the issue." He paused again. "A... series of events occurred, which resulted in the 'creation' of Nightmare Moon, and Celestia was 'forced' to seal her sister away on the moon, where she is to stay for a thousand years."
Luna then spoke up, her voice rather soft and delicate. "I was incredibly surprised when Harry here turned up on my half of the moon, even more when he decided to visit Nim's half of it too. It's thanks to him that tension and bad feeling between myself and her has calmed down somewhat. It's also thanks to him that I'm not currently on the moon, despite my 'sentence' not yet being up."
"The moons an awful place to spend centuries alone." Nim gruffly added. "I'm grateful to the guy as well." That was as close to a heartfelt thanks as anyone was going to get from her.
"Understandable." Sirius nodded. "Being in Azkaban for twelve yours was not particularly pleasant either, though I have no idea how that would compare to centuries by yourself."
"Harry has mentioned this 'Azkaban', and the disgusting creatures that guard that place." Nim replied. "That you made it out sane is something you should be proud of."
"Thanks." Sirius said, a little unsure of the black unicorn/pegasus hybrid, she carried an air of inherent superiority and arrogance, though the edge of it seemed a little blunted, probably from contact with Harry. "Now, weren't we talking about Harry's little temper tantrum?"
Harry sighed. "It's... frustrating. I'm still somewhat amazed that myself and the Dumbledore of my birth world are on decent, if not good, terms. To see another version of him that I'm mentally comparing him to the Dumbledore I knew several years back. It's the same with the rest of them, I already have established opinions of them, and their personal opinions and experiences with my alternate are clashing with the truth of myself. It's all pissing me off, and I'm wondering why I even agreed with Fate to 'save' this reality, rather than simply consigning it to oblivion."
"Because she'll owe you a favour for it?" Sirius shrugged. "I've gotta say, a favour from an Aspect of Existence isn't something a normal person comes by easily, and I'm not sure this is your first either."
Harry removed his Gorgon Breaker and began to toy with it in his hands. "Yeah, a favour from Fate itself is nothing to turn your nose up at. Still, I can't wait until the wait is over, so I can slaughter Voldemort and move on." Harry's brow creased as a frown crossed his face. "I'm also wondering what it was that Rose Prophecy sensed that Sumire told me about."
"Any ideas?" Sirius asked.
Harry shook his head. "No. I went and checked on ORT, but that's no more active than it was a decade ago. I then tried Primate Murder, but she shows no signs of an impending rampage. After that, I tried all of the 'powers' that I know about. The gods are stirring, but not quickly enough to have a major impact while I'm here, and once I leave they'll most likely return to their slumber."
Harry held out a hand in front of him, where countless trillions of golden threads appeared from nothing. "However, something is happening, the threads of Fate are fluctuating. Whatever it is, it's nothing mundane, and it also transcends most supernatural forces, possibly even higher than Fate is."
"Fate is an 'Aspect of Existence', a fundamental part of all realities, what's higher than that?" Sirius asked.
Harry sighed again. "Not a lot, and what there is... well, let's just say that I really don't want to tangle with them."
Sirius contemplated asking what Harry was referring to, but what could he really do against something on that level of power? Heck, Sirius himself was only on a level a shade or two higher than the majority of wizards, primarily due to adapting to being around high-powered individuals all the time.
"What is that?" Luna asked, and Sirius blinked before glancing over to see what she was looking at.
"Just a side project I've been fiddling with, it's mostly DoD's work." Harry shrugged, holding up the object in his hand for her and Sirius to see. "It already works, I'm just refining and improving it."
The object turned out to be a rod of metal, around eight inches long and covered in rune arrays. Harry channelled prana into it, and instantly a beam of light, or at least that's what it looked like, leapt out of the end, reaching four feet from it before stopping.
"Is that... a lightsaber?" Sirius asked, eye twitching, before he face-palmed. "I'm not even surprised." His muffled voice came from behind his hand.
Harry swung the lightsaber around a little, making it hum like the 'real' thing, before the blade, his chosen colour being lavender, retracted back into the handle.
"Wait, never mind that right now." Sirius shook his head, remembering what he'd been considering asking Harry, before deciding that getting a better baseline of Harry's abilities and power might be a better idea. "Harry, just how much raw power do you possess?"
"A lot." Harry replied casually. "If I was to release all of it in one go, it would result in an explosion of raw magic that would engulf and annihilate all of Europe. Of course, if that power was focused properly, like into a blasting curse, the damage, physically, would be far greater than that, taking out much more than a single continent." He frowned. "My most powerful technique though, that's something else."
Sirius waited for him to elaborate, before noticing the distant look in Harry's now revealed eyes. He nudged him, encouraging him to expand on what he was saying.
"Well, what sort of high-level being doesn't have a sacrificial move or two in reserve? Mine takes advantage of my Sorcery, Heaven's Feel. As you know, the very instant I use even a drop of power, my reserves are instantly refilled. It's the reason that I have endless stamina, infinite reserves of wizarding magic, and bottomless reserves of prana. You following?" He asked.
"Yeah, that's easy enough to understand." Sirius shrugged, and the others nodded in agreement, even the ever still Ai Enma.
"Well, there's a slightly necromantic ritual I found that drains a target of magic and adds it to the caster. I have the ritual circle, enhanced with runic arrays etched into certain internal organs of mine, ready to be activated at a moments notice. When activated, they will drain the target, myself, and add the accumulated magic to my own reserves. Do you see where that's going?" Harry questioned them. This time, however, it was Ai who answered.
"The instant the ritual drained your magic, your reserves would once again be full." She spoke in a monotone. "Once again, your reserves would be drained and added to. Depending on the speed of the ritual, you would rapidly accumulate magic, causing a build up inside of your body."
Harry nodded. "As it so happens, the ritual is instant. In a fraction of a second, the magic accumulated would eclipse the power supplied by half a dozen sun-sized stars in their entire lifetimes. My physical body would not be able to handle that, causing a critical failure. Like with the technique mentioned earlier, that magic would be released in a single blast, causing untold amounts of damage on a large scale."
Sirius mouth was dry at that thought, though he had to ask. "Just... what kind of scale are we talking here?"
Harry shrugged. "If released as raw magic, the explosion would consume everything for more than twenty light years in all directions. If focused with a spell... the damage radius would multiply massively."
"That... that's a lot of damage." Luna mumbled to herself, though the others heard her clearly.
Harry nodded. "That's the greatest physical damage I'm capable of causing, conceptual damage on the other hand..." Once more, the golden threads of Fate materialised. "Imagine all of that power focused upon these threads, cutting them, stretching them, weakening them, and the calamities that would cause. Not pretty, is it?"
"Harry, you scare me sometimes." Sirius shook his head. "Your casual admittance of such ridiculous power just now has hit number one on my list of 'oh shit' stuff."
Luna shook her head. "That amount of power is beyond me."
Nim sighed. "Yeah, I can't match it either."
"More powerful than I." Ai added.
Sirius then remembered why he was asking about how powerful Harry was. If he was capable of things like that, just how powerful would these he didn't want to tangle with have to be to put him on edge like that?
"Wait, you said those were 'sacrificial' techniques? You mean you'd die if you used them?" Sirius asked.
Harry chuckled. "Yes and No. I'd die in the sense that my physical body would be completely destroyed by all of that pent up power tearing its way out of the vessel that held it. However, my soul does not require a body to remain anchored to the world, and I could recreate my body from nothing fairly rapidly if I needed to."
A mischievous grin then split Harry's face. "Also, remember that I'm constantly increasing my capacity to hold and channel prana, and I have not yet reached a limit, so imagine what I might be capable of in a decade or two, or even a century."
"Powerful." Ai nodded her head. "Incredibly so."
"I think dog guy had it right when he said 'scary'." Nim snorted. "I doubt anyone in princess' memories could match up, not even her and her sis with the Elements of Harmony teamed up with Discord would come even close to a fraction of that raw power."
"Enough of the power level discussion." Harry waved them off. "Let's talk about something else."
Luna shrugged. "There's not a lot to inspire conversation on the moon."
"Yeah, I've got nothing either." Nim added.
"I oversee the dead headed for hell." Ai said. "There have been more contracts since the last time we met, none of them noteworthy."
"You know what I do, Harry, so I've got nothing to say." Sirius said his piece, but Harry shot him a look.
"Haven't you been flirting with Touko and Taiga recently? Even Shirou has been a little creeped out, and we both know he's not normally flustered. Well, not unless he's being targeted by Rin's teasing or something." Harry replied with amusement.
"Aside from her runes and replacement puppets, Touko isn't too far out there, and Taiga's a fun girl to be around. I'm also fairly sure she suspects something about her surrogate little brother, and you lot by extension. Do you have any idea if her family knows anything about the non-mundane world?" Sirius shrugged in reply.
Harry considered the question. "I'm fairly sure Raiga, her grandfather and head of the local yakuza, knows something, probably from Kiritsugu, if not whatever he managed to dig up in regards to the fourth and fifth Grail Wars. He's also old enough to have been a child during the third war, so that might have left an impression, if anything happened back then. I don't think he's told Taiga anything however, though it's not exactly unexpected that she'd suspect something, a lot of odd stuff has happened around her after all."
"So she'll accept it without too much difficulty?" Sirius asked.
"Magic in general? Yeah, I believe so. Wizarding attitudes? Not much more difficult. The standard Magi outlook? Perhaps, perhaps not." Harry weighed things up. "Remember, most Magi are arseholes, the ones you've met are the exceptions."
"Enough with the mutt's love life." Nim rolled her eyes. "What do you plan to do for the immediate future, Harry?"
Harry shrugged his shoulders again. "Not much really. I'll be wasting time here at Hogwarts for another couple of months at least, but interestingly enough, the fourth Grail War is due to occur this winter, and I intend to be at least present for the duration of it, if not participating, or perhaps simply messing with people. Aside from that, I've got nothing planned, so hopefully something interesting will turn up."
"Something 'interesting'?" Luna wondered with her head tilted cutely to one side.
Sirius snickered. "Luna, you might not have known Harry long, but you can bet that Harry will be involved in some sort of situation or event that can be classed as 'interesting' by those with an adventurous spirit, and 'something to avoid like the plague', from those without that same spark he possesses."
"Really?" Luna asked. "I was already aware that he was unusual, but you make it sound as if his life is in peril on a regular basis."
"Not 'regular', and it's very difficult to kill me, but I do often find myself facing puzzles, strange occurrences, or troubling situations, and not all of them by chance either." Luna gave him an odd look, so Harry explained what he meant. "I'm immortal, and I do not enjoy the concept of boredom, so I do search out trouble somewhat, it gives me something to do and occupies my time."
"Better to have fun than be boring." Smirked Nim. "Nothing ventured, nothing gained, and all that rot."
"Hmm, I suppose." Luna agreed, albeit a little reluctantly. "Boredom is most unpleasant, I can agree with you on that at least."
"Oh, I almost forgot!" Sirius suddenly called out, drawing everyone's attention to him. "I meant to give you this earlier, but with everything going on, well..." He shrugged, before pulling something out of a pocket, obviously expanded as what was in his hand really shouldn't have fit into it.
"The cloak?" Harry queried. "What are you doing with that?"
"Before that meeting with Dumbledore, James and Lily both thought you should have it. The cloak is supposed to be passed down the Potter line, father to son, unless there are no male children, in which case the eldest girl gets it. Anyway, Lily mentioned some complications after the birth of the twins, so the chances of her getting pregnant again are very low, and the chances of a miscarriage are fairly high too." Sirius explained. "So, they thought giving it to you would be best, especially as neither Blake or Rose are at all interested in it."
"The last of this world's set of 'Deathly Hallows'." Harry murmured, drawing the Elder Wand and summoning the Resurrection Stone. "They bring one closer to Death, and if they survive, they then become an avatar of Death. Normally, that doesn't mean much, as minor as their connection is, but I was an exception to that rule. I'm kind of curious what collecting a second set will do for me."
Sirius, it seemed, was rather curious as well, as were Ai, Nim, and Luna, who all looked on with curious looks on their faces as Sirius draped the cloak over Harry's arms, as he held the Elder Wand in his left hand, and the Resurrection Stone in his right.
He let out a breath he didn't know he'd been holding when nothing immediately happened. "I don't know what I was expecting, Harry, maybe atmospherics or something, or Death appearing in a cloud of smoke, but that was kind of disappointing." Sirius grinned slightly, only to jump in surprise when he heard a voice behind him.
"I could have done that, but are the theatrics really necessary amongst us?" A familiar individual spoke.
Death had come to Hogwarts.