[warnings: Suicidal thoughts.]

The days at Hogwarts were too filled with sunshine, the castle stone walls always had the steps of the sun dancing on them, and completely different from the castle Harry had lived in since he was a child. So Harry knew that he didn't worth it. A dark wizard like him, the so-called Dark Prince, was only deserve to hide in dark corners.

The words of the Defense Against the Dark Arts professor stirred up waves in his heart, making him realize that they at Hogwarts didn't welcome him and that Hogwarts wasn't home.

So he ran away, back to his true home, the castle of the Dark Lord, a place shrouded in darkness. It was also very damp, and they even lived underwater, or rather in the reflection of the water. At least Nagini would like this dark and damp place... it wasn't too bad.

Harry remembered the words he had heard while in confinement.

"I saw my best friend die, and the killer is right in front of me! They still told me to keep calm!"

"Did you hesitate when you killed him?"

"You are irredeemably, aren't you? Shouldn't you just rot in Azkaban with Bella and the others, or be kissed by a Dementor?"

He knew that person hated him and wanted to kill him.

But Harry felt that he was right.

Harry had never encountered the Dementors too many times before, and every time he did, he only used a dark curse to deal with them, without any real impact. It was his first time at Hogwarts.

Harry had almost forgotten what he was like as a child. The Dementors were like a meditation bowl, showing him all his memories. His former self was so strange, like a lifetime ago.

Harry felt that he had really changed a lot over the years.

Not only did he have painful childhood memories, but also the later memories of hurting so many people at his father's command. The Dementors also made him relive these nightmares, and Harry gradually felt that these nightmares were more painful than his childhood shadows.

From an unknown point in time, Harry began to hate himself. The seed of hatred was planted without knowing when, and in recent times, this hatred has grown stronger and more toxic, every strand of resentment carrying a venom that seemed to want to devour him alive.

Sometimes, he even wished for his own pain, just so that he wouldn't feel as much pain.

Harry's sleeping problems were getting worse and worse. He had tried every obscure sleeping potion and developed a resistance to them. He began to feel that he didn't deserve to sleep, having hurt so many people, why should he be able to rest easy?

He increasingly felt that he was indeed a monster.

At times like these, he would cast a Wakefulness spell to clear his head and put on his clothes to continue to working. Academics could temporarily distract him from the things that made him uncomfortable.

Monsters don't need rest.

Once, he went several days without sleep, barely eating anything, until he passed out. He was awakened the next morning at 7 a.m. by his alarm spell, realizing that he had collapsed on the ground.

Even though it was on the ground, this was the most peaceful sleep Harry had had in years, even better than the sleeping potions. So he thought this might be a good way to sleep.

Harry remembered how he had worked so hard for his father, perhaps because he wanted to live on.

He still remembered how he had tried to escape from the castle's body processing facility. On that snowy night when they first met, he had wanted to live on so badly. And even earlier than that, when he had escaped from the hands of those bad people and wandered onto the streets. And even earlier still, when he had been in the hands of his uncle and encountered a group of sadists, with new and old wounds all over his body, he had wished so much for someone to come and save him, to live on.

But now, he was gradually losing the will to live. He didn't know when his mentality had changed, as if he was becoming more and more indifferent to it all, until he crossed a threshold and began to see death as a kind of release.

Sometimes, as he looked at his test subjects, he would think that he wished that one day he could die like them, preferably in a more painful way...the most painful experimental method that would torment him to death would be what he deserved.

Most of the time, his father didn't care about Harry's condition. He only focused on his goals. This made Harry feel fortunate, and he didn't want his father to know about his weaknesses and useless feelings.

When he was occasionally asked, Harry would insist that he was "fine" and try to look cold and aloof, not revealing any true thoughts. He didn't want to be seen as a useless waste by his father anymore. Although he wasn't afraid of death or punishment, he still wanted his father to be happy.

Harry had spent almost his entire life loving his father, and only this love could sustain him, keeping him alive, breathing, walking, and working. If life needed a motivation, this was his only motivation, the whole meaning of his existence in the world.

It's the end of another year, and Harry brings a big breakthrough he's been working on tirelessly as a gift. Harry knows his father will like it.

Father flips through the detailed paper on parchment, his eyes gleaming with delight. And Harry just wants to say, "Happy birthday."

Nagini chimes in beside him, "Master's birthday? Oh, happy birthday!"

Harry loves this day every year, and looks forward to it, as if it were his own birthday.

Anyway, he never really knew when his own birthday.

As someone who never should have been born, there was never any reason to celebrate Harry's birthday. As a monster like him, he shouldn't even exist in this world.

Harry didn't know if Lily and James regretted giving birth to him, but he felt that... they should regret it.

In any case, Harry himself would regret it - if he had never been born, maybe many people wouldn't have been hurt.

Harry always looked up at the tall figure, but that person never stopped to take a look at the little Harry following him.

He just zealously pursued his goals.

Harry knew that despite being named the Dark Prince, having the authority of the Dark Mark and the castle, and seemingly holding a high position, he was still just a senior Death Eater in his father's eyes, a mere tool.

He couldn't even compare to Nagini.

Harry was painfully aware that his father didn't love him. In fact, his father even sneered at the concept of love. Harry didn't expect anything from him.

When his father finally achieved immortality, he wouldn't need Harry anymore, would he? Maybe death would be the best outcome for him... At least he had Nagini to keep him company.

But Harry couldn't help hoping that his father would erect a gravestone for him and visit him from time to time in the eternal years that followed. It would be so nice if he didn't forget about Harry.

But maybe that was asking too much. Harry decided to stop hoping and just focus on his work.

Even the people his father had ordered him to kill, such as some tricky Death Eaters or members of the Order of the Phoenix who accidentally discovered the Dark Lord's secrets, Harry was now trying not to kill them if he could help it.

He found a better way to deal with them - modifying their memories and sending them to the Muggle world to start a new life. As long as they didn't return to the wizarding world, they wouldn't interfere with his father's plans. Wasn't that enough?

The bad Harry tried to persuade the good Harry, telling himself that this was the right thing to do.

Harry and his father consulted many ancient books and finally found a clue about the Tree of Life in the Utnapishtim myth: myths and legends often had some basis in reality, and the Tree of Life was likely to exist in the real world, even though it couldn't provide eternal life with just one bite, it did contain some magical powers related to immortality.

They went on a journey to find this tree as one of the ingredients for their magic ritual.

The lost city ruins under the sea, like a fallen giant, still had magnificent walls and broken remnants, as if proclaiming its past glory and its final resistance against destruction. However, death was the fate of all things, and the end would inevitably come. Ironically, hidden in the ruins of this collapsed city might be some eternal secrets.

The ruins still held many ancient magics and a group of guardians who had lived under the sea for thousands of years and were extremely dangerous.

In order to protect his father and get the seed of the Tree of Life, Harry was unfortunate enough to be seriously injured. His blood, as red as smoke, scattered into the surrounding seawater. Harry realized that the bloody smell would attract more guardians.

Perhaps death would come earlier than he had anticipated.

Anyway, now that Father has achieved his goal in this mission, he no longer needs him to cover for him or slow him down, right?

As for getting injured... did Father see it again? Harry remembered being thrown into a corpse processing site because he was unconscious back then, and now that he's injured again, Father must think he's useless... and then throw him away like when he was a child. He was mentally prepared for this.

Dying in the ruins of the ancient city isn't bad either. Harry kind of likes the atmosphere of the broken walls and ruins here, the only regret is that Father can't come to see him often. Or maybe... he really doesn't deserve to expect Father to come and see him. Harry thought sadly.

So Harry said to that person, "Father, go ahead, don't worry about me..." After thinking about it, he didn't want to leave a useless impression in Father's heart, and added stubbornly, "I'm fine."

Even though they were underwater, magic conveyed his voice and intention to Lord Voldemort beside him.

However, what surprised Harry was that this time Father didn't throw him away. The two of them fought against a group of ancient and powerful creatures, and finally broke through and successfully left.

The sobering spell was still in effect, as long as he didn't die, he could stay awake. So Harry was awake and tried not to hold them back. By the time they successfully returned to the surface, Harry was severely injured, exhausted, and weary.

There was still some confusion in his emerald eyes, and he didn't quite understand the situation in front of him. He thanked Father and then Voldemort hugged Harry and helped him back to the castle. Meanwhile, Harry still tried to pretend he was fine. But this time Voldemort didn't believe him.

Voldemort suggested Harry take a break to rest and recover, but Harry didn't want a break. He only thought that if they could complete the ritual quickly, the war could end.

Nagini was killed. When Harry heard the news, he was overcome with grief. They had always been good friends, and even when Father was angry and wanted to punish Harry, Nagini would plead for him.

The enraged Dark Lord went to find the culprit himself to take a revenge, and Harry was extremely sad too. As he looked at Nagini's cold body, there was a moment when he wanted to support Father's decision.

However, he then thought, is this kind of thinking really right? The culprit killed Nagini because Nagini had bitten her loved one to death.

Nagini was always naively cruel. She was indeed innocent and lovely, but she really loved to eat people. She had killed others, so just like Harry's current desire for revenge, victim's friends came to seek revenge on her.

Harry felt that his thoughts were really unfair to Nagini...She died, how could he think this way? And should he feel that she deserved to die? Lady Snake would be angry if she knew. Harry couldn't even stand his own thoughts.

"Yes, she is a snake and she doesn't have to abide by human morals. Isn't it natural for snakes to eat meat? The real wrong is war itself, it's war that causes innocent beings to harm each other."

Harry was thinking, if he had completed his father's goal earlier, if the war had ended yesterday, would Nagini still have to die today? Why couldn't he have been faster...

And why wasn't it him who died? He clearly deserved to die more than Nagini. The number of people who died at his hands was much more than those bitten by Nagini. If he could, he really wanted to exchange his own life for Nagini's.

"Farewell, my lady," Harry whispered softly at the funeral, gently stroking the smooth and cold snake body. He could still remember Lady Snake's laughter.

Then he inappropriately thought of Sirius Black. The pain of losing loved ones and friends was so unbearable. He knew that the person hated him, but experiencing this pain firsthand still tore him apart. And there were countless people who lost loved ones and friends because of him and them...

Father had already left the funeral. Harry wanted to accompany his Lady Snake a little longer, but realized that his father needed company more at this moment. Father must also be in pain, but he was so proud and unwilling to speak.

"Father, you still have me." Harry hoped he wouldn't be sad anymore. Maybe father didn't think much of him, and Harry couldn't compare to Nagini at all, but he still wanted to be with him.

The experiment was over, but this test subject was lucky enough to survive. Harry didn't hesitate to transfer his own life force to him, this emergency treatment was the most useful.

The person was pulled back from the brink of death, and Harry then skillfully used several healing spells - also dark magic, there were healing spells in the dark arts, but they were just not used as often.

The person's injuries quickly recovered, but he looked at Harry in horror, as if he was looking at an invading monster: "Don't kill me...please, I still have family and children...please let me go..." he pleaded tremblingly.

"It's okay, I'll let you go." Harry comforted him and continued to use healing magic to restore the injuries on his body as much as possible.

His father got injured. Harry continued to transfer his life force to his father because it was the most useful emergency measure.

This spell involved transferring one's own life to someone else, so the backlash was severe. Therefore it was rarely used by most people, but Harry had been using it quite a lot recently. Those people he wanted to save was more worthy of living than him, weren't they?

This even included his father... at least his father wanted to live, while Harry didn't care much. So this was also good. Harry held his father's hand, feeling the warmth in his palm.

The flow of life force made him feel weak, so his injured father must be even more uncomfortable, right? Harry couldn't bear to see him suffer. He squeezed Voldemort's hand tighter.

But he suddenly realized that he would like holding hands like this. They had never held hands before.