The Gaunts were his last link to Voldemort's past, and Regulus wasn't about to leave any stone unturned.
Regulus stood at the edge of Little Hangleton, taking in the quiet, almost eerie atmosphere of the village. The narrow, winding road led him past sagging cottages, their windows dark, as if the life had long drained out of the place. A village frozen in time, hiding secrets no one bothered to speak about anymore. He had no real hope of finding anything concrete, but this was all he had left.
Merope Gaunt—the sister—was a ghost in the records, barely mentioned. Regulus had found that curious. If Merope had lived, if she had been anywhere near Little Hangleton, someone had to have seen her. And if there was one thing Regulus knew about small villages, it was that the local pub held more answers than the Ministry ever could.
The Hanged Man was exactly what Regulus expected: dimly lit, filled with the smell of stale beer and damp wood. Regulus straightened his cloak, letting his family's wealth and status do the talking before he even opened his mouth.
He sidled up to the bar, ordering a drink with a calm confidence. "I'm looking for some old information," he said, casually throwing down a couple of sickles onto the bar. "Ever hear of a family called the Gaunts?"
The bartender squinted, as if trying to recall something buried deep in the recesses of his memory. "Gaunts?" he repeated, shaking his head. "Nah, can't say I've heard of 'em."
The bartender, however, wanting to impress this well-dressed young gentleman, regaled him with tales of a triple murder that had occurred in the village not so long ago. That caught the young man's attention; but not for reasons the bartender knew or suspected. Regulus knew an Avada Kedavra murder when he heard about one.
He pressed for details, but the bartender had already told him all he knew about the murder. "The maid came running straight here after she found them, you see. You can imagine the fright she had; the entire family was dead around the dinner table. That family always seems to have something or the other happening to them."
"What do you mean, what else happened?"
"Well, rumor has it that Tom Riddle had an affair with that ugly little girl who lived in the tiny cottage at the edge of the village. No one really knows much about it."
And to prove how much no one in the village knew about it, the patrons of the bar proceeded to tell Regulus about the scandal that had seized the village many years earlier. Regulus learned how the son of the village chief had eloped with the daughter of the violent tramp and who 'never actually had been a part of the village'.
He listened, enthralled, about how Tom Riddle had returned alone a few months later, saying something about having been manipulated into the relationship to begin with. "I reckon she told him she was pregnant with his child," said the bartender sagely, and when he found out she was lying, well...", he shrugged.
Regulus remained unnaturally still as the bartender's words sank in, his mind racing as he pieced everything together. He had learned far more than he ever intended when he first set out on this quest.
Voldemort was, without a doubt, the Heir of Slytherin. Regulus had traced the Gaunt bloodline straight to its last surviving descendant—Tom Riddle Junior. But what shook him more than anything was the scandalous truth he now fully grasped: Voldemort, the self-proclaimed champion of pureblood supremacy, was a Half-Blood.
Regulus's old pureblood pride, something he thought had long faded, came roaring back with a vengeance. Voldemort had corrupted something sacred—Salazar Slytherin's legacy, his locket—with his half-blood soul. It sickened him to the core.
It was at that moment that Regulus's hatred for Voldemort crystallized, sharper than ever. Claiming to be a pureblood was one thing, but the sheer hypocrisy of slaughtering innocent people over blood status—a blood status Voldemort shared with them—ignited a fury within Regulus that burned hotter than anything the Death Eaters had ever made him feel.
Regulus clenched his fists as the memories of his younger self came flooding back—idolizing Voldemort, soaking up every word of the Dark Lord's victories, feeling the rush of being a Death Eater. How could he have been so blind? The admiration he once held was now replaced by something darker: a burning need for revenge.
The hours that followed were a blur of anger, resolve, and reckless planning. Whatever else Regulus Black might have been, he was not foolish. He knew Voldemort would come for him eventually. His time was limited, and he had to act fast. The plan forming in his mind was dangerous, nearly suicidal. He didn't expect to live through it—Voldemort's punishment would be slow and excruciating. But that didn't matter anymore.
What mattered was that Voldemort knew it was Regulus Arcturus Black who had unraveled his secret, who had discovered the Dark Lord's fatal flaw. And Regulus wanted him to know, without a doubt, that it was he who had made Voldemort mortal once more.
Adrenaline coursed through him as he found himself back in the Black family mansion, preparing for what he knew would be his final journey. His hands moved feverishly as he penned the note to Voldemort, detailing his betrayal and hidden within the fake locket. There was no room for second thoughts. Every moment he held this knowledge put his family and himself in grave danger. It had to happen today.
He summoned Kreacher, the family house elf, who appeared reluctant but obedient. Regulus explained only what the elf needed to know—there was no point in burdening him with unnecessary details. All Kreacher had to do was lead him to the cave, switch the lockets, and return the real one to safety. Regulus could worry about how to destroy the Horcrux later.
As he took one last glance at his childhood bedroom—the familiar trinkets, the tapestries of Black family history on the walls—he felt a pang of something like regret. But there was no turning back now.
Taking one last look at his childhood bedroom, Regulus Black and his faithful family elf left Number Twelve, Grimmauld Place, London; not knowing that fate would allow only one of them to return.