Tom Riddle stared down at the words written in his notebook:
TOM MARVOLO RIDDLE
He was tired of having such a common name, but he wasn't quite sure what he could do about it—what name truly fit him? It would have to be something strange; something unique and memorable, but where to start, that was the question.
"What am I?" he asked himself, the words in front of him spinning into an answer.
I AM
He looked more intensely at his name, trying to unscramble any other words from it. There, amongst the remaining letters making up MARVOLO RIDDLE, he found the word "LORD."
I AM LORD
The remaining letters were nonsensical, but he was set on making something out of them. T-O-M, V-O-L, and R-D-E. It didn't sound like an actual pronounceable word, so he continued unscrambling them, hoping he could uncover more words mixed into the remaining letters. Finally, he found MORTE. He didn't have another M to finish mortem, the Latin word for death, so he removed the E, leaving just MORT.
I AM LORD MORT
That didn't quite sound as terrifyingly unique as he was hoping, so he continued staring at the remaining letters: V-O-L-D-E, trying to make sense of them. Eventually, he just tacked them onto the end of MORT:
I AM LORD MORTVOLDE.
Nope, that didn't sound cool; it just someone trying to be cool, so he flipped the MORT and the VOLDE, transforming the word into VOLDEMORT.
I AM LORD VOLDEMORT.
Now that sounded terrifyingly unique. Witches and wizards from all over the world would come to fear the name Voldemort—he just knew it.