Harry Potter and the Obscurus

Chapter 8 The Room of Requirement

Harry missed Friday night's dinner. Although Snape had a house-elf prepare a separate meal for him, it was clearly not enough.

Due to extreme mental exhaustion, Harry immediately surrendered himself to Mo Ran after leaving Snape's office, which brought forward their plans.

As originally planned, Mo Ran intended for Harry to find the Half-Blood Prince's "Advanced Potions Making." However, since the Half-Blood Prince had already volunteered to tutor Harry, this book, which recorded Professor Snape's embarrassing past during his teenage years, was no longer necessary.

"Let's go find the House of Requirement first!"

Harry (Mo Ran) muttered to himself.

In the Harry Potter film series, the director only filmed Neville finding the Room of Requirement. However, in reality, entering the Room of Requirement requires meeting specific triggering conditions. If this room truly responds to all wizards, then its existence wouldn't be a secret.

“On the eighth floor, opposite the blanket hanging with the story of Barnabas trying to teach trolls to dance ballet, walk back and forth three times.”

"I need a place to practice fighting! I need a place to practice fighting! I need a place to practice fighting!"

As the process of summoning the Room of Requirement was completed, a perfectly smooth door appeared on the previously clean wall, like a biscuit floating in milk. Harry (Mo Ran) breathed a sigh of relief; this was the third location he had tried this week.

After grasping the brass handle, pulling open the door, and entering the Room of Requirement, Harry (Mo Ran) discovers that in addition to mannequins and targets, the room is also filled with many books related to combat. This is quite different from the scene depicted in the movie.

The books on the shelf, including "The Complete Book of Self-Defense Spells," "Fighting Poison with Poison," and "Outsmarting the Dark Arts," were almost all books Harry had never seen at Flourish and Blotts. After casually flipping through "Common Spells and Counters," Mo Ran couldn't help but regret not having read the entire Harry Potter series.

"Huh... Everyone looks pretty much the same as in the movie, but the setting and plot are so much more complicated."

Thinking of this, Harry (Mo Ran) seemed to recall something. He abruptly closed the book, shut his eyes, and began to silently recite in his mind:

"Give me a place to hide things, the bigger the better, and show me everything that has been stored or discarded in the Room of Requirement."

The ground shook slightly, and Harry (Mo Ran) could even hear strange wind sounds in his ears. When he opened his eyes again, the scene around him was a messy, giant warehouse.

Harry (Mo Ran) vaguely recognized some of the objects piled on the surface, such as the Demon-Revealing Mirror, the Sweeping Series flying brooms, the crystal ball, the tattered portrait, and the Goblin Stone; as for those that were older and buried underneath, he had never even seen them before.

This isn't just a wish fulfillment store, it's a paradise for free purchases!

Harry (Mo Ran) trembled as he started walking, stuffing whatever valuables he could identify into his pockets as if he were strolling through an amusement park. But he soon realized that even with his seamless, retractable suitcase, it wouldn't be enough to take a single hair from the ox's body.

"No, no!"

Harry (Mo Ran) raised his hand and slapped his cheek, trying to clear his head.

"Why should I make myself look like a thief who has sneaked into a treasure vault? No one is trying to steal it from me, so why am I in such a hurry? Besides, if I accidentally touch some dangerous dark magic item, I might just lose my life here."

"Dark magic, dark magic... dark magic?"

"That's right, black magic!"

When the Dark Arts were mentioned, Harry's (Mo Ran's) logic instantly became clear. He might not know what the most valuable or precious item in the Room of Requirement was, but the one thing he absolutely couldn't miss was the 'Ravenclaw's Crown'. As one of Voldemort's seven Horcruxes, finding and destroying this relic of the founder of Hogwarts was a task Harry had to complete.

“Accio Diadem!” (The diadem flies in!)

"Accio Ravenclaw's Diadem"

"Accio Rowena Ravenclaw's Diadem"

……

After his spell failed, Harry (Mo Ran) slowly put away his wand. He guessed that the Summoning Charm might not work, but he felt it would be foolish not to try.

According to the film's plot, Harry sensed the tiara's location using a method similar to echolocation, relying on his connection with Voldemort. However, the problem is that by the time of *Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows*, Voldemort had fully resurrected, and in the previous films, Harry never showed any signs of telepathy with Voldemort. This means that finding the tiara during Harry's first year would essentially require a rudimentary, exhaustive search.

"Alright, alright..."

Harry (Mo Ran) picked up a broom from the Sweeping series that he couldn't identify, and said self-deprecatingly:

"Let's just consider it like the Foolish Old Man Who Moved Mountains. Anyway, the crown is lying in this room. I don't believe it can grow legs and feet to play hide-and-seek with me."

Recalling the theoretical knowledge Mrs. Hooch had shared in the movie, Mo Ran manipulated Harry's body and straddled the flying broomstick. At that moment, Harry, fast asleep, never dreamed that his long-awaited first flight would be experienced by Mo Ran in this way.

The old Sweeper series brooms weren't fast to begin with, and the one Harry (Mo Ran) was holding even had a strange quirk. No matter how tightly or straight he gripped it, the broom always tilted to the right involuntarily. Mo Ran couldn't even concentrate fully on searching for the tiara; he had to spare some of his energy to ensure his host didn't crash headfirst into a pile of junk.

Ten minutes passed, twenty minutes passed... an hour passed, and Mo Ran, whose mentality was already on the verge of collapse, returned to the ground. He held a broom in one hand and clutched his chest with the other, panting heavily.

"Ah! Merlin's flowery shorts!"

Why do I always have to do all the dirty and hard work?

"I can't see when I fly too high, and I can't see clearly when I fly too fast. This broken broom is like it's about to malfunction. If I hadn't yet learned the Fiery Spell, do you think I would have burned everything here to ashes!"

With a series of roars, Harry's body trembled violently, his emerald green eyes slowly turning into a white mist, and his body began to twist and deform. In just a few seconds, the young wizard's body ceased to exist, replaced by a darkness so thick it could swallow all light.

The raging wind brought a deafening crackling sound, and the instant the Obscurial fully materialized, everything near the black mist was instantly crushed into dust. Moran had deliberately used his anger to unleash the Obscurial; he had figured it out. Since Horcruxes could only be destroyed through specific methods, he might as well become a master of cleanup, first destroying everything in the Room of Requirement, and then searching for the Ravenclaw tiara among the remaining items.

Over the next ten minutes, Mo Ran did not allow himself to immerse himself in the pleasure of destruction. While observing and recording the power of the attack, he began to think about the advantages and disadvantages of having Mo Ran.

First, the Obscurial, a form of dark magic, is incredibly powerful, excelling in speed, destructive force, and attack range. It can even ignore physical attacks. In the human world, this power is virtually unstoppable; even against wizards who also use magic, the Obscurial's black mist can give them a decisive advantage. However, against someone of Dumbledore's caliber, the situation changes drastically. Referring to Claydens Byrburne's performance against top-tier opponents in the movies, his Obscurial at most caused his opponents some trouble, not even a real problem. Unless Dumbledore and his allies compete with the Obscurials in efficiency and speed at slaughtering ordinary people, Harry and Morgen wouldn't even be worthy of being their opponents.

Secondly, Obscurians, who are adept at controlling their Obscurial powers, have more ways to escape than ordinary wizards. Even powerful wizards like Dumbledore rely on Apparition and Apparition for movement. Aside from Credence, who is also an Obscurian, only Voldemort and Professor Snape in the entire series truly possess the ability to fly without any aids.

Finally, and most importantly, Obscurials possess an almost limitless ability to evade attacks. Once an Obscurial fully transforms into one, their physical body ceases to exist; the agile black mist makes them extremely difficult to hit. Obscurials, who frequently fly through the forest in their black mist form, have discovered that they can freely manipulate their "body" to wander through the woods without touching a single flower or leaf. In other words, if an Obscurial's incarnation reacts quickly enough, they can theoretically dodge most attacks by contorting their "body." Whether it's the fatal Avada Kedavra curse or other magic that damages the body, mind, or even soul, the Obscurial can neutralize it through its form advantage. Even in *Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them*, Credence, nearly suicidal from a barrage of magical attacks by the Orochi, was able to regenerate his body from a small fragment of Obscurial. This is the Obscurial's greatest advantage over ordinary wizards.

Furthermore, Mo Ran had some uncertain hypotheses. For example, what was the principle behind how he, as the Obscurial, provided nourishment to his host Harry by devouring creatures like rats, insects, and snakes? Could he devour even more powerful creatures to strengthen himself? Was Harry's astonishing talent a power already flowing in his blood, or was it merely a random phenomenon resulting from the alteration of Harry's life trajectory after his soul transmigrated? What was the reason Harry had survived unharmed until now? Why did Dumbledore do nothing after learning of the Obscurial's existence? Did he not care about the savior's life or death, or was he certain Harry wouldn't die because of this power?

……

The gale gradually subsided, and Harry (Mo Ran) slowly emerged from the black mist, surrounded by all the items that had survived the "tornado" attack. Looking at the magical items—more than the books in his suitcase—Mo Ran couldn't help but sigh inwardly:

"As expected, the Silent One's attack power only has a high lower limit. Now, let alone Soul Weapons and powerful wizards, even these things placed in the Room of Requirement are so immune to my Black Mist's damage... By the way, what are all these things? I don't recognize any of them..."

Time passed by unnoticed, and Harry (Mo Ran) had lost count of how many magical items he had sorted through. Just as he numbly went to "open the next blind box," he suddenly felt a chill run down his spine.

It was a crown shaped like an eagle, studded with diamonds. Even in the dim light of Harry's wand, the eagle's wings reflected a dazzling brilliance. Correspondingly, at the very center of the crown, serving as the eagle's belly, was a dark gemstone; deep and serene, it remained like a still, unfathomable lake, even amidst the surrounding brilliance. At the very bottom of the crown was inscribed a line of smaller text, the famous Ravenclaw motto: "Superior wisdom is the greatest treasure of mankind."

Harry (Mo Ran) slapped his forehead in utter regret. If a seasoned Harry Potter fan had transmigrated to this world, he would have known to prioritize finding anything with the Ravenclaw eagle emblem.

"Should I just hand it over to Dumbledore? If I do that, will he like me more and stop worrying that I might have designs on Harry? Hmm... no, that seems a bit too deliberate. I don't have a reasonable explanation for how I know about Horcruxes. Besides, his words weren't entirely threatening. But I don't have the means to destroy Horcruxes right now. Should I just keep it? Wouldn't that be too dangerous? Do I have the ability to protect it? What if it has the same seductive power as the diary? Wouldn't I be putting Harry's classmates and friends in danger?"

Mo Ran never expected that what he had spent so much time and effort to find would turn into a hot potato just seconds after he got his hands on it. As a casual viewer, he didn't have the extensive knowledge of Harry Potter fans, and he couldn't even remember all the details in the movie. However, he did understand the core message that J.K. Rowling wanted to convey.

Leaving aside the most important theme of love, everyone in the Harry Potter series who was obsessed with magic or anything else, whether good or evil, powerful or mediocre, met a bad end. Voldemort and the Elder Wand, Dumbledore and the Resurrection Stone, and Helena and her mother's tiara.

Magic is a wondrous thing, but it is by no means omnipotent. The Elder Wand, representing invincibility, has almost brought death to every owner and seeker of it; the Resurrection Stone caused wizards like Dumbledore to become careless and cursed; and the fate of Helena Ravenclaw is needless to say. These things are like traps set by the devil in fables, plunging people into blindness and madness.

Therefore, the so-called golden tiara that supposedly enhances the wearer's wisdom is nothing more than a magic spell that improves concentration. Truly wise people would not, and would not, use such unreliable external forces to improve themselves. Otherwise, Dumbledore and Voldemort would have already kept it hidden away.

Moran could guarantee he wouldn't wear the crown out of curiosity or a pursuit of wisdom, even if Voldemort hadn't turned it into a Horcrux. The problem was that Harry, influenced by Moran, had become a child determined to defeat Voldemort. At only eleven years old, he might be fantasizing about somehow removing the dark magic from the Horcrux, purifying the crown, and then using it to enhance his power.

Should I spoil the entire plot of the movie for Harry? That's unrealistic. Besides, the lessons J.K. Rowling teaches can only be grasped from an omniscient perspective. You can't simply lecture the characters in the story; they have to figure it out for themselves.

"So, in the end, confronting Dumbledore is still the safest option?"

Harry (Mo Ran) slowly stood up, thinking of a method that might work.

……

Several hours later, Harry woke up. Perhaps because he had slept on the cold floor, which was painfully hard, he had a very vivid dream. In the dream, he was still living with the Dursleys; the magic, friends, classmates, and Hogwarts school that brought him joy were all fake. He had been sent by his Uncle Vernon to a boarding school for delinquents, where he was bullied by all sorts of people as detestable as Dudley. The suffocating sense of collapse almost crushed Harry. He genuinely felt that even if the price of being a wizard was facing an enemy like Voldemort, it was still better than returning to his previous life.

Harry looked around, his memories of his other self were incredibly hazy; he couldn't even remember how he got into the room.

"The other me found this place following some strange feeling, and what I'm holding is... Ravenclaw's crown?"

Intense pain surged from the scar on his forehead throughout his body, and the face that had cast a curse on his mother from under the black robe in his dream began to become clearer.

"what!"

Harry screamed and covered his head. Then, the two different memories of Voldemort merged together.

Their skin was as pale as the dead, twisted strangely, like ruined wax figures. The first Voldemort entered the Room of Requirement at Hogwarts and placed the golden tiara on the pockmarked bust of a wizard; immediately afterward, another, dressed in Harry's robes, took back the tiara symbolizing wisdom and put it on his own head.

Harry was confused. Was it another version of himself who wore the crown to gain wisdom, or had Voldemort done something similar?

"Is there some special connection between me and Voldemort? And why did I only see this scene after I touched the diadem? Could it be the key to solving the mystery?"

“I think I should give it to Professor Dumbledore.”