Chapter 101: Volume Two Final Summary

Volume Two Final Summary

Explain the overall setting and some hidden plotlines

The title of Volume Two is “Harry Potter and Avalon,” “HarryPotterandAvalon.” Avalon is the ideal land from Celtic legend, but in modern context, it often refers to a tabletop game.

The rules of the tabletop game Avalon involve six to ten players holding different roles, each with distinct victory conditions; they guess each other’s identities through speech and vote to make a series of decisions, with victory determined by these outcomes. Overall, it is very similar to Werewolf (also known as the Murder Game).

Avalon’s unique feature is that the Blue Team does not need to identify all Red Team members—completing missions is enough to likely win (public opinion and results matter more); the Red Team does not need to deliberately lie—merely understanding their own identity is enough to turn the tide (truth matters more).

The eight-person group’s repeated meetings are essentially a step-by-step analysis of the Chamber incident’s essence, based on these two principles; the true theme of this volume is deconstructing the Chamber incident using the form and core of the tabletop game Avalon—the magical realm is merely an add-on.

Harry and Dumbledore’s situations have been analyzed multiple times in the text; Dumbledore cleverly turned the tables, and Harry’s astonishing political growth makes them unquestionably the greatest beneficiaries of the Chamber incident.

The Death Eaters’ plot was simple: just get Harry to obtain the diary. When Voldemort briefly revived on the train, he noticed Harry was also one of his Horcruxes; thus, with Harry holding the diary, the Horcrux’s custody would be safer. If Harry trusted the diary, Harry—as a natural leader—could protect it; if Harry distrusted it, the diary could self-destruct to further elevate Harry’s status, making anyone unable to suspect him. Voldemort’s plan was highly sophisticated; the only flaw was his failure to consider the possibility that Harry might discover the truth and choose sacrifice—but with his level of awareness, he could never have imagined this.

The third-party forces, Donald Fontroy and Cui Ge: Cui Ge succeeded, Luna accepted him, and their naive first love began. But Donald must undergo a Jieduanxing failure—first, to respect the original curse; second, to make way for Lupin. Also, spoilers ahead: Donald is not a standard good person; most readers may not wish to see him with Hermione. Yet for a long time, Harry, though seeing through his true nature, had to temporarily cooperate with him for mutual benefit. This is part of the outline design, ensuring Donald can continue participating in plot progression later. Readers are asked to understand this appropriately—this villain will eventually face his comeuppance and regret.

By now, it becomes clear that the truth of the Chamber is not important; what matters is Harry’s profound realization that “appearance, public opinion, and truth are equally important—perhaps even more important than truth.” This marks Harry’s political maturation (though emotionally he has not yet begun to grow); compared to the original, this is almost a darkening—only then can future plots be designed with greater depth, otherwise Harry Potter would forever remain a fairy tale of a righteous hero slaying a dark lord.

Meanwhile, considering the original Volume Two contained mystery elements, the challenge became: how to recreate suspense when readers already know the truth? Thus, we introduced eight people simultaneously using the diary, and the attack details were designed with minute discrepancies leading to vastly different outcomes. The truth’s construction followed the rules of detective fiction; to intensify suspense, many chapter titles borrowed names from Sherlock Holmes cases.

The full truth of the Chamber will be gradually revealed later. Beforehand, stating the rules followed in designing the truth is meant to encourage readers (who have read the Harry Potter original, including the Fantastic Beasts films and the Cursed Child play) to make their own guesses after finishing this volume.

Additional detective fiction rules: the criminal is someone who has appeared in the story; the method of crime and detection does not exceed the scope of magic in the original; no secret passages unmentioned in the original exist; Harry is not the criminal, and the information he receives is identical to the reader’s; Harry’s dim-witted friend (Ron) openly states his thoughts without reservation; twins or extremely similar characters are pre-notified (in fact, we pre-notified readers that Polyjuice Potion had been stolen); and a Chinese person must appear in the novel (this rule exists because readers find it warm and interesting to see a Chinese character, making them want to keep reading).

Finally, some hidden plotlines that will not be explained later are directly clarified here.

The Avalon realm was proposed by Donald Fontroy and implemented by Dumbledore as a large-scale amusement project for Harry and Ron (thus containing some meme elements); Donald donated a custom-made magical armor and a spell, and Dumbledore took the opportunity to entrust the Sword of Gryffindor to Harry (in the original, he indeed left the sword to Harry in Book Seven).

Draco only knew he had to deliver the diary to Harry; he noticed nothing unusual about it. He also carefully maintained his relationship with Harry, because he did not believe Voldemort could win again—if the Dark Lord fell once more, Draco needed at least a chance to cleanse his name and preserve his connections. This reflects the Malfoys’ dual-betting strategy.

Tom inside the diary truly had ulterior motives, but facing eight different users across four groups, he himself became confused; thus, no one was truly influenced. Tom played the role of a caring older brother for a semester. Pansy-Draco livestreamed fawning devotion, Luna-Cui Ge livestreamed dog food, Ginny-Ivy livestreamed palace intrigue, Crabbe-Gao Er livestreamed breakdowns—Tom said it was torture enough.

Dobby truly acted out of good intentions, but after being suppressed by Zhang Qiu on his birthday, he dared not show up during the Bludger incident; he overheard their conversation and realized he had caused Harry trouble. Since this novel does not require him to later rescue Harry from capture, Dobby’s subplot with Harry was simply removed. Such “for your own good” meddling is genuinely annoying.