Chapter 19: Ignotus Peverell

After the tea break of turkey sandwiches, toasted bread, scones, and Christmas cake, everyone felt full and sleepy, sitting there lazily, watching Percy chase Fred and George back and forth, because the two of them stole his prefect badge.

That night, Harry couldn't sleep, and he couldn't stop thinking about the legend of the Deathly Hallows. This invisibility cloak, as soft as water, yet incomparably tough, couldn't be pierced by steel needles, and no powder or liquid could leave any traces on it. The more Harry tested it, the more he felt that only the legendary Death deserved such a magical invisibility cloak.

Finally, he decided not to rush to sleep. If he couldn't find any useful information in the library, then he could go to the Restricted Section. Now that he had the Invisibility Cloak, he could completely sneak in and look at those forbidden knowledge.

Harry got out of bed and draped the Invisibility Cloak over himself. Luo En's stomach was stuffed with turkey and cake, and he had fallen into a deep sleep. Besides, Luo En didn't like the library in the first place. Harry thought coldly that the Deathly Hallows should be enjoyed by him alone, because he was the descendant of Ignotus Peverell. Then, he regretted having such thoughts, constantly reminding himself not to get lost in the ambition of gaining power.

The library was pitch black, eerie and terrifying. Harry lit an oil lamp and walked between the bookshelves. Although he felt he was holding the oil lamp, because he was invisible now, the lamp seemed to be floating and moving in mid-air, which was truly creepy.

Harry's gaze swept across rows of bookshelves. Some book titles were written in Latin, and some were languages similar to Latin that Harry didn't recognize at all. Judging from the few words he knew, they were related to ancient runes; there was a copy of "Most Potente Potions," but Harry passed it by; he wasn't here to study Potions today; there were a few books with no titles at all, and the gloomy black covers were stained with dots of blood-like traces. These must be Dark Magic; Harry didn't even dare to look at them.

Finally, he found an interesting book, on which was written "On the Extinction of Pure-Blood Families: Blood Curses and Obscurials."

The book wrote that magic and talent would be inherited with blood, but some families pursued the purity of blood too much, which often led to bad consequences.

If the magic power in a descendant was too huge, he would become an Obscurial. An Obscurial is a dark parasite produced by a wizard child suppressing his own magical power. Generally speaking, an Obscurial should be produced by a medieval wizard child suppressing magic power after awakening magic for fear of being hunted by Muggles. But if the magic power in the child was too huge, causing him to awaken magic in infancy, before the brain was fully developed, then he would also become an Obscurial. This kind of Obscurial is different from ordinary children who cannot live past ten years old, but will gain a longer lifespan according to different talents. But in short, this is a tragedy.

When two very talented wizards combine, their children are very likely to be infected with a blood curse. A blood curse is a manifestation of high talent, which will endow the child with talented spells, but the child often finds it difficult to control these spells well, and finally goes astray. One of the common blood curses is the blood-cursed werewolf; the high talent for Transfiguration makes the child a natural Animagus. Such children often cannot distinguish between humanity and animality, and finally degenerate into complete animals.

The extinction of many ancient powerful pure-blood families was mostly because their descendants fell into these two fates. But with the development of medical magic, many diseases that were originally incurable have found solutions, including blood curses. The divination talent and Metamorphmagus we see today are classic cases of blood curses being controlled. Perhaps in the near future, Obscurials can also be controlled, and then pure-blood families can optimize their bloodlines to their heart's content.

Harry had suspected more than once why the Peverell surname died out, and now he suddenly had a train of thought. As powerful wizards who made the Deathly Hallows, perhaps most of the descendants of Peverell were plagued by blood curses or Obscurials, and finally only one healthy child was left, which was Iolanthe Peverell who married into the Potter family.

He couldn't help but think a little more. What was the purpose of the three brothers making the Deathly Hallows? Perhaps, when they found their children suffering from Obscurials, these three items were tools they tried to use to heal the Obscurials? So the legend that the Deathly Hallows combined could defeat Death, perhaps the real meaning was to snatch their dying children back from the hands of Death.

However, Harry couldn't figure out even if he broke his head what the Elder Wand, Resurrection Stone, and Invisibility Cloak had to do with healing. He vaguely felt that this speculation might be wrong, and the real purpose of the three brothers making the Deathly Hallows became another topic worth exploring.

After finishing a book that might be of some help, Harry found that his confusion hadn't decreased, but had become more and more. Every time he learned a little more history, what followed was an overwhelming "why." Harry felt a bit tired, he quietly put the book back on the shelf, and returned to the dormitory to sleep.

The next day, he came to the library early again. This time he wanted to borrow "The Study of the Elder Wand." Harry realized that if the master of the Elder Wand was always unable to escape the fate of being defeated, then the real effect of the Elder Wand was definitely not "invincible." He hoped to find some clues in the actions of the masters of all generations.

Just when Harry was enduring the discomfort and slowly pondering the commonalities of these people, Zhang Qiu sat down beside him with a stack of textbooks.

"Oh no, on Christmas holiday, you are still reading?" Zhang Qiu said casually.

"Some interesting character biographies, what about you, you are still holding textbooks?" Harry didn't want to be outdone.

"Just for show, I don't want others to think I'm not doing my job in the library," she said. "Actually, I wanted to find you to play. Luo En said you came to the library early in the morning."

"Play? Do you have any good ideas?" Harry asked casually.

"Didn't you find anything interesting?" Zhang Qiu asked tentatively. "Like abandoned classrooms? Magical mirrors?"

"No, did divination say anything strange again?" Harry was somewhat accustomed to her hit-or-miss prophecies. "I have been studying the secrets of history recently. As for mirrors or something, maybe they will pop up by themselves in a few days."

"Secrets of history?" Zhang Qiu was also very curious. "What is it?"

Harry hesitated. He didn't know whether he should tell the story of the Deathly Hallows. It would be good to let Zhang Qiu help him come up with ideas, but he didn't want to say bluntly that the Invisibility Cloak was in his hands.

"I found that my ancestor Linfred might be the owner of the hopping pot," Harry used the hopping pot as a cover. "So I was wondering if the story of the three brothers could be based on real people."

"Isn't that a fairy tale?" Zhang Qiu said helplessly. "I thought there was something strange."

"No, no, no, Professor Binsi told me that he and Deng Buliduo studied The Tales of Beedle the Bard, and their conclusion is that when Beedle created the stories, they all had confirmed prototypes," Harry explained.

"That's also very strange," Zhang Qiu said. "Who told Beedle the story of the three brothers? The eldest and the second died, and the third was not the kind of character who liked to show off. If Beedle really learned this story from elsewhere, then where did he learn it from?"

"You're right," Harry murmured. "In this story, the eldest and the second look like fools, while the third is set off as so smart. It can't be said that the third was a character who liked to belittle others to elevate himself, and specifically took this story everywhere to show off so that it reached Beedle's ears. No, I don't think things are like that; there must be other explanations."

"That's right, if the third would tell these things to others, and he was such a character who liked to show off, he couldn't have asked Death for an invisibility cloak; he might have asked for a big loudspeaker," Zhang Qiu made an expansion gesture. "So, this story was made up by Beedle to tell us some truths."

"Unless... unless..." Some clues gradually connected in Harry's mind: the three brothers made these three items themselves - the real use of the Elder Wand was not invincible - the Peverell family disappeared - and the legend that the three Hallows combined were enough to defeat Death.

Harry felt he had never been so clear-headed. He jumped out of the binary logic of true and false. He realized that the story was left by the three brothers on purpose. They were misleading later generations; they didn't want people to know the real use of the three items.

"The Elder Wand being invincible is fake," Harry said calmly. "But it was deliberately described like that in the story to make greedy people fight for it. Because the Elder Wand is always changing hands, the three Hallows can never be gathered together. This is the real intention of the three brothers leaving this story."

Zhang Qiu looked at him with some confusion.

"The Elder Wand must have other uses. Its real role cannot be known by people, because it is the key for the three Hallows to confront Death," Harry calculated. "Resurrection and invisibility are common supernatural concepts, although they might not really play a role in resurrection and invisibility, people won't doubt it. Only the Elder Wand, its use is too obvious; people can read the research results of the three brothers at a glance, so it was promoted as invincible."

"What research results of the three brothers?" Zhang Qiu felt she couldn't keep up with Harry's train of thought at all.

"Deng Buliduo also admitted that people who can gather the three Hallows will become the Master of Death," Harry pointed at the table with his hand. "The three brothers back then made these three items in order to become the Master of Death. Perhaps they failed, perhaps becoming the Master of Death doesn't mean eternal life, but represents other meanings. But in short, the three brothers must have encountered something terrible, so much so that their surnames died out. They deliberately split the three Hallows and left this story, because families that touch Death are destined not to appear on the earth a second time." ===== CHAPTER 20 =====