Hogwarts Advanced Guide

Chapter 432 The Cruel Murderer, Tom Riddle

Morfin looked away, his body swayed slightly, and Voldemort stepped forward. At this moment, a strange darkness came, engulfing Voldemort's oil lamp and Morfin's candle, engulfing everything.
The two of them flew back to reality, and Hera covered her right hand with her robe and carried it behind her back so that Harry wouldn't notice.After the impenetrable darkness, the soft golden light in the headmaster's office dazzled Harry a bit, but Hera didn't care.

"That's all?" Harry asked quickly, "Why did it go dark all of a sudden, and what happened?"

"Because Morfin can't remember what happened after that." Hera beckoned Harry to sit down. Of course, it was the left hand without the ring. "When he woke up the next morning, he was lying on the ground alone. Marvolo's ring was gone."

"So, what happened that night?" Harry asked, vaguely feeling that something must have happened that day, that Voldemort couldn't have left without doing anything.

"A very sharp sense of smell," Hera said, nodding appreciatively. "Just that night, in Little Hangleton Village, a maid ran screaming and running through the street, saying that there were three dead bodies in the living room of the mansion: old Tom Riddle and his parents."

"I think I've 'been' to that house," said Harry, looking down, remembering what he'd seen through Voldemort's memory in the summer of 1994, that poor, innocent old man, Frank Bryce.Because he witnessed the plot between Voldemort and Wormtail.

"In fact, we've all been very close to it before," Hera said, looking at Harry. "Remember the Goblet of Fire? It was replaced by Moody as a portkey, and the place leading to it is Little Hangleton. Not far from it is the Riddle House, which can be seen even during the daytime."

"That's really a bad memory." Harry's expression changed a few times, and he said in a strange tone.

Hera agreed, "Yeah, I'm sure that's definitely not a bad memory. But let's move back."

Harry nodded.

"The Muggle authorities are clearly at a loss for what happened to Old Tom's family. As far as I know, they still don't know how the Riddles died. They can probably only conclude that the family was scared to death, because the Avada Kedavra generally doesn't leave any scars. But it's obviously impossible, even wizards can't scare three people to death at the same time." Hera paused, and glanced at the lightning scar on Harry's forehead, "The only exception is sitting in front of me."

The scar on Harry's forehead was definitely abnormal, but no matter how Dumbledore looked, he couldn't find any records.It wasn't until Harry last year that his brain was connected to Voldemort's, which made Dumbledore have some terrible guesses about what happened back then.

And this is what Hera knew and had to hide from Harry.

Harry didn't make a sound, and Hera continued, "But the Ministry of Magic knew right away that it was a wizard. They also knew that a Muggle-hater lived across from the Riddle house, and that he had been in prison for assaulting one of the victims in this case."

"They hate Muggles so much, but why don't they move away?" Harry asked suspiciously, he couldn't figure out why they had to live in an area full of Muggles, obviously they hated it, didn't they?

"Because of honor, Harry," Hera said with emotion, "the sense of honor unique to the Gaunt family or most pure-blood families. They are proud of their pure blood and being able to inherit everything left by their ancestors. The Gaunt family is obviously the most loyal supporter. They insist on only marrying members of their own family, for generations. How do you say that word—marriage between close relatives, yes, that's it."

"It's no wonder that their brains don't seem to work very well. In the Muggle world, it has long been proved that intermarriage between close relatives is unscientific." Harry muttered.

Hera laughed, "But we are in the wizarding world, Harry, and everything here is unscientific."

"Yes." Harry nodded. "So what happened next? The Ministry found Morfin?"

"That's right, they found Morfin very quickly. They didn't use interrogation, Veritaserum or Legilimency. He immediately confessed, provided details that only the murderer knew, and said that he was proud of killing those Muggles, saying that he had been waiting for this opportunity for so many years." Hera shook her head sighingly. "The wand he handed over was immediately proven to be the murder weapon that killed the Riddle family. Morfin didn't resist and was taken into Azkaban obediently. The only thing that disturbed him was his father." His ring is gone. He spent the rest of his life in Azkaban, mourning the loss of Marvolo's last heirloom, and was finally buried next to the prison, along with the other poor souls who died in prison."

"It's definitely not him who did it, Riddle did it!" Harry said immediately, and then he rubbed his head and thought carefully, "He went to Little Hangleton in order to pursue his own origin. When he knew that his father was a Muggle, he must have been full of anger. He must have done something to Old Tom's family, and then pretended that it was Morfin who did everything, so that no one would know his true identity?"

"That's right." Hera nodded approvingly, and Harry finally went on, "Although there are no memories to prove it, I think we can be pretty sure that Riddle stunned his uncle, took his wand, went across the valley to the 'great house across the way', killed the Muggle who abandoned his wizard mother, killed his Muggle grandparents by the way, wiped out the unworthy Riddle family, and took revenge on his biological father who never wanted him. Then he went back to the Gaunts and did that. Complicated magic, planted false memories in his uncle's brain, placed the wand beside its unconscious master, and walked off with the ancient ring."

"But Morfin didn't suspect that he did it?" Harry asked suspiciously. According to his understanding of the Oblivion Curse and Legilimency, the party whose memory was implanted should feel a little uncomfortable, because these are not his own memories, and he will definitely have doubts about the memory.

"Yes, I think we just said that he confessed and showed off everywhere." Hera shrugged, "Maybe his brain is not very bright."

"Then he kept that memory?"

"I'm afraid it is. I think it must require a lot of highly skilled Legilimency to draw it out. Morfin has already pleaded guilty, so who will dig his thoughts?" Hera said helplessly, "Besides, it didn't take long for a Dark Lord who almost overturned the entire wizarding world to show his face. No one still remembers that he was in charge of a guy who might be imprisoned wrongly, and he thought he did it himself."

"But why didn't the Ministry of Magic think about what Riddle did to Morfin?" Harry said angrily. "He was underage at the time, right? I thought they could detect underage magic—like the Patronus Charm I cast on Privet Drive last year!"

"You're quite right - they can detect magic, but not the caster: you must remember that in your second year, the Ministry of Magic accused you of using a Hovering Charm, when in fact -"

"Dobby did it," Harry growled, looking aggrieved but still unrepentant, "So, if you're underage and you're doing magic in an adult wizard's house, the Ministry won't know?"

"Yes, they have no way of finding out who cast the spell," Hera said, smiling at Harry. "They rely on wizard parents to monitor what their children do in the house."

"That's bullshit!" said Harry excitedly. "Look what happened, look at Morfin!"

"I agree." Hera nodded in praise.

"Then at the Burrow, you just watched Ron and I peel potatoes with a knife? We can use magic!" Harry said aggrievedly, and he accidentally cut his finger at that time.

Hera shook her head. "Sorry, I was at the Burrow at the time, and I couldn't encourage you to break school rules. Even if no one knew about it."

"When did you follow the rules?" Harry asked rhetorically. In his impression, Hera had always been an informal and even somewhat rebellious wizard, and he knew it from the time he knew him.

After meeting for the first time in the Leaky Cauldron, Hagrid once told Harry to be careful of Hera, because he was always wandering around the gray edge. Hagrid reminded Harry to be careful, lest Hera would count the money for him if he was sold-although Harry never took this sentence to heart.

"Haha, this really seems like an evaluation of me." Hera was amused by Harry's words, but he was also quite puzzled in his heart, when did he become so obedient?Since Dumbledore left?
No, it seems like this happened a long time ago.

"Let's not talk about this for now," Hera chuckled and lowered her head. "It's getting late, let's read another memory quickly. First of all, this is very necessary. We may not be able to finish reading these memories in a long time."

"Dumbledore has many memories?" Harry asked.

Hera circled the Pensieve with both hands, looking for the memory fragments he needed, and replied casually: "It's true that there are not too many, but we are making good progress, haven't we? I have seen the memory of Riddle when he was 16 years old. Does such a course make you feel distressed?"

"No, I just feel novelty and warmth about these things." Harry said something Hera couldn't understand at all.

"Warm?"

"I mean, even though Dumbledore is gone, he still guides our direction and brings us hope." Harry quickly explained, "Without him, we would be at a loss for Riddle, and we couldn't find any useful clues at all, let alone a Horcrux, right?"

"That's right, if he knows, he will be very pleased." Hera raised his eyebrows, "Don't gossip, let's enter the last memory of today."

They fell into that silvery surface again, and this time in front of someone—a much younger Horace Slughorn, still sporting a thick head of lustrous yellow hair, though apparently less severe than a bright, Galleon-sized patch of baldness on top of his head.

His beard was not as thick or as round as it was now, but the gold buttons of his embroidered waistcoat were stretched very tight.He rested his little feet on a large velvet cushion, half reclining in a winged armchair, holding a small glass of wine in one hand, and picking through a box of pineapple preserves with the other hand.

"He's always been such a sweet tooth," Hera said with a grin, tilting her head, but Harry didn't respond, his attention focused on sizing up the others in the room.

There were half a dozen or so boys sitting next to Slughorn, all five or six years old, and the chairs were harder or shorter than his.

Anyone can almost easily recognize Tom Riddle among them. He is the most shining existence in the crowd, and it is no wonder that he won the love of almost all the professors when he was in school-except Dumbledore of course.

Riddle was the handsomest and seemed the most relaxed, completely free of the tension of the other boys.With his right hand casually resting on the arm of the chair, he had already put on Marvolo's black stone ring.

"Sir, is Professor Mellors retiring?" Riddle asked.

"Tom, Tom, I know I can't tell you." Slughorn wagged a frosted finger at him reproachfully, but spoiled the effect slightly by blinking, "I have to say , I want to know where you got your news, boy. You know more than half the faculty."

Riddle smiled, and the other boys laughed too, casting him admiring glances.

"You ghost, you can know things you shouldn't know, and you are careful to please important people - by the way, thank you for your pineapple, you guessed it, this is my favorite -"

While the boys were snickering, a strange thing happened.The whole room was suddenly enveloped in a thick white fog, and Harry could only see Hera's face beside him.Slughorn's voice filled the room, unnaturally loud: "—you'll make mistakes, boy, mark my words."

The fog lifted, as suddenly as it had come, but no one mentioned it, and nothing unusual had just happened from their faces.The only difference was that the little golden clock on Slughorn's desk struck eleven.

"By God, is it time?" said Slughorn. "Time to go, boys, or we'll be in trouble. Lestrange, papers tomorrow or detention. You too, Avery."

Slughorn got up from his chair and carried the empty glass to the table, and the boys filed out.But Riddle fell behind.

"Come on, Tom," said Slughorn, turning to see that he was still there, "you don't want to be caught staying out at lights out, you're a prefect..."

"Sir, I want to ask you something."

"Then ask, boy, ask..."

Hera said in a low voice: "Next, we come to our most important part."

(End of this chapter)