Hogwarts Study Panel.

Chapter 594, page 592: Speculation

The atmosphere at the dinner party subtly changed after the newspapers arrived.

The students were still whispering to each other, but their voices were much lower than before, as if covered by frosted glass, making it difficult to hear clearly.

In the corner, Sheen gently put down the newspaper; the plate of roast beef in front of him had gone completely cold.

"You didn't eat a single bite."

Hermione leaned over from across the table; her plate, too, was almost untouched.

A book titled "A Study of Norse Dark Magic Objects" lay open in front of her, which she had borrowed from the library before dinner. A few drops of pumpkin juice were now on the pages, but she obviously didn't care about being scolded by Mrs. Pince.

"Is it cold yet? —"

Sheen said, while simultaneously picking up a piece and placing it near his mouth.

It's definitely gone cold.

Looks like I'll have to take it to the kitchen to reheat it.

"Really."

Hermione closed the book, pushed it aside, and then glanced at Justin.

"You know, I know some simple life magic."

Justin gently took out his wand and tapped it on the table, and the steak instantly steamed.

"Sheen, are you thinking about Horcruxes?"

Hermione did not make a question.

Justin didn't speak, but looked at Sheehan with a calm and focused gaze.

Justin is the kind of person who doesn't need to say much to make people feel that he is listening.

"Yes, the last one."

Sheen answered.

Hermione's eyebrows furrowed immediately.

She sat up straight in the chair, gripping the book tightly.

"The diary, the golden cup, the diadem—these are all relics of the founder or important items related to Voldemort's origins. If he hid the Horcruxes among these things, then the last one should follow the same pattern."

Hermione said seriously.

"Maybe not."

Justin said.

His voice was gentle yet clear.

Hermione turned to him.

"What do you mean?"

"Hermione, I mean—everything is different now—"

Justin put down his fork and carefully organized his thoughts. "Sheen, I was thinking, you must know where Headmaster Dumbledore went, right? If—if you know, and if you'd like—"

"What?"

Hermione pricked up her ears.

"Um.

""

Sheen nodded.

"You know"

Hermione's eyes widened.

Then, as if she had just realized something, she said, "These are the werewolves and giants—"

"Um."

Sheen had no intention of hiding it; it wasn't something that needed to be kept secret.

What's the secret?

Did Dumbledore keep it a secret that he killed Voldemort so badly that Voldemort was running around like a beast?

"Headmaster Dumbledore hunted him down four times."

Sheen said calmly.

"Merlin—"

Hermione stared blankly.

Whispers filled the hall as Sheehan easily recounted the events of that night to Hermione and Justin.

That night when Headmaster Dumbledore, sword in hand, was unstoppable.

"—So, think about it, Hermione—if you were someone who had been hunted four times, and if you knew that the person hunting you was destroying all your Horcruxes one by one, would you hide the last Horcrux in a place they could guess?"

Justin guided the conversation.

Hermione opened her mouth, but did not immediately refute.

Sheehan looked at her and knew she was rapidly rearranging the information in her mind.

"Voldemort would not choose something meaningless."

Hermione finally spoke, but her speech was a beat slower than usual. "He has an obsessive-compulsive obsession with 'greatness' and 'specialness,' which can be seen from his choice of those Horcruxes."

Gaunt's ring, as Sheehan told us, was his way of proving his lineage. The Slytherin locket, Hufflepuff's cup, and Ravenclaw's tiara are all relics of the founders of Hogwarts.

He turned his diary into a Horcrux because it was the first piece of evidence he had to prove he was the heir to Slytherin. So whatever he chose as a Horcrux must have held special significance for him.

But Justin is also right; under Dumbledore's relentless pressure, he might change his strategy.

The order of creating a new Horcrux is: first, murder; then, splitting the soul; then, sealing it in a container. Before the fourth hunt, he attempted to create a Horcrux using the life of a wizard—that Horcrux was never completed, but what was the container?

Sheen thought about it for a long time.

His gaze fell on the book "Norse Dark Magic Objects" in front of Hermione, but his focus was not on the pages, but on something further away.

"If I were Voldemort,"

Sheehan said slowly, "I was hunted down by Headmaster Dumbledore four times, and lost an arm, half a face, a snake, and a servant."

I know Dumbledore is looking for my last Horcrux, and I know he has Gryffindor's sword—one of the few things capable of destroying Horcruxes. The giant snake that was with me is dead.

If I were someone who had lost six Horcruxes and only had one left, where would I hide that last Horcrux?

"A place you absolutely trust," Hermione said.

"A place that Headmaster Dumbledore would never have thought of," Justin added.

Sheehan shook his head slightly: "There are too many places like that. But if we look at it from another angle—if we were Headmaster Dumbledore, and we didn't know what the last Horcrux was, how would we search for it?"

Hermione gasped. "If Voldemort has changed his ways, then Dumbledore shouldn't be looking for where Voldemort might be hiding. He should be looking for when Voldemort created it."

Sheehan nodded slightly: "Hordeal weapons can only be made during a murder. The diary was created when Moaning Myrtle died and Voldemort first opened the Chamber of Secrets. The ring was created after he killed his Muggle father and grandparents. The locket and the golden cup were made while he was working at Borgin-Burke, a period during which he came into contact with Hepzba Smith, who possessed both items, and they disappeared after her death. The tiara was hidden when he returned to Hogwarts to apply for a teaching position, and the murder must have occurred shortly after he left the school."

"And the latest Horcrux—if it exists—was made with whose life?"

Justin asked.

The three of them fell silent.

The conversations of the other students in the auditorium surged like distant tides, creating an invisible distance between them and the table they were sitting at.

Sheen stared at the plate of cold roast beef in front of him, the mashed potatoes having solidified into a grayish-white solid.

"Insect tail".

He finally uttered the name.

"What?"

Hermione said.

"On the night Voldemort was resurrected, he killed Wormtail."

Sheen's voice was soft, but every word was clear: "He told Wormtail—you have one last use. He killed Wormtail, tearing his own soul apart with a murder, to create his—or rather, the newest Horcrux in terms of number."

Hermione's pupils dilated slightly in the candlelight. She opened her mouth, but Sheehan continued, "The Hufflepuff Cup is the last known Horcrux."

He said, "But if he created a new Horcrux after his resurrection—the one with the insect tail—then that Horcrux is not in any records."

We don't know what its container is, or where it's hidden. But we do know one thing—the process of making a Horcrux involves first tearing off a soul and then sealing it into a container. So the sequence is: the murder occurs before the container is chosen.

Justin slowly put down his fork.

"so,"

He said, "When Wormtail died, a new rift had been torn in Voldemort's soul. But at that time, he had no golden cup, no locket, nothing of value."

He stopped.

"Therefore, if he were to choose an object to create a Horcrux, it would definitely appear in the tavern."

Sheen said.

The doubt that had troubled him for some time thus became a firm guess.

Did Voldemort have any murderous intentions during the time he was with Wormtail?

Of course there are, and quite a few.

Frank Sr. and Persha, a Ministry of Magic employee, were among his chosen targets.

But Sheen let them all slip away.

If they died, Wormtail would know exactly what Horcruxes Voldemort had created, but Sheen was unwilling to do that.

Life is the only thing that cannot be put on the scales.

Thus, the insect tail ended its final mission.

Given Voldemort's obsession with the number seven, Sheen doesn't believe he would create an eighth Horcrux, splitting his soul into nine parts.

What he wanted was seven souls.

Although he had already ruined that himself.

With seven Horcruxes, plus Voldemort's own piece of soul, his soul was no longer a stable set of seven pieces without Voldemort's knowledge.

Seven, in mysticism, this number has special significance.

If Voldemort had truly split his soul into seven pieces, perhaps he could have maintained a certain stability.

But Harry's arrival had already disrupted this hidden balance.

So perhaps, in some mysterious way, Voldemort's loss of mental control was inevitable.

Could Voldemort have created the Horcruxes before he met Peter?

Sheen thought it was unlikely.

At that time, how could Voldemort, facing the treacherous Peter, have the strength to split his own soul and make himself weaker?

Thinking of this, Sheen slowly stood up: "We need to investigate that tavern."

After the discussion, Hermione and Justin went back to their respective dorm rooms.

Sheen did not leave the auditorium immediately.

He sat at the long table, listening to the low neighing of Thestrals coming from the edge of the Forbidden Forest in the distance.

He took out two glass bottles containing memory silver threads.

A copy of Mr. Lupin and Mr. Sirius's account, faithfully recording the scene before Voldemort set off for Albania.

One of his own copies contained a scene of Wormtail's final confrontation with Voldemort.

In this memory, the scene of that tavern is vividly portrayed.

Sheen had plenty of time to figure out what Voldemort had chosen as his Horcrux.

He guessed that even under such conditions, Voldemort wouldn't randomly choose a piece of trash.

What will he choose?

The tavern's interior was more dilapidated than it appeared from the outside.

The stone walls were covered with a layer of mortar that hadn't been replaced for who knows how many years, and cracks, like a spider web, extended in all directions from the flue above the stove, all the way up to the low ceiling.

The ceiling was made of heavy oak beams, which had turned almost black and dark brown from years of smoking and fumes. A layer of sticky grease had formed on the surface, and the beams gleamed dimly in the candlelight.

There were only five tables in the tavern, all of them dilapidated.

On the table by the window in the southwest corner, there were several unusual objects scattered about, as if they had been carelessly tossed there.

But it's not so strange to find something like this in such a remote old tavern—a tattered book with a leather cover.

It was left lying on the edge, its cover moldy, its spine cracked, revealing the parchment inside.

But when Sheehan looked closely, he was surprised to find the title "The Secrets of Cutting-Edge Black Magic Revealed." The only known version of this book should be at Hogwarts.

This copy cannot be the original; Sheehan believes it is a copy of the tomb manuscript that Voldemort personally copied while reading.

In the lower right corner of the title page is a faded ink signature: Tom Marvolo Riddell.

Next to the book was a stemmed glass. It was upside down on a dusty tray, with a badger relief inlaid on its rim. The badger was made using a very ancient technique, as if gold was rolled into extremely thin foil and pressed into the surface of silver before it cooled, creating an effect somewhere between relief and inlay.

There is a fine, almost invisible inscription on the rim of the cup, in Old English, spelling out an illegible name.

The other things on the desktop are no longer visible.

A wizard with a cold smile covered them with his robe.

Sheen managed to identify another locket.

The lid has Slytherin's "S" shaped snake pattern, but it's different from a real Slytherin locket—a real locket is made of gold and inlaid with emeralds.

This one is made of brass, and the emerald is stained glass. It's a replica, but its craftsmanship is so exquisite that it could almost be mistaken for the real thing if it weren't made of cheap materials.

Behind Voldemort.

The trapdoor leading to the cellar was half-open.

There was no light in the cellar, but a strange smell wafted from the cracks in the trapdoor.

A large pot stood there in the cellar, next to which were eerie, white bones and a jumble of bottles and jars.

The wind blew by, and Sheen was pulled from his memories.

The people in the auditorium had gradually dispersed, and the candles on the long table were extinguished one by one.

Sheen was still pondering.

What did Voldemort choose?

He wouldn't take these things out for no reason.

He struggled with the decision.

A book, perhaps another relic associated with Hufflepuff, and a locket.

As for that big pot, it shouldn't be overlooked either, and those bottles and jars might not necessarily clear them of suspicion.

From this perspective, Voldemort's options remain quite broad.

He knew of Wormtail's betrayal, yet he still calmly laid many things out in the open.

Even if he were fully exposed, it would be difficult to fathom his true intentions.

At this moment, Sheehan missed Professor Snape a little. Rather than pondering Voldemort's choice, he would rather Voldemort have no choice at all.

The scene of Headmaster Dumbledore chasing Voldemort lingered in Sheehan's mind.

He knew Voldemort was looking for him.

He also knew that, no matter what, he always had a final plan.

Face Voldemort head-on, defeat him, from the very core of his mind—

Sheen knows everything.