Everything was achingly familiar—even the faint scent of mothballs lingering in the air.
Beside the door stood a wardrobe, its door slightly ajar. Inside, clothes hung in neat rows, and at the bottom were scattered books and toys: a book wrapped in old newspaper, a wind-up frog with chipped paint, marbles etched with scratches, a beanbag yet to be washed...
Every book in the orphanage had been covered by Wyzett himself—his hands were the quickest, his work the neatest. He remembered it all, clear as day.
Instinctively, Wyzett tried to stand, only to nearly topple from his wheelchair.
He glanced down at his legs. Below his thighs was nothing—just empty space, his trouser legs fluttering softly in the breeze.
"Have I come back? Or... was everything that happened before just a dream?"
His hands moved to the wheels, pushing them forward with rusty, uncertain motions.
The wheelchair rolled smoothly until the hand rim bumped against the wall. Only then did he remember to pull the brake.
He murmured Snape's words under his breath: "When you feel the darkness... the Patronus Charm can be your final sanctuary... a magic for self-protection..."
A faint smile touched his lips as he looked again at his empty trouser legs. "So that's it? This is the darkness in my heart. Of course..."
This was what he'd been running from all along.
He could face bullies at school, endure the cold stares of others—those were just the world pressing in.
But to face his own flaws... that was the shackle he'd locked around himself, slow and silent.
…
It was a secret every child in the orphanage knew.
Those who stayed here always had some kind of flaw.
Only the healthy children stood a real chance of being adopted.
It was cruel, but it was real. Adoption came with a price, and a child with a defect multiplied that cost beyond measure.
…
Learning became his last escape—a pure, unyielding goal that kept him moving forward.
Only by relying on himself could he break the chains of his limitations and walk out of the orphanage.
That was why he craved knowledge so desperately...
Now, for the first time, he understood.
So this is what it means to have a soul?
"If I'm back, then let me see this place through to the end."
Wyzett let out a slow breath. He could still feel the warmth, the protection of all those positive emotions.
He didn't need to solve any riddles here. He only needed to look his past in the eye and remember everything he'd tried to forget.
He forced himself to recall the life he'd unconsciously left behind when he crossed into this world.
And now, it didn't seem so hard to accept.
Without those old scars, he wouldn't be who he was today...
His hands grew steadier on the wheels, his pace quickening, his turns tracing graceful arcs.
He could never have done this before.
Compared to the blank faces around him, his own smile—soft, determined—made him look almost like an outsider.
"In a way, I suppose I am," he thought. "But at our core, we're all the same."
He remembered the story Ollivander had once shared—the tale of wizards and Muggles, and where they truly came from.
Two worlds, two lives, finally blending together...
And when everything became one, the soul revealed itself.
…
Wyzett circled the orphanage again and again, until night fell and he returned to the dormitory.
There, he found a thick stack of exam papers and reference books—the very ones he'd used to study before his final exams.
"This is the last stop... I remember, one moment I was worrying over tests, the next I was thinking about how to survive in a new world..."
"I never really felt that strangest of sensations—death... What is it really like? I'm curious."
He gave the wheel a gentle push. The chair rolled forward and stopped, perfectly aligned with the stack of papers.
His heart filled with a peace and harmony he'd never known.
In this moment, he truly embraced himself. He accepted everything—flaws and all.
He faced his soul, unflinching.
He picked up a pen, just as he always had, and began working through the papers—one after another, until his vision blurred, until the world flickered between light and dark, but he pressed on, just as he always had.
And then—blackness.
…
Darkness pressed in on all sides, but Wyzett could sense it: an archway stood before him, ancient and battered, covered in strange, twisted runes—the scars of some long-ago battle.
It was a lonely arch, freestanding with no walls to support it, yet it never fell.
A tattered black veil hung from its top, swaying gently, drawing ever closer...
"So this is what you see before death?" Wyzett wondered, his face calm as he strained to take in every detail.
Even if he couldn't understand it now, knowledge like this was precious. Someday, he would return to it, searching for its meaning.
Passing through the arch and veil was cold—bone-deep, soul-piercing cold that filled every inch of him.
Beyond the veil, he glimpsed a world of grey, and perhaps—just for a moment—a skull.
The skull seemed to see him, too. The cold grew sharper, as if something was reaching for him.
But he passed through the veil too quickly to see more. The archway and veil vanished.
The cold faded, replaced by a warmth that radiated from within.
It was as if his soul had become a sun, flooding him with endless warmth—warming his body, warming so much more...
…
"Expecto Patronum!"
The incantation left his lips, sealing the moment.
All those positive emotions blazed like a sun, burning bright and eternal. His memories surged forth—
The time with Headmaster Dumbledore, beginning with a flicker of flame;
With Luna, starting in that sunlit hospital room;
With Professor McGonagall, from the moment he received his Hogwarts letter;
With Xenophilius, from that long, late-night conversation...
No matter the memory, every one held a spark of positive emotion.
…
Silvery mist poured from the tip of his wand, swirling into the shape of a radiant sun—yet within it, a trace of the Obscurus's quiet power.
The moment the silver mist appeared, the Dementor—born from the Boggart—let out a shriek, stumbling backward, tripping over its own tattered cloak.
Even after the Boggart fled, the silver mist kept spreading, slipping through windows, squeezing beneath doors...
It seemed determined to fill every crack in the walls, to light all of Hogwarts, all of the Scottish Highlands.
Even the fading sunset, outside, seemed to catch new warmth from its glow.
…
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