The Aurors arrived after things had already finished. By the time they apparated into Hogsmeade in force to rush towards Hogwarts. The crashes and booms of massive spells being fired in the distance frightened most of them as they all rushed with all haste towards the castle itself. As they rushed forward in waves, a giant beam of light flashed in the distance, carving a massive trench in the earth until it reached the great lake where it boiled the water, sending clouds of steam into the air. A great tornado had formed in the distance, and they could all see the flashes of spells from within its swirling form.
Then there was nothing, the spells had stopped.
Over half of them made it inside the castle before the shield around the Hogwarts castle sprung up out of nowhere. A massive shield covering the edge of the grounds also appeared, stalling the continued reinforcements that were still arriving from the Ministry.
The Aurors that were stranded outside the barrier and no matter what they did the groups of Aurors couldn’t manage to pierce either barrier with their relatively weak spells. The half of the Aurors inside the castle rushed farther inside to secure the area from the unknown threat while the rest waited outside nervously, eyeing the looming tornado seemingly staying in place and the sudden silence with the end of the spell battle.
One of the Aurors inside found the collapsed building where Nidhogg the Basilisk and Roachmort had battled, the whole area cratered from Roachmort's spells and crushed under Nidhogg’s bulk. This Auror called for help and it was to his relief that no one was trapped under the rubble. He continued moving looking for the students.
Another Auror stood on top of one of the towers staring out into the distance. He saw the lightning and fire being fired from the figure in armor near the edge of the grounds. He had to squint to see the figure from so far away, but it was massive and he could just barely track the dark cloud that it was fighting with. The Auror felt a tinge of fear in his spine. He had been there when those madmen had openly attacked the ministry. He recognized that spell, it still haunted his nightmares. The one claiming to be lord Voldemort had seemed impossible to defeat, only Dumbledore able to pin him down enough to kill him. And the inhuman monster had seemed nearly as skilled…
The dark cloud escaped through the gap in the shield and it flickered off after the armored figure charged after it. This Auror saw the dark cloud seemingly charge the armored man after the armored man placed something glowing on the ground below it. The Auror saw the final back breaking turn slicing the dark cloud in half and sending its two separate pieces falling to the ground. And he saw the armored figure leave after a few minutes, walking back onto the grounds and disappearing into a massive tunnel that appeared in front of it without even slowing its pace. It looked as if it had been swallowed by the earth.
He watched as the shield around the Hogwarts castle dropped, letting the Ministry invade the castle with full force. It was his account of the battle that would be published in the papers in the following days, and would become common in the following years to speculate on what had truly happened at what became known as the Great Attack. The presence of the massive dead basilisk only added to the confusion and mystery of events.
Dumbledore’s body was never found, consumed by opportunistic Acromantulas as the Aurors remained holed up at the castle, too fearful or disorganized to venture onto the site of the cataclysmic battle to investigate just yet. The elder wand lay on the forest floor, forgotten by the world. Its last owner killed by an object with no ego, it sat passively there, completely masterless. Whoever would discover and claim it next would command its full power…
Harry, well, after he spent a few hours recovering, Dobby brought him and Hermione back to Hogwarts exactly where he left them. The two of them claimed to have convinced one of the Hogwarts house elves to apparate them to safety in the chaoos and Fred and George bullied the other three into silence after Hermione and Harry asked them for the favor. The others all ended up keeping their mouths shut and while there was some worry and suspicion of Harry and Hermione's story for a little while, it was eventually brushed off. Things were still far too chaotic and tense at the castle for the Aurors to investigate things that they deemed unimportant. A manhunt for the man in the suit of armor was already underway, to question him about his triumph over the man like creature who it was now believed was the same as the one behind the attack on the Ministry.
The man in the armor was never found. This failure was Fudge’s last, and he was replaced as Minister in the following weeks.
And after weeks of chaos at Hogwarts as the Aurors hunted the grounds for clues. The hallways were being guarded by Aurors at every corner, and to everyone’s surprise nothing else had happened. No students had even died despite the complete destruction of one of Hogwarts buildings. Hogwarts certainly had enough abandoned classrooms, so the classes were shifted elsewhere for a time as the building was repaired. There were no big attacks on Hogwarts or anywhere else in Britain by the mysterious insect human hybrid. It seems he really had been a single rogue wizard, and with his death none rose to follow his footsteps like many had feared.
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The dark lord was vanquished.
— — —
As time passed, everyone relaxed and things returned back to normal. Harry enjoyed spending his time with his friends, and learned more magic down in the Chamber. Salazar had been upset when he heard of Nidhogg’s death, the basilisk had been the guardian of the chamber for over a thousand years. Whenever Harry walked into the Sanctum from the outer chamber he glanced at the empty depression in the ground where Nidhogg had usually been curled up when he walked by before.
At least Salazar told him that Harry’s activation of the Hogwarts defenses had provided vengeance against Nidhogg’s killer, Roachmort. He had also told Harry of Dumbledore’s death, which Harry had more complicated feelings about. He had caused Harry so much pain when Harry knew him, but his last action had been fighting Roachmort to a standstill.
And unlike every other time in Harry Potter’s time in the magical world, nothing else exciting happened in the following weeks and months. He took his finals, went home, and enjoyed time with his family over the summer.
And in the following years ahead he could finally relax and let himself live his life without having to look over his shoulder anymore. No Dumbledore, no Voldemort, not even James Kensit. The man was still out there, but didn’t come after the events of the battle to question Harry as he had expected Kensit would. Harry let himself believe that the man had finally moved on to bigger and better things than him and left him alone. Something reinforced by the years of silence.
Harry graduated from Hogwarts best of his year, with Hermione a close second behind him.
Luna and Neville’s wedding was a surprisingly small affair with only their closest friends invited. They were happy with each other, Luna having an even dreamier look than usual on her face during the ceremony. Luna’s father was nearly as eccentric as she was, and Harry enjoyed talking to him during the wedding reception.
Hermione went into the Ministry to change things from the inside. Her casual displays of wandless magic had taken magical Britain by storm, and many even said she would be the next Dumbledore. Something that was used in both a positive and negative way by her opponents and allies. Dumbledore was still an incredibly divisive figure especially given most of the world thought he was still out there simply biding his time or manipulating things behind the scenes from the shadows. But decades of him being praised as a saint meant there were many that still had a positive view of him despite everything that had been revealed in the last few years.
Ron had become an Auror, and although they stayed in touch occasionally Harry, Hermione, and Neville were no longer more than acquaintances with him by now. He had simply moved on to different friends over time during their sixth and seventh years at Hogwarts.
Harry and especially Hermione were both still great friends with Ginny, who had gone into business with her brother Fred and George of all things. Fred and George ran a joke shop focusing on making the candy sweets and more potion based products for pranks. Meanwhile Ginny focused on the cursed items and hexes for pranking, which she was rather inventive with.
Fred and George had struggled for three years to establish themselves with minor success, but had trouble getting off the ground without much money to their names. It was Ginny who had come to Harry to ask for a loan after she decided to join the business with them. Harry had given it to them of course, and now they owned a bustling and successful shop. They had enough money from Harry's loan to rent a better location in Diagon alley and make a wider range of products to dazzle and wow their customers. With their success, they had no trouble paying back Harry’s loan with heavy interest within only a few months. Harry occasionally invited them over to discuss enchanting formulas and generally come up with fun new ideas for spells.
As for Harry? Well, he had taken up enchanting as his trade. It was precise and with his memory remembering the formulas he already knew was a breeze. With him inheriting the full Potter fortune once he turned seventeen, he could not work for his whole life and still live lavishly. But he still enchanted when he could, and brought in a healthy income.
He occasionally got large bursts of wealth whenever he cured an insane victim of the Cruciatus curse as well. With secrecy regarding how he did it conserved through the use of magical contracts of course. Now that he was older and with more control over his soul and magic, the backlash only knocked him out for a few days afterward. Consuming the souls of a few of the animals on his land was enough to get over the resulting sickness he would get after waking up from those.
He had bought the enchanting store that Dobby had been working at for all these years, and kept Dobby as an employee there to sell whatever Harry ended up making on almost on a whim for any given day. Dobby knew better about what things should really sell for and how to advertise the products for customers with his experience. He had become quite the smooth talking salesman after his years at the store counter.
Things were going well. Harry had stability, people cared about him, and a nice magical house he had bought out in the countryside with a small fraction of his fortune. Well, a mansion as his friends joked. It was a rather large building. His life was everything he had ever dreamed of when he first came to Hogwarts.
Life was good.