Does this describe an event that has already happened?
It’s been debated constantly since the start because it’s highlighted as important. The best guess was that it might have been when Voldemort attacked the Potters, but there’s obvious problems with that (what’s the silver? and as far as we know, no blood was shed by Voldemort since he favored AKs). Given that ch90 brings up blood as a powerful sacrificial element, it’s looking more like it’s about a future event and maybe a ritual by Harry—pursuant to bringing back Hermione being the obvious goal.
The only plot-significant things that have been described as silver are Fawkes, the Time-Turner, Dumbledore’s beard, Lucius Malfoy’s cane, and Patronus charms. I think we can safely eliminate Dumbledore’s beard and Malfoy’s cane. If it is in the future, I would have dismissed the time-turner before the past 2 chapters, but not anymore.
(I still believe it likely describes the attack on the Potters. Edit: I no longer believe this.)
“Beneath the moonlight glints a tiny fragment of silver, a fraction of a line...”
This sounds like an alchemy circle, which has to be drawn “to the fineness of a child’s hair.” I guess it involves the creation of a philosopher’s stone.
And if Yudkowsky’s going to make a Fullmetal Alchemist reference, we know how to make a philosopher’s stone, or even crude approximations, but only using human scarifice.
Could be alchemy or related magic used to turn someone’s blood into a fake burned body. (Free transmutation seems easy to recognize.) But I’ve been thinking of it as an event in the past, which now seems dubious.
FWIW, the Summon Death ritual is a reference to the Rite of AshkEnte, from Terry Pratchett’s Discworld novels. The usual purpose of summoning Death in that context was to ask him questions, and a counterspell to dismiss him wasn’t required because he was always in a hurry to be back about his business, as soon as the summoning wizards let him go.
I interpreted it as creating a … King Dementor or something, that has wide-ranging effects when lit up with True Patronus (probably the Counterspell To Dispell Death).
Remember his anti-Batman resolution from a few chapters ago, where he said that a dead body means the gloves come off and he quits trying to fight a bloodless war.
Noted. I think it’s still a fairly accurate summary of his mental state, however.
Edit: Half of Ch. 85 is still basically in this vein.
Harry closed his eyes, swallowing hard a few times against the sudden choking sensation. It was abruptly very clear that while Harry was going around trying to live the ideals of the Enlightenment, Dumbledore was the one who’d actually fought in a war. Nonviolent ideals were cheap to hold if you were a scientist, living inside the Protego bubble cast by the police officers and soldiers whose actions you had the luxury to question. Albus Dumbledore seemed to have started out with ideals at least as strong as Harry’s own, if not stronger; and Dumbledore hadn’t gotten through his war without killing enemies and sacrificing friends.
Are you so much better than Haukelid and Dumbledore, Harry Potter, that you’ll be able to fight without a single casualty? Even in the world of comic books, the only reason a superhero like Batman even looks successful is that the comic-book readers only notice when Important Named Characters die, not when the Joker shoots some random nameless bystander to show off his villainy. Batman is a murderer no less than the Joker, for all the lives the Joker took that Batman could’ve saved by killing him. That’s what the man named Alastor was trying to tell Dumbledore, and afterward Dumbledore regretted having taken so long to change his mind. Are you really going to try to follow the path of the superhero, and never sacrifice a single piece or kill a single enemy?
The detail given could be that a knife is being used rather than a wand. And no-one we know would use a knife to kill rather than a wand unless there was a very special reason to do so.
Harry doesn’t trust Quirrell anymore, hasn’t trusted him since the Azkaban arc. That was made pretty clear inthe conversation in the dark warehouse immediately after the raid.
It’s been debated constantly since the start because it’s highlighted as important. The best guess was that it might have been when Voldemort attacked the Potters, but there’s obvious problems with that (what’s the silver? and as far as we know, no blood was shed by Voldemort since he favored AKs). Given that ch90 brings up blood as a powerful sacrificial element, it’s looking more like it’s about a future event and maybe a ritual by Harry—pursuant to bringing back Hermione being the obvious goal.
When you said AKs, I immediately thought you meant AK-47s. That put a very amusing picture in my head.
I might play too many videogames.
They share many characteristics, don’t they?
The only plot-significant things that have been described as silver are Fawkes, the Time-Turner, Dumbledore’s beard, Lucius Malfoy’s cane, and Patronus charms. I think we can safely eliminate Dumbledore’s beard and Malfoy’s cane. If it is in the future, I would have dismissed the time-turner before the past 2 chapters, but not anymore.
(I still believe it likely describes the attack on the Potters. Edit: I no longer believe this.)
“Beneath the moonlight glints a tiny fragment of silver, a fraction of a line...”
This sounds like an alchemy circle, which has to be drawn “to the fineness of a child’s hair.” I guess it involves the creation of a philosopher’s stone.
And if Yudkowsky’s going to make a Fullmetal Alchemist reference, we know how to make a philosopher’s stone, or even crude approximations, but only using human scarifice.
Or a horcrux? We still don’t know what the ritual for that looks like.
We know from canon and Word of Rowling that it involves murder, and is so disgusting it almost made her editor vomit.
Nitpick: “felt like vomiting” is well short of being almost made to vomit.
Could be alchemy or related magic used to turn someone’s blood into a fake burned body. (Free transmutation seems easy to recognize.) But I’ve been thinking of it as an event in the past, which now seems dubious.
In the first Canon, unicorn’s blood is silver, and that has a life-extension effect.
IIRC, Canon!Dumbledore says it is used as a last, terrible resort of a wretched life (or something).
In canon, it’s also Unicorn blood.
It could also be Harry using Godric Gryffindor’s sword to murder someone (Bellatrix?) in order to power the Summon Death ritual.
I’ve always interpreted the Summon Death ritual to just create a dementor.
FWIW, the Summon Death ritual is a reference to the Rite of AshkEnte, from Terry Pratchett’s Discworld novels. The usual purpose of summoning Death in that context was to ask him questions, and a counterspell to dismiss him wasn’t required because he was always in a hurry to be back about his business, as soon as the summoning wizards let him go.
I interpreted it as creating a … King Dementor or something, that has wide-ranging effects when lit up with True Patronus (probably the Counterspell To Dispell Death).
That is completely out of character.
Remember his anti-Batman resolution from a few chapters ago, where he said that a dead body means the gloves come off and he quits trying to fight a bloodless war.
Eliezer edited out his explicit resolution at some point before these updates began.
Noted. I think it’s still a fairly accurate summary of his mental state, however.
Edit: Half of Ch. 85 is still basically in this vein.
Not anymore. .
Or he could just go all brutalist utilitarian.
You mean like this?
Ooops. No. I mean more like Grindelvaldesque.
Would Harry have access to the sword, being a Ravenclaw?
It could just be a random knife.
Possible, but unlikely.
The detail given could be that a knife is being used rather than a wand. And no-one we know would use a knife to kill rather than a wand unless there was a very special reason to do so.
Unless they can’t do magic...
An alternative to Harry doing the ritual would be that Harry get’s sacrificed by a ritual of Quirrelmort to bring back Voldemort.
Given how much Harry trust Quirrelmort, it should be in Quirrelmort’s power.
Harry doesn’t trust Quirrell anymore, hasn’t trusted him since the Azkaban arc. That was made pretty clear inthe conversation in the dark warehouse immediately after the raid.