"I am Harry Potter," a boy said, looking at his reflection with calm eyes. His voice bounced around the cramped space, sparsely filled with broken toys, books, and thrown-away trinkets. "Didn't think it would be me. I thought only good souls get to transmigrate."
The boy, or man, who had now taken in his surroundings, was not as surprised after being desensitized from reading dozens of transmigration novels. He tried going out of the small cupboard, only to see that it was locked. Narrowing his eyes, the boy looked at the door.
"I don't like this," he muttered, narrowing his eyes as he thought back on all he knew about Harry's life in the Dursleys' house. He took off his t-shirt to check his suspicions, and sure enough, he could see bruises, fresh and old. A chill flashed in his eyes.
He took a deep breath, stepped back onto the makeshift bed, and said, "Whatever, let's just wait for my memories to integrate, and then I will deal wi…" As he expected from his knowledge of regular transmigration, he was not surprised when a pang of pain struck his head. He became comfortable on the bed and waited for the memories of himself and Harry to assimilate simultaneously.
Bit by bit, the old Harry's memories started fusing into him. He saw scenes from the life of 7-year-old Harry: his first memory, his first steps, first words, his mother's eyes, his father's smile, Sirius, Lupin, the rat, the goat, the snake, the giant, and so on. "What a novel experience, just like described by many," he marveled at the experience. However, beyond his knowledge, as the memories were integrating, something else was also happening—something really bad.
"It's like watching a movie and experiencing it firsthand at the same time. It's lik… AHHHHHH… MY HEAD… AHH…!" Harry clutched his head and raised it to let out a scream due to the pain tearing through his body and mind. "This is not supposed to happen."
He writhed and thrashed in his small cupboard under the stairs. Feeling suffocated by the pain and the small space, he got up and started pushing and punching the door. His small fist merely rapped on the door, not really doing much. The Dursleys were out, picking up Dudley's aunt, locking him in.
"Open, open… open…" Harry screamed, his eyes turning red and his face flushing, almost as if blood would start leaking from his pores. Then, like a call summoning magic, a force unparalleled to his weak body burst forth, tearing the door apart and blasting it open. Harry fell out of the cupboard he called home. As the pain intensified, he crawled out on his knees and hands.
A step, two out, he started banging his head on the floor, once, then twice, as his perception wavered in and out. Turning on the floor, Harry lay on his back, his face covered with tears and snot, barfing only air as he hadn't had today's breakfast or yesterday's dinner. It was all black; he had lost his senses, his brain unable to process anything except the excruciating pain.
At the beginning, his screams were a mixture of a beast being slaughtered and a childlike banshee. But the screams never left the house, just like any other day. And neither would it have helped, as the reason for the pain Harry had yet to realize was the thawing of the protective barrier around his soul left behind since the day Lily sacrificed her life for her son. And now, the beast—the abomination right outside the barrier protecting his soul—was stretching in joy, seeing the possibility to possess and devour what had always been near yet beyond its reach.
His saving grace, though, was that having just been isekai'd into this body, he had a fragile connection to it. So while he was going through intervals of pain and darkness, a corporal form of sorts sped around his body, magic pulsating sporadically. Being not completely anchored in body and soul led him to access the soul sea, which for all of history has been unaccessed by any known being.
Standing in the center of the wide space, he saw images covered in a golden glow converging on him. He felt them being absorbed into his being, becoming a permanent part of him. When the last of it entered his soul, he received all of Harry's memories. He focused more on the memories to move away from the pain. With sheer will, he 'looked' past the pain and observed his surroundings—pitch blackness above a golden sea.
'Harry' tried hard to concentrate and look around. In this painful trance, he observed his form for what it was: ethereal, not defined in any way other than the basic features of a man. He 'saw' himself floating in space, which seemed to hold no color yet felt bright, and his form was crimson. Beneath him, a golden sea slowly turned into bundles of light. He saw the barrier, a pink sphere of sorts, that had enclosed him and the flying motes of golden light.
He then saw what was beyond. "Haaa…" Even in such pain, an unquestionable terror flowed through his being, or soul, as he deduced in his sparse lucidity. A horrid being, or thing—a wraith—of dirty black and sewage green, screamed and wailed outside the barrier of pink. And then for a second, it stopped. A crescent tear covered most of its 'face,' as if to smile as it seemingly looked directly at him. Then it went on to bump and smash the barrier with more fervor.
As it kept crashing, loud thumps of magic traveled through the barrier. Though it seemed to hold, Harry had an innate sense that told him it wouldn't for long. There was no distance or closeness inside wherever he was. So when he paid attention, he could see everywhere. Focusing on the barrier, he could see it thinning as time passed.
"No… no… no… I don't want to die…" Harry screamed in a mixture of terror and despair. "I have to hold… the barrier…" He struggled to clear his head and think of a way, any way, to escape what was at bay. He had prided himself in his last life on being cold in every decision he made, even if he never portrayed it outwardly. He was a sociopath through and through. But now, with pain and fear coursing through his being, he couldn't think of any way out. He reached his arms akimbo and let out a bellow, "I DON'T WANT TO DIE."
But nothing came to mind. As he spiraled into despair, something brushed past his hand—a golden residue from a process he didn't know. When it touched his hand, he felt something—an expansion of his senses. He hyperventilated, if that was even a thing in this space, looking around to the nearest mote. He reached out and held it close. "Haa… ha… ha… ha…" He felt it again. This time he knew what it was—the shield. There was a connection between these golden motes and the barrier that was holding the monster at bay.
In his madness to survive and the vibrations of the impending doom, he did something truly ridiculous. He 'ate' the mote. He didn't seem to have a mouth, but when he brought it close to his face, a tear fell across it. Not delaying a second, 'Harry' stuffed it into himself. There was a sharp needle-like itch near his throat, but he saw hope as the barrier pulsed with him for a second and stopped thinning. He could feel a connection almost forming, and that seemed to be the go-ahead for him to madly rush from one mote to another and stuff them inside him, making his crimson specter-like form now have splotches of gold all around.
While he was doing this, he made a rough guess about what was happening to him and what he was doing. He was in the soul space, the golden motes being the residue or the last of Harry's soul as it went on to the beyond. And some of the soul being left behind might be due to Harry being a Horcrux. As for the pink barrier, it was the result of Lily's sacrifice, and the eldritch wraith outside was part of Voldemort's soul.
"Ha-ha… At least I bought myself some tim… Ahhh… why the fu*k," said Harry to himself, only for the impossible pain to increase. The soul is a very delicate entity that has not been researched enough; even slight harm to it causes insurmountable pain, like how the strong blows of the wraith outside were causing him pain. Now imagine how it would be if he tried to assimilate another person's essence into him. And the dark, sickly black-green mass with a demonic face coming towards him was not helping.
"Why is this happening? Where is my protagonist luck… shit! System! Status!... God damn it! Did I get nothing?" Harry was breaking down. The pain he was feeling was amplified many times. The specter of Voldemort was still ramming against the pink barrier like a mad bull. Its manic spouts of glee were coursing through the soul space.
"Shut the f**k up, you Volder... loseblader whatever, ahhh... SHUT UP!"
Most of the dread he was feeling towards it was now more or less suppressed with annoyance.
*Crack*
It was then that the most precious and only dear gift Harry had from his mother was lost. As though he had absorbed all that was left of the soul of the original Harry, he had yet to assimilate with it. But could the barrier wait for him? The answer could be seen in the shattered pieces of the barrier.
*Screech*
Not a second later, the sick mass lunged to attack the crimson soul, which had golden patches all over its soul body. There was never a lull in this weird roller coaster of struggle. {AN: Bad reviews 1/10}
In this tug of war, the scepter-like fusker soul was trying to corrupt and take control of him. Harry gathered every bit of courage, wit, or just whatever he could muster, and commanded the shards of the broken barrier to attack the Voldmold.
*Screech*
The pedo weirdo was now screeching in pain. But that didn't stop its mad assault; rather, it increased its ferocity. They say when you are at rock bottom, the only way is up. But our MC opted for the option to take a shovel and dig deeper. At this rate, he might as well dig a grave while he's at it.
The brave (dumb) are not afraid, they say. And it might as well be true, but our MC was terrified to the point he grabbed the perp who was soul-raping him and dug his F-ing face into the scepter.
Gnawing and tearing, the savage attempted the absurd. It then became a battle of one devouring the other, as Harry and the Horcrux gnawed at each other. After a long struggle, a single soul was left standing (floating) in the expanse of emptiness.
The last remaining will from the green mass was removed, and the leftover absorbed. Now, the new soul, the leftover essence of the OG Harry, and part of Voldemort's soul had made a monster.