Adrian pushed through the small crowd gathered around the bed and bent down to look directly at Harry, examining his eyes with concern. He asked gently, "Can you see my face clearly, Harry? Focus on me."
Harry weakly shook his head in a jerky, uncontrolled motion. His eyes were still glassy and unfocused, unable to fix on any specific point.
"Can you speak then? Say anything at all," Adrian pressed, keeping his voice calm and encouraging.
Harry opened his mouth with effort, his jaw was working strangely. But only a few broken, garbled syllables emerged from his throat, more like breath than sound. "Uh... ah... nn..."
His face contorted with frustration at his inability to form words.
Adrian sighed heavily, straightening up. "Just as I thought."
Dumbledore stepped forward closer to the bedside, his eyes were observing Harry's unfocused gaze and uncontrolled bodily reactions. His voice was somber with understanding. "It's not just his speech function that's been affected, is it? His soul has been damaged, hasn't it, Adrian?"
"That's correct," Adrian confirmed gravely, meeting Dumbledore's eyes with matching seriousness. "Given his current condition, the severity of the soul trauma, it's genuinely fortunate he even woke up at all. Most victims of such injury never regain consciousness."
A complex expression crossed Dumbledore's face.
Adrian reached out with gentle movements and brushed the black hair away from Harry's forehead, revealing the pale skin beneath.
Sure enough, as he'd suspected, the iconic lightning-shaped scar that had marked Harry since infancy had vanished completely.
In its place remained only a patch of slightly wrinkled, puckered skin as though the scar had never existed at all.
What this meant was all too obvious.
"Someone removed Voldemort's soul fragment," Adrian explained quietly.
"The soul is a very complex thing, incredibly delicate. It's possible that during the extraction process, whoever did this also inadvertently tore away part of Harry's own soul along with it. Like removing a deeply embedded splinter and taking flesh with it. That's why Harry has fallen into this coma."
"Wait," Hermione suddenly spoke up, her mind still working despite her distress. She tried to keep her voice steady and rational, but the slight tremor revealed her roiling emotions beneath.
"Why would someone specifically go to the trouble of removing Voldemort's soul fragment? What would they gain?"
"Because that person is Voldemort himself," Adrian said with stark, calm certainty.
This statement was like ice water poured directly into a hot pan of oil, instantly exploding throughout the hospital wing.
Gasps and exclamations erupted. Ron stumbled back. Hermione's hand flew to her mouth.
"That's still just speculation, after all," Dumbledore's steady, authoritative voice rang out, timely quelling the rising panic in the room before it could spiral into chaos. "We should not jump to conclusions."
"There's another question I don't understand," Hermione said, her brow furrowed tightly in concentration, voicing another doubt that many in the room clearly shared. "If that's true, if Voldemort really did this, then how could this matter possibly be connected to John? What does an eleven-year-old boy have to do with him?"
"That's rather complicated to explain," Adrian replied evasively, not wanting to speculate publicly. "In any case, let's wait for Professor Snape to locate and bring John here first. Then we can get answers."
At that precise moment, Harry on the hospital bed spoke again with tremendous effort.
This time it wasn't meaningless mumbling or random sounds.
His lips moved with difficulty, each word seeming to require enormous force of will. He stuttered out a chilling sentence word by painful word: "John... is... Voldemort..."
As soon as those words left his mouth, Harry seemed to exhaust his very last bit of remaining strength. His head slouched limply to one side against the pillow, and he fell into unconsciousness once more.
Everyone exchanged glances with one another.
Since Harry had identified him with his own words, with such conviction despite his condition, there was nothing more to say or debate.
"Minerva, Adrian," Dumbledore immediately ordered, his voice was sharp with command and urgency. "Go support Severus at once! He may be walking into danger!"
The group had just stepped out of the hospital wing, moving with quick purpose through the corridor, when they encountered Snape hurrying toward them from the opposite direction. His black robes billowed behind him.
He reported directly sounding slightly out of breath, "Selwyn isn't in the common room. His roommate says he rarely stays in the dormitory at all and always returns very late each day, well past curfew. I asked the other students in the common room as well, but no one has seen him today."
This news made everyone's hearts sink like stones into cold water.
John's disappearance undoubtedly confirmed the credibility of what Harry had struggled so hard to say before losing consciousness.
An ordinary first-year student could never have such strange, secretive movements and whereabouts.
Especially not a Muggle-born wizard with no connections, no resources, no reason to disappear.
"Minerva," Dumbledore decided immediately, "summon all staff members at once. We need to conduct a thorough search of the entire castle."
Professor McGonagall nodded solemnly, her lips pressed into a grim line. "I'll gather everyone immediately."
After that urgent order, Hogwarts staff searched nearly every corner of the vast castle with thoroughness.
As expected, even when night fell deep and darkness flooded the castle, even when exhaustion set in and torches burned low, they had absolutely no success at all.
John Selwyn had vanished completely, as though he'd never existed.
Oh, and Umbridge was not notified to participate in this search, kept in the dark by mutual unspoken agreement.
Now it could be basically confirmed beyond doubt that John Selwyn was indeed Voldemort himself.
However, they did not understand what method or dark magic Voldemort had used to accomplish such a possession, to take over that child's body so completely.
This storm of activity did not affect the ordinary students at all.
Over the following days, students continued attending classes as normal, blissfully unaware of the crisis.
Of course, neither Harry nor John were in the classroom, their seats were conspicuously empty.
This unusual absence quickly sparked heated discussion and speculation among the students.
After all, Harry could be said to be the most watched and famous student at Hogwarts at present, even enjoying quite a few devoted admirers on campus who followed his activities.
Many students were constantly paying attention to his every move, his presence or absence.
Perhaps due to unfortunate experience and pattern, whenever anyone was absent from class at Hogwarts now, the students' first instinctive reaction was to check the hospital wing.
Therefore, the fact that Harry was lying unconscious in the hospital wing was quickly discovered by certain curious students who went looking.
Rumors began to spread, everything from Quidditch accidents to dark creature attacks.
In contrast, absolutely no one cared about or even noticed John's absence from classes.
This was hardly surprising, since he was nothing more than an unremarkable new student in Slytherin.
Who paid attention to random first-years?
Nearly a full week passed slowly.
On Saturday morning, Adrian was in his office grading the long-accumulated pile of student assignments that had been gathering dust on his desk. Essays on Kneazle behavior, reports on Flobberworm care, sketches of Hippogriff anatomy.
Harry remained unconscious in the hospital wing, showing no signs of improvement.
Over these past few days, Adrian had tried various potions and healing methods, restorative draughts, calming elixirs, even some experimental brews of his own creation. But none had improved Harry's condition in any meaningful way.
He had also tried the leaves of the Wisdom Tree multiple times, administering them with hope each time, but they no longer had any visible effect after that first miraculous awakening.
The soul energy contained within those leaves was simply not abundant enough. For the missing portion of Harry's soul, for actual regeneration and repair, they had no decisive effect and could at most only temporarily alleviate the pain and disorientation of soul damage.
It was like trying to fill a lake with a cup of water.
"Knock, knock, knock."
The sudden knocking on his office door interrupted Adrian's increasingly dark thoughts.
"Come in," he called out, setting down his quill.
The door was pushed open carefully. Adrian looked up and saw that it was Hermione who had entered, closing the door quietly behind her.
Her complexion was poor, pale and drawn. There were faint but unmistakable dark circles under her red-rimmed eyes, clearly indicating she hadn't been sleeping or resting well at all. She looked like she'd been crying.
"What is it, Miss Granger?" Adrian stopped what he was doing, giving her his full attention.
Hermione didn't beat around the bush or waste time with pleasantries. She immediately stated her purpose.
"Professor Westeros, I'd like permission to enter the Restricted Section of the library to research some information. I need a signed note from you authorizing access." Her voice was steady and urgent.
Adrian paused, studying her tired face. "For Harry?"
Hermione nodded vigorously. "Yes, sir."
'She probably wanted to find a way to cure Harry,' Adrian thought with a mixture of admiration and pity.
If one wanted to enter Hogwarts' Restricted Section, a professor's signed note was absolutely essential.
The note would clearly specify the names or types of books one was permitted to borrow.
Adrian immediately pulled out a piece of parchment and began writing, giving Hermione a broadly worded note that would allow her to borrow books of all categories without restriction.
He advised as he signed it, "Remember not to anger Madam Pince. Be respectful, quiet, and return everything on time."
Hermione accepted the note with both hands like it was precious treasure. "Thank you, Professor. I will."
She left in a hurry, practically running from his office.
When it came to borrowing books, Adrian had always been quite lenient with students who showed genuine interest in learning.
He still remembered clearly that some time ago, John had also come to him requesting a similar note for Restricted Section access.
At that time, he didn't seem to care much either, and hadn't questioned it seriously. He'd asked just a few casual questions about John's research interests before approving it for him without hesitation.
Thinking about this now, Adrian suddenly grew intensely curious about what specific books John had borrowed.
After all, John's true identity had now been exposed as Voldemort.
Perhaps he could find some useful clues about Voldemort's plans and intentions from studying his reading choices, his research interests.
Adrian immediately set off for the library, abandoning his grading.
After explaining his purpose to Madam Pince, who guarded the library like a dragon guarding treasure, she immediately retrieved the detailed borrowing records for all books in the library recently, going back several months.
As she organized the thick stack of records, scouring through pages, her brow furrowed more and more tightly with each passing moment. Her expression grew increasingly puzzled.
"There are many different types of books on this list, and it's very strange," she said, her voice carrying confusion as she handed the long parchment scroll with the records to Adrian. "Not what I'd expect from a first-year at all. The range is... unusual."
The parchment was densely covered with a long, detailed list of student names and corresponding book titles, dates borrowed and returned, organized chronologically.
Unfortunately, even parchment in the magical world didn't have a convenient one-click sorting function or search feature.
Adrian had to carefully examine each entry one by one, scanning down the list with patience, looking for John's name.
Sure enough, just as Madam Pince had observed, John had borrowed a great many books from this library over the course of the year, far more than any normal first-year would read and they covered all sorts of different categories.
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