Within the domain of the mind, the forging of a key is never an isolated event. Somewhere, hidden in the recesses of the world, there will always be a corresponding door waiting for it, silent, patient, inevitable.
The forbidden magic of the Thought Backdoor had fully settled into the deepest strata of Alan's consciousness, becoming part of the foundation of his mental fortress.
He knew the moment had arrived.
The final reckoning with the fragment of Tom Riddle's soul, coiled inside the diary like malignant software, was no longer something to be postponed.
He did not seek a professor.
Nor did he look toward any authority for assistance.
Instead, he turned to the bedrock he trusted most.
The Weasley twins.
Lee Jordan.
The Gryffindor boys' dormitory, transformed by them into a makeshift "maker workshop," full of metal scraps, alchemical soldering fumes, and the leathery scent of charred parchment, became the staging ground for the final operation.
The room was as chaotic as ever: half-finished "Quick-Skip Class Candies" cluttering the desks, stacks of trick-design drafts piled in corners.
But tonight, the atmosphere was utterly different.
The laughter was gone.
The lively brainstorming had vanished.
Alan stood in the center of the workshop. The alchemical lamp behind him stretched his shadow across the wall, shrouding him in a solemnity far too mature for his age.
Fred, George, and Lee perched on the edges of their beds, staring at him.
They had never seen him like this.
It wasn't the sharp focus he wore when solving a problem.
Nor the quiet delight he showed after a successful experiment.
This was the stillness before a storm, absolute, heavy, decisive.
"Everyone."
Alan's voice was soft, but the room seemed to freeze around the sound.
His expression belonged to a strategist, not a second-year student.
"I've decided. Before the end of this term… I am going to complete the final sealing of Riddle's diary."
The words fell like a depth charge into still water.
The twins and Lee went rigid.
The diary.
A name they never spoke, but which lurked in the back of all their memories, a dark brand.
They knew better than most how twisted and dangerous the entity sealed inside that harmless-looking black cover truly was.
"Alan… are you sure?"
Fred's voice was tight, stripped of its usual careless humor. He leaned forward instinctively, alarm sharpening his expression.
"That thing, maybe we should let Dumbledore handle it?"
"No."
Alan's answer was immediate, immovable.
"I must be the one to finish this."
There was no hesitation, no negotiation. Only the calm certainty of someone who had already accepted the weight of the choice.
"Professor Dumbledore has already authorized me to handle the diary. And from a technical standpoint…"
He lifted his eyes.
"I am the most suitable person to confront it."
His gaze swept across his friends, their fear, their worry, their instinctive desire to protect him.
And that softened something in him.
He would not let them remain merely onlookers.
"I need your help."
The three straightened instantly.
"I need you to act as safety observers for the sealing ritual," Alan continued. "While I engage the diary's consciousness, you will stay at my side. No interruptions. No interference from anyone, or anything."
He paused.
His voice deepened.
"And you will be the final fail-safe."
Then, to convey his plan in the clearest possible way, Alan used the language they understood best:
The language of the workshop, of inventors, engineers, and programmers.
"Imagine Tom Riddle's consciousness as a program."
Alan traced a rectangle in the air.
"A highly sophisticated artificial intelligence possessing full self-awareness. And it's trapped inside the diary, an isolated, outdated server."
The analogy captured their attention at once.
Worry shifted into technical fascination.
"I couldn't destroy it before because its core code, its operating system, is protected by a paradox-logic defense."
"Any attempt to delete it is absorbed, twisted, or reflected. It has turned itself into a Möbius loop in logic, invulnerable to external deletion."
"So this time," Alan said quietly, "I will not try to delete it."
A cold, clinical light entered his eyes, the look of a surgeon under the lamp, preparing for a high-risk procedure.
"I'm going to plant something inside its operating system."
A long breath.
Three pairs of eyes widened.
"A structure formed entirely out of its own logic."
He lowered his voice.
"A recursive paradox.
A closed conceptual loop."
A,
"logic bomb."
The twins inhaled sharply.
Lee Jordan's heartbeat seemed to stop.
"This bomb will remain dormant, like a sleeper line of code. Undetectable. Inactive."
"But, "
He pressed each word like a nail.
"The moment Tom Riddle's consciousness attempts any kind of information output…"
"Such as trying to tempt someone again."
"Or trying to attack me."
"That moment, the bomb activates."
"And then…"
In a tone as calm as polished steel, Alan uttered the end of his plan, its heart, its terrible precision.
"It will trap Tom Riddle's arrogant, self-sustaining intellect inside a perfect, unbreakable loop of the question:
'Who am I?
Do I exist?'"
"A question with no answer."
"A loop that will consume his entire processing capacity, his magical cognition, every time he tries to think."
"Every cycle is self-destruction."
"Every attempt at resolution is self-corrosion."
"Until the processor, the fragment of his soul, burns itself out."
Silence fell.
Only the small flame inside the alchemical lamp flickered softly, patient and unaffected.
Fred. George. Lee.
They were completely stunned.
Mouths open.
Minds reeling.
This was not magic as Hogwarts taught it.
This was not wand-work.
Not spellfire.
Not dueling.
This was war waged in the dimension of thought.
A battle of logic, concept, recursion, more lethal than any curse.
Listening to Alan outline his plan, they saw an impossible, almost hallucinatory image,
A programmer attempting to install a virus in the mind of a god.
A boy inserting a single lethal line of code…
into the consciousness of Voldemort.
For a heartbeat, awe, terror, and exhilaration fused into a single electric shudder that raced up their spines and exploded behind their eyes.
The war was no longer at Hogwarts.
It was in the realm of ideas.
And Alan Scott was ready.
~~----------------------
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