Having the power to call back the dead, even temporarily, had been invaluable while breaking the curse of Ashford Estate.
Without Echo of the Departed, Harry would have failed.
Without Cadmus Peverell, Edith Ashford would still be trapped in endless hatred.
At the time, Cadmus and Edith had consumed so much of Harry’s attention that he had not truly stopped to think about what Echo of the Departed actually meant outside the context of the quest.
Until last night.
Until he laid awake staring at the ceiling while one thought repeated endlessly through his mind.
Mom.
Harry was an orphan.
A child who grew up unwanted inside a house that never let him forget he had been abandoned.
A boy who spent his entire life staring at mirrors and reflections trying desperately to imagine what his parents looked like.
What they smelled like.
How they laughed.
Whether they would have held him when he cried.
And now…
Now he could meet them.
The morning after the curse lifted, Harry returned to Ashford Estate.
The difference in the land felt almost surreal.
The oppressive weight that had hung over the hills and forests for centuries was gone.
Mist still drifted above the lake beneath the pale morning sunlight, but no longer with that unnatural stillness that made the entire estate feel like a graveyard.
Birds moved freely between the trees while the wind carried the scent of grass and river water rather than decay.
The estate no longer felt haunted, just old and wounded.
Harry stood near the shore staring at the dark waters for several long moments.
Only yesterday the surface reflected the world wrong, as though the lake belonged somewhere else entirely.
Now it simply looked like water.
Cold water, admittedly, that probably still contained enough dangerous creatures to discourage swimming.
But normal.
Harry exhaled slowly and looked in the distance.
The tower on the isle no longer looked like the lair of some ancient horror.
In daylight, with the curse broken, it simply appeared sad: a ruin left behind by history instead of a nightmare clinging stubbornly to the world.
Harry stared at his reflection in the water.
He could bring back the dead, he could see THEM again.
He had never been this nervous before.
Not when facing the wraith, not when facing the basilisk, not even when facing Voldemort.
How could he not be?
Because what if it worked?
And perhaps even worse—what if it did not?
Harry closed his eyes briefly.
Then he activated the transformation.
[First Wing Awakening]
Power flooded through him instantly.
White spread through his hair while black wings unfurled from his back with a rustle of dark feathers.
Mana surged beneath his skin in warm currents, and the world sharpened around him into impossible clarity.
Harry barely noticed any of it.
His heart hammered too loudly.
For several long seconds, he simply stood there beside the lake struggling to breathe properly.
Then Harry swallowed hard and whispered softly:
“Echo of the Departed… Lily Evans Potter.”
Mana poured out of him in vast, shimmering waves as light slowly gathered in front of Harry.
Unlike Edith’s manifestation, this glow felt soft and warm rather than cold.
The radiance brightened, and someone appeared.
A woman stood before him.
Red hair.
Green eyes.
Lily Potter blinked in confusion while looking around the lakeshore as though waking from a dream.
Then her gaze settled on Harry.
Or rather… on the white-haired, winged stranger standing before her.
She frowned faintly.
Harry realized how bizarre he probably looked.
White hair.
Black wings.
Ethereal beneath the strange radiance of Angel Mode.
No one would recognize him as Harry James Potter at first glance.
After a few seconds, Lily’s eyes widened because, despite everything else that was still James Potter’s face staring back at her.
Her breath caught.
“…Harry?”
That was all it took.
Harry moved before thinking.
The distance between them vanished in seconds as he practically crashed into her arms.
Lily caught him without any hesitation, just instinctive love so overwhelming it hurt, and Harry broke.
Years of loneliness cracked apart all at once inside the arms of the mother he had spent his entire life missing.
He buried his face against her shoulder while tears burned uncontrollably behind his eyes.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered brokenly, not even sure what he was apologizing for.
Lily’s hands trembled slightly as she held him tighter.
“Oh, Harry.”
That made it worse.
She sounded exactly the way a mother should sound: warm, gentle, safe.
Harry had imagined this moment so many times while growing up.
He had wondered what her voice sounded like, what her hugs felt like, whether she would have loved him if she had lived…
Now he knew.
In her embrace, Harry now knows what unconditional love feels like.
Lily pulled back just enough to look at him properly, her green eyes—identical to his own—filled with tears.
“You’ve grown so much,” she whispered shakily.
Harry let out a weak laugh through his tears.
“Yeah… I guess I have.” The source of this chapter is g.com.
A tiny watery smile crossed Lily’s face.
She reached up and touched his cheek carefully, almost reverently, as though afraid he might disappear.
“You look so much like James,” she murmured softly.
“But your eyes are all mine.”
Harry’s throat tightened painfully.
Nobody had ever said that to him before.
Not like this.
Not with love as though it was something precious.
Lily glanced toward the wings behind him, confusion briefly flickering across her expression.
“…Harry,” she asked carefully, “why do you have wings and white hair?”
Harry let out a wet, embarrassed laugh.
“I honestly have no idea.”
That drew genuine laughter out of her.
It was a soft and bright sound.
Harry thought he would remember that sound forever.
They spoke after that.
Not about wars or prophecies or Voldemort.
Lily asked about Hogwarts, his friends, his favorite foods, and whether he liked flying as much as James once had.
Harry answered everything, trying desperately to fit twelve years of loneliness into a few precious minutes together.
And all too quickly… his mana began running out.
Harry felt it before it happened.
The transformation weakened first.
The wings started dissolving into fading black feathers while exhaustion settled heavily through his body.
Lily noticed too.
The smile on her face faltered.
“No,” Harry whispered immediately.
“No, wait—”
Her corporeal form flickered, and panic surged through him.
He grabbed her hands desperately.
“I still have so much to say.”
Lily’s expression broke his heart.
“Oh, my sweet boy…”
The light surrounding her grew thinner.
Harry felt tears burning in his eyes again.
“I missed you,” he whispered shakily.
Lily smiled through tears of her own.
“We never stopped loving you.”
She leaned forward and kissed his forehead gently before vanishing.
Harry stumbled forward onto his knees beside the lake while the wings vanished and exhaustion consumed his body.
But despite the tears still falling silently down his face for the first time in his life, Harry Potter truly understood something with absolute certainty: He had been loved.
***
Harry remained on his knees beside the lake long after Lily vanished.
The morning breeze moved softly through the grass while distant birds sang somewhere across the hills of Ashford Estate, but Harry barely heard any of it.
His entire body trembled.
That had not been enough.
Not even close.
A few precious minutes after twelve years, and now she was gone again.
Harry pressed the heels of his hands against his eyes desperately, trying and failing to stop the tears.
He could still remember her warmth, her voice, the way she had held him without hesitation, as though loving him had remained the easiest thing in the world even after death itself.
And now she was gone.
Again.
The grief hit differently this time because now Harry finally understood exactly what he had been missing all those years.
The ache in his chest became almost unbearable for the twelve-year-old boy.
“No,” he whispered hoarsely.
There had to be a way.
He needed more time.
He needed more mana—
Harry’s eyes widened slightly.
Mana.
If the problem was mana, then—
The Status screen appeared before him.
[Status]
Name: Harry James Potter
Level: 7
EXP: 30/3725
HP: 120/120
MP: 2/180
AGI — Rank E (16)
END — Rank E (12)
MNA — Rank E (18)
[Unassigned Stat Points: 6]
Harry stared at the numbers through wet eyes.
Then, without even thinking properly about it, he dumped every single unassigned point directly into mana.
The system chimed instantly.
[MNA increased: 18 → 24]
Power surged through Harry as his magical core expanded with startling force, mana flowing heavier and denser beneath his skin like rivers suddenly breaking through narrow channels.
Harry inhaled sharply as he adapted to his new power.
Then another notification appeared.
[Main Quest Complete!]
[The Beginning of Change]
Description:
A foreign power has merged with your soul.
The future has diverged from its intended course.
Survive.
Change fate.
Objectives Completed:
Reach Level 5 ✔
Improve at least one stat to Rank D ✔
Learn 3 new spells ✔
Rewards Granted:
+500 EXP
Basic Skill Unlocked
System Feature Expansion
Harry stared at the notification.
He had completely forgotten about that quest.
Improving his stats had seemed like a long-term objective, something he probably would not complete until the end of summer at least.
Then again, he had never considered dumping all his unassigned stat points into a single attribute.
Originally, he had been saving them for later, for some future emergency.
Ironically, when an actual emergency finally arrived, he forgot those points even existed.
So, in hindsight, using them now was probably not a bad decision.
And honestly, extra mana would be useful either way, considering he was a wizard.
The system window itself flickered, and for several seconds, lines of glowing text rearranged themselves while entirely new sections unfolded beneath the Status screen.
[New Stat Unlocked: STR]
[New Feature Unlocked: Inventory]
Harry sat there stunned while additional information flooded into his mind.
Strength.
Straightforward enough.
The Inventory, however…
That was incredibly useful: a dimensional storage system linked directly to the soul.
At his current level, Harry possessed seventy total slots—ten per level—and each slot could store one object regardless of weight.
There were limitations, of course.
A bag containing twenty objects counted as one stored item because the bag itself qualified as the object.
But attempting to shove twenty loose objects individually into one slot would not work.
Honestly, Harry barely cared about inventory management right now because another notification appeared immediately afterward.
[Skill Acquired]
[Common Skill: Self-Regeneration]
Harry opened the description right away.
Then reread it.
Then read it a third time because surely this had to be a mistake of sorts.
[Self-Regeneration]
Rank: Common
Description:
As long as the user possesses mana and a material body that has not been completely destroyed, most injuries may be recovered through continuous energy expenditure over time.
Lost limbs, damaged organs, and severe physical trauma may be regenerated depending on available mana reserves and user vitality.
Limitations apply.
Warning:
This Skill restores physical damage only.
Fatigue and stamina depletion remain unaffected.
Harry stared at the screen in disbelief.
“How,” he whispered aloud, “is this COMMON?”
This sounded overpowered.
Regrowing limbs?
Regenerate organs?
Harry immediately checked the mana consumption estimates for different injuries.
“…Oh.”
There it was.
The skill devoured mana like Dudley devours pies.
Healing something as simple as a broken bone would nearly empty his current reserves.
Regenerating an arm might outright kill him through mana depletion before completion.
Still.
Harry laughed weakly through the remnants of tears while staring at the skill description.
Even with absurd costs, the existence of something like this completely shattered his understanding of what counted as “normal” abilities.
Somehow, this was merely Common.
What in Merlin’s name did Divine-tier regeneration look like?
Immortality?
Rebuilding yourself from a single drop of blood?
Harry suddenly understood why the lunatic from another world became obsessed with systems.
This was ridiculous.
Completely ridiculous.
Broken beyond belief.
And yet, despite the excitement slowly creeping back into his thoughts, Harry’s gaze eventually drifted toward the calm waters of the lake again.
Toward the place where Lily had vanished.
His chest tightened softly.
He could summon her again—longer next time.
Not today, though; his mana reserves and emotions were both exhausted already.
And for the first time since he was a baby, Harry Potter was no longer an orphan.
***
p*treon.com/EdenHawthorne
***
Author’s Note:
And with this chapter, we end Volume 1 of Harry Potter: Angel of Death
Hope you have enjoyed the story thus far.
Well, if you got this far, then you must have liked at least something of it, so please leave your thoughts and reviews.
All the best,
Eden.