As we all know, the Patronus charm doesn't kill them, merely drives them off temporarily. As well as being as immensely difficult charm to perform until the 5th book basically destroyed its relevance by giving it to everyone like candy.

So, I was wondering if there was a more...permanent solution to the dementor problem. My theory is that the Killing Curse doesn't work, due to the fact that somebody in the past probably tried to use it against the literal soul-sucking demons, to no avail. Given that they still exist.

Thoughts?

 

Well they are metaphors for depression are they not, so hit the gym, get some sun, a solid sleep schedule and a big titty goth gf and the next time you encounter one in a dark alley, it'll be the dementor the one who's running for its life.

 

Canonically no... but I would guess that since they feed off of human misery and suffering you could probably starve them and possibly kill them by imprisoning them away from humans for an extended period of time.

 

My headcanon has a way to kill them, but it's so incredibly dark that it isn't done.

As dementors are depression, despair and everything wrong in the world, the only way to counter is through something so pure and innocent that it will destroy them.

You need to feed them a soul that has never committed a single sin, a soul so innocent that it hasn't suffered heartbreak or fear.

A soul of a newborn babe.

(I actually had a one-shot idea on this for one of DLP competitions once. Auror Harry undercovers a plot where pureblood babies have been going missing, and their parents memories changed that they gave up their child as they weren't magical. He slowly unveils a conspiracy at the top most levels of the ministry with Hermione herself as the MoM. Hermione has been taking magical newborn purebloods (as magical newborns have more power than just muggle newborns) to destroy the dementors once and for all, while weakening the pureblood society. For the greater good indeed.)

 

Even better (or worse), the soul of a newborn unicorn foal. After all, if just drinking the blood of something so innocent, so pure, leads to a cursed half-life...

Then what would abusing it's babies' soul do?

 

In this story are pureblood babies more powerful than muggleborn babies, or did I read your post wrong. It's an interesting idea for sure, I'd love to see the chain of events that radicalised Hermione to the point where she would murder children.

 

Rather that magical babies are more powerful than muggle babies. And Hermione isn't about to take muggleborns, not after how much they already suffer. But purebloods? Well, so many of them already abandon any non magical children...

Imo, Hermione has always been pretty radical. I could easily see her doing terrible things for what she believes is for the good of everyone. Especially when she gets it in her mind that this is the only way.

 

My memory is most likely just addled with fanon/fanfic stuff, but isn't it Canon (either from the books or one of Rowling's Pottermore essays) that dementors can be 'destroyed' if imprisoned someplace isolated from anyone and that after a long enough time they'll starve to... well, not death, but let's go with that anyway.

Also, I'd like to bring up that Remus mentions in PoA that there are multiple way to fight a dementor, or at least, multiple ways to defend oneself against it. That's actually what he says "certain defenses one can use". Notice the plural. It feels strange, then, that in later books no other defenses are used against dementors - only the Patronus Charm. We don't even see someone try to conjure a wall or a Shield Charm to, say, block dementors in a corridor. This is actually what I think every time I watch the scene where the trio and the Muggle-born witch that was being trialled in Deathly Hallows part 1 flee from the dementors in the basements of the Ministry. Of course, conjuring a full brick wall is probably still more than Harry, Ron or Hermione can do by themselves even at that point.

As for actually destroying dementors, I don't think they are supposed to be destructible. Just like how past Hogwarts Head Teachers couldn't get rid the school of Peeves, so cannot the Ministry or anyone else get rid of dementors. They are human emotions and concepts taken magical, physical form. Now, of course, if a story finds a way to get rid of dementors that isn't "Harry casts a super-powered Patronus because his magical core is the size of a Super Star Destroyer" then that's something I'm fine with. After all, this is now the author's story and they can do as they please.

 

Not at all, we know the Dementors of Azkaban survived centuries without any wizards to feed upon after wizards found the island but before the decided to utilize it as a magical prison.

They even felt drawn to the castle seeped in misery and dark magic, despite it's lack of humans.

 

Correct me if I'm wrong, but don't dementors come from misery? I seem to remember dementors multiplying from the generally dismal conditions under Voldemort's rule, so could a happy populace reduce the number of dementors?

They are supposed to be metaphysical beings of fear/hopelessness after all and they exist to spread it.

 

From what I can understand, while happy populaces do in fact prevent them from multiplying, it doesn't completely get rid of them 100%. Kind of how like 1% of bacteria will survive some antibiotics.

 

Well idk, she did end up marrying a pureblood wizard. Blood based discrimination isn't really canon Hermione's style. I think that a fic depicting her being radicalised would be extremely interesting though.

 

Basilisk's gaze? Nick was petrified by it and he is a ghost. So, not death, but a pretty permanent solution.

 

Unfortunately, dementors don't have eyes so I don't think Basilisk's gaze would work on them.

 

New Blood: dementors can be destroyed by fiendfyre and maybe some other ways. Spoiler: Hermione goes to Azkaban and destroys them all with fiendfyre.

Basilisk Born: idr about destroying them but they are physical beings and particularly, they have blood.

HPMOR (yeah I know), fiendfyre was tried and it doesn't work. Dementors are believed indestructible. Harry then discovers a more powerful version of the Patronus charm that can destroy dementors instead of just repelling them. In a sequel written by another author, Hermione gets her own super-Patronus charm and goes to Azkaban and destroys all the dementors there too. Idk if that is a trope.

It comes up in a few other stories but the above are the ones that I've actually read and remember how it was handled.

Anyway, it varies.

 

In my work I think I decided people had tried something as simple as fire charms against them, but they ended up with this plan to lead them up a tall mountain and abandon them at the top, feeding them with fewer and fewer happy memories. Eventually, summer comes and they couldn't go down the mountain even though they're starving. In an ideal case they get weaker when they don't have happy memories to consume, but plan by is to surround the mountain with Patroni and wait them out.

 

Well, technically Nick doesn't have eyes either. I think looking into basilisk's eyes is more symbolic in this case.
Then there's the basilisk's venom, which could destroy anything.

 

I feel like trying to destroy a Dementor with Dark Magic is the wrong idea, be it basilisks, fiendfyre or the killing curse.

Like this really gives the vibe of a special reaction that would cause the dementor problem to become much worse.

 

Fire dementors, can't get much worse than that.

 

golden patronus mate