Shezza had been planning to get rid of the Bone Wyrm for aaages. He'd been slowly phasing it out, and now we have the pay off.

I think it's a good decision. Simply put, the Bone Wyrm form was too powerful.

Good chapter partial, I was kinda surprised (and yet, at the same time, not) that Harry didn't rape Verrine though. His morality is interesting.

As a side note, the chapter felt quite restrained in terms of action. I know that you can't have Harry pull out all the stops in every fight, otherwise there would be nothing to distinguish the big fights from the small ones, but there should be some in-story reason why Harry is holding back so much. I mean, we see Fiendfyre burn down a cathedral-sized room in minutes with no sign of stopping in DH. Why confine himself to a single double-man-sized piece of fiendfyre when he could win much more efficiently with a fuck off wall of fire?

 

It's a given that Verrine is an opportunist, and can't be trusted. She's definitely not a top tier player like Harry or Vesper or Nicodemus. The woman's a flunky, a gofer. Like Wormtail, but much more attractive and powerful.

All that said, she is not human, and needs to be watched. There was an element of this in the last part of the new scene, in the descrption of how she is watching Harry. You can't really tell what's going on in her head, as she is not human and is an immortal being. She's attracted to strength, so she's with Harry, hoping to survive on the winning side, by joining the Denarian Renegade.

But if Harry bites off more than he can chew, which is a given that he will at some point, will she turn on him again, or play both sides?

I know Harry being a bastard and acerbic is who he is, but perhaps cultivating something more with Verrine other than insulting her would work better.

Then again, beating the shit out of the bitch may work just as well, along with a raping. She did try to kill him, after all.

 

Well, I don't actually see how the Bone Wyrm was all that powerfull? I mean Harry could not really use his wand in that form so only brute physical force remainened. Handy in certain situations perhaps, but all it would take is a single spell from Voldemort while Harry is a Wyrm for the game to be over.

That being said, the problem I atleast have is that we learn so suddenly that Harry can no longer transform with very little warning. Unless I missed something, only Vesper even mentioned the possibility and the way she said it implied that she was just taunting Harry and not serious.

Powerfull or not, the Bone Wyrm has been an important part of the series and mentioned several times, if the sword has removed the ability then I would have liked to both see it, and see how Harry reacts to it. Like for example having Harry try to transform, fail, and then see his and Meciels reaction to that fact. Maybe concern about what the sword is doing to him and justification to himself that the power of the sword is worth the price and so on. Not just a throwaway line somewhere.

I am kinda glad that he did not. I mean Harry is a mean bastard in this fic but he is not utterly evil. Some might not care but I for one enjoy the fact that Harry is still likeable and has not crossed the line. If Shezza made him utterly depraved to the point of rape and murder of little children and so on, Harry would lose something.

 

Harry hasn't crossed the line?

Wow it takes a lot for you to call someone evil then. In my opinion Harry became evil a long time ago. He's commited genocide (the merpeople), after all. Genocide is okay but for some reason rape isn't?

 

A small brush may be grammatically correct, but it sounds off to me. Crouched within the roadside brush, maybe?

Use, instead of you. I think.

Missing something between "two" and "of". "a", perhaps?

 

Merpeople were enthralled and would've gone slowly mad anyway. And Harry so far hadn't killed truly innocent and defenceless.

 

Well yes and no.

If he had just decided to go and kill all the Merpeople just for the sake of fun then it would have been genocide and pretty bad. However Harry did have (some) justification for his actions when he did it. Not only where the merpeople trying to kill him, but it was also said that their minds had been irreversibly damaged so that even if Harry had just managed to flee, they would have gone crazy and started killing anyone around such as the students. So Harry can (and did) argue that it was atleast partly self-defence. Though admittedly he did enjoy the fight a bit much considering.

Obviously this was not a truly good act on Harry's part, but neither did it have the feel of same kind of evil as say Voldemort deciding to attack and murder some innocent muggle family who is no threat to him or anyone and who has done him no harm for no reason other than to spread terror.

Still, after thinking about this whole thing a bit more, I wonder if rape would have been all that different from using Crucio on her. Both are methods of causing pain and humiliation. I suppose we have seen Crucio used often enough that rape "feels" more evil at this point. Or maybe its that if he rapes Verrine, then it much becomes easier to see him being willing to rape (innocent) people like Amanda or Tonks and such, making his sexual comments and flirting less amusing and far more sinister in tone.

Still, I would say that for a denarian, Harry has been "relatively" good. He has killed people but for the most part they have been enemies or criminals. Has Harry actually murdered a single truly innocent and helpless person in the series?

 

He's killed a lot of people who he didn't need to kill.

And if we're talking innocent and defenceless, Verrine is hardly that. If we say that Harry only becomes evil if he harms someone who is innocent, then him raping Verrine wouldn't change anything (her not being innocent and all).

 

He isnt innocent but he is far from pure evil. He did go save Amanda and the other brats at the DoM. He is a cruel hearted bastard who loves to fight. Killing is how he was raised basically. He survived in a survival of the fittest world by always being that last one left standing. He isnt pure evil or no way in hell would God have trusted him with a sword of the cross.

 

You've posted in the wrong thread: http://forums.darklordpotter.net/showthread.php?t=10038

 

Harry is still walking the line between dark and evil. Sure, he is dark, and a nasty sort of dark, but he still has some semblance of morals.

Shezza: I have emailed you the version I checked over in .docx format, WITH comments. I just got MS office 2008, and I felt like feeling special using the comment system.

 

I can't believe you guys actually think Harry isn't evil in this fic.

 

Taure thinks Harry is evil. :O Surprise of the century, that.

IMO: Harry is a bad guy, evil just isn't the right word though. (What it is, I wouldn't know.)

Maybe Shezza can incorporate a scene with Harry eating babies or something to put it all to rest?

:awesome

 

I think the thing is that the story has humanised him. We, as a reader, like Harry. Or most of us do anyway. This like translates into us trying to excuse his actions. Much like Amanda.

The story itself, despite the violence, has quite a light hearted air. This contributes towards us thinking of Harry as not evil, I think.

But he is a cold blooded serial killer who enjoys the fight and kills beyond what necessity would demand in a war situation. You can't use the "he's a soldier in a war" argument for this Harry.

Most people would call that evil.

 

Theres not good and evil Taure. Many shades of gray. I would say Harry is pretty far into the dark gray but I wouldnt say he is evil. Im not saying he is good person far from it. Im saying that he isnt evil like Voldemort, Vesper, or especially anywhere near Nicodemus' level. Nicodemus was as evil as any being every had a right to be. He did nothing on a whim. Nic thought decades if not centuries in advance when making plans.


Meciel evil yes. Harry is pretty close to as dark as you can go without being pure evil. Regardless of how we might think of him his actions speak louder. He DID go save the brats. He DID care however slightly if Amanda got hurt. He DID go help Maeve( quite possibly a mistake in the long run but he did it non the less). He DID promise to protect the school in Dumbledores absence. Most of all he DID take up the sword and has been granted its power. The sword is the biggest supporter of the idea that he isnt completely evil. In the hands of those who arent considered worthy the sword is just that a normal sword. In Harry Potter's hands the sword is the 3rd sword of the cross. A weapon of heaven.

 

God. I don't even know where to begin. But really, trying to argue morality using a line from bad indy!Harry fanfic? I lol'd.

So, here we go.

Continuing the analogy: to have the grey you first have to have black and white.

And why is that? Why is Harry only "dark gray" but not evil? Elaborate. Also, didn't you just say that there wasn't any good and evil?

So making plans rather than being spontaneous is evil?

If anything, Meciel is the less evil one. After all, she can do nothing but through another person. The decision to act is Harry's, not Meciel's. There is always the possibility of him rejecting her, but he chooses to continue to perform what I would say are evil actions under any usual moral judgement.

A very small proportion of actions, given the whole. If a serial killer helps an old lady across the street, does that absolve him of his murders?

We have no idea why Harry has the sword. It may have nothing to do with his morality. I personally think Harry has the sword because he is being used by God. Perhaps redemption as a secondard objective. But even if redemption is a secondary objective, that only says that Harry could possibly not be evil in the future. It doesn't say anything about his current state.

 

He also seemed to genuinely care for his daughter.

 

Again, I admit that the character has been humanised. He's not a caricature of evil. He's like many real evil people are - a person who cares for his family, has friends, is able to smile and laugh, and happens to one day decide to kill someone.

 

Killing people is so overrated.

P.S. Harry hasn't committed fucking genocide, either.

 

Genocide - The systematic and planned extermination of an entire national, racial, political, or ethnic group.

Merepeople could be called a racial group, and a political one. Especially since Harry said "it's not like they're people anyway" - a statement that we are given no indication that he does not believe.