It's been used many times in the fanfiction, but I don't think it's been actually ever really used to it's full potential. I know it really depends on how the absorption happens, and that depends solely on the author, but what are your possible theories/headcanons? Off the top of my head.

• Harry just "gains" the knowledge. This one is probably least "personality" changing, but could be interesting in hands of "proper author" in the sense that one of Harry's canon superpowers is instinctual understanding of deeper magical mysteries, so with all the regular knowledge of Voldemort, he could probably find connections where Voldemort himself didn't.
• Harry "sees" all the life of Voldemort in a dream-like state, in one go. This could probably really change him, depending on how old he is (with the amount of horrible stuff Voldemort probably did, it doesn't really matter… you can't see all that shit we see in canon and can interpolate without it changing you). In truth, I imagine, Harry would be all sorts of fucked up and broken, if he somehow observed the life as a young person.
• Harry reliving Voldemort's life as he dreams. Depending on Harry's days vs Tom's days (1:1, two days of Voldemort in one night, etc.) he could probably absorb all the later shit, depending on whether the story would be angst or adventure
• All this can be cahnged / made easier for Harry by any sort of magical fuckery in the way of Lily's dying spell, however you interpret it.

What is your favorite way to go about this? What would you really like to read, or what is your headcanon?

 

I guess on the mechanics side of it, the question is about how a soul fragment may become part of a larger soul so that it can no longer be said to be Voldemort's soul. I would think in order to accomplish that, Harry would have to accept all that the soul was and use the horcrux spell on himself. Since souls appear to contain memories, I would think what would happen is that Harry has all the memories from his own life, but if he thinks back further, he can remember things from sometime in the nineteen thirties up until Halloween of 1981. He could put them in a Pensieve, if he so chose, or he could try to remember them just by thinking back. Important things would stand out to him, like where he put all the other horcruxes.
I can't see this coming without a cost. He would probably be even more vulnerable to Voldemort's use of the mind arts, and probably willingly surrender his mother's protection, and because Voldemort's tainted soul would be a part of him, as opposed to just attached to him or something, he would probably lose some fraction of his ability to love.

 

I'd imagine that two souls merging would result in a completely different person. This is a chunk of someone's soul, not a repository of memories. The way I imagine it is that, should they merge, Harry would take on some of Voldemort's characteristics and behaviors. He may find himself far less affected by suffering, have a more callous approach to death or simply find himself incapable of really caring about the people around him.

Other instinctive behaviors may appear, such as specific spells being cast without thinking, a change in the way he speaks or acts. I don't really think he would gain memories that he could somehow peruse at will. Instead, the change might lead him to having these memories but just like with any of us, they wouldn't pop up at random. However they might be triggered by certain events or people.

Ultimately I believe it would be a more subtle change in personality, behavior, habits, etc.

 

This is exactly what I meant, the result of all these options being highly dependend on author - on hand, things having cost is a running fantasy theme and part of canon as well. On the other hand, you could quite easily argue that the price has been paid by Voldemort - murder and such - and that thematically Voldemort's soul (mind/memory), destoryed and broken as it is, is simply no match for the full, innocent soul of Harry Potter.

That's an interesting version - no memories, other than perhaps echoes of "soul shaping events", and just subtle changes in personality. Also interesting. And easily sidesteps the darker, more angsty options

 

I think this is the best route for this kind of scenario. If you want to turn this into a "power-up" just have it so that Harry learns magic easier and such things are like a deja-vu eque experience, but no actual memories.

This avoids 11 year old harry with Voldemorts powers or insta-dark harry. etc.

 

I think it depends on what the goal of the fic is. If you're looking for a way to change Harry's personality, to make him more driven, ambitious, independent, etc, then the horcrux is a great way to do that. If you're wanting to power jump Harry and don't want to write a bunch of years of training to reach that stage, then the horcrux is no worse way to explain a power increase than any other. If you want to go full blown Evil!Harry then the horcrux is a fantastic way of doing that. Any of these can work in the hands of a decent author, or be shit in the hands of a bad author.

 

There's also a second part of the question - which would interest you (the DLP) the most?

 

I sort of like the deja vu magic idea suggested above. It could also be a conflict source, if the Horcrux goes so does Harry’s borrowed skill and talent. Maybe in this AU Dumbledore dies early and Death Eaters take control without Voldemort. Harry with Voldemort’s talents is able to fight back, but as the war goes on he starts to get hints that both Voldemort is returning and that his skill with magic isn’t really his. He’d have to make a choice between relying on Voldemort to keep the Death Eaters down, or sacrifice his skills to kill Voldemort.

 

The problem with horcrux absorption stories is that they usually go one of two ways: (1) Harry inherits memories, power, etc., and becomes a demigod who slaughters Voldemort, or (2) Harry becomes a sociopath who rejects his canon personality, friends, etc., and becomes unrecognizable as Harry.

I'd like to read a story that threads the needle. Let's say the horcrux merges with him before Hogwarts (giving him a huge head start), but doesn't overwhelm his natural heroism. He becomes more manipulative and has the same ambitions as Voldemort, but for different reasons. He thinks: "I can do it better, motherfucker." He wants to take out Voldemort for revenge, and then remake the magical world in his image (which is not a horror show).

Maybe he's sorted into Slytherin; maybe he isn't. But he befriends and manipulates people around him and uses his celebrity status to advance his agenda (e.g., maybe he recognizes Hermione's potential early on and molds her into a perfect minion/attack dog). I want to read a story where he's ruthless and makes bold moves to take control without losing the essence of Harry Potter. He still has friends and loves people. He still doubts himself.

In other words, he's a teenage, powerful, 'good' version of Voldemort--what Tom Riddle could have been--in a fight versus the actual Voldemort.

Has anything like that been written? Don't suggest 'The Merging' unless you want to be mocked on the internet.

 

I reread that this week! Or last week. It was horrifying. And also wasted potential, because Snape survived

I have something in development, and may have or haven't used DLP for ideas

 

An interesting spin on this tired trope of 'Harry absorbs Horcrux, instantly becomes better at everything and easily beats Voldemort' is that it might not be as simple as tossing Voldemort and Harry into a cauldron and mixing them together until you get the best of both worlds.

This is a soul fragment. And there is only so much soul a person can have, so the parts Harry absorbs from Voldemort replace or mute some aspects of his own soul. This is in line with the thread so far in that Harry will lose some things, and gain some of Voldemort's characteristics.

Where my idea deviates is that, in replacing some of his sould with bits of Voldemort's, Harry loses the uniqueness and spark that would usually get him through, while sort of adopting methods that would more closely resemble a Voldemort-lite.

Like others mentioned, he might grow a tolerance for suffering, greater ambition, a penchant for crueler or darker methods, etc. But this is Voldemort's playground, and he's the best at it.
After all, Voldemort is the genuine article, and a fraction of his soul will not be enough to beat him at his own game. But it might push Harry into trying to do exactly that.

In essence, Harry absorbing the Horcrux might have some advantages in the short term, but it's not an addition, and it could destroy him down the line if not noticed in time. Voldemort can beat a softer version of himself.

 

You're basically describing Dodging Prison as far as it's been written.

 

Except Dodging Prison also has the creepy harem stuff and other questionable parts, so there's space for "the same, but with less stupid romance".

Which is incidentally what I feel everytime I read anything by Jeconais

 

Eh. That's a decent story on the whole, and a really good one in parts, but it doesn't use horcrux absorption, iirc. It uses time travel, supernatural intervention, harems, and worst of all, WBWL tropes. My apologies to Santi fanbois here, but there's not a single story in existence that does justice to that ridiculous premise.

But you're right that the characterization of Harry in Dodging Prison could work for this idea, if only he were a little less clueless and didn't have to deal with dumb family drama.

 

It has the same effect as the horcrux absorption as we were discussing; Harry does get all of Voldemort's memories and he's able to apply all of them as soon as he's out of Azkaban. I'm not saying it's good (I'm not exactly caught up, nor do I care if it ever finishes) and it definitely has annoying tropes, but the basic premise is there. I honestly had no idea you had read it from the post.
That said, since the story isn't finished, I obviously don't know how it will turn out, so I really can't say how it stacks up to the ending you want. I would guess it ends with Harry facing the camera and explaining how having a well-trained cult of personality most of the time wins out against the solitary genius. Who'd have thought?

 

Well, that was proper horrifying. Seems like a good worst case though.

 

I think the best version of such a fic would be Harry Potter and The Accidental Horcrux

 

This is interesting but I'm curious about knowledge, would Harry have an instinctive understanding of things, kind of like how because we've done something so long we don't have to think about or would Harry know how to do things only when they were brought before him.

 

Harry doesn't absorb the Horcrux in that fic. The Horcrux wakes up and guides him.

This is what I think the result would be. An instinctive understanding of the particular spell they are learning because it's like he already knows the material and has done it before. He'll make leaps of logic. He doesn't know all the magic Voldemort does straight off the bat. It's a case of "remembering" each spell.

It would also give him a particular talent for mind magic.