Gamer Harry one-shot (Patreon)

“Avada Kedavra!”

“Expelliarmus!”

Time froze in that moment as the sickly green light of the Dark Lord's curse clashed with one of the most basic of dueling spells. All logics of magic dictated that the killing curse would overwhelm the simple disarming spell. It should engulf it, swallowing it whole as it continued its path towards the Boy-Who-Lived.

But Dumbledore's complicated gamble had worked. The allegiance of the Hallows, Harry's sacrifice and Voldemort's folly had all converged on this very moment, as in front of hundreds of witches and wizards, the Dark Lord's killing curse was thrown back at him once more.

The corpse of the one who had up to this very moment thought himself immortal crumpled to the floor, just like any other man. 

Harry felt the weight of the entire world lift off his shoulders as he stared at Voldemort's body. There was a deep silence that stretched for what might have been an eternity as every single eye was glued to a single, solitary point, to the fall of a tyrant.

A loud, roaring cheer rang through the Great Hall. It was the loudest, most wonderful sound Harry had ever heard. It was louder than any Quidditch match, louder than the Triwizard Tournament and the Quidditch World Cup put together.

Harry couldn't help himself, he smiled. It was a smile full of relief, joy, and pure bubbling excitement. There was grief there too, and there would be many days of mourning sure to come, but for the first time in his life, there was no cloud hanging over Harry's head, no boogieman, no axe ready to cut him down at a moment's notice.

As everyone began to hug and cry in pure joy, Harry searched the crowd for Ginny. He couldn't help it, he needed to hold her, to hug her, to squeeze her tight and share tears of pain and joy.

His eyes locked with her warm brown orbs, and his feet began moving before he'd even had the time to think. Ginny ran after him as well, and through all the chaos, people moved aside, a path opening up for their momentous embrace.

Harry held his arms out wide, and Ginny bore that fierce look on her face, she was ready to jump into his arms.

Harry crouched down, ready to scoop her up, to catch her as she wrapped her legs around him.

But the leap never came. 

Harry frowned as Ginny just stopped. She was reared back, looking as if she was about to leap, but she just stopped moving. It was like she was frozen in place.

Suddenly, the Great Hall was silent once more.

Harry glanced around. Everyone else was frozen too. Expressions were unchanging, people were stuck in mid-air, more than one couple were locked in a now eternal kiss.

What the hell was going on?

Harry's mind went haywire. Was this some sort of spell? Was this Voldemort, playing some sort of cruel trick on him? Had he actually fully died when he'd been struck by the Killing Curse in the forest, and this was the last sputterings of his dying brain?

Just as he began to fall into a pit of despair, music began to play. It was upbeat, electronic music, heavy on the synthesizers. And, in the most shocking turn in a day that had been full of them, words began to scroll down in the middle of the Great Hall.

“What the bloody hell is going on?” Harry screamed. He really was going insane.

“Those are just the credits, Harry.”

Harry spun around, Draco's wand in one hand and the Elder wand in the other.

He brandished them both at the figure before him, though he immediately noted that the man, a middle aged man dressed in muggle jeans and a band shirt, appeared translucent, like a ghost.

“Who are you?” Harry growled, pulling Draco's wand back as he held the Elder wand forward and shifted himself sideways. He raked his brain, quickly recalling the spell Remus had used against Peeves, and keeping it on standby in case whoever this was turned out to be a poltergeist.

“No need to be so tense, Harry, you beat the game!”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

The ghostly figure frowned. “Dudley never did let you use his playstation, did he? This has all been a game, Harry. Your entire life up to this point, it's all been part of a video game.”

Harry spluttered, his hand falling limply to his side as he gaped at the ghostly figure.

“Yes, yes, I know, this is all quite a shock, big existential crisis and all that. Has your life been nothing but a game? Is life nothing but a cruel joke? What is outside the bounds of this game? All legitimate questions. I'm David Yates, by the way, senior developer of your game.”

Harry was still gaping. His mind could barely comprehend what this man had just said. 

“W-what are you?”

“Like I said, I'm a game dev. Though to you, I'm somewhat of a god, I guess. Listen, Harry, for your purposes, just know that your existence is as real as anyone else's and your life has all been real and meaningful. Now, do you want to see your stats?”

“My stats?”

“Yeah, come have a look.”

The ghost waved him over, and Harry just followed numbly.

They walked past the mass of people where the words were still scrolling down. The words seemed to emerge out of nowhere and disappear into nothing as well, and Harry was finally able to notice what exactly it was: a list of names and titles.

“That guy-” Yates pointed at one of the names, ‘Corban Yaxley - Level Designer.’, “He was the one that came up with the maze for that tournament in fourth year. Brilliant guy. We put him in the game as one of Voldie's guys!”

They walked past the credits, over to the platform where the staff table usually sat, where there were a few more lines of text, though these were static and unmoving as they stood superimposed into the air.

Harry Potter

Difficulty: Normal

Level 26

Completion Percentage: 27%

Horcruxes Destroyed: 7/7

Hallows Collected: 3/3

Magical Artifacts Found: 2/267

Grade: C-

“C minus?” Harry exclaimed. “I spent an entire year hunting Horcruxes. I killed a bloody basilisk when I was twelve!”

“Hey, hey, hey there! Yelling at me isn't going to change your grade! C minus is probably being generous, if I'm honest. You barely even know any spells, you killed the dark lord with a disarming charm of all things.”

“I was busy trying to survive!”

“And I understand that, buddy, but the game doesn't care, the game just assings a score based on how you did, and you were pretty mediocre.”

Harry let out a huff as he balled his fists. “What now?” 

“Now? We've got a couple of options. You can try the post-game, but, word to the wise, we left it kinda barren. It'll just be like eighty years of you having kids and working a day job.”

That did not sound bad at all. Harry was tired, he'd had enough excitement for a lifetime. 

But he still wanted to know what the other options were.

“Or?”

“Or, you start a new game!”

“A new game? S-So… I go back to…”

“Tutorial level, cupboard under the stairs, Dudley's birthday.” Yates said.

“Will I remember everything?”

“I mean, you already played through the game once, so yeah. You can adjust the difficulty sliders too if you want.”

“Adjust the difficulty sliders?”

“Yeah, there's Easy, Normal, Hard and Voldemort.” Yates navigated the new game menu, showing Harry what he meant.

“Of course, you won't get any trophies if you play on easy mode.”

“I'll play on normal.” Harry finally said. Easy was tempting, but he worried about the changes it would cause.

“Alright then, new game, here we come!”

…

“Avada Kedavra!”

“Bombarda Transpira!”

The two spells met in the middle. Harry's bombarda phased through the killing curse, catching the dark lord by surprise. Harry dived away from the killing curse, which exploded against a wall and left a deep singe in the stone. Harry's bombarda struck true, impacting the dark lord and blowing him to smithereens.

The crowd roared. Harry pumped his fist in the air. He saw Sirius grinning from ear to ear, Cedric giving him two thumbs up, and Ginny was running up to him, a blazing look on her face.

When the game froze this time, Harry was ready.

“How's that for a do-over?!” He yelled out enthusiastically. “Saved Cedric, saved Sirius, saved Fred and Tonks and even Hedwig's alive and kicking!”

“Yes, that was very good work this time Harry. Wanna see your stats this time?”

Harry grinned “Sure, nice little cherry on top.”

Harry Potter

Difficulty: Normal

Level 37

Completion Percentage: 41%

Horcruxes Destroyed: 7/7

Hallows Collected: 3/3

Magical Artifacts Found: 29/267

Grade: C

The smile slid off Harry's face as he went through his stats. “A C? I saved everyone and my grade barely went up?”

“I mean, you didn't really do any side-quests. Plus, your mage level was better, but its not like you reached Dumbledore levels or anything.”

Yates saw the look on Harry's face and put up a hand to placate. “Hey, hey! These are just numbers, kid. Truth is, you beat the dark lord and you saved everyone. Good on you. Postgame is about a hundred nice, boring years as a reward. No-”

“I played some of Dudley's video games this go around, you know.” 

Yates blinked. “Yeah, I saw that.”

“I wanted to get a better idea of how this stuff worked.” Harry turned to the dev with a fierce look. “This is a save file, isn't it? Can I go back to this one whenever I want?”

Yates shook his head with a smile. “you're learning, kid. I do have to caution you, you can only keep three separate save files at once. It's a console limitation, we decided to put all our eggs into graphics and gameplay, had to give some back on memory.”

“That's fine. I just want to get a better grade, then I'll come back to this save and live out my life.”

…

“Harry, my sister's been taken by the heir of Slytherin! What the bloody hell are we doing?!”

Harry waved Ron off, not even bothering to look back at him. “We'll get Ginny in a moment, Ron. You need to help me find these basilisk scales. They don't show up anymore after this year.”

Harry saw something glint in a corner and he hurried over, crouching down to pick up a shiny green scale. He placed it inside of his endless bag. He didn't hear any music, so he knew there were still more for him to find.

Ron grabbed Harry by his shoulders and shook him roughly. “Are you fucking serious right now, Harry? My fucking sister could die at any moment!”

“I don't know what to tell you, Ron. I've been looking for these scales all year, but they're really hard to find. And its a fucking roberry, cause all of them together only count as one item. Anyways, lets go check the library.”

“We've been to the library five times already!”

“This time I'll check even harder.”

…

Harry waved at Ron and Hermione as they approached his booth at Florean Fortescue's, the Weasleys and Hermione's parents following close behind.

Harry stood up, and Hermione gasped as she saw what he was wearing.

“Harry, where did you get that?!”

Harry glanced down at the long, silvery-green duster he was wearing. “Oh, this? I got it at the end of last year. Made of basilisk hide. You like it?”

Collecting the basilisk scales had been a bitch, and he'd been quite irritated that they'd only credited him with a single new item, but he'd also been rewarded with this cool new coat, so he figured it was all even stevens.

“First the pixie dust hourglass, now this. Where do you keep getting this stuff?”

Harry grimaced. The scales had been tough, but the pixie dust hourglass had been a painful mission that he hoped to never repeat. Not only had he had to capture every single pixie Lockhart had unleashes, but he'd had to read through all his stupid books to make sure he aced the fraud's quiz. He would definitely be logging a complaint to Yates so they maybe patched that mission out of the game.

Harry looked up to see Hermione giving him an expectant look. “I'll tell you later, ‘Mione. Right now, how bout you guys help me with this sundae?”

…

Harry Potter

Difficulty: Normal

Level 100

Completion Percentage: 100%

Horcruxes Destroyed: 7/7

Hallows Collected: 3/3

Magical Artifacts Found: 267/267

Grade: S+

“I thought you'd be more pleased.” Yates said as he noted Harr's lack of joy.

It had taken him three playthroughs to finally one hundred percent the game. He had deleted his first two save files without even giving it a second thought. 

“I mean, I one hundred percented it, but does it really count if it was on normal?”

“Ahh. So you want to try the game on hard this time?”

Harry shook his head. “I think I'll play on Voldemort.”

Yates whistled, and Harry's brows furrowed. “What? I know this ‘game’ like the back of my hand now, I doubt you could make it that much harder.”

“Hey man, I like the confidence. Alright, go right ahead, start a new game.”

Harry deleted his oldest save file and selected a new game. He bumped the difficulty up to Voldemort and gave Yates a nod before pressing start.

…

His eyes fluttered open as he woke up in his cupboard once more. A hand went to his forehead, the world spinning. No matter how many times he'd done it, he always felt groggy and disoriented when he woke up in a new game, wondering whether it had all been a dream.

Harry got up. It was always a bit of a letdown when he woke up in his scrawny ten-year-old frame, with no gear and no enhancements to his magic.

“UP! GET UP!”

And there was aunt Petunia, her voice shrill as always as Harry yawned and stretched. No matter how skilled he got, he could never deliberately use magic in the tutorial level, as it was locked out until he read his Hogwarts letter. It meant that the first month or so, he'd always had to play by the Dursley’s rules.

“I SAID GET UP, FREAK!”

“I'm coming.” Harry said in an annoyed tone as he got up from the bed. He really hated having to deal with the Dursley's shit. Perhaps he should just run away from home this time around.

Harry put his glasses on and opened the cupboard door, stepping out onto the kitchen.

He recognized the back of a cast iron skillet as aunt Petunia swung it at his face. Then, everything went black.

…

“Are you still not done with breakfast, freak?” 

Harry's heart raced, knowing that if he didn't finish cooking the eggs and bacon within the next minute, Uncle Vernon would sprint into the kitchen with his shotgun and spray buckshot through his chest.

“Almost done!” He said, cranking up the heat in hopes that the bacon would be cooked to Dudley's liking in time. He'd tried serving them the bacon slightly undercooked to make time, but Dudley had stabbed him to death with a fork. The front door was locked, so he couldn't even make a run for it.

No, he needed to cook the food in time, wait for the Dursleys to all sit down to eat and then make a run for it. There was zero chance he was going to try and survive in this hellhole for another month.

He thought about Yates’ smug smile and his incessant suggestions to go down to  hard mode first and he grumbled. He powered through, and he managed to cook the bacon perfectly just in time. He plated the food and rushed over to the table, where the bloodlusted Dursley family glared at him, fingers twitching as if they were seconds away from killing him just for breathing.

Harry let out a breath when the family finally put their heads down and began eating. He waited a few moments before slinking away as silently as he could manage. He reached the front door, undoing the deadbolt and stepping out, taking his first breath of fresh air in what felt like weeks. 

He did not even dare to do the mental math on how long he'd actually been stuck in this Dursley murder loop. 

Once outside, Harry practically sprinted down the driveway. He needed to get far away before Ms. Figg noticed he was gone and she alerted Dumbledore. Perhaps he cou-

One moment, the street in front of him was empty. Then, out of absolutely nowhere, a police vehicle pulled to a stop in front of him, siren blaring before one of the officers killed it.

“What the fuck?!” Not even his first encounter with the Knight Bus had rattled Harry to this extent. He could only stare in slack-jawed horror as a pair of police officers stepped out of the car, looking sternly down at him.

“Everything alright there lad?” The taller one asked.

“Y-y-yes sir.”

“Are you sure? Cause it seemed like you were trying to run away.”

Harry cursed Yates and the other devs to hell as he heard his uncle's thundering footsteps coming from inside the house.

He already knew he was screwed, but he would be damned if he didn't at least try to save his own hide. “Yes! They're very abusive, officer, I fear for my life!”

The two officers glanced at each other as uncle Vernon came rumbling out.

“The boy is a bloody liar, officers! Nothin’ but a ruddy lying criminal.”

“Yeah, we've heard about him in the precinct. Want us to book him, sir?”

“I wouldn't want you to waste your valuable time, officers. I'll take care of the little ruffian.”

Harry actually cried as Uncle Vernon dragged him into the house.

…

“I've got some notes.”

“Oh?”

Harry was in the game over screen, where he stared at a black and white still picture of uncle Vernon choking his ten year old self to death with a belt, not the best way to go.

Harry had died so many times in quick succession, the concept of death itself was beginning to lose all meaning to him.

“That thing with the cops was fucking bullshit. Just because you made an ultra-hard mode doesn't mean the AI can act illogically just cause.” 

“Your complaint has been noted. We'll take it into consideration when developing the sequel.” Yates said drily.

Harry shook his head.

“Want to give hard mode a try?”

Harry glared at him. “Fuck you.”

…

He'd finally made it. Innumerable lives later, and after drowning horribly more times than he cared to mention, he was finally at the Three Broomsticks with Hagrid.

“By Merlin's beard, its Harry Potter!” 

Harry's eye twitched as the crowd of people waiting to greet the Boy-Who-Lived started to form a line. He noted everyone's hands and faces, and the moment someone's hand went for their coat, Harry dived to the floor and rolled.

A blood-boiling curse flew past the space Harry had just occupied as people tackled the random wizard who had tried killing him.

Harry got back up immediately, still on high alert as Hagrid went to shield him.

Now that he'd gotten his letter, Harry could use magic, and he cast a wandless spell that kept him from being suffocated by the half-giant.

Later, he placed a sticking charm on his feet that stopped him from getting thrown off the mine cart at Gringotts. He also kept a watchful eye, and he batted away the five different stalagtites that tried to crush him.

He was jumpy and on edge when they visited the apothecary, and he cursed up a storm when his jumpiness caused him to trip and crash into a jar containing acid slugs.

Next playthrough, he made it to Hogwarts. He spent most of his trust vault on protective charms and amulets. He'd half expected Quirellmort to try and kill him during the sorting, but that had gone by smoothly. In fact, there had been no random ‘accidents’ since he'd done his school shopping. It seemed that once he got his wand, the bullshit random deaths stopped.

He was sitting next to Ron as McGonagall launched into her lecture for the inaugural transfiguration class. Harry knew all seven year’s worth of material like the back of his hand. Right now, it was a bit muddled as the years of continuous death were all his mind could recall off top, but he was confident it would all come back to him in an instant. He would spend these classes sketching out how to best gather all the collectibles, as he wanted to 100% this playthrough to leave himself no temptation to attempt another playthrough on this difficulty.

“Mr. Potter, have you heard any of what I've just said?”

Harry blinked as he looked up at McGonagall, who was looking back down at him sternly with crossed arms. Ron sent him a sympathetic look and Harry suppressed a chuckle. If only he knew, Harry could probably teach this class better than McGonagall at this point.

“You said we were going to turn matchsticks into needles, right, professor? Something like this?”

Harry waved his wand and conjured a matchstick, which he turned into a needle with another wave, all cast silently. He had long ago shed any shyness about showing off his magical skill.

He couldn't hide the smug look he sent his professor. Who's shell-shocked face…

Was not shell-shocked at all. In fact, McGonagall looked wholly unimpressed, and a bit disappointed. Looking around, Harry saw his classmates were looking back at him with pity.

“Five points from Gryffindor, Mr. Potter, and I suggest you pay attention in class if you wish to do well. As I was saying, we will begin our first class by transfiguring lead into a golden hippogriff. I expect the hippogriff to be fully functional and viable, now go!”

For the first five minutes, Harry didn't move, he could only stare dumbly as he watched a bunch of eleven year olds perform master level transfigurations on a whim. Hermione was the first one to complete the task, but most everyone else soon followed. 

McGonagall went about the classroom with a critical eye. She observed Ron's perfect golden hippogriff and frowned as she cast a diagnostic charm, “His reproductive system is not fully developed, Mr. Weasley, he is sterile. You will need to do better.”

Ron bowed his head as McGonagall moved on to Harry, who had turned his lump of lead into a gold-shaded hippogriff statuette.

McGonagall clicked her tongue. “Mr. Potter… take five points for your effort.”

Harry did not like the way everyone looked at him then, nor the snickers that McGonagall quickly shushed. 

Maybe dying all the time wasn't so bad after all.

…

“I bet the broom won't even lift off for you, squib.”

Harry grit his teeth as Malfoy and his friends snickered and laughed. 

“Don't let him get to you, Harry. You're doing great.” Ron whispered.

That just made Harry clench his fists. Two weeks into class, Harry had to withstand constant jokes and pitying looks from everyone. Rumours spread about how the great Harry Potter was practically a squib who couldn't even create a pocket dimension or brew a simple immortality potion.

But now, today, he would have his revenge, they had their first flying lesson, and he would show off his skills on a broom. 

“Up!” Harry said with confidence, smiling as the school broom zipped up to his open hand.

Madame Hooch nodded, “Good, now, everyone kick off, let's do three laps around the planet to start. Nice and easy warmup.”

What?!

Everyone else blasted off and Harry was left spinning out on his broom. Just as he managed to regain his composure, dozens of hypersonic missiles flew by again, and all he could do was bob and weave weakly as he tried not to be splattered into a paste.

When the three laps were finished, Harry was still floundering in the air, his face green as he felt ready to throw up.

“You are a disgrace to magic itself, Potter!”

…

Harry conjured several galaxies and vanished them into Voldemort's head. Voldemort warped reality so that the galaxies became supermassive blackholes that surrounded Harry. Harry snapped his fingers and the black holes decayed away as he erased the concept of time itself, superimposing every single version of Voldemort that had ever existed on top of the current one. Voldemort attempted to restart the universe but Harry blocked him before he finally managed to use his infinity gun to shoot through the superimposed Voldemort in every single reality, erasing his entire being from all of time and space.

When the credits rolled over a backdrop of the universe itself, Yates was looking at Harry with slight weariness.

“Erm… postgame time?”

Harry glanced up at his score with dead eyes. He'd 100% the game, on Voldemort mode.

“I want to try easy mode now.”

…

“Stupefy!”

“Incredible! Mr. Potter has taken out the puffskein with a stunning charm and now he's going for the egg! Our youngest champion is the quickest to complete the task!”

Harry walked calmly as the crowd cheered, collecting the golden egg and waving at the crowd. 

Afterwards, he stood among the champions as they received their scores, not surprised one bit when he got all tens.

He looked over at Fleur, who looked rather impressed by his score. “Hey, Delacour, want to have a threesome?”

Fleur considered him for a moment before answering. “Oui, that would be quite good.”

Harry nodded. “Nice. Alright, come along, I think I'm feeling like professor Sinistra this time.”

…

“You seem relaxed, real balanced.”

Harry shrugged. “Easy mode has its perks.”

Yates snorted. “Yeah, I noticed. Was there a witch in the game you didn't sleep with? I guess you'll want to go into that postgame now…”

“Actually…”

…

“U-”

Aunt Petunia was cut off mid-sentence as her no good nephew sprinted out of the cupboard as he made his way over to the stove.

Harry grabbed a frying pan and began thrusting it forward while crab walking towards the door. He did a little hop every three steps, and when he reached the door, he phased through it, coming out the other side onto the battle of Hogwarts, where a crowd of very confused spectators stared at the strange ten year old boy holding a frying pan.

Voldemort stepped up, raising his wand. “Harry Potter, come to-”

Harry threw the frying pan at Voldemort, hiting him square in the face. The frying pan did +three million damage and destroyed all his horcruxes in one go.

The dark lord collapsed onto the floor, dead.

“Hmm, a minute and three seconds. I think I could still shave some more time off…”

…

“Alright, you've done evil runs, you've done pacifist runs, you've unlocked bobblehead mode and the special hidden level and the duel against Merlin. You've abused the infinite galleon glitch to all hell… are you ready for the goddamn postgame now?”

Harry grinned, and Yates knew he was fucked.

“Actually, I've been coming up with a few mods.”

“Mods? But you can't do that!”

Harry snapped his fingers and he turned into a giant blue hedgehog.

“Oh, but I can.”