Chapter 52: "The Happy Dementor"

"Yes!"
Cohen cheered.
"Yes, your—coo-coo-coo-coo—"
The Earl was so anxious he forgot how to speak human words, his two large eyeballs bulging as if they were about to pop out of their sockets.
A Dementor-like creature, formed from the happy emotions Cohen had stolen from the Earl, was floating near the ceiling of the Room of Requirement. Except for its silver color, it was almost identical to a normal Dementor.
"I must have passed out from exhaustion and still be dreaming," the Earl said with certainty. "You evil little Dementor brat, don't even think about tampering with my wet dream. There'll be a whole flock of owls arriving any second now..."
The Earl turned his back stubbornly, refusing to look at Cohen and the silver Dementor floating at the top of the room.
Muttering to himself about the contents of his wet dream, he looked like a ball of brown fluff.
It was too bizarre, utterly bizarre no matter how one looked at it.
It was as bizarre as Satan suddenly ripping off his demonic skin and having Jesus crawl out from inside.
But Cohen paid no mind to the Earl's feelings—an Animagus's Patronus takes the form of their Animagus shape, so it was only logical that Cohen, being half-Dementor, would have a Dementor as a Patronus, right?
Cohen didn't have any creatures around that were afraid of a Patronus to test it on right now, so he couldn't be sure if this Patronus could be used to ward off Dementors or Lethifolds...
Perhaps he could go kidnap a few Dementors from Azkaban?
There were quite a few problems with that, though. Cohen wasn't a pure Dementor—would they discriminate against him? Would they treat him as one of their own, or as a human? Or would they genuinely think Cohen was a "Mudblood" among Dementors?
There was also the very important question of whether he could eat them—it wasn't even certain whether Dementors had souls, as very few people had ever studied them in depth.
There were too many questions; he would have to add sneaking off to Azkaban to his plans for this year.
"Do you know where Azkaban is?"
Cohen asked the Earl.
"Are you talking to your Dementor Patronus?" the Earl asked, curled up in his nest without turning around.
"I'm talking to you," Cohen corrected. "At least I'm not crazy enough to talk to a doll I conjured myself."
With that, Cohen dismissed the spell.
This success with the Patronus Charm proved that Cohen could bypass the innate instinct in his soul that avoided Patronuses and summon one using unorthodox methods—such as consuming the emotions of others.
Yet the appearance of this Patronus was certainly a bit... unacceptable to ordinary people.
After all, an ordinary person's Patronus typically took the form of "the animal with which they share the greatest affinity," and a Dementor could hardly be considered a "friendly" "animal."
This also meant... Cohen couldn't rely on this thing to prove the goodness and righteousness of his heart at present.
Still, there had to be a solution—the form of a Patronus can change... right?
"What crazy idea have you cooked up now?"
The Earl slowly turned around. Upon seeing that the Dementor Patronus had vanished, a heavy stone seemed to lift from his heart.
"Just now, that Patronus of yours almost sucked away the best memory of my life. From now on, I firmly—"
"A Patronus won't suck your happiness," Cohen interrupted. "I did that—but that's not the point. I have a very important new plan—do you know the location of Azkaban?"
"Are you planning to launch a rebellion and a coup right now?" the Earl asked suspiciously. "You've only been enrolled for half a year..."
"I'm planning to initiate the 'Minister Norton' project after graduation."
Cohen said earnestly:
"This trip to Azkaban is to find a few Dementors."
"What on earth do you want with Dementors?!" the Earl suddenly asked with heightened vigilance, connecting this to the fact that Cohen was keeping that black unicorn in the Room of Requirement...
"You don't mean to..."
"I want to keep a few." ("You're looking for a Dementor girlfriend?")
Cohen and the Earl spoke almost simultaneously.
"Is your brain filled with nothing but hunger and lechery?" Cohen asked calmly.
"Why else would you keep Dementors if you're not looking for a wife!" the Earl retorted. "Can the happiness of a single bird support the two of you? Don't force me to start running away right now—once I join the Owl Moon Landing Program, you'll never catch me again!"
"Not two, I plan to keep a few more." Cohen held up a finger and waved it. "Assuming they can communicate with me amicably."
"Ha, very amicably indeed, seeing as you're a little Dementor brat. They'll probably share the single largest remaining chunk of happiness in all of Azkaban with you so you don't starve—every species takes care of its own young."
The Earl spoke in a dry voice.
"If that's truly how it goes, it'll save a lot of trouble." Cohen nodded in agreement with this prediction.
"Mark my words, I am not agreeing to you keeping Dementors. It's going to murder me, and then you'll lose some very important things, like my loyalty, my friendship, and some other bonding nonsense—"
"I wasn't planning on asking for your approval anyway," Cohen said bluntly. "You can't interfere with anything I do anyway—so where is Azkaban?"
"If Dumbledore finds out you're keeping Dementors at school, you're doomed," the Earl warned again.
"I suppose I don't have to keep them—but I still need to take a look at Azkaban. So where is Azkaban?"
Cohen continued to ask, and after a moment's thought, he added:
"Just tell me the location, I'll go myself."
"It sounds like you really want to go home." The Earl felt somewhat helpless at Cohen's persistence. "Fine... Azkaban is in the northwest of Britain, on a small island in the middle of the North Sea—though I can't mark it for you, it's an Unplottable magical area."
"No specific address?" Cohen frowned.
"Those people transport criminals using Portkeys, I've observed it before," the Earl said. "If you want to find it, you'll probably have to drift on the sea for a very long time, so my advice is—"
"If I drift a little longer, I'll find it." Cohen wasn't too concerned about that; as long as he knew which sea area it was in, that was enough.
However, this also meant he would have to disappear from home or school for many days—there probably wouldn't be any chance this semester, but during the summer holiday, he might need to find some excuses to let Rose and Edward let him out.
Moreover, to avoid not being able to hurry back quickly, Cohen felt he would also need to learn Apparition—otherwise, the journey out to sea and back would take up far too much time.
Many things had to be taken one step at a time, such as the idea of raising Dementors, the ultimate plan to become the Minister for Magic, the long-term project to solve his soul-fragmentation problem, and... the short-term goal of stealing the Sorcerer's Stone.
Quirrell would get the information tonight, and Cohen would also be able to go see the baby dragon Hagrid hatched after a while—he wondered if a baby dragon's soul was strong or not.