First off, if you happen to be a Muggle and find yourself amid this scroll of undeniably useful information, know that you are in perfect hands. A Muggle’s Guide to Horcruxes, drafted and overlooked by highly renowned Wizards in the present community of Magic, was published for the sole use of harmless, albeit a little naïve, Muggles. Perchance, if you happen to NOT BE A MUGGLE, I’d recommend you burn the article in Fiendfyre and by Merlin’s Beard GET OUT OF THERE, wherever you happen to be.

To put it simply, Horcrux is an object in which a Dark Wizard (or Witch) hides a fragment of their soul to become immortal. The act of creating a Horcrux is in itself considered to be the darkest art in the Wizarding World. Thus far, only two wizards in recorded history have succeeded in creating Horcruxes, the first being Herpo the Foul in Ancient Egypt, and Lord Voldemort being the second.

How do you create a Horcrux?

You can’t.

Why? BECAUSE YOU ARE A MUGGLE.

But, for those of you with absolutely no ill intent, the book, Secrets of the Darkest Arts would prove in supplying detailed information regarding the creation of a Horcrux. While the book was once registered to be in the Hogwarts Library, it was later removed and placed in the office of the then Headmaster Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore.

To list out some of the main steps in creating a Horcrux:

The one creating the Horcrux should deliberately murder another. Not killing someone in the sense of self-defense or by protecting another, but cold-blooded murder. The maker should feel no remorse or regret whatsoever.Murdering another would damage the maker’s soul metaphysically. The maker should then take advantage of the damage to their soul by casting a spell that would sever the damaged portion of the soul and encase it in an object.

Tip when creating a Horcrux, do not use a living being as your Horcrux, instead use inanimate objects which decreases the chances of it being destroyed.

How do you destroy a Horcrux?

Not to sound demoralizing, but SURPRISE, SURPRISE, turns out Muggles can’t destroy Horcruxes either. But, if you do happen to have a wizard (OR witch) locked up in your cold, damp, probably moldy basement, you could make him (OR her) destroy it and take the credit all for yourself. Seriously, nobody would ever know.

Horcruxes should be damaged to a point beyond all physical and magical repairs in order to be destroyed. At this point of damage, the Horcrux may appear to bleed – evidence of the fact being the ink that bled out of the pages of the diary of Tom Marvolo Riddle (a.k.a. Lord Voldemort) – and a scream could be heard as it perished.

One method, as mentioned by reliable sources who wish to remain unnamed, is Fiendfyre. Fiendfyre is a substance that has the ability to destroy Horcruxes, being a curse that produces enchanted flames of immense size and heat. And it was used to destroy Ravenclaw’s diadem in the Room of Requirement (seventh-floor corridor, Hogwarts Castle).

If you don’t really feel up to conjuring up a hot-as-hell inferno, Basilisk venom would help do the trick. The venom of the Basilisk is one of the very few substances known to be capable of destroying Horcruxes. Harry Potter used the venom to destroy Riddle’s diary in the Chamber of Secrets. Tears of the Phoenix happens to be the only known cure for the venom of the Basilisk

One other way to destroy a Horcrux would be to use the Sword of Godric Gryffindor. The sword being Goblin-made has the ability to absorb anything that makes it stronger. Being imbued with the power of the Basilisk venom when Harry Potter used the sword to kill the Basilisk, it was enabled with the power to destroy other Horcruxes.

But, to warn you, know that most if not all Horcruxes are usually enchanted by the maker to have other forms of defenses to prevent its destruction. So, if you do try to destroy a Horcrux, try not to leave behind too much of a mess to clean up.

Powers of a Horcrux

Immortality. Good enough of a reason to try and create a Horcrux? While immortality would not be a “power” of the Horcrux, the fact remains that one of the benefits of creating a Horcrux would be to grant the maker immortality.

The powers of the Horcrux itself would include the ability to influence those in their vicinity and affect them mentally. In 1997, Salazar Slytherin’s locket brought out the worst of Harry Potter, Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger in the Forest of Dean. Effects of the Horcruxes are said to wane away and disappear when the one affected stays away from the Horcrux.

If a person is more emotionally vulnerable, the fragment of the soul in the Horcrux could take control of the individual. This is evident in how the soul took control of Ginny Weasley during her first year at Hogwarts and used her to reopen the Chamber of Secrets.

Side effects of Creating Horcruxes

Hate to keep reminding you, but you Muggles would never have to deal with the side effects. Why? Answer that yourself. But if I were to mention them, a key side effect happens to be dehumanization, making the creator less human emotionally and physically. And this happens to be one of the reasons why the quite dashing young Riddle ended up looking like he did by the end.

The instability of the creator is a second side effect of creating Horcruxes. Voldemort’s soul splits and causes Harry Potter to become a Horcrux when Voldemort tries to kill Potter in Godric’s Hollow as a result of his instability. The more one tries to make Horcruxes, the more his (or her) soul becomes unstable.

A final known side effect is the inability of the soul to move on from limbo after death. Unable to return to the land of the living, unable to become a ghost and unable to go to the land of the dead, the soul would eternally be in limbo.

Lord Voldemort’s Horcruxes

Lord Voldemort remains to be the only wizard in Wizard history to have successfully created not one, but SEVEN Horcruxes.

Tom Riddle murdered Myrtle Warren, or more commonly known among students at Hogwarts as Moaning Myrtle, in 1942, creating his first Horcrux–his diary. Harry Potter destroyed the diary by stabbing it with a fang of the Basilisk during his second year at Hogwarts.

His second Horcrux was the ring of Marvolo Gaunt (Riddle’s grandfather) created with the murder of his father in 1943. It was eventually destroyed by Albus Dumbledore using Godric Gryffindor’s Sword.

Riddle turned Salazar Slytherin’s Locket into his third Horcrux with the murder of a Muggle tramp. Ron Weasley and Harry Potter destroyed it after they retrieved Godric Gryffindor’s sword from the bottom of a frozen pool.

Helga Hufflepuff’s Cup became his fourth Horcrux with the murder of the then holder of the Cup and was destroyed by Hermione Granger using a fang of the Basilisk during the Battle of Hogwarts.

The only known relic that belonged to Rowena Ravenclaw, her diadem, was transformed into his fifth Horcrux when Riddle murdered an Albanian peasant. It was destroyed by the Fiendfyre cast by Vincent Grabbe, a fellow student of Potter’s at Hogwarts.

Lord Voldemort’s only accidental Horcrux turned out to be Harry Potter when his killing curse backfired and destroyed his body instead of Baby Harry, causing Voldemort to accidentally give a part of his soul to the boy. The Horcrux within Harry was destroyed by Voldemort himself when he cast the Killing Curse upon Potter during the Battle of Hogwarts.

Voldemort’s final Horcrux, Nagini, created with the death of Bertha Jorkins, a witch working at the Ministry of Magic, was the only other living Horcrux besides Harry Potter. It was destroyed by Neville Longbottom during the Battle of Hogwarts.

Lord Voldemort, motivated by the prospect of immortality, superiority, racial cleansing and if I were to dare say, self-hatred, ended up with fragments of his soul scattered once destroyed, and ended up dying, to exist in eternal limbo, probably a state much worse than death itself. While immortality might sound tempting enough, ask yourself, do you think that the process is worth murdering another and losing a part of your soul to the darkness? What say you?