Eneasz Brodsky

He doesn't need to corrupt him because, of course, Harry's evil.

Like, he's a copy of Quirrell.

He's totally got to be evil, right?

It says, only in chapter 20 does Quirrell realize he has a problem.

And then the rest of the plot is Quirrell seducing Harry to evil.

And on the other side of that is Hermione.

And Hermione represents trust in reason and logic to solve the world's problems, the morality of the modern world, and Harry's ties to his friends and family.

And...

everything else in the story.

As he's overcoming his initial mistake of trusting Quirrell is something that's either pushing him closer to Quirrell and his nice sounding answers about how you can use evil to solve the world's problems or pushing him away from Quirrell and back towards Hermione and righteousness.

And that is how the plot resolves through this back and forth conflict between the two of them.

And every time one of them scores a major goal, they also score some kind of... Either the other side also scores a goal or they score some kind of setback so that there continues to be a tension between the two of them.

And it keeps ratcheting up, but it doesn't stay static.

Things happen and battles are won and lost.

But they are won and lost with consequences that keep them fighting instead of resolving one way or the other.

And in fact, less so.

I think Eliezer has this quote that if you're writing Lord of the Rings fanfic and you give Frodo a lightsaber, then you have to give Sauron a Death Star.

And I think this is the same thing where the, the reason like Hermione has been leveled up so much to the point that Eliezer calls her Mary Sue is because on the other side of her is fricking Quirrell.

Quirrell is amazing.

He's everything Harry ever wanted aside from the evil part.