Prologue Of Misery

The Dursley home belonged on an episode of hoarders. Old rotten food lay on the floor, along with rat feces and animal carcasses. Pink knickknacks were piled high to the ceiling, piled atop the rotten corpse of one Vernon Dursley. Petunia sat in the remaining rocking chair knitting a pink doily while Dudley watched the tele. Drool dribbled down his emaciated cheeks as a constable beat against the door.

"There is no such thing as magic. There is no such thing as magic. There is no such thing as magic!" Petunia chanted to the boom of a forced entry.

I sighed and stood up. Magic was real, and I had finally gotten a handle on things. Well, I made many mistakes and fucked up royally. Now Petunia was an obsessive hoarder of pink things, and Dudley was even more brain dead than before. Without Petunia or Vernon to distract the kid, all he did was watch the tele and consume junk food. At least he lost some weight; too bad foster care would eat him alive.

System Quest EAT

Establish Humanity among the galactic community

Annihilate the Reapers

Terminate the Steel Swarm

I had a couple hundred years to work on three simple tasks in the body of Harry James Potter. I was practically ahead of the game already. My repertoire of abilities was numerous without magic. Handing me magic on top of my cultivation should have been overkill. Only it wasn't my magic, it didn't want to work right, and whenever I tried something, I felt another presence fighting me for control.

When I tried to be subtle, Vernon made me do chores for looking at him funny. After he belted me, I lost my temper. My first response was usually a qi beam to the head. Instead, I took a chance for some practice. I wrapped him up nice and tight in some vines with a few seeds and messed around with mind magic. Unfortunately, he started eating his own shit, and Petunia freaked out. I had to figure out why he started doing that, so I wrapped up Petunia, and she turned into a compulsive hoarder.

Really, I only wanted them to ignore me. If my relatives had just stopped bothering me so I could think about my impending quest, none of this would have happened. Qi beams to the head were so much easier and, as it turned out, cleaner.

Poor Dudley, that kid was the victim in all of this. Another bang sounded through the house and the power shut off. A glob of light appeared above my hand and hovered in the air. The little qi I invested in the skill should continue illuminating for 10 minutes, but I knew it would only last 5.

"Hey, mom, why did the tele go off. Where is dad?" Dudley asked.

The poor child must have passed by his father several times on the way to the fridge.

"For your trouble," I said and pulled some bacon from my inventory for the kid. Dudley gratefully ate the bacon with his rotten teeth. It was amazing; every time he asked questions, all I had to do was give him bacon, and he shut up and went back to the tele.

I waved my hand over Petunia's face and tried to fix the damage I had done for the thousandth time. Finally, she put her knitting down and stood up. "Dudley, I go buy pink." Petunia said.

She hadn't bathed herself in weeks and lost the ability to wipe her own ass. As she moved away, I formed a slight cyclone of air around my head. Sadly, Dudley didn't notice. Of course, after weeks of draining their accounts, the house was piled high inside to the point no one could leave. Petunia went rabid when someone moved her stuff.

If she managed to find a way out, the constables were sure to get inside and find Dudley. My magic was ok enough now to get out of here and find my own way. Now that I could use it on command, I was sure I could get it right after more practice.

I floated up the stairs over piles of garbage and discarded knickknacks. My cultivation was still only in the coalescence realm. For those in the know, there are 3 realms to the cultivation I learned. Coalescence, Nascent, and Majority, while there could be more, those are the ones I know about. They are based on spiritual energy called qi and spirit cores of various elemental types and ranks. I currently had 11 high-class cores, each with a balancing type. But I failed to reach the next realm. Something went wrong in my cultivation. So instead of being truly beyond mortal understanding, I'm merely really strong. But we all work with what we're given.

When I took over this body, there was no soul inside. That's because souls didn't exist. It's one of my less than popular philosophies. So, there was no Harry Potter classic to battle me for control. I merely popped in and took up residence.

"Petunia Dursley, you are under arrest for child endangerment; where is your husband." A deep voice said, followed by some vomiting.

"I must have pink." Petunia roared.

"Taizé her," A constable ordered.

"Pink!" Petunia cried as she dropped.

I opened the hatch to the attic and stood back as a flood of pink crap tumbled out. After floating up the hatch, I pulled it closed behind me. Hopefully, no one would bother looking up. The last thing I wanted was to get caught up in police custody. After that, there would be no nightmarish orphanage for me.

While I planned my escape, I looked myself over in the mirror. I was breathtakingly beautiful; all the pedophiles in town would be all over me, from my slightly long black hair to my devilish green eyes. I almost wanted to play good by horse. There was no doubt I would make an excellent honey trap. Cultivation had given my body an ethereal beauty of almost glowing flawless skin and a devilish jawline. Soon I would have plenty of people to perfect my mind magic on.

Just before I could make my move and escape, a presence suddenly appeared on the roof. A square-cut opened a hole in the roof for an elderly man to jump down. I could call the man an old greybeard, but his had gone white a long time ago. A phoenix flamed upon the old man's shoulder and sang a sad song.

It turned its head to the side and spoke. "Oh, you poor thing, do you need help, young man. Why don't you relax while I sing for you? I find my songs help young wizards forget even the most terrible of traumas." Fawkes said.

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