A Start To An Adventure

*tap*

Feeling a familiar poking of my cheek, I go to grab Meowser off my face.

"Meowser, it's too early for this."

"Meow!"

Hearing a meow of injustice, I reach towards the source of the meow and pat Meowsers head. Attempting to scratch behind Meowsers ears, I felt that they have fallen off.

"Don't worry, you'll get new ears, even if it's the last thing I do."

Muttering that out towards Meowser, I take my hand back into my blanket, for my hand nearly froze upon contact with the cold temperatures surrounding me.

*tap tap*

Getting slightly annoyed, I open my eyes and try to find Meowser, so I can hold him captive within my bedsheets, before I was greeted by a sight I'll never forget. It was Luna, staring at me with shining eyes, dressed in Ravenclaw robes.

"Uhhhhhhhh, hi?"

"Are you ready?" She asks me.

Looking down and seeing that I'm still in my pyjamas, I answer Luna.

"In like 5 minutes."

After saying that, I kick the blanket off of my bed with near immediate regret. Who knew it would be so cold during September in Scotland? Opening Glorf, I put my Ravenclaw robes over my pyjamas due to a lack of time and Luna staring at me, however, it ends up being strangely comfortable. Fastening my wand holster and putting on the pointy wizard hat we are forced to wear during the first years. Turning towards Luna, she is giving me a strange look as she approaches me.

"You wore your robes over your pyjamas?" She whispered.

"...Yep." Admitting it, she just nods before walking towards the door of the dorm.

"How did you get in?" I asked when we were outside.

"Girls can go into the boy's dorms, but not the other way." She answered.

Shivering a little at this knowledge, I nod and follow her towards the common room. Looking outside the windows along the way I notice that the sun hasn't risen yet.

"Luna... What time is it?" I asked slowly.

"Um, I don't know." She replied with a small voice.

Looking towards Meowser, who has basically become embedded in her arms, I can't help but feel sorry for going through an entire night by herself with Luna.

"Why did you wake me up so early?" I asked, to which she replied.

"To explore the castle together."

Thinking back on it, I did mention something similar last night. Inside the common room, spot a notice board in the distance. Walking towards it, I can see the first years time table for the year.

"Luna, we don't have classes till 1 today. Let's see how much we can discover."

Getting a nod in response, I look around the common room to see we are the only ones who are awake. Making sure I'm not forgetting anything, I walk with Luna outside of the common room. Walking up to the door, it opens automatically.

"Since the door opened I think we can explore, right?" Asking my question at Luna.

"Well, it makes sense." She responded

Giving a small nod, I lead the way outside of the common room, before hearing a loud thudding behind us. Looking at the door that is now closed, the animated raven moved its head towards Luna and I, before asking another question.

"What is the time." The eagle asked.

Hanging my mouth open in disbelief, I am left speechless by the shamelessness of the raven. Turning around and refusing to deal with it, I turn to Luna for our next course of action.

"We should try to find the kitchen first, get something to eat to fuel us," I explained, getting a nod in response. Walking down the spiral of stairs that is just outside of the entrance of the common room, I pull my wand out and stand it on the floor, before letting it fall. Looking in the direction it fell, I see stairs that go up.

"We shall do as the wand says, I guess."

Getting another nod, we continue up the flight of stairs, admiring the scenery around us. Walking into new areas of the castle, candles sputter to life, lighting up the previously dark corridors. Aimlessly wandering around, I turn towards Luna hoping she had a better method of exploration than my wand trick.

"Luna, what way do we go?"

"Why don't we ask Meowser?"

"Oh... right," I muttered out, mentally facepalming.

"Meowser, do you know where the kitchen is?"

Seeing the cat shoot me a look of, 'I've had even less freedom than you, what lets you think I know,' I wisely turn my head to face the opposite direction, avoiding Meowser's harsh and judgemental gaze.

"Doesn't look like she knows," Luna said.

I nod dumbly, returning to my wand falling over method. Letting the wand go on the floor, it falls towards a painting hanging on the wall, whose occupants were staring at me and Luna. Seeing my wand fall towards them, I walk up to them.

"Do you know where the kitchen is?" I asked the painting, getting nothing in response.

Realizing I'm literally talking to a painting, I cant help but feel like my experiences at Hogwarts will get consistently more stupid to think about, luckily the easy fix is to not think about it. Before I could turn around and consult Luna about what to do next, I hear the painting reply to me.

"Young Ravenclaw, do you know what time it is?" The man on the left asked.

"Nope!" I admitted without shame.

"..." The man on the left stared at me, before sighing. Immediately after signing, the painting began to move off of the walls, revealing a dark passage.

"The kitchen will be right in front of you when you come out on the other side." The painting explained.

"Thanks, Mr Painting," I said

"I have a name! It is Wyllt." The man on the left said.

"Ok, Mr Painting," Luna said, while I tried to hide my chuckling.

Waving goodbye to the painting that opened for us, or more specifically, Wyllt who had opened the painting for us, me and Luna walked into the dark passage, our eyes slowly growing used to the darkness.

"Would be great if the tunnel had candlelight or something." Immediately after me finishing my sentence, the dark tunnel lit up with candlelight, all the way towards our destination. Learning to accept such situations, I thank the tunnel for its help.

Exiting the tunnel on the other end, the painting we exited from closed, but on a closer look, it remained empty.

"Maybe it's just an exit?" I thought out loud.

"Perhaps," Luna agreed.

"I realized we didn't ask Mr Painting where the kitchen would be exactly," I said.

"Where is the fun in exploring, if you know where what you are looking for is," Luna replied.

"Fair enough."

Luna made a good point, and I search the barrels that now surrounded us for any hint of where the kitchen could be. Hearing a knocking on some barrels across the basement, I turn my head over to Luna, before walking over to her to see what she is knocking on. Before I could ask what she is doing, I saw the barrel collapse into itself, revealing a hidden passage.

"Nice find."

I volunteer to crawl into the space first, mostly to avoid having to look at the floor or anywhere else that isn't in front of me. Reaching the other side of the crawl space, we are greeted by all of the candles lighting themselves up, revealing a warm room, covered in plants with a seating area in the middle.

"I think this is another house's common room," I said out loud, getting a nod in response. Looking around, I spot various types of plants hanging around the room, with no real order to their decoration, however looking even better with the seemingly careless placement of the plants. Taking Dororthy out of my robes, I open a new page and write down everything I see, the plant types and questions to ask the other students about the room that we discovered. Seeing that I was taking notes of what interested me, Luna stood off to the side, staring at some plants that caught her interest. Finishing up taking notes, I walk up to Luna who is staring at a curly-looking plant. Deciding to draw what it looked like in Dororthy, I take down its characteristics and even smell.

"We can find out what plant this is later," I explained.

Walking back towards the entrance, I turn back to see no students in sight. Seeing this, I really can't help but wonder how early Luna woke me up, however, I have also lost track of time having too much fun exploring. Deciding to leave before the students woke up, I started to crawl out of the house's common room before I spot a noticeboard with some information attached to it. Reading it, it contained the basic timetables for the first-year students, as well as the trick to finding the kitchen, and the Hufflepuffs common room rules.

"Luna, this is the Hufflepuff common room," I said without turning around, looking at the trick to finding the kitchen, I can't help but smile at what I read.

'To access the kitchen, find the painting with food and tickle the pear.'

Thinking about it, it made sense that the kitchen would reside behind a food-themed panting. Writing down the trick in Dororthy, I crawled out of the Hufflepuff common room, with Luna in tow. Stumbling out of the barrel, I take a breath of fresh air, before looking toward Luna who is already standing up and hitting the dust off of her robes.

"The kitchen is behind a painting of food," I said. We began our search for the food painting, and it didn't take long with it being just around the corner from the Hufflepuff entrance. Tickling the pear, the painting opened to a dimly light room, which immediately assaulted my nose with the smell of good food. However, upon our arrival, all the noise stopped as hundreds of beady eyes stared at me and Luna.

"A pair of students have found the kitchen!" A pair of eyes screamed. Looking towards the strange little creatures, they have distinctly long flappy ears, which vaguely reminded me of the elves from Lord of the Rings in my past life. They all stare at me and Luna with fear and intrigue, which is a strange combination of emotions to feel, and I can't help but think I'm reading them wrong.

"I don't suppose you are elves," I asked directly.

"Sir knows what we are!" They shouted in response.

Completely speechless, I stare at the one who keeps respectfully shouting.

"And what's your name?"

"This lowly one's name is Julis, Sir," The elf named Julis said, and before I could ask another question, Luna jumped in.

"My name is Luna, and he is Zane," She explained, while I nodded in response.

"Julis is happy to meet Ms Luna and Sir Zane! Do you want food?" He asked in a happy tone.

"Yes, thanks Julis," I said, before asking another question.

"Do you know what time it is?" I asked Julis on a whim.

"Yes, Sir Zane! The little hand is pointing at the 4!" Julis responded.

Whipping my head toward Luna, who is looking off to the side, pretending to be distracted by a stain on the wall, I let out a low sigh.

"Thanks, Julis, can you make us an early breakfast? We are going to explore Hogwarts today."

"Certainly, Sir Zane. It is all my pleasure." Saying that, the little elf turned around and started using magic to manipulate some cooking utensils into whipping up me and Luna a meal. Me and Luna enjoyed watching the process, of how the elf turned the most basic of materials into a wonderful breakfast filled with things that I'd never heard of before.

"Sir Zane and Ms Luna can eat at this table!" As he said that, he moved his hands and used magic to present the food on the table next to us.

"Luna, what ones have the nargles touched?" I asked, which earned me a gasp in surprise.

"...none," she replied, which shocked me too.

"I wonder when or how the nargles infect the foods?" I thought out aloud, with no response from Luna.

Digging into the delicious meal that the elf has made for me, I take my time enjoying it while also eating it at a pace that could be considered record-setting. Eating the breakfast, I notice a certain part of my old diet is missing, something I sorely missed.

"Julis, can you make coffee?" I asked with trepidation.

"Sir Zane would like a coffee? No problem!" said the spirited elf, running off to make the coffee before I could tell him how I like it.

'Maybe he will surprise me.'

"Sir Zane, I made the coffee!" He exclaimed, before setting a jug with a lid of coffee in front of me.

"So big?"

"Yes, I made enough to last you all day!"

"Thank you, Julis, I'll come back at midday for a refill."

Taking a sip, my eyes dilate as I am greeted by a rich-tasting coffee, something I have sorely missed. Why not create another coffee addiction in this life, not like it's a bad thing. Thinking like that, I had no problem downing coffee to alleviate the pain of eating food too fast and getting heart-burn.

After finishing the breakfast, Julis takes the plates off of us, before ushering us out of the Kitchen.

"Good luck on your adventures today, Sir Zane, Ms Luna."

Before we could say goodbye, the painting closed up, muting all sounds.

Looking toward each other, we smile before pulling out my wand and letting it fall in a random direction.

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Author Corner:

2.2k words in this chapter, took 3 hours to do it since I'm spending a lot of time making sure I get some basic facts right, like where the Hufflepuff room is and what not.

Sorry for my pretty bad lack of updates, please understand that it will get worse until November when my schedule goes from oh god every hour is a priceless treasure to oh yea I can spend an entire day doing nothing with no consequence.

I initially wanted to do the entire day in this chapter but its taken too long and I'm about to pass out.

The votes are in about giving Zane some more basic knowledge of HP and it was a resounding 'Do whatever you want' from Webnovel and 'Implement some more basic knowledge, please' from scribblehub. However I know what I'm doing now, and a certain comment had pretty much steeled my resolve to write a book I want to see personally, which is already pretty unique.

Recently i wanted to read in my free time and decided to see what HP fan fics were updated and good and my novel came up. I was a bit shocked that i was so high on the scribblehub list, like #30 or something. So thanks for that.

Lastly i want to experiment with a new writing method, currently i envision what I see, write it and then move onto the next scene. Next i want to write out what happens in a chapter and plan it properly and flesh it out when I'm actually writing it. Ill see how well that goes.

I'm pretty much certain I'm forgetting something else here, but i dont have a remembrall so i guess ill never know.