Chapter 70: Back Home
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I tend to upload drafts of early chapters on there to get people's opinions of them so you can read up to 20 chapters ahead as a bonus.
I would like to thank my beta, Akisu, for his help in this chapter.
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1 September 1992, King's Cross Station
While he wouldn't want to be formally under a stranger's mercy, if it protected him from Dumbledore, then it would be worth it. Still, he was happy where he was, and he had a backup plan in case he was caught. That was a relief. But when thinking about what was probably going to happen the following day, he had the opportunity to get an advantage. The Potter scion took a breath and answered, "I need everything you have on Basilisks."
Harry walked around King's Cross station while earning odd looks from the passerbys. He could understand it, he was lifting up his trunk which was bigger than he was, as if it was nothing. It probably looked odd seeing a twelve-year-old child walking by himself in a train station while holding a giant trunk that looked more like an antique than any modern accessory.
Although Harry did buy this trunk, not because of how it looked, but because of its practicality. It was something that he had noticed, the less processed anything was, the better it can handle magic and the easier it is enchanted. It was probably why wizards and witches still used parchment and quills. It wasn't really about sticking to traditions, but it was simply easier to enchant a quill than a pen, and it was easier to enchant parchment than paper. Although, the Japanese have special scrolls that are very efficient in holding runes, only their own. They were very secretive people, the Japanese, and Harry ached to visit this civilization. They used magic so differently over there, and he wanted to figure it out as well.
Well, as for Harry's trunk, it was made of wood and covered with leather. If it wasn't enchanted, it would have probably collapsed under the weight of the hundreds of books and small knickknacks that he bought over the summer. Having the featherlight charm and a basic expansion charm added in was already proving to be worth the price. He would have had to drag that thing around the station.
He passed by the entrance to the Hogwarts Express and entered the train. He had already let Hedwig fly to the castle since he knew how much she hated being cooped up. He sat down in an empty compartment and decided to continue reading one of the books Arcturus Black had loaned him. The man really went above and beyond. Outside of widening his eyes at the request, the man simply gave him a dozen of books that pertained to Basilisks. Blacks really were something else if he didn't really mind giving a child a book on weapons of mass destruction.
Well, at least there was nothing on the creation of Basilisks, because that would be very irresponsible. Or maybe he just didn't have any books on it. Either way, Harry started understanding slightly how Basilisks worked, even if its glare was still subject to a lot of controversies. Well, the venom, outside of being very poisonous, was designed to destroy the structure of any magic it touches. If it touches a wizard, it will slowly dissolve their magic circuits, something that was agonizing for the accounts. Phoenix tears could theoretically counteract it since it promotes the generation of magic, outside of healing, of course, although the outcome would still be uncertain as the two substances would not really disappear but continue to fight each other for the rest of the mage's life.
Now, unfortunately, the basilisk's glare was widely considered to be soul magic. So, Harry was right on that part, but no one was ever able to study them properly, since, you know, you either kill them or you're dead if you look at them. What the Basilisk hunters did was use goggles enchanted to reflect what they see multiple times, which made them slightly resistant to the stare, to a point. After ten seconds of consistent eye contact, they were still petrified, but at least it gave them enough time to look away when the King of Serpents was attacking.
Of course, the Rooster's crow thing was a hoax. It did cause agonizing pain to young Basilisks, and could even kill hatchlings, but to an adult, it was like a particularly annoying voice, and they became aggressive towards anything near the rooster. Apparently, it was theorized that somehow, the ritual used to create Basilisks involved roosters somehow, probably as a training method when they were younger.
Still, Harry had some trouble understanding some of the theories behind the glare, and he'll have to focus a lot to counteract them. The refraction thing was a good initial idea, but he would rather be immune than only give himself ten seconds to run away.
Barely fifteen minutes later, with a huffing Tracy and Daphne came into the compartment. Harry smiled and commented, "You're late."
"We wouldn't have been late if it wasn't for those useless Lockhart books weighing down our trunks. Seriously, why would anyone need that many books," Daphne replied with some bite in her voice.
"Hey, Lockhart's books are not useless," Tracy protested weakly. The brunette shivered at the piercing glare her blonde friend gave her.
Harry, on the other hand, snorted, "Tracy, I'm not going to argue with you, but there isn't a single spell in any of the books, or any theories. They're adventure books that have no place in any educational institute outside of entertainment. But why didn't you just buy enchanted trunks? They're very handy."
The brunette glared at him, "Because they're too expensive and our parents don't trust us with something that costs hundreds of Galleons. Just because you can buy whatever you want doesn't mean that we all can as well."
Daphne nodded and sat down at the seat next to Harry. Soon afterwards, Blaise joined them and started regaling them of his trip to Italy. Halfway through the story, Daphne stiffened as the Hogwarts Express started moving, "Curious."
The dark skinned boy gave her a dirty look for interrupting his story, "What's so curious?"
"I didn't see Longbottom or Weasley on the platform. Usually, he's swarmed by photographers and admirers since people know where he's going to be."
Tracy simply shrugged, "Maybe he just took the floo to avoid people swarming the Express. But I did see the Weasley twins when I got up, so maybe you just missed Ron?"
Daphne nodded, but Harry, on the other hand, stiffened. He had forgotten about the Dobby situation and the fact that Longbottom was probably stuck on the other side of the barrier. The Potter scion sincerely hoped that he wouldn't follow his counterpart from the stories and break the Statute of Secrecy instead of just flooing to Hogsmeade or contacting his grandmother. That would just be ridiculous. Although, if by some miracle, he does end up going to Scotland in a flying car, that would be hilarious.
"What are you smiling about," Daphne asked, having noted his small, amused smile at the thought of Longbottom flying to Hogwarts in a car.
"Just an amusing thought. I really can have an overactive imagination," Harry remarked.
Blaise shook his head at the last Potter's eccentric behaviour and spoke up, "Although, Longbottom is really popular since last year."
Harry frowned, "I don't remember people really liking him outside of his house."
"Oh, I mean because of the House Cup," Blaise answered, "Slytherin has been winning it for years, and the moment he gets here, Longbottom snatches it. Even if Dumbledore practically handed it to him on a silver platter, it didn't really matter. The other houses are overjoyed that we didn't win for once. I heard an upperclassman in Hufflepuff saying that she's glad that we just didn't win again."
The Potter scion shrugged, "Jealous and envy are very human traits. People will always look to others to see what they do not have."
Afterwards, the discussion moved to the absolute nightmare that was Binns' class and what Lockhart's own classes were going to be like. Harry was adamant that either the man would keep to theoretical work for the upper years and would involve his books somehow in the lessons to justify requiring the students to buy them. Tracy, however, was resolute that he picked the book for their practical applications and that he was going to set up an obstacle course with scenarios from the book, while he would teach them applications of spells that they already knew.
Honestly, it wasn't a bad shout, but considering who was teaching them, Harry didn't expect much from the blonde ponce. The man was a performer, an actor, but he had no qualifications outside of his stories. He wasn't trained as an Auror, he wasn't trained as a Hit-Wizard, hell, he wasn't even a dueler. As far as his books are concerned, one day, he just decided to start going on adventures. The average Hogwarts graduate would die horribly, or at least be mutilated without having the proper training to fight dark creatures and dangerous wizards. His narrative was just unlikely. The only way the Potter scion could see his narrative working would be if Lockhart was some sort of prodigy that hid his talents in school for some reason and wasn't deemed to be particularly remarkable to be recruited by the Unspeakables or the Aurors, and just decided to go on random adventures all over the world and just write books about them.
Still, the bickering continued until the sun went down and Harry saw that they just went past Hogsmeade. He could feel his Arcane Hearing note the proximity to the Hogwarts wards and excuse himself, "Sorry, I have to go somewhere."
Harry practically ran out of the door and waited for the Diary to be overwhelmed by the wards. As expected, barely two minutes later, Harry could feel the same abominable feeling he caught in Flourish and Blotts. At least that confirmed that the Diary was in fact in the train.
The young Slytherin was following the quickly fading song of the abomination. It was far faster at adapting than it was in Diagon Alley. Was it because Riddle was already familiar with the wards? He had to have taken the book to the school after turning it into his Horcrux.
Still, Harry ran from compartment to compartment, desperate to get closer to the cursed diary and not risk his fellow students' lives. He lost count of how many people he trampled on, trying to get to what seemed like the end of the train. By the time he was almost there, the song had faded into nothing, having adapted to the castle wards. Harry knew that he was so close, that he was barely more than a few compartments away.
Frustrated beyond belief, he punched the compartment door. A young girl with long blonde hair and protuberant silver eyes opened the door to her compartment and gave him an odd look.
"Hello," the girl spoke up.
"Hello," Harry parroted back.
"Why were you hitting the compartment?" the girl asked with a dreamy tone. That girl was weird.
"I was just angry about something," Harry responded.
"Oh, I thought you might have been hunting Wrackspurts. They're very tricky buggers. I think I saw one around here…"
"No," Harry answered, "I was just angry."
"Oh, that's a shame. I would have liked it better if you were fighting the Wrackspurts. I have seen a lot of people around with infections. They're so full of negative thoughts. Oh, I haven't even introduced myself. My name is Luna Lovegood, what's yours?"
Oh, that makes a lot of sense now. Luna was coming to Hogwarts this year, "Harry Potter. You're a first year, right?"
She nodded with that weird, dreamy look on her face and Harry continued, "If you need anything, let me know. You seem like a good person."
"You're a very kind boy, Harry Potter. Don't lose that. The world needs more kind people."
"That it does, Luna Lovegood. That it does."
Harry turned and left the compartment, oddly relaxed. He was still frustrated beyond belief for not finding the Diary, but he had a lead now. He had isolated the possible culprit to the compartments he hadn't visited yet, which were around a tenth of the total ones. Having stopped being frantic, Harry walked around the following compartment, making sure to note the faces of every single person he saw. One of them was the one being possessed by Tom Riddle, after all. He didn't really know all of them, outside of a few familiar faces he had seen in the Great Hall a few times, whose names still escaped him.
He might have lost a chance at getting the Diary, but at least, he didn't come back empty handed. There was still the possibility of stopping Riddle before anyone dies. When he came back to the compartment, he was oddly smiling. He barely even batted an eyelash at the Thestrals pulling the carriages to the school. They were oddly beautiful in a dark sort of way. Alas, he was back at Hogwarts, and he couldn't wait to see what would happen next.
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If you want to support me check out my patréon at https://www.patréon.com/athassprkr
I tend to upload drafts of early chapters on there to get people's opinions of them so you can read up to 20 chapters ahead as a bonus.
Thank you guys for your support in these hard times.