August was one hell of a time for Harry, simply because of everything he'd gotten from the Alley.
First, he convinced Millicent Bulstrode and her family to join the House of Hydra. One: he wanted an actual friend from Slytherin Clan who wasn't Theo or Zabini. And two: he was tired of seeing people look down on her just because she was from a gray family.
Once that was done, Harry hit the books. Rosa had made it very clear—he hadn't bought all those books just to look at the covers.
The very first night in his new room, he dove straight into One Thousand Magical Herbs and Fungi, figuring potions would be similar to cooking. He was surprisingly good at that for an eleven-year-old—turns out, you pick up a lot when the alternative is a frying pan being flung at your head. The first time he came across a word he didn't know ("What on Earth is a bezoar?"), he asked Tristan, who promptly bought him a copy of the Oxford English Dictionary. From then on, Harry kept a spiral notebook to write down every new word and its meaning.
He started reading just after dinner and didn't stop until he yawned, checked his watch, and realized it was past midnight. Six chapters in, three pages of notes filled. More studying than he'd ever done in his life.
For the rest of August, Harry spent nearly every waking moment poring over the books from Flourish & Blotts. He ate little, and always in his room.
Mornings were for magic. He wasn't legally allowed to practice spells outside school, but being Lord of a Noble House—especially the Hydra House—meant the Ministry couldn't do much about it. With Rosa's guidance and training from House Amphisbaena, Harry not only began learning spells but also picked up shadow magic with startling ease.
Having a literal Sin Sword fused to him probably helped.
He also started swordsmanship lessons, taught by an older boy from House Amphisbaena. The boy was quiet, serious, and frighteningly skilled. Harry learned fast, partly due to Beelzebub's influence, and partly because pain was an excellent motivator.
Afternoons were dedicated to etiquette and noble education. House of Cobra and House of Python were both responsible for teaching history, politics, magical law, social customs, and magical theory. It was exhausting.
Harry was apparently doing about as well as Draco Malfoy, which wasn't saying much.
Draco, who should've been focused, spent half the time whining, "My father will hear about this!"
Harry often wondered how that brat could possibly be the heir to House Viper.
Evenings were for deep-dives into whatever subjects had left him the most confused during the day. He also practiced with a quill—an utterly foreign skill—and quickly realized he was hopeless. Eventually, the instructors gave up and handed him a magical pen. Hogwarts was notified.
Theo and Millicent never let him live that down.
Before bed, Harry spent thirty minutes in front of the mirror, practicing wand draw techniques. The first time he tried, he dropped it on the floor. If that happened in front of actual students, he would never recover.
With Tristan's help, he eventually got the hang of it. Tristan even had him start with a pencil.
"Back when I was training at the Police Academy," he'd said, "we used rubber guns to practice draw speed. Same concept."
Around the second week, training shifted from spell theory to actual combat. Knives. Blades. Ninja stars. Smoke bombs. The works.
No one was ready. Not even Harry.
But, out of everyone, he picked it up fastest.
That shocked Rosa and Daphne more than anything else.
It was also around this time they discovered Harry could talk to snakes. Or rather, Harry told them.
The look on Draco's face was priceless.
Immediately, they started specialized Parseltongue training. Most of the other kids avoided him after that.
To practice, they found a small garden snake in the courtyard. Harry named him Bob. Bob was chill. A little too sarcastic for a snake, but helpful. And with Bob's help, Harry figured out how to properly use his new ability.
Meanwhile, back at 4 Privet Drive…
BOOM!
Petunia Dursley's voice rang out in the smoky air.
"Stop blowing up the damn kitchen with that wand! This will be the sixth visit from an Auror!"
Dudley, covered in soot and holding a slightly singed wand, scratched the back of his head sheepishly.
"Sorry, Mum."
When it came to studying, Dudley was surprisingly… devouring books.
Not literally, of course—but you get the idea.
Now, you may be asking yourself: How was the boy who was once dumber than a brick suddenly absorbing knowledge like a sponge with a Wi-Fi connection?
Simple.
He was reading every word, every line, every chapter…
As if it were part of an epic fantasy saga about noble houses, magical duels, and forbidden love.
If he imagined himself as the noble heir of House Dursley, wielding a wand and defending his title in the Great Cauldron War… everything just clicked.
Unfortunately, his glorious anime fantasy came to a screeching halt the moment he reached the law section.
That's when his brain quietly exited the chat.
Just like the rest of us.
Now, did his parents help?
Well… Vernon tried.
He genuinely tried to be part of this strange, new magical life for his son. He even sat beside Dudley during his study sessions and attempted to read a paragraph or two out loud.
That lasted exactly five minutes.
After fumbling through some spell names and mispronouncing "Alohomora" as "Alotta-horror," Vernon snapped.
He yelled things no child should hear about "wands," "unnatural stick waving," and "sorcery ruining proper British families."
He was promptly sentenced to Couch Arrest by Petunia.
The sentence? Three weeks, no parole.
As for Petunia?
Oh, she dove in headfirst.
Her long-buried love for magic resurfaced with the force of a tidal wave. She sat beside Dudley like a woman possessed, explaining every magical term to the best of her ability.
After all, she had lived with Lily for seven years—and tried (and often failed) to sneak into her sister's room to peek at spellbooks and potion notes.
Sure, her brain had been fried half the time back then, but now?
Now she was in full-on Magic Mom mode.
And heaven help anyone who told her she wasn't qualified.
Flashback — 1970s, the Evans Household, Petunia Age 12
The hallway was quiet. Too quiet.
Petunia Evans tiptoed past the creaky floorboard (second from the stairs), clutching a bobby pin like a secret agent. She eyed the door at the end of the hall—the one with the DO NOT ENTER – MAGICAL STUDIES IN PROGRESS sign hanging crookedly from a sparkly ribbon.
She snorted.
Magical studies? More like magical nonsense.
Still… curiosity burned.
She jammed the bobby pin into the keyhole with the focus of a war strategist. One click. Two clicks.
Click! Success!
The door creaked open. Petunia peeked inside.
Books were floating in midair, flipping pages by themselves. A cauldron was bubbling in the corner, its fumes forming little hearts that floated toward a nearby diary. A quill scribbled something furiously in a notebook, completely unsupervised.
Petunia took a bold step inside—
ZAP!
The diary snapped shut and shot a spark that hit her square in the forehead.
The quill launched itself like a javelin, stabbing into her hair and getting tangled like a possessed ferret.
A flying textbook whacked her in the face with a chapter titled "Charms That Should Not Be Left Unattended."
She screamed, stumbled backward, and slammed the door shut as a small, enchanted rubber duck bounced after her, honking indignantly.
Lily, sitting on her bed nearby with a smug look, called out:
"Told you not to come in. That diary really doesn't like you."
Petunia, her hair now scribbled with ink and lightly smoking, glared and muttered:
"Stupid magic..."
Back to the present, that memory always flashed through her mind whenever she caught Dudley swinging a wand too close to the toaster.
Dudley looked at his mother, confused but concerned.
"Are you okay, Mother?"
Petunia blinked, her expression distant for a moment—as if haunted by something deep and unholy. Then, softly, with a twitch in her left eye, she muttered:
"Just remembering why I hate rubber ducks."
In the background, a single enchanted duck let out a faint magical honk, rolled off the counter, and waddled away innocently.
Bob then hissed something sharp and fast, his tail flicking with attitude.
Harry turned to glance at him, narrowing his eyes.
"Hey, we don't say that about Theo."
Theo blinked.
"What did he say?"
Harry sighed, rubbing the bridge of his nose.
"…Don't ask."
Bob gave a smug flick of his tongue and slithered in a circle like he'd just won an argument.
With everything done, the second-to-last day in the Slytherin Clan arrived — and with it, the First Hunt.
No, it wasn't a kill-your-enemy kind of thing. It was more... traditional. Symbolic. Still, it came with real danger.
Harry stood alone in the shadowy forest, cloaked in a black outfit that concealed his face: a hooded cloak, worn black boots, hidden blades, and his wand strapped under his sleeve like an assassin's dagger.
Each young member was assigned a beast at random — drawn from a magical urn. Most of them got harmless game: deer, oversized birds, even some unlucky fish.
Harry?
He pulled a slip of parchment... and got a three-headed, giant black dog wreathed in fire, its purple eyes glowing like cursed gemstones and black fur flickering like smoke.
Totally random, they said.
He glanced sideways — and spotted Draco's smirk just as the paper was drawn. That made Harry raise an eyebrow.
Didn't help that Daphne, ever unreadable, handed him a few cocoa beans with a casual, "You'll need these," before heading off to hunt her oversized raven.
Confidence? No, Harry wasn't exactly brimming with it right now.
Thankfully, Lord Slytherin himself had pulled him aside earlier.
"It doesn't need to die. Bring back a fang, a tuft of fur — a mark of survival is enough."
Apparently, a few others with cursed beasts had gotten the same speech.
Now, standing alone in the dark woods, Harry rolled up his left sleeve and looked at the red-black pattern on his arm — where Beelzebub slept beneath the skin.
"I guess," he muttered, flexing his hand as a faint red shimmer passed over it, "I get to actually use you?"
Somewhere in the forest, a tree cracked... followed by a distant, low growl — deep, layered, and full of hunger.
Meanwhile, in a different part of the forest, a silver knife slid cleanly across the neck of a tiger-like beast. The creature collapsed with a thud, its glowing eyes dimming as blood soaked into the moss-covered ground.
The hunter stepped back, quiet and efficient. A moment later, he knelt beside the corpse and pulled back his hood.
It was Draco Malfoy.
Next to him, another figure dropped down from a low branch and landed softly beside him. She, too, removed her hood — revealing Pansy Parkinson's sharp eyes and unmistakable smirk.
She crossed her arms and tilted her head at him.
"You know," Pansy said coolly, "you're going to get into so much trouble if they find out."
Draco didn't look at her right away. He wiped the blood from his blade on the tiger's fur, his expression unreadable.
"They won't," he said flatly. "I made sure of it. The draw was 'random,' but I made a few... suggestions."
Pansy arched a brow.
"You gave Potter Cerberon, the Black Flame Hound. That thing's on the restricted registry of magical apex predators."
"It's not the Cerberus," Draco muttered. "Just one of the bloodline. Big difference."
"Still has three heads and breathes fire."
"So do half the Pureblood uncles at the reunion feast," Draco muttered. "He'll survive. Or he won't." He stood, sheathing his knife. "Either way, we learn something."
Pansy narrowed her eyes.
"What's the game, Draco? You pushing him to break... or hoping he doesn't?"
For a moment, Draco said nothing. He just looked out into the misty forest, in the direction Harry had gone.
"I want to see what's really inside him," he said at last. "Not the Boy Who Lived crap. Not the orphan. The real him." He turned to her, eyes sharp. "And I think Beelzebub wants the same."
Pansy just sighed.
"You're worse than your father."
"I sincerely hope so."
Back with Harry.
The forest was thick with mist and shadows, the trees looming like silent watchers.
Harry walked slowly, eyes low to the ground. He crouched beside a faint depression in the earth — a footprint, maybe.
He frowned.
"Too small."
A few paces ahead, something caught his eye — a deep gouge carved into the bark of a twisted tree. He approached it, hand grazing the edge of the scratch.
"Too big?" he muttered.
None of it made sense. No consistent trail, no clear signs. It was like the forest was playing with him.
With a quiet sigh, he drew his wand and whispered,
"Lumos."
A pale orb of light hovered just above his palm, casting eerie shadows along the underbrush. It wasn't much, but it gave the trees shape — and gave Harry something to focus on besides the weight of the silence.
He moved cautiously, wand raised, scanning the area.
If you asked him, he was hoping to just find a cracked fang of the creature. Maybe a claw lodged in a tree. Something simple. Something he could grab, wave around, and bolt straight for the barrier.
Respect be damned.
But no such luck. No fang. No claw. No easy out.
Just forest, cold and quiet.
He exhaled slowly through his nose, steeling himself.
"Of course it wouldn't be that easy."
Behind him, a branch cracked.
Not loud.
But loud enough.
He froze.
Very slowly, Harry turned, wandlight shaking slightly in the dark.
There was nothing there.
Yet.
To be continued
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