Dudley cleared his throat, trying to calm the group. He reached into his bag and pulled out a small cage, revealing his animal companion.
Inside, a plump little juniper-colored badger blinked sleepily at them.
"This is Gohan," Dudley said proudly. "Don't worry—if he glows, it means we're in danger. And since he hasn't glowed…"
Everyone stared at the badger.
A few seconds passed. Then a full minute.
The badger yawned, curled into a ball, and fell asleep.
"…See?" Dudley finished.
Ron collapsed back into his seat with a massive sigh of relief. "Good. Now we're safe."
And then—without warning—he sprang back up, shoved Neville, Parvati, Padma, and Hermione straight out of the compartment, and slammed the door shut.
The four of them blinked at the closed door in stunned silence.
Hermione crossed her arms. "Well, that was rude."
Parvati spun in a daze, eyes spiraling like an anime character. "Wait, hold on—did anyone even get his name?"
The twins and Neville exchanged glances, then all three shook their heads at once.
"Nope."
Padma looked at Harmonie curiously. "So, um… Harmonie, that lamp—you called it Jophiel—where did you get it? Most first-years don't exactly walk around with something like that."
Harmonie glanced down at the lantern in her hands, the faint white glow flickering softly inside. She hesitated before answering. "Well… it's been in my family for generations. Ever since my great-great-great-great-great-great-grandfather bought it from some little shop. Back then, everyone thought it was just a decoration. He used to say it gave him patience. Honestly, we only just discovered it was a magical object because… well, because I'm the one holding it. That's when the white flames appeared inside."
Neville frowned, tapping his chin as if trying to fish something out of memory. "Jophiel… and a lantern, huh? Why does that sound familiar?"
Harmonie perked up, clutching the lamp a little tighter. "You know something about it?"
Neville gave a sheepish shrug. "Not really. It's just—most of that kind of information is locked away in the Ravenclaw Clan Library. I'd have to wait until Christmas or maybe summer to go back and check the old place. If I find anything, I'll send you an owl."
Parvati tilted her head. "So… the Ravenclaw Clan has all the weird records and archives, huh?"
Neville nodded. "Yeah, they guard old knowledge, stuff the other Clans either lost or don't want remembered. Some of it's boring… some of it's dangerous."
Padma's eyes narrowed. "And you think Harmonie's lantern falls under the dangerous category?"
Neville hesitated, then shook his head quickly. "I didn't say that! Just… anything tied to the Founders or with a name like Jophiel isn't exactly small potatoes."
Hermione crossed her arms. "Then that means it's important. Magical objects don't just wake up after centuries for no reason."
Parvati scratched the back of her head. "Great, so we've got a lamp that could either save us… or curse us."
The lantern in Harmonie's hands flickered faintly, a white flame dancing higher for just a second, as if it had heard them.
Everyone froze.
Padma just spoke. "Nope, back too our Compartment in the train, before we start the end of the world".
They noded and went back, meanwhile in Harry Compartment.
Harry, Theo, Blaise and Millicent were eating candy
Harry spoke looking at all them. "I think buying all thr Chocolate from the Trolly was a bit rude".
Theo smirked as he spoke. "Hey, your the one who said, give the lot".
Harry chuckled as he spoke. "Will, yes, but I didn't expect this much".
Blaise leaned back in his seat, popping a Chocolate Frog into his mouth. "You basically robbed the poor witch blind, Potter. I don't think the next compartment even got a Licorice Wand."
Millicent shrugged, happily munching on a Cauldron Cake. "Not my problem. More for us."
Harry sighed, looking at the growing pile of wrappers on the floor. "Still… if word gets out, everyone's gonna think we're greedy first-years."
Theo smirked again. "Correction—they'll think you're greedy, Harry. You're the Boy-Who-Lived. We're just your accomplices."
Harry rolled his eyes but couldn't help grinning. "Great. First week at Hogwarts and I'm already the villain of the candy heist."
The four of them laughed, though Blaise's eyes flicked to the window, watching the countryside blur past. For just a second, he muttered under his breath, "Better a candy thief than what's waiting for us there."
Harry didn't quite hear it, but Millicent did. She looked at Blaise curiously, but said nothing, taking another bite of her cake.
Theo tried to remember something from the books he had read in the Apophis house, as he tried to remember. "It's odd, from what I read in the books, all of Salazar's 7 Sin Weapons communicated with Holder, each was different, some Triggeres, maybe Beelzebub has trigger, why did it speak to you last time?".
Harry thought back to the Events of the first hunt as he spoke. "Because I was in danger? Or maybe because it drains the blood of the Cerberon?".
Blaise raised an eyebrow, leaning forward slightly. "So it spoke the moment blood was spilled… and not just any blood, but a beast tied to the Clan. That doesn't sound like coincidence."
Millicent frowned. "If that's the case, then maybe Beelzebub reacts to powerful prey. A Cerberon isn't something you see every day. Maybe it's not about danger at all, but about feeding."
Harry rubbed the back of his neck, the weight of the thought settling in. "Feeding, huh? Figures the Sword of Gluttony would want something like that. Guess I should've expected it."
Theo tapped his chin, muttering half to himself. "The Apophis texts said each Sin Weapon reflects its name, but in ways deeper than just combat. Gluttony isn't just hunger for food. It's hunger for power, hunger for blood, hunger for… everything. If Beelzebub stays quiet until it tastes something worthy, that could be its trigger."
Harry's eyes narrowed, staring at the faint glow under his sleeve. "So what happens if it decides I'm the worthy prey?"
That made the entire compartment go still.
Blaise finally broke the silence with a smirk, though his eyes were sharp. "Then I'd say we'd better hope you're hungrier than it is."
Theo chuckled nervously, trying to lighten the mood. "Great, just what we needed. A sword with an appetite. Guess we'll have to make sure it doesn't get the wrong idea."
Harry leaned back, his expression unreadable. "Either way… I'll control it. Not the other way around."
The mark on his arm faintly pulsed—just once—like the sword itself was amused by his words.
Harry heard something in his mind, a whisper.
"We Sin weapon don't feed on our master".
Harry's jaw went slack. A whisper—cold, smooth as metal sliding over skin—threaded through his head.
"We Sin weapons don't feed on our master."
He froze. The compartment's chatter dimmed around him, as if the world bent to the edges of that sentence.
He clenched his fist against the mark on his arm. It was just a faint scar now, but under his skin he could feel something like a small, patient pulse—like a heartbeat waiting to be woken.
"Who—" he started aloud, voice thin.
No one answered. Theo was halfway through saying something about Chocolate Frogs; Blaise was chewing; Millicent was idly flipping a wrapper. None of them looked up. None of them noticed the voice curling into Harry's bones.
The whisper came again, closer this time, like it had moved from the back of his skull to right behind his ear. Not words so much as intention.
"We take from the world. We hunger for blood, for power, for life that is not our own. We keep our hand from the one who bears us. We eat through what they do not, what they cannot. That is the Pact."
Harry's stomach dropped. The voice was old and patient and very, very hungry. It wasn't cold in the way Voldemort had been cold in the stories—it was greedy. Ancient. Unashamed.
"Why did you speak to me at the Cerberon, then?" Harry whispered back into his own head, ridiculous but necessary.
There was a pause, the kind that felt like a tide pulling back to show how deep the water ran.
"You bled it," the sword replied finally. "The beast gave what weapons taste. We tasted. We learned. A bond can be set by blood taken from another. Not by yours. Yet."
Harry imagined the Cerberon's black fur and the flare of hellfire as he plunged the blade; he remembered the heat, the smell of singed earth, the way the world had narrowed to the weight of the sword inside him.
"So you chose me because of that?" His voice was steadier than he felt.
"We chose the vessel who can carry us," the whisper said. "You have the mark. You have a hunger inside, small and bright. You will learn to feed it outward, or you will rot from within. Both roads are possible."
A swallow lodged in Harry's throat. He thought of every time he had wanted to lash out in anger and not been allowed—Dudley's taunts, the cupboard, the bruises no one asked about. He thought of the dark little wording that sometimes rose behind his eyes when he slept. The sword's words scraped at something older, an ache he had always name-less.
"I won't let you take me," Harry said, not entirely sure whether he was promising the sword or himself.
We are patient, the voice said. The faint pulse in his arm beat like an answer and then, quietly, almost tenderly, the whisper slid away. The compartment returned—laughter, candy wrappers, the train's hum—and none of his companions had heard a thing.
Blaise nudged him with an elbow, breaking the silence. "You spacing out again, Lord James? You look like you just saw a ghost."
Harry forced a smile and rolled his shoulders, the mark under his sleeve suddenly unbearably warm. "Just… thinking. Eat another frog?"
Theo grinned. "Thought you'd never ask."
Harry took the Chocolate Frog anyway, but his eyes kept flicking to the window. The countryside blurred past, green and innocent. He could feel something very old riding shotgun in his blood. It didn't want him destroyed—not yet. It wanted what it always wanted.
Hungry.
He tucked that thought away like a blade into a sheath and pushed the fear down. For now, there were girls to talk to, compartments to annoy, a train to ride. There would be time for vows and plans later—time to learn to pull the blade empty, to teach it to take from the world instead of devouring him.
But in the back of his mind, a small, stubborn voice—his, not the sword's—answered the last whisper.
We'll feed the world on our terms, he thought.
And if the sword would not be ruled, he would learn to rule it.
Harry went outside, as he spoke. "Getting some fresh air".
Harry pushed the compartment door open and slipped into the corridor, the train's thrum filling the narrow space. He didn't stop at the window — he shoved it up and crawled out onto the little step between carriages, letting the cold wind slap his face. For a moment the world narrowed to nothing but night and the green blur of fields. He breathed deep.
"Are you evil? he asked, voice low as he felt the mark throb".
A slow, amused warmth unfurled through his arm—Beelzebub's presence, patient as a coiled thing. "Not necessarily, the blade replied inside his head. We are tools. Salazar forged us to fight calamities the founders feared. To cut through things that bend the world. Not good, not evil. Hungry. Purposeful".
Harry let the words roll around him. "If you were made to destroy things, why should that make you a monster?" he said.
Because purpose is a blade without a hand, Beelzebub answered. If the hand feeds the blade on others, it eats outward. If the blade feeds on the hand, the hand decays. Choice lies not in our steel but in the bearer who wields us.
The wind tugged at his hair. Harry pictured the Cerberon again — the heat, the teeth, the way the sword took from the beast. It had tasted power and shown him a sliver of what it was. He felt neither revulsion nor pride, only a cold, steady clarity.
"Then I choose, he said aloud to the fields and to the dark. You don't take me. We take what needs taking. My terms".
A faint vibration answered him — not aggression, not agreement, more like a promise. "We will wait. We will teach. You will learn hunger's shape".
Footsteps thudded on the roof behind him. Theo's voice came, muffled but impatient. "Oi, Potter! Stop mooning — the platform's coming up. Don't try anything dramatic like jumping the barrier for the hell of it."
Harry glanced back, smiling without humor. "Coming." He slipped back inside, the cold lantern of the night still burning in his chest, and folded himself into the compartment as if nothing had changed.
Only he and the sword knew the exchange had happened. The Chocolate Frog wrappers rustled. Conversations resumed. The train carried them on toward a beginning that was no longer innocent — and Harry felt, for the first time, ready to meet it with a weapon at his side and a promise in his mouth.
Harry looked at a Chocolate frog, as he pulled out, he saw a Photo with a name
"Helga Hufflepuff".
Harry flipped the card between his fingers, the smiling portrait of Helga Hufflepuff waving warmly at him. She looked soft, kind—the sort of person who might've handed him a pie instead of a sword. He almost laughed.
"Ironic," he muttered. "Of all people."
The voice stirred again, low and faint in the marrow of his bones. Ah… Lady Helga. A chuckle followed, bitter-sweet. Do not trust that painting, little master. The woman was far more… formidable than history bothers to remember.
Harry frowned, leaning his head against the cool glass of the window. Not accurate?
Not even close. But another day. Not yet.
And then Beelzebub was gone, just as always—leaving behind silence heavy with half-truths. Harry let out a sigh through his nose. The sword never lied, but it never gave him the whole truth either. A riddle dressed as a weapon.
He pocketed the card and turned the frog loose; it bounced away across Blaise's lap before disappearing under the seat.
Theo raised an eyebrow. "Something funny about Hufflepuff?"
Harry smirked faintly. "Just history being a little too neat, that's all."
The train shuddered, the whistle cutting through the chatter of compartments. Hogwarts was drawing near. And Harry couldn't shake the weight of two new mysteries pressing against his ribs—Helga's hidden truth, and the shadow of the so-called calamities.
He didn't know what they were yet, but he was certain: the sword hadn't spoken of them idly.
And he would have answers. Hogwarts owed him that much.
To be continued
Hope people like this Ch and give me Power stones and enjoy