At this very moment, the Kyle whom the five young wizards had assumed was long since torn to shreds was dangling a massive meaty bone in front of Fluffy.
"Fluffy! Sit! Sit and it's yours!"
The drooling three-headed dog bared its fangs and charged straight at him.
The middle head knocked Kyle flat onto the ground with its snout, while the left head instantly snatched the bone right out of his hand.
Well then. Humanity's natural enemy really is the dog.
Kyle was deeply unsatisfied with Fluffy's shameless behavior.
So he drew his wand and pointed it at the bone the left and middle heads were now fighting over.
A spell struck the bone dead-on. With a flick of his wand, Kyle sent it flying straight into the gaping maw of the right head.
The bone that had been seconds from being eaten vanished into thin air. Instantly, all three of Fluffy's heads turned on each other and started snapping and biting.
Fluffy: I may not be human, but you're the real dog here.
By the time Hermione and Hannah returned to the room, they did not see the horrifying sight they'd feared: Kyle reduced to a bloody, mangled corpse by the terrifying three-headed dog.
Instead, they saw Fluffy lying on its back, soft belly exposed, while Kyle threw himself onto the beast and ruffled its fur like there was no tomorrow.
Hermione: ???
Hannah: ???
Seeing the two little witches come back, Kyle rolled to his feet and instantly regained his usual image of the perfect Hufflepuff heartthrob.
"Allow me to introduce you. This is Fluffy."
The three-headed lick-machine Fluffy felt ignored and flipped upright as well.
All three enormous, fluffy heads immediately launched a furious licking assault on Kyle, coating him from head to toe in slobber.
The heartthrob image Kyle had just rebuilt collapsed on the spot.
Hermione and Hannah stared in stunned silence at the… interaction between one human and one dog. Two dogs? No, definitely one human and one dog.
Kyle shoved Fluffy's slobbery heads away with a look of utter disgust, then whipped out his wand and cast Scourgify on himself.
At the same time, he didn't forget to explain to the two gobsmacked little witches:
"Fluffy is Hagrid's little pet. I watched him grow up, so he'd never hurt me."
"How can you keep a monster like that inside the school!?" Hermione shouted in horror. She'd genuinely thought Kyle was about to meet his end in a dog's jaws just minutes ago.
"Relax, relax," Kyle said airily.
"Didn't Professor Dumbledore declare the right-hand corridor on the fourth floor off-limits? As long as students don't court death by sneaking over here, everything's fine."
He pulled another huge slab of meat from his pocket and casually tossed it to Fluffy. The three heads immediately began fighting over the new prize.
"So? Wanna pet Fluffy? He's actually super cute."
Hannah and Hermione stared in abject terror at the monster with three gigantic heads.
Its three enormous maws were ripping into the meat with ferocious abandon, thick ropes of drool dripping from yellowed fangs…
The expressions on both little girls' faces screamed refusal.
Kyle shook his head. These people just don't understand the charm of magical creatures.
"Let's go. Time to head back." He gave Fluffy's hind leg a pat. "See you next time, Fluffy."
Fluffy, busy devouring its meal, waved a paw and let out a vague, meaningful whimper from deep in its throats (three throats, technically), as if saying goodbye to Kyle.
Thanks to their timely escape, Kyle and the girls managed to miss Harry and company, who were hurrying toward the fourth-floor forbidden corridor with Professor McGonagall in tow.
Under the Disillusionment Charm, Kyle first escorted Hermione back to the Gryffindor common room on the eighth floor.
Only then did he take Hannah through a different shortcut and slip back to their own house's territory.
The next morning, at the entrance to the Great Hall, Kyle noticed with surprise that the giant hourglass representing Gryffindor's points was missing a massive pile of rubies.
Word spread through the school lightning-fast: three certain little wizards had not only gone night-wandering, but had marched straight to Professor McGonagall and turned themselves in.
Hermione instantly knew what had happened.
Last night, after splitting up with her and Hannah, Harry, Ron, and Neville must have gone to McGonagall to "rescue" Kyle.
Who could have guessed that Kyle was perfectly fine—he'd finished petting the dog and even personally escorted her back to the Gryffindor common room?
After Kyle left, McGonagall had followed the trio up to the fourth floor… only to find absolutely nothing.
Convinced it was a prank, she furiously docked fifty points from each of them.
Thanks to the incident, however, Harry learned the whereabouts of that grubby little package from Vault 713—the one that had been stolen from Gringotts.
When Kyle spotted the three of them in the Great Hall, they all looked utterly wilted.
Anyone who'd just cost their house a hundred and fifty points wouldn't exactly be jumping for joy.
Especially not when they had to endure the glares and contempt of their own housemates.
The mischievous Weasley twins had lost points before, of course, but thanks to their skill, they usually only lost five or ten at a time—barely a blip.
Fifty points each?
That was a new record they'd never come close to touching.
Harry, Ron, and Neville had officially set a precedent.
And unlike their astonishing ability to lose points, the twins were just as talented at earning them back.
Outside of Potions, the points Fred and George earned in other classes pretty much balanced out whatever they lost.
A perfect break-even.
That is, until the morning owls delivered a long, thin parcel to Harry along with a letter from Professor McGonagall.
Only then did our Savior perk up again.
McGonagall had specifically instructed Harry not to open the package in the Great Hall, lest the rest of the Gryffindor Quidditch team start howling for new brooms of their own.
Inside was a brand-new Nimbus 2000—the professor had bought it for Harry out of her own pocket.
But the moment Ron (ever the helpful teammate) saw the letter, he let out a whoop so loud nearly the entire hall heard him.
Kyle's ears instantly pricked up.
The Hogwarts acceptance letter clearly stated that first-years were forbidden from bringing broomsticks to school.
Kyle hadn't received an acceptance letter himself, but he was well aware of the rule.
As if school rules could stop him.
He'd actually been thinking about getting a broom for a while, but with Buckbeak around, he'd shelved the idea for the moment.
Besides, a decent performance broom cost hundreds of Galleons. It wasn't that he couldn't afford it—technically it was his old man's money—but even though Gellert Grindelwald wouldn't bat an eye at the expense, Kyle still felt a little bad spending his father's fortune so extravagantly.
Now, though, seeing Harry with a shiny new Nimbus 2000… that buried desire started stirring again.
Still, it would probably be best to check with Professor Dumbledore first before buying a broom.
Besides, there was something else Kyle wanted to ask the headmaster about.
Last night, he had noticed a trapdoor beneath Fluffy's paws.
With the meager knowledge he retained from the original story, Kyle knew perfectly well what was hidden behind that trapdoor: the Philosopher's Stone.
The stone itself held zero appeal for him.
From what he remembered of the books, the Philosopher's Stone could turn any metal into pure gold and produce the Elixir of Life.
Turn things to gold?
His father was already richer than most countries—what did he need with that?
Immortality?
He was a twelve-year-old kid. Why would he care about living forever right now?
What actually interested Kyle was the profound alchemical knowledge the stone represented.
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