Chapter 11: Winter's Lessons
January scraped London raw with wind that cut through concrete and flesh alike, turning the city's streets into a frozen battleground where only the strongest survived until spring. Adam Wright crouched beside a barrel fire in an alley behind King's Cross, watching flames dance against the night while Old Tom poked at burning scraps with a rusted poker.
The homeless veteran had taken an interest in the strange kid who survived too well, who never seemed quite as desperate as he should be, who had tricks that kept him fed and warm when others froze. Now they shared the fire's warmth in comfortable silence, two outcasts finding shelter in each other's company.
"You're running from something, kid," Old Tom said eventually, his voice carrying the rasp of too many cigarettes and too many cold nights. "We all are. But you run smarter than most."
Adam poked at the fire with a bent coat hanger, watching sparks spiral up toward the stars. "Just trying to survive."
"Surviving's one thing. Thriving's another. You do both."
"If only you knew how right you are."
Over the following weeks, Tom became Adam's guide to a world the System couldn't teach him about. Where police rarely patrolled (under bridges, abandoned tube stations, the spaces between official London). Which soup kitchens didn't ask questions (St. Bartholomew's on Tuesdays, the Salvation Army after eight PM). How to spot undercover social workers (too clean, too interested, questions that probed instead of helped).
"The trick," Tom explained one evening, sharing a can of beans heated over their barrel fire, "is becoming invisible without disappearing. People see what they expect to see. You're just another street kid to them—hungry, desperate, harmless. Long as you keep acting the part, they'll keep ignoring you."
Adam learned to perfect that performance. How to slump his shoulders just so, how to make his eyes slide away from direct contact, how to radiate the particular kind of defeated resignation that made authority figures uncomfortable enough to look elsewhere. Magic was power, but invisibility was survival.
Tom noticed Adam's "tricks"—food that appeared too easily, doors that opened when they shouldn't, the way Adam always seemed to know which alleys were safe. But the old soldier never asked directly. Some things were better left unspoken, and their friendship grew stronger for what remained unsaid.
"He knows I'm different. Doesn't care why. Just accepts it."
It was the first real connection Adam had made since his transmigration, and it warmed him more than any fire.
February brought dedicated training in the abandoned warehouse Adam had claimed as his practice space. The Basic Wand made everything easier—Lumos now cost only three MP instead of five, Alohomora fifteen instead of forty. Every spell was more efficient, more precise, more responsive to his will.
Adam experimented with combinations: Silencio layered over Invisibility created perfect stealth that couldn't be detected by sound. Accio combined with Wingardium Leviosa let him manipulate objects with surgical precision, pulling coins from across the room and floating them through complex patterns.
The System tracked his improvement with cold mathematics: [Alohomora: 65% mastery], [Lumos: 80% mastery], [Protego: 45% mastery]. But it was the emotional breakthroughs that mattered most.
One evening, practicing Lumos while thinking about Mrs. Chen's quiet kindness, the light blazed brighter than ever before while using less MP than usual. Magic responded to emotion, not just technique. Intent mattered. Purpose mattered. The spells weren't just tools—they were extensions of his will, shaped by his desires and strengthened by his connections.
"Magic isn't just power. It's feeling made manifest."
That realization opened new possibilities. Protego cast while remembering Dumbledore's violation formed shields that hummed with righteous anger. Stupefy fueled by memories of the warehouse guards' violence hit practice targets with devastating force. Every spell became more than the sum of its parts when backed by genuine emotion.
But it was the Daily Prophet that consumed Adam's attention as winter slowly loosened its grip on London. He'd learned to steal copies from wizarding sympathizers—a newsstand owner near Charing Cross who definitely saw more than he should, a coffee shop proprietor who kept magical periodicals behind the counter. Adam would read them through grimy windows or snatch discarded copies from rubbish bins, desperate for any glimpse into the world he was trying to infiltrate.
February's headlines made his stomach churn with frustration: "Philosopher's Stone Incident—Details Classified." "Dumbledore Denies Danger to Students." "Harry Potter: The Boy Who Lived Again."
"I know what happened. Quirrell was possessed. Voldemort tried to steal the Stone. The Dark Lord is still out there, and nobody's talking about it."
Adam tried writing an anonymous warning letter, thinking written words might bypass the gibberish curse. But when he set quill to parchment, the results were even worse than speech: "Voldemort is—PURPLE BANANA DARK LORD—planning to—DANCE WITH SINGING TEAPOTS—using—MAGICAL RAINBOW PONIES!"
Every method of communication failed. The curse was absolute, unbreakable, perfectly designed to keep him from sharing what he knew.
But one article caught his attention like a fishhook: "Chamber of Secrets: Ancient Legend or Modern Threat?—Hogwarts History Revisited." Published in late February, months before the events Adam remembered from the second book. The basilisk was stirring. Ginny Weasley was about to find Tom Riddle's diary. Students would be petrified, and Hermione would figure out the truth while everyone else flailed in confusion.
"I can't warn them. But I could be there when it happens."
The thought crystallized into desperate certainty. He needed to reach Hogwarts. Not as a student—that ship had sailed when he was rejected at Platform Nine and Three-Quarters—but as someone with legitimate business at the school. A merchant, perhaps. A supplier. Someone who belonged in the magical world and had reason to visit the castle.
But first, he needed an identity that would let him through the Leaky Cauldron's door.
March arrived with melting snow and the first hints of spring warmth, and Adam's SP total had climbed to 1,800 points through constant mission completion. Street magic performed for Muggle tourists (they thought it was clever tricks). Minor chaos caused by making pigeons follow specific people. Objects mysteriously rearranged to create small inconveniences for rude shopkeepers.
Every mission brought him closer to his goal: False Wizarding ID - 1,000 SP.
Adam sat in his current hideout—a maintenance room in an abandoned office building—and stared at the System Shop interface. This purchase would change everything. Once he had magical identification, he could enter Diagon Alley legally. He could rent a room, open accounts, become real in the magical world.
His finger trembled over the confirmation button.
"This is it. This is the moment everything changes."
Adam confirmed the purchase: [False Wizarding ID - 1,000 SP].
The world shimmered around him like heat haze, reality bending to accommodate the System's will. Documents materialized in his hands: an official-looking ID card with his photograph (how had the System obtained it?), birth records showing him as a homeschooled wizard, educational documentation signed by a guardian named Marcus Wright (deceased), and even a death certificate for said guardian dated six months prior.
The craftsmanship was perfect. Too perfect. Every detail was authentic, every signature genuine, every seal properly applied. This wasn't forgery—this was retroactive reality alteration, the System reaching into the past and creating a history that had never existed.
"It doesn't just give me power. It changes the world to accommodate that power."
The implications were terrifying and exhilarating in equal measure. If the System could alter Ministry records, what else could it change? What other impossibilities were waiting in its shop, hidden behind point costs and cryptic descriptions?
But those questions were for later. Right now, Adam Wright had an identity. He had legitimacy. He had the right to exist in the magical world.
And tomorrow, he was going to walk through the Leaky Cauldron's door.
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