Privet Drive did not change.
The houses remained identical bricks in identical rows, lawns trimmed to regulation height, curtains twitching with the same quiet suspicion Harry remembered too well. Even the air felt smaller here, pressed flat by expectation and unspoken rules.
Harry stood in the narrow hallway of Number Four, his duffel bag at his feet, Hedwig's cage resting lightly against his leg.
Vernon Dursley loomed in front of him, hands planted firmly on his hips.
"Now listen here, boy," Vernon began, moustache bristling. "Just because you've been away at your, your institution doesn't mean things will be different under my roof. You'll follow the rules, you'll stay out of sight, and you'll,"
Harry didn't answer.
He felt something stir in his chest, not anger, not even irritation, but a deep, quiet tiredness. He had faced Dark Lords, tyrants, wars that scarred worlds. He had buried sons who were not his by blood but were his by soul.
Vernon's voice faded into background noise.
Harry exhaled.
And shifted.
The hallway filled.
Blue skin rippled into existence, bones lengthening, shoulders broadening until the ceiling felt suddenly, dangerously close. Harry dropped instinctively to all fours, tail curling to avoid knocking over the umbrella stand. His head brushed the light fixture; the bulb shattered with a sharp crack.
Petunia screamed.
Dudley shrieked and fell backward into the wall, eyes bulging, hands scrambling uselessly against the wallpaper.
Vernon froze.
Harry's golden eyes locked onto him, not predatory, not cruel, just present. Massive hands rested against the carpet, claws dimpling the floor without piercing it.
Harry said nothing.
He did not need to.
Vernon's face drained of colour. His mouth worked soundlessly, years of bluster collapsing under the weight of something he could not shout down or threaten.
Harry shifted back just as smoothly, bones folding inward, human again in an instant. The hallway felt suddenly too small, too quiet.
"I'll be in my room," Harry said calmly. "I won't cause trouble. But I won't be threatened either."
He picked up his bag and walked upstairs.
No one followed.
For two weeks, the house was silent.
No shouted orders. No slamming doors. No pointed remarks about abnormality or freakishness.
Petunia avoided looking at him altogether. Dudley stayed glued to his room, emerging only when Harry was nowhere to be seen. Vernon pretended Harry did not exist, and Harry let him.
The heat came in the third week.
Britain baked under a sun that felt wrong somehow, too relentless, too heavy. Even at night, the air clung to Harry's skin, sweat slicking his back as he lay atop his covers, window thrown wide open.
Sleep came hard.
And when it did,
He fell.
Not into Pandora.
Not into the cool blue light of Eywa.
But into stone.
Ancient corridors rose around him, carved arches humming with magic older than Hogwarts itself. Torches burned with steady, enchanted flame. A wand rested in his hand but something else thrummed beneath his skin.
Ancient magic.
He learned.
He fought.
He flew on a broom over Highlands he did not recognize, dueled dark wizards whose hatred was cold and methodical rather than frenzied. He uncovered secrets buried beneath centuries of lies, felt magic surge through him in raw, untamed currents.
He stood in the Forbidden Forest.
The ground shook.
Ranrok roared.
Fire, earth, air, and ancient magic tore through the clearing as Harry moved, not as a child, not as a student, but as something shaped by choice and consequence. He wielded power that answered not to incantation but to will, channeling it through his body like breath.
When the dragon fell, the forest went still.
And Harry stood alone.
He woke with a gasp.
Morning light streamed through the thin curtains of his bedroom, birdsong drifting faintly from outside. His heart pounded, magic humming violently under his skin before slowly, reluctantly settling.
Harry sat up.
That was… another life.
Different from Pandora. Shorter. Sharper. Academic, even, but no less real. He remembered friendships formed and lost, lessons learned in quiet halls, choices that bent the world in subtle ways.
He pressed his hands to his face.
"How many lives have I lived now?" he murmured.
Later that afternoon, he slipped out of the house and walked to the park at the end of the street. The metal swing set creaked in the heat, paint peeling, chains warm beneath his fingers.
Harry sat and pushed off gently, boots dragging through the dirt.
Pandora had been vast, spiritual, alive in every breath.
Hogwarts, his present, was political, constrained, dangerous in quieter ways.
The Highlands of that other life had been… transitional. A bridge between instinct and structure.
Harry rocked slowly back and forth, eyes on the empty sky.
Different worlds.
Different wars.
Same lesson.
Power meant nothing without choice.
And Harry Potter, once a boy forced to survive, was now something far harder to control.
A young man who understood what it meant to change the world.