There were some things in life that only ever came in two numbers: zero times, or countless times.
Once Tom had tasted Extraordinary Mode, his brain had immediately started counting the next one, and the one after that. Second time. Third time. Fourth. Like a greedy kid who had taken one bite of cake and decided the whole bakery belonged to him.
Unfortunately, his wallet did not share that ambition.
Since awakening the system over a month ago, he had been grinding like a man possessed. He had squeezed time from cracks in the day, burned midnight oil, and basically treated "rest" as a rumor. Even so, he had only managed to save up a few hundred credits.
It was not that he was lazy. It was that every day came with expenses.
The Learning Space was a bottomless pit, and Tom kept throwing time into it. Three hours on a good day, six or seven on a bad one. Add the constant use, the practice, the small costs that came with pushing his limits, and the result was painfully obvious.
His achievement points were doing much better. In fact, after the past few days of learning spells and picking up all sorts of minor achievements, he was nearly at one hundred.
The number stared back at him like a temptation.
A hundred achievement points meant one thing: he could summon another teacher.
Tom felt the idea sprout in his mind and immediately begin growing into a full sized plan.
Should he do it?
One hundred points could call forth a "Peerless Talent of an Era" level mentor. Andros was great in every way that mattered, but he had one fatal weakness: he did not understand the modern system. He was a genius from another age. Most of what he taught Tom was either based on his own old framework, or it was Tom learning something from a book first and then having Andros polish it, correct it, and elevate it.
That worked, but it was slow, and some of Andros's truly terrifying spells were, by today's standards, ancient magic.
Ancient magic was not like learning a new charm from a school textbook. Ancient magic was a whole lifestyle commitment.
You needed deep theory to even begin. You needed foundations that most modern wizards never touched. Then you needed languages. Not "I can order tea in French" languages, but old magical scripts that carried power in their very shapes.
Ancient runes.
Cretan.
Mycenaean.
And even Ionian dialects, the kind of language used to write the Iliad and the Odyssey. That too was a kind of power script, a way of shaping magic through words that were older than the world Tom was living in.
In other words, it was a pain.
Right now, the only spells Tom had that truly belonged to Andros's era were the Patronus Charm, the shockwave spell he had used on Zabini and the others, and the two defensive spells he had just acquired.
Everything else he was learning was basic. Solid, useful, necessary, but still basic. The better, higher level material was simply not available to a first year.
The Restricted Section might have what he needed, but Tom only had to think about his name, his background, and his House to feel a cold, sensible warning settle in his chest.
Fine.
He was not going to wander into the Restricted Section this early.
It was basically poking the old headmaster's sore spot with a stick and asking what happened next.
By now, Tom had also finally realized something he should have realized sooner.
Being sorted into Slytherin was not just "fate."
Andros had played a huge part in it.
The Sorting Hat had said one sentence that mattered more than everything else it had babbled: his magic was even purer and more ancient than Salazar's.
That had to be it.
When Tom had drawn Andros's magical talent, something in him had changed. The foundation of his magic, its texture, its "age," the way it felt to the Hat, all of it had shifted.
Slytherin worshiped bloodlines, but if you talked about purity of magic alone, Tom was practically everyone's ancestor.
Including Salazar Slytherin himself.
It was ridiculous.
It was also dangerously useful.
Still, Tom did not immediately spend his points.
He forced himself to breathe, to think, to remember that not all upgrades were equal.
A "Peerless Talent of an Era" sounded close to a "King of the Century" on paper, just one rank apart, but in reality the gap was like a puddle compared to the sea.
Talents of an era appeared all the time. Every generation had its bright stars. The four Heads of House at Hogwarts, each of them, in their own fields, were absolutely at that level.
But people like Dumbledore, like Andros, were different. They did not show up every hundred years just because the calendar felt like being generous.
They were the kind of existence history had to make room for.
So instead of summoning another teacher now, Tom made a decision that felt like swallowing vegetables.
He would keep saving.
He would hoard achievement points until he hit one thousand, then pull another King of the Century.
As for an Immortal Legend, that was so far away it almost felt like a joke. He would worry about that later, when the system finally offered new ways to earn achievement points.
Honestly, it was the system's fault.
It had launched him at such a high starting point that his standards had inflated along with his ambitions. Now he looked at "excellent" and felt mildly unimpressed.
That was a dangerous mindset.
Tom knew it.
He also knew he was not going to change it.
…
At some point, he fell asleep.
He did not know when. He only knew it happened because he woke up angry.
Zabini and the other two had gotten up earlier than him. Early morning, bright voices, stupid laughter. They were cackling like they had forgotten the previous night entirely. The noise punched into Tom's skull and dragged him out of sleep.
For a few seconds, Tom lay there staring at the ceiling, trying to decide if he was awake or in a nightmare.
Then he decided it did not matter.
He got up.
He grabbed his wand.
And each of them got three lashes before they fully understood what "morning routine" meant in this dormitory.
After that, Tom kicked them out and shut the door.
Peace returned.
He went back to sleep like a king reclaiming his throne.
Outside the dorm, the three boys stood trembling with humiliation and fury. Their teeth clenched so hard it looked like they might crack them.
They wanted to scream. They wanted to curse. They wanted to pound the door and swear they would kill him, or at least ruin his life, or at minimum make him regret being born.
Just as Zabini sucked in air to unleash a flood of filthy words, the door to the neighboring dorm opened.
Draco Malfoy walked out, half asleep, hair a mess, eyes squinting like he had been personally insulted by the concept of morning.
He blinked at the three of them standing there.
"What are you doing here?"
Zabini swallowed his curse so hard it nearly choked him. The other two did the same.
It was not about "family shame should not be spread." It was simpler than that.
They did not want Malfoy to know.
Three pure bloods, beaten by a so called mudblood, whipped, and then thrown out of their own dormitory like stray dogs.
If that got out, they would be laughed at for weeks. Months. Maybe years.
Especially by Malfoy.
They had already noticed at the welcoming feast. Malfoy strutted around like the castle belonged to him, supported by two big, broad shouldered goons. He was even more arrogant than they were.
"Nothing," Rosier answered quickly, his brain moving fast. He handed them an excuse like a lifeline. "First day at school. Too excited to sleep. We decided to walk around."
Malfoy, still not fully awake, did not think too deeply. He muttered something about them being ignorant country bumpkins, then wandered off to wash up.
When Malfoy's back was gone, Zabini's face twisted.
"I think he's even more annoying than Riddle."
He stared after Malfoy with a violent kind of longing, as if imagining a whip cracking down on that smug blond head could heal his soul.
The audacity was unbelievable.
They were pure bloods too. They were part of the Sacred Twenty Eight too. Where did Malfoy get his sense of superiority?
From his father, that political weather vane who changed sides whenever the wind shifted?
Nott spat onto the stone floor.
"They're both trash. One at a time. We deal with Riddle first."
The other two nodded.
It was funny, in a miserable way. After being beaten twice in one night, the three of them had accidentally formed a real bond. Shared pain did that. A strange kind of brotherhood.
They retreated into a corner of the common room where no one would listen too closely and started plotting.
Nott spoke first.
"We ambush him. Corner, hallway, empty classroom. Hit him from behind. We'll win."
"No," Rosier cut in immediately. "Too risky."
He touched his bruises with a slow grimace.
"The moment we give him an opening to cast, we lose. Did you see him last night? Transfiguration, attack spells, all smooth, all practiced. He looks more like a pure blood than we do."
"And if we fail," Rosier added, voice flat, "I guarantee we get whipped again."
Zabini's eyes narrowed, face darkening.
"We can use a magical item. My family has a dark artifact. If someone touches it by accident, they get cursed."
Nott jerked like he had been slapped.
"Are you insane? This is Hogwarts. This is Dumbledore's territory."
"If he finds out," Nott said, voice sharp, "Riddle might be fine. But you will be expelled. No question."
Zabini fell silent.
Slytherin students feared Dumbledore. They also resented him. Both emotions were inherited, passed down through families like heirlooms.
They did not want their revenge to reach the headmaster's ears.
Because if it did, it would not be "both sides get punished."
Not according to what their parents had taught them.
According to their families, Dumbledore adored mudbloods and half bloods. If trouble happened, the pure bloods were the ones who would suffer.
Rosier rubbed his shoulder again, thinking.
Then he spoke slowly, as if offering a plan he had been saving.
"What if we tell Professor Snape?"
Zabini frowned hard.
"Snitching? Isn't that humiliating? And what if he tells my mother…"
Rosier's confidence returned instantly, bright and sharp.
"He won't."
He smiled, and the smile was not pleasant.
"My parents are in Azkaban. He can't exactly send them a letter there, can he? Dementors aren't postal owls."
Zabini and Nott stared at him.
Neither of them spoke.
Because somehow, Rosier had managed to make "reporting to the teacher" sound like the most logical plan in the world.
And the worst part was, it was.
Low cost. High impact. Immediate results.
All they had to do was make sure Snape did not spread it to other students or to their families, and they could avoid losing face.
They could even pretend they never asked for help at all.
Zabini clenched his fists, nails biting into his palms.
Nott swallowed, then nodded once.
Rosier's eyes gleamed.
The three of them made their decision.
They would go to their Head of House.
They would complain.
And then they would watch Tom Riddle pay.
But as they began to move, none of them noticed the figure sitting not far away, quiet as a shadow.
Daphne Greengrass.
Her small face had been calm at first.
Then, as she listened, worry flickered across her eyes like a warning light.
Because whatever those three idiots planned next, it was going to land on Tom.
And if Slytherin had taught her anything, it was this:
Revenge never came alone.
It always brought friends.