The next morning, Silas woke naturally, enjoyed a leisurely breakfast at home (at his insistence, the family meals had improved considerably), then prepared to leave under his parents' slightly worried yet amused gazes.
He wore a dark blue wizard's robe and a deep red Levitating Cloak, carrying nothing else—all his luggage had long since been tossed into his Hogwarts dormitory through a portal. He only held the cage containing the Niffler. The little creature's tiny eyes darted around behind the bars, eyeing every shiny thing nearby with greedy interest.
"I'm off, Mom, Dad!" Silas waved. Without waiting for any further reminders from his parents, he raised a hand, drew a circle, and opened a portal directly to a relatively secluded corner of King's Cross Station.
The station was packed and bustling. Silas's outfit immediately drew plenty of attention. The Niffler in his cage especially prompted curious Muggles to whisper among themselves, its flat beak and black fur catching their eyes. "Look at that kid. Is he carrying a platypus?" "What a weird outfit..."
Silas felt uncomfortable under all those stares. He quickened his pace, searching for the barrier between Platforms Nine and Ten. Based on his mother Pella's perspective as a Squib and the descriptions in books, he roughly knew where it should be.
"Hmm... this should be the wall, right?" He stood before an ordinary-looking load-bearing wall, muttering uncertainly to himself. Recalling the scene from the movies, he gritted his teeth, lowered his head, and pushed the luggage cart—despite having no luggage at all—straight at the wall. He figured the Niffler's cage counted as "luggage."
Bang!
A dull thud rang out. The expected sensation of passing through never came. Instead, his forehead slammed solidly into the wall, and stars burst before his eyes. He staggered back two steps, clutching his forehead and grimacing in pain.
"Ow! Wrong wall?"
The Muggles waiting for trains were drawn by the commotion. Seeing the strangely dressed boy ram an empty cart—with only an animal cage on it—into a wall before clutching his head and crying out, they gave him even stranger looks, some tinged with sympathy, as if they thought there might be something wrong with his head. Some whispered, while others pointed.
Silas rubbed his reddened forehead, and anger flared inside him. He had already been reluctant to squeeze onto a train, and now he had embarrassed himself in public and been treated like an idiot!
"Enough!" he muttered irritably, fed up with this awkward and inefficient way of searching.
He looked around, then, the instant no one seemed especially focused on him, swiftly raised both hands and drew a perfect circle in front of himself!
Crackle—
Golden sparks burst forth. A portal opened before him in an instant, its stable rim framing a clear scene of a steam locomotive and bustling wizarding crowds. The thick scent of coal smoke and the cries of owls drifted through from the other side.
Without hesitation, Silas hugged the Niffler's cage and stepped through.
The portal rapidly closed behind him and vanished.
All that remained were several Muggles who had happened to glimpse the scene, rubbing their eyes in stunned disbelief and wondering whether they had hallucinated. Meanwhile, Silas was already standing steadily on Platform Nine and Three-Quarters, surrounded by noisy wizarding families, floating luggage, and the deep red Hogwarts Express billowing white steam.
"Should've just done that from the start." Silas brushed nonexistent dust from his robes, ignoring the stunned young wizards around him who had seen him suddenly appear, and began searching for an empty compartment. Right now, he only wanted a quiet corner to catch up on sleep.
Holding the Niffler's cage, he walked down the noisy train corridor, paying no attention to the curious and astonished looks from the other young wizards. He only wanted some peace and quiet. Before long, he found an empty compartment toward the rear half of the train.
"Perfect."
He pulled open the compartment door, slipped inside, and shut it behind him, blocking out most of the noise outside. He placed the Niffler's cage on the opposite seat—the little creature immediately started pawing at the cage door, trying to escape and explore—then walked over to the long sofa by the window, flicked his Levitating Cloak behind him, and flopped down with a squelch like a lump of boneless mud. He found a comfortable angle and rested his head against the slightly stiff velvet cushion.
A powerful wave of drowsiness—mostly brought on by waking early and his frustration from ramming the wall—washed over him at once. Before completely losing consciousness, he did not forget to give the system an order in his mind.
"System... set an alarm... wake me in two hours..."
[Received, Host. Two-hour sleep mode activated.] The system's voice carried a trace of helplessness.
Almost the very next second after giving the command, soft, steady snores drifted from Silas. Curled up on the sofa, with his cloak covering him halfway like a blanket, he slept soundly. After struggling for a while and realizing it could not get out, the Niffler yawned, curled into a little ball of black fur, and fell asleep as well.
The entire compartment fell quiet, filled only with the rhythmic clatter of the train and Silas's breathing.
A few minutes later, the train had already started moving and left London behind. Someone gently knocked on the compartment door, then pulled it open a crack.
A little girl with thick, fluffy brown hair and slightly oversized front teeth peered inside. She held a book so thick it could have served as a brick—the newly released hardcover edition of Hogwarts: A History. It was Hermione Granger.
She looked over the empty compartment, then glanced at the boy on the opposite sofa, who was sleeping soundly while hugging a strange animal and wearing peculiar dark blue robes. Her brows furrowed slightly, as though she were weighing the pros and cons of "sharing a compartment with a stranger/someone who was asleep."
"Um... is anyone here?" she muttered softly, hesitantly.
Only Silas's snores and the Niffler's faint snuffling answered her.
Hermione's brows relaxed, as if she had reached a conclusion. She carefully entered the compartment, making as little noise as possible, sat in the corner farthest from Silas, and gently shut the door.
"All right," she said quietly, as though convincing herself. "At least it's quiet here. No one will disturb my reading."
She immediately opened Hogwarts: A History and immersed herself in the sea of knowledge. Occasionally, her eyes would light up at an interesting detail, or she would shoot Silas a slightly annoyed glance whenever his snoring suddenly grew louder.
One compartment, two completely different states: on one side was a top student hungry for knowledge, full of nervous anticipation for the future; on the other was someone sleeping away, treating the journey to school as a chance to catch up on rest. Their first meeting aboard the Hogwarts Express quietly began in such an unequal, even somewhat comical atmosphere. Meanwhile, Silas's system alarm silently counted down.
Two hours slipped by amid the train's clattering and the rustle of Hermione turning pages.
[Ding—! Wake up, bro! The sun's shining on your ass!] The system's teasing alarm blasted through Silas's mind right on time.
Silas sprang up from the sofa as though shocked, rubbing his eyes groggily as he muttered, "So noisy... How long did I even sleep...?"
[By the way, here's some good news,] the system said brightly. [During those two hours of deep sleep, your body and mental strength received full rest and consolidation. The proficiency for your two main skills, 'Claws of Denak' and 'Ring of the Ragaddor,' has just filled up, automatically upgrading them to LV5! Congratulations, you have officially unlocked four new spells on the third tier of the Vishanti Origin skill tree!]
Silas's drowsiness instantly scattered by more than half. "What a coincidence... I can level up just by sleeping?" He eagerly wanted to pull up the skill tree interface and see what had been unlocked.
But then, from the corner of his eye, he noticed the opposite corner. A little girl with fluffy brown hair was holding an alarmingly thick book, looking at him with an expression mixed with curiosity, surprise, and a hint of disapproval.
Only then did Silas fully wake up and realize he was not alone in the compartment. "...Wait, why is there someone sitting across from me?"
Seeing that Silas had finally woken up and noticed her, Hermione closed her book, straightened her back, and introduced herself in a clear, slightly nervous tone. "Hello. I'm Hermione Granger."
Silas blinked and quickly matched her face to the name—future Miss Know-It-All, the brains of the Harry Potter Trio. He adjusted his posture and responded politely, "Hello, Granger. I'm Silas A. Kirill."
Just then, the Niffler had somehow pried open its own cage door—the little creature had clearly maxed out its lockpicking talent—and slipped out. It was using its long nose to curiously sniff at the clasp of Hermione's suitcase by her feet, its little claws already trying to pry it open. Clearly, it had been attracted by the possibility of shiny things inside.
Silas reacted quickly—or rather, could not be bothered to get up—and simply snapped his fingers crisply.
An invisible force instantly wrapped around the sneaky Niffler, lifting it lightly into the air. As though gripped by an unseen hand, it flew steadily back into Silas's outstretched palm. The Niffler squirmed unhappily in his hand.
"Sorry." Silas stuffed the Niffler back into its cage and reinforced the door with a simple arcane seal. "This little guy is being naughty again. He has absolutely no resistance to shiny things."
However, Hermione's attention was no longer on the Niffler at all. Her eyes widened, her mouth slightly open, and she pointed at the hand Silas had snapped with, her voice rising an octave in shock.
"Wait! Wait! Was that... was that the Levitation Charm? 'Wingardium Leviosa'? But you didn't say the incantation! And more importantly—you didn't use a wand at all!"
It was as though she had discovered a new continent, her words firing off like popping beans. "The books say wandless, silent casting is an extremely advanced magical technique! Only very powerful wizards can master it! You... how could you possibly...?"
Silas was a little stunned by her barrage of questions and casually brushed it off. "Uh, that? What's the big deal? It's just a little trick..." Compared to Vishanti Magic, it really was nothing.
His offhand remark, however, was like a bucket of cold water poured over Hermione's head. The shock on the little girl's face was swiftly replaced by frustration and anxiety. She snapped Hogwarts: A History shut over her knees, her voice tinged with grievance and urgency.
"I knew it! Young wizards born into wizarding families must have been exposed to magic from childhood, so they're bound to be different from me! Oh no, it took me the whole summer just to memorize all the theory in the textbooks. I thought I was thoroughly prepared... but I'm already so far behind!"
Seeing that she was nearly in tears, Silas did not know whether to laugh or cry. He quickly clarified, "Ahem... Granger, I think you've misunderstood. I'm not from a wizarding family. I'm Muggle-born."
"Muggle-born?" Hermione abruptly looked up, her eyes widening even further. The frustration in them was instantly replaced by immense confusion and even deeper anxiety. "You're Muggle-born too? Then how... how can you...? Doesn't that mean I'm... even more hopeless?!"
She logically arrived at a conclusion that made her even more despairing: they were both Muggle-born, yet he could already cast silently without a wand, while she was still stuck memorizing theory! The gap between them was practically a chasm!
Silas looked at Hermione, whose worldview had clearly taken a blow and who seemed on the verge of shutting down, then opened his mouth, unsure how to explain it. Was he supposed to tell her, Actually, I'm using cheats, so don't compare yourself to me? That sounded even more hurtful.
The atmosphere in the compartment suddenly became rather awkward. Silas scratched his head and decided it was more practical to check out his newly unlocked skills first. Hermione, meanwhile, sank into deep self-doubt and panic over "falling behind before school even starts," flipping through her thick copy of Hogwarts: A History even more frantically in search of the slightest comfort.
Before you continue