Change

Early the next morning, Harry arrived at Number 13, Privet Drive, fully prepared.

Normally, the first floor of Moonlight Castle should have been empty at this hour. Uncle Mu En would either still be asleep or conducting magical research in the basement.

Harry would stand outside and knock softly, after which Mr. Lucifer, who controlled the entire castle, would open the door for him.

Yet today, the moment Harry stepped into the flowerbed, he heard an impassioned melody.

The door slowly opened, and the music immediately grew louder. Harry instantly recognized the sound—it was from a hugely popular British band.

Uncle Vernon disliked music. Whenever the television showed a music program, he would always angrily change the channel.

He would constantly mutter things like, "It's so noisy, a bunch of people polluting everyone's ears," and so on...

Then Harry saw Uncle Mu En bustling about in the kitchen.

Hearing the door open, Mu En turned to look toward the entrance. When he saw Harry, he nodded at him, then turned back and continued focusing on cooking.

"Uncle Mu En?!" Harry greeted him in surprise.

"Mm." Mu En replied blandly.

Low music rang in Harry's ears. It came from the record player he had repaired while practicing spells before.

Mama, just killed a man...

Mama, life had just begun...

Listening to the song, Harry found everything before him incredibly strange, but... he could not put his finger on why.

Then he turned his gaze toward Lucifer and asked, "Mr. Lucifer, what happened?"

Lucifer appeared perfectly normal at the moment. Still looking lazy, he replied to Harry, "Him? He got lost!"

"Got lost?" Harry was completely baffled.

"Mm." Lucifer did not seem inclined to elaborate and sank back into the fire.

At that moment, Mu En brought out two breakfasts. After having Harry sit down, he said, "From now on, go to the second floor and pick a room to use as your study."

"Really?" Harry immediately looked up.

"Mm." Mu En nodded. During this time, Harry had always studied at the large stone table on the first floor. It was indeed rather shabby.

There were plenty of empty rooms in the castle. Sailors had even stayed in some of them before.

The reason Mu En had not given Harry a study earlier was... laziness.

After breakfast, Mu En headed down to the basement. While Harry cleaned, Mu En brought up a great many books from below.

"These are?" Harry looked at the books nervously.

"These are the books you need to read this year." Mu En nodded calmly.

Mu En looked at Harry's expression, then turned to look at the stack of books, which was only about as tall as Harry. Slightly puzzled, he asked, "One a month isn't much, is it?"

Harry nodded stiffly. "It should... be fine."

Clearly, even he was not certain.

Seeing Harry's expression, Mu En almost laughed. Then he turned and headed upstairs first, with Harry following close behind.

On the second floor, Mu En led Harry to a room of roughly twenty or thirty square meters with a balcony. It was somewhat cluttered, though there was no rubbish.

With a wave of Mu En's hand, a large amount of clutter rushed toward the wall on the left. At the same time, the wall split open with a wide gap, and in the blink of an eye, all the clutter had been cleared into the next room.

Only a desk, a chair, and a bookcase remained.

"If you want to add anything, you can search through the other rooms," Mu En said. He gently pushed his hand forward, and the books all flew onto the shelves.

"You've been cleaning for so long. I imagine you know better than I do what useful things are hidden in the piles of clutter."

Harry nodded repeatedly, his eyes shining.

Unable to help himself, he stepped forward and looked around the room.

This was his room!!

Although The Dursleys had "granted" him a room some time ago, it was far too small, and it also doubled as Dudley's rubbish room.

It was the room filled with toys Dudley had broken...

"Oh, right." Mu En suddenly remembered something and called Harry back.

Harry turned around and saw Mu En place his left hand over his right wrist.

When Harry had first met Mu En, his sleeves had been rolled up. That was when Harry learned that Uncle Mu En's arm bore numerous runic arrays.

After that, Harry had seen Mu En retrieve and store many items through that hand and its sleeve.

Mu En slowly withdrew his hand, and an ancient ring appeared in his palm as though by magic.

"A birthday present for you," Mu En said, tossing the ring to Harry.

Harry's heart skipped a beat, and he hurriedly caught the ring in a fluster.

Looking closely, it was an old ring that had oxidized somewhat. Its material matched the description of pewter in the books.

The ring was not as large as the rings on Uncle Mu En's hand, nor did it have much ornamentation. It only had some profound runes that could be seen upon close inspection.

"This is an amplifier I discarded a long time ago," Mu En said. "It provides roughly a 135% amplification effect for most spells. But if you use it to cast Dark Magic, it only has 80% effectiveness."

Mu En rubbed the ring on his own hand, then abruptly changed the subject. "Harry, what are the advantages of a ring Casting Implement?"

Harry was still playing with the ring. He had never imagined that one day, he would receive a Casting Implement too.

He put the ring on the middle finger of his right hand. The ring automatically shrank, clasping tightly around his finger.

He was still delighted when Uncle Mu En suddenly asked him a question. Harry jolted and immediately began racking his brains. After a moment, he answered:

"The advantages of ring-type Casting Implements are concealment, resistance to disarming, and the fact that we can cast spells with them at any time.

"And ring-type implements have virtually no requirements for compatibility between the person and the implement, because they're worn right on our fingers!"

Mu En nodded, fairly satisfied with the answer. Turning away, he said, "Tidy up the room. You can handle it however you like, entirely according to your own vision. I'll give you one day..."

"Yes!" Harry said happily. "Thank you, Uncle Mu En."

Time passed quickly. Today, the lights in The Dursleys' house came on early, before the sun had even risen. Even Dudley had climbed out of bed of his own accord.

Through the window, Harry looked at Number 13, Privet Drive, diagonally across the street, and sighed softly.

The reason was simple: today was the first day of school.

He had to go to school.

Bang bang bang bang—

Violent pounding sounded on the door. Uncle Vernon shouted angrily from outside, "Get up, you little brat! Are you going to make everyone wait for you?!"

"I'm already up!" Harry called through the door, then hurriedly began getting dressed.

His school uniform had once belonged to Dudley. After Dudley fell and accidentally tore the crotch of the trousers, the uniform had been given to Harry.

After ripping the clothes, Dudley had even known that this uniform would end up with Harry. He deliberately wore it into a mud pit and rolled around in it, then had his group of friends draw all over it with watercolor pens and even stick snot onto it...

Scouring Charm!

Thinking of that, Harry helplessly cast another spell at the school uniform.

The motion was incomparably practiced.

Only then did he put the uniform on. When he went downstairs, he was met with the usual disgusted urging, just as expected.

But there was no abuse.

This was the change Uncle Mu En had brought to this household.

Standing before the bathroom mirror, Harry looked at the clothes he was wearing. Thanks to Uncle Mu En, he had grown much sturdier over the holiday and could barely fill out the uniform.

He straightened his collar and looked at himself in the mirror, suddenly feeling that something was missing.

His hand reached for the comb on its own. Then he combed back the long, messy hair on his forehead.

That incredibly conspicuous scar was exposed just like that.

Through the scar, Harry seemed to see the expressions of the people at school and hear the things they would say.

For a child to have an ugly scar on his forehead was not a good thing to begin with.

Especially when that child was someone who got bullied.

That was why, even if Harry cut his hair short one day, it would return to being long and messy the next.

Because deep down, he was afraid of exposing the scar. He needed his long hair to hide it!

Because that scar would bring comments from his classmates, and even ridicule.

Harry took a deep breath. No longer hesitating, he combed his hair back.