Hogwarts' Letter

Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry

Dear Mr. Skofot Tom Leoqi,

We are pleased to inform you that you have been accepted to study at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry...

Deputy Headmistress

Yours sincerely,

Professor Minerva McGonagall

Skofot gripped the letter, his fingertips turning white from the force, but the Weakness debuff quickly drained even that bit of strength from him.

He stood there blankly, while turmoil had already engulfed his heart.

A school of magic? Hogwarts?

I'd struggled to survive in this damned alley for three years!

When I was hungry, I gnawed on moldy bread. When I was cold, I picked up discarded robes. I had to stay on guard against Muggles at all times!

And now you're telling me this world has magic?!

An indescribable sense of absurdity and rage nearly overwhelmed his reason.

If... if he had known sooner...

He stared fixedly at the date at the bottom of the letter and the deadline for replying.

A thought rapidly took shape.

He deliberately did not reply.

He carefully hid the letter away, then, as usual, dragged his even weaker, more powerless body out of the attic to look for food.

The effects of the [Rabbit Rhymer] card fully revealed themselves in this moment of crisis.

His stubborn attempt at bravado, tinged with a sense of brokenness, did not inspire pity in a place like Knockturn Alley. Instead, it was like blood drawing sharks.

Two men with unfriendly expressions blocked the dark alley where he stood.

"Look who it is. Our little pitiful thing looks like he needs even more 'help' today."

One of the men bared his yellow teeth in a grin and reached for Skofot's pale cheek.

"Let's have some fun."

Skofot wanted to resist, wanted to draw the gun he had hidden away, but the "Strength Reduced" debuff had left his arms limp. He did not even have the strength to push the man away.

He could only shrink back, his spine pressing against the cold wall. His eyes, surely filled with instinctive tears at that moment—the effect of the Brokenness Buff—were full of helplessness and terror.

"Don't touch me..." His voice was weak and trembling.

The other man impatiently drew a knife. "Enough nonsense. Hand over anything valuable you've got..."

Just as those filthy fingers were about to touch him, and the cold blade reflected a faint glimmer—

"Stupefy!"

A red beam struck the knife-wielding man with perfect accuracy, and he fell at once.

Then came a second beam, and the first man crumpled as well.

A tall witch in dark green robes, wearing square glasses and an exceedingly stern expression, appeared at the mouth of the alley. Her wand was still pointed at the two fallen men.

Professor Minerva McGonagall strode in, her gaze immediately falling on the boy pressed against the wall as though he wanted to melt into it.

The boy was shockingly thin. His old robe hung loosely from his body, his cheeks were hollow, and his lips had gone pale from lack of color.

He looked up at her slightly, his tear-filled eyes brimming with lingering fear and the dazed confusion of someone who had survived a disaster. His long lashes trembled, damp with tears.

His entire body radiated a fragility that seemed ready to shatter at any moment, making Professor McGonagall's heart tighten sharply despite her experience with mischievous students.

She immediately lowered her wand and tried to make her expression gentler, though her voice still carried a trace of tension born from anger at those two thugs. "Child, it's all right now. You're safe."

She held out her hand, intending to lead him away from this filthy place.

However, the boy shrank back abruptly like a frightened animal, retreating farther despite the cold wall behind him leaving nowhere else to go.

He hugged his thin arms, lowered his head, and murmured in an almost inaudible, choked voice:

"Hungry... I'm so hungry..."

Those words struck McGonagall's heart like a heavy hammer.

She looked at how weak he was, barely able to stand, and at the most primal longing in his eyes—for food, for survival. All her questions, such as why he had not replied, were temporarily pushed aside.

A powerful surge of pity and responsibility rose within her.

Her expression softened completely, and her eyes filled with heartache.

"Oh, dear child..."

She no longer tried to touch him rashly. Instead, she spoke in an exceptionally gentle, reassuring tone,

"Come with me. I promise you'll have hot food soon. Lots of food. I give you my word as a professor of Hogwarts."

Professor McGonagall did not Apparate.

She could tell that the child's current condition could not endure the strain of any magical means of travel.

She merely waved her wand lightly and murmured, "Scourgify!" A faint glow brushed over the most obvious stains on Skofot's body, making him look slightly less conspicuous.

—Though his excessive thinness and that aura of fragility were already conspicuous enough.

She led him on foot through several alleys until they arrived before the unremarkable black door of The Leaky Cauldron.

Old Tom was polishing glasses behind the bar. When he saw Professor McGonagall enter with an unfamiliar boy, he was about to greet her, but the words caught in his throat when his gaze fell on Skofot.

Professor McGonagall offered no further explanation, only said in an unquestionable tone, "Tom, a quiet corner. A steaming bowl of oatmeal, with extra milk. And some soft-baked bread with butter, plus a cup of warm honey milk. Quickly."

Old Tom hurriedly nodded and pointed toward a relatively secluded spot by the fireplace.

Sitting on the rough wooden chair, Skofot

—Or rather, Skofot's consciousness was somewhat hazy under the effects of weakness and the card, but the scent of food instinctively brought him into focus.

When the warm oatmeal and soft bread were brought over, he did not even wait for Professor McGonagall to tell him to eat before grabbing a spoon and practically throwing himself at the food.

He wolfed it down. The spoon scraped rapidly against the bowl, while he swallowed the soft-baked bread with barely any chewing, nearly choking several times.

"Th-thank... thank you... Professor..." He struggled to swallow as he forced out an indistinct expression of thanks. Tears, brought on by eating too quickly and by surging emotions, uncontrollably mixed into his food, making him look even more miserable and pitiful.

Professor McGonagall said nothing.

She merely sat opposite him, her hands folded on the table, her gaze behind her lenses following him closely. Her eyes held tightly restrained shock and overwhelming heartache.

She had seen students from poor families before, but never a child starving to this extent, in such a... nearly life-threatening condition.

The way he ate did not look like he was enjoying something delicious. It looked more like an instinctive struggle for survival.

She watched his wrists, so slender they seemed as though they would snap with a fold, and the clearly visible bones protruding from his neck whenever he swallowed. A cold fury burned in her chest.

—Anger at those who had allowed a child to fall into such a state, and lingering fear that she herself, or the school's admissions system, might have failed somewhere.

Only after his eating slowed slightly, after more than half the oatmeal had disappeared from the bowl, did Professor McGonagall speak in the calmest tone she could manage. Her voice was far gentler than usual.

"Slow down, Mr. Leoqi. No one will take your food. If it isn't enough, we can order more."

She noticed that even after slowing down, one of the boy's hands still instinctively guarded the edge of the bowl while the other clutched the bread tightly, as though afraid the food would vanish.

That detail made her heart clench again.

"Now,"

Only after he finally set down the spoon and no longer looked so desperately ravenous did Professor McGonagall continue. Some of her usual rigor returned to her tone, but it still carried warmth.

"We need to talk. First, about your reply—or rather, your lack of one. Second, and more importantly, about your... living conditions over the past few years."

Her sharp gaze swept over the boy's clearly ill-fitting, tattered clothes and his face, which still retained traces of exhaustion and fear even after he had eaten.

"Hogwarts has a responsibility to ensure that every one of its students is at least safe and healthy before enrollment. Clearly, without our knowledge, you did not receive the care you should have."