Draco Malfoy

This time, three boys came in. Two were fat and stood like guardian statues on either side of a pale-faced boy in the middle.

Harry immediately recognized the boy in the middle as the pale-faced boy he and Tierra had met at Flourish and Blotts.

The boy watched Harry with far greater interest than he had shown in Diagon Alley.

But when he saw Ron and Tierra, there was obvious disdain in his eyes.

"Is it true?" he asked, imitating an adult. "Everyone on the train is talking about Harry Potter being in this compartment. So that means it's you, right?"

"Yes," Harry said. He looked at the other two boys. They were both short, fat, and particularly ugly, standing one on each side of the pale-faced boy.

"Oh, this is Crabbe, and this is Goyle." Noticing Harry looking at them, the pale-faced boy introduced them casually. "I'm Malfoy. Draco Malfoy."

Ron gave a light cough to keep from laughing out loud.

But Tierra was not nearly so polite and simply chuckled.

"You think my name is funny?" Malfoy glared at Tierra.

"No, I just happened to think of something amusing," Tierra said solemnly, though a smile still lingered at the corner of his mouth.

"Who are you?" Malfoy asked. "Oh, I remember now. The little follower who was hanging around Harry in Diagon Alley."

Then Malfoy said mockingly, "I remember. That Mudblood who looked like a poor beggar!"

"Mudblood."

The moment Draco said the word, Ron's mouth fell wide open, as though he could not understand why such a vicious word would come from the mouth of a child their age.

Then his face flushed bright red with anger.

Tierra might have been strange to him, but he was already Harry's and Ron's friend. How could Malfoy insult his friend like that?

But before Ron could open his mouth to argue, a thick book slammed flat into Malfoy's face. The hand holding it belonged to Tierra.

Malfoy's lackeys were still laughing at the word "Mudblood" and had not expected anything like this.

Harry, meanwhile, sat there dumbly. Having grown up in the Muggle World, he had no idea what the word Mudblood meant. He only instinctively felt that it was not a good word.

Tierra moved extremely quickly. He had the soul of an adult, and the Huris Potion had strengthened his mental power, making his reactions unnaturally sharp.

First, he picked up the thick copy of Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them and smacked it squarely into Malfoy's pale, chubby little face.

Then, before anyone could react, he raised Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them and brought it down hard on top of Malfoy's head.

The weight of the book, combined with Tierra's strength from years of labor—far greater than that of an ordinary child—left Malfoy dizzy and disoriented, and he dropped to his knees.

Crabbe and Goyle finally reacted and stepped forward.

Unfortunately, Tierra reacted faster. After knocking Malfoy to his knees, Tierra swung Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them and gave Crabbe and Goyle a resounding slap across the face each.

The two lackeys froze for a moment from the blows.

"You! You dared hit me!" Malfoy stood up, his face flushed red with humiliation and fury, and pulled out his wand.

Unfortunately, a child's reaction speed was far too slow compared with an adult's.

Tierra brought the book down again. The heavy book smacked Malfoy's hand, jolting his wand from his grip.

Then Tierra raised Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them high over his head, its edge facing outward, and took a menacing step forward.

Goyle, Crabbe, and Malfoy were startled by Tierra's ferocity.

Malfoy scrambled out of the compartment on all fours. As he crawled, he tripped over Crabbe and Goyle behind him, and the three of them rolled out of the compartment like three miserable rats.

"Just you remember this!" Malfoy snapped furiously after getting to his feet. "When we get to Hogwarts, I'll make you pay!"

Perhaps because he heard footsteps, Malfoy turned and stormed away with his two lackeys.

"What happened?" The proud Little Witch saw Malfoy's miserable state in the corridor.

"Tierra, that was bloody cool," Ron said to Tierra. "Malfoy came looking for trouble, and we beat them up."

As he spoke, Ron puffed out his chest as though he had taken part in the fight too.

"Beat them up?" Hermione practically screamed. "Didn't you break school rules?"

"Will he report you? Will you be expelled?" Hermione asked nervously. "I've read Hogwarts' rules. Little wizards aren't allowed to use magic to attack each other. If you're caught, it's very likely that..."

"No," Tierra interrupted calmly, lifting the copy of Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them in his hand. "Knowledge is power."

Then Ron excitedly told Hermione all about how Tierra had beaten Malfoy up.

Although Hermione frowned at Tierra using a book that way, when she heard how badly Malfoy had been beaten, she could not help laughing.

"You'd met Malfoy before?" Ron asked.

"Yes," Harry answered. "At Flourish and Blotts..."

Harry then recounted what had happened.

"I've heard of their family!" Ron said excitedly, apparently pleased to have finally encountered a subject he knew something about.

"My dad said... well, my dad works in the Misuse of Muggle Artefacts Office at the Ministry of Magic. He said the Malfoy family was originally granted a place like Malfoy Manor because they provided magical services to Muggle kings. Almost every wizard knows that."

Then Ron lowered his voice. "But when Voldemort rose to power more than ten years ago, the Malfoys were among his first followers."

"But after Voldemort fell, they were among the first to come back to our side, claiming they'd been controlled by the Imperius Curse. But my dad and I don't believe it." Ron spoke like a little adult. "By the way, did you need something?"

Only then did Ron suddenly remember that Hermione was in the compartment.

"I only came to make sure you'd all changed into your robes," Hermione said like a mother. Then her expression turned serious. "But I never expected you to cause so much trouble."

"Especially you." Hermione glared at Tierra with a stern face. "Fighting is bad! When you run into people like that, just ignore them. No more fighting."

"Fine," Tierra said. He silently sighed, and after Hermione left, he rubbed his brow tiredly.

I'm so tired. All the children here are pretending to be adults, while I, an actual adult, have to pretend to be a child.