Students

The next day, in the headmaster's office, Dumbledore finished Oren's daily lesson in ideological education.

He took a sip of tea-flavored syrup. "Oh, right, Oren. The clues about your origins have gone cold, but we can confirm that you are an heir of the Black family."

After saying that, Dumbledore took out a ring bearing a crest and a strange vault key.

"They can prove it even though the trail went cold? Does that make any logical sense? Is that scientific? Is this really that absurd?"

Dumbledore nodded. "It is very magical."

Oren curled his lip. "That certainly is magical..."

"Let me see! Where is the heir of our old Black family?"

"Oh, I thought you were an extraordinary young wizard the first time I saw you. I never expected..."

An old geezer who had become a portrait hanging on the wall went on and on about all the ancient scandals of the Black family.

"Enough, Phineas!"

The people in several other portraits rushed into the chatterbox old geezer's painting and thoroughly dealt with him.

Oren dug at his ears with a finger, which had been made sore by the old geezer's rambling, and said,

"Headmaster Dumbledore, looking at how excited that old geezer on the wall is, does this Black family you mentioned have some hereditary mental illness or something?"

Dumbledore swallowed a mouthful of syrup. "Who knows? Pure-blood families may all be touched by something strange, more or less."

"Huh??!!"

Oren's CPU began running at high speed. No way. I started with nothing, not even a dog. Things have only just started looking up, and now there's hereditary insanity too!

Wait, that was wrong! Not just wrong—nine, maybe even ten parts wrong. This body had been manufactured by the Black family, but the filling inside was not.

Only then did Oren breathe a sigh of relief.

Dumbledore looked at Oren slumped in his chair and comforted him.

"Don't worry, child. As far as I know, there should be nothing wrong with the Black family. At most, they are a little paranoid. It has been passed down since your great-great-great-grandfather's generation."

Oren rolled his eyes. Wasn't that still a problem?

"Enough wild thoughts. Spend more time reading in the Library when you have nothing to do. Don't keep wandering around the castle."

After putting on the ring and slipping the strange vault key back into his pocket,

Oren, having figured out the relationship between the shell and the filling, left the headmaster's office and prepared to find Hagrid.

When he reached the little wooden cabin, Hagrid was leading Fang out the door.

"Hagrid, are you heading out?"

"Oh, Oren. I'm going to patrol the Forbidden Forest."

"The Forbidden Forest? Take me with you."

"No, no. School rules say students aren't allowed into the Forbidden Forest."

"A student? But I haven't enrolled yet."

Hagrid...

"Fine, you convinced me."

In the quiet woods, Britain's strongman, leading a hunting dog, kept chattering away to the little carrot beside him. Other than Hagrid's rambling, only the rustling of dead leaves beneath their feet could be heard.

"Harry Potter, the Boy Who Lived, will be enrolling next year."

"He'll be in the same year as you, Oren."

"I think he'll definitely be a Gryffindor."

"In the future, he'll surely become an outstanding wizard like his parents."

"Lily and James were so exceptional. It was all that damned Voldemort's fault."

Oren patted Hagrid on the lower back.

"Alright, let's not talk about such sad things."

"Oren, have you ever seen a Hippogriff? Those little darlings?"

A strange creature with the front half of an eagle and the rear half of a horse bowed to Hagrid, and Hagrid returned the gesture.

"What a polite little darling."

"Oren, remember this. You must be polite when you encounter them. Rudeness will earn their displeasure, or even provoke an attack."

"Of course, if they bow to you, you can ride them and take a little trip through the sky."

The two of them and the dog continued deeper into the Forbidden Forest. Along the way, Oren saw quite a few strange creatures.

Clip-clop, clip-clop. The sound of hooves crushing dead leaves came from nearby.

A creature with the upper body of a human and the lower body of a horse appeared in their view.

The Centaur said, "Hagrid, you should not have brought a foal into the Forbidden Forest."

Hagrid scratched his head. "You're right, Firenze."

"Alright, Hagrid. Take him away quickly. There have been scattered Acromantula sightings nearby."

Hagrid guiltily shrank his neck.

"Alright, Oren, let's head back quickly."

On the way back, Oren did not ask what exactly an Acromantula was.

"Oren, watch out for these little fellows."

"What is it, Hagrid? Are these duck-billed little things dangerous?"

"There are no dangerous creatures at the edge of the Forbidden Forest, but these Nifflers will steal every shiny thing on you."

Oren pulled a Niffler off his trouser leg and gave it a shake. Four Silver Sickles fell out.

"Nifflers, huh? I'll borrow these coins for a bit."

After stuffing the Niffler back into its burrow, Oren thoughtfully stomped the entrance flat.

Hagrid stared at the footprints on the ground. "Someone has been here. It must be those Weasley twins again."

"Driving those two out of the Forbidden Forest has practically taken half my life."

"Don't worry, Hagrid. I'll help you look. We'll definitely bring them to justice."

Hagrid and Oren searched for quite a while but found no sign of the twins.

"Alright, Oren, no need to keep looking. They've probably gone back already."

Oren had intended to respond to Hagrid, but then he noticed Fang gnawing on a grilled steak not far away.

Something was off. Not just off—twelve parts off. Where in this wilderness had a wild grilled steak come from?

"Shh~ I'll go take a look over there," Oren whispered.

Sneaking around Fang, he saw two redheads crouching behind a tree stump.

Redhead Number One said, "Shh~ Don't alert Hagrid."

Redhead Number Two said, "I'm sure a pretty little witch like you won't tell on us, right?"

Oren's blood pressure shot through the roof. He really could not understand it. His hair was tied back already, yet these two idiots had instantly decided he was a witch without the slightest hesitation?

He stepped aside, pointed one hand at the twins, and patted Fang, who was happily eating, with the other.

Fang reluctantly barked a few times, drawing Hagrid over.

The group left the Forbidden Forest. After saying goodbye to Oren, Hagrid tucked a redhead under each arm and went to complain to Professor McGonagall.

Oren nodded in satisfaction. Without saying a word, he had cracked a major case of trespassing into the Forbidden Forest and brought the criminals to justice on the spot. He felt that he might have some talent as a detective.

He walked back to the cabin, hoisted Hagrid's farming tools onto his shoulder, and began tending the fruits and vegetables in the garden.

Under the blazing sun, Oren wiped away his sweat, tossed down the hoe, and headed toward the distant castle.

He needed to get himself some pie in the Great Hall. If the house-elves in the kitchen had not told him that the Great Hall was where people actually ate, he would still have been going down to the underground kitchen to beg for food.

Entering the Great Hall, Oren looked at the groups of young wizards wolfing down food at the four long tables and felt that eating in the kitchen might not have been such a bad idea.

"Fred, look who we found!"

"George, you found the little witch who tattled on us."

Fred said, "I suspect you're a little spy Hagrid sent into the castle."

George said, "Little spy, why don't you have a house badge? Tell us, which house are you from?"

Everyone in the Great Hall: A young wizard without a house badge? That was rarer than an old bat with two legs.

A huge crowd of young wizards from every house gathered around Oren. Some upper-year girls with wandering hands had even begun pinching his cheeks.

Maxed out. Oren's blood pressure was completely maxed out.

Just as Oren was about to develop social anxiety, Professor McGonagall appeared in time, drove everyone away, and led him toward the Gryffindor table. Before leaving, she shot the twins a fierce glare.

"She's terrifying, George."

"Shh, Fred, keep your voice down. We just got Gryffindor docked twenty points."

George said, "Little witch, are you from Gryffindor? How come we've never seen you before?"

Oren rolled his eyes. "Headmaster Dumbledore brought me back. I won't be enrolling until next year! And do you two have to be so careless about deciding I'm a witch? Even calling me an armed helicopter would be better."

The twins: ???

The little Gryffindor lions: Enrolling next year?

Fred stared at Oren for a long while. "Alright, handsome young wizard. I'm Fred, and he's George. What's your name?"

"Oren." He touched the ring on his finger again. "Black."

"Black? Which Black?" asked a little lion across from him.

Oren placed the hand wearing the ring on the table.

"George, I think he might be a future Slytherin spy sent back in time to infiltrate Gryffindor."

"Alright, Fred, stop talking. This is getting a little too brain-breaking."

An older redhead squeezed George away. "Hello, Oren. I'm Percy, their brother."

Before Percy could continue, another little lion squeezed him aside. "Hello, Oren. You can call me Wood. If you're interested in Quidditch..."

Before he could finish, he was squeezed away as well.

At the Gryffindor table, Oren turned into a merciless handshaking machine while also having to endure the upper-year girls pinching his cheeks.

After finishing a torturous lunch, Oren sprinted toward the Library as though a dog were chasing him.

The Library was mostly empty in the afternoon. Most of the people there were Ravenclaw eagles.

Oren selected several books on spells from the shelves. He only knew a few powerful dark spells at present, but he could not exactly open every situation with Avada Kedavra and then follow up with Fiendfyre.

He sat across from a little eagle and flipped through his books.

"You're the young wizard from lunch without a house badge. I'm Cho Chang. What's your name?"

"I'm Oren Black. Wait, Cho Chang?"

Looking at the black-haired, East Asian little eagle across from him, Oren said,

"Cho Chang? (in Chinese)"

Cho Chang said, "Your Chinese is really good."

Oren's mouth twitched. Wasn't the filling inside him from Dragon Country?

Oren began talking nonsense. "Ahem, it's all thanks to Granny Wang from Chinatown."

He looked around. Madam Pince was unusually absent from the Library at the moment, so the two of them began chattering away in Chinese.

Oren said, "The food at Hogwarts tastes pretty good, but the dishes are strange. Can you get used to it?"

Cho Chang shook her head. "The dishes are too strange. I can't get used to them at all. Can you imagine beef kidney inside a pie?"

Oren bared his teeth. "No, I can't. Who would have thought beef kidney could be used as pie filling?"

Cho Chang said, "If you ask me, that stuff should never go into a pie."

The two looked at each other and said, "Disgusting."

The moment Madam Pince entered the Library, she discovered that some young wizards actually dared to chatter away while she was gone.

She immediately grabbed one in each hand and threw them out of the Library. Cho Chang's face flushed red with embarrassment after being tossed out.

Oren, meanwhile, acted as though nothing had happened. "Relax. You'll get used to it after enough times."

"I need to go to class first." With that, Cho Chang hurried away.

"Tsk~" Oren entered the Library again.