Only children make choices

That evening, the living room was filled with a rich aroma.

Dinner was quite a feast. The pie was coated in golden syrup, with a dollop of clotted cream spread around it.

There was a large platter of fried cod and chips, evenly coated with almond flakes on the outside, crisp and fragrant without being greasy.

Near the end of dinner, William quickly explained what had happened that morning.

His father, Roy, held a cup of black tea and sipped it as he carefully read the letter, without immediately offering an opinion.

But his mother, Lyanna, hesitated for a moment before offering a tactful reminder:

"Dear, this is obviously a prank. You know, when I was little, I received a letter from Doctor Who. He invited me to visit the TARDIS and save the world while I was at it..."

Nine-year-old Anne, sitting nearby, raised her hand and shouted, "Anne got a reply from Baker Street too!"

The little girl sent five letters of commission to Baker Street every week.

The staff probably couldn't stand such a fervent fan, so they wrote a tactful reply saying that Holmes had gone to the Himalayas to study magic and asking her not to send any more letters for the time being.

William was at a loss. He had no way to explain that it wasn't a prank.

As for magic, he still couldn't wield that power freely.

His father, Roy, was silent for a moment. He put down the letter, raised his head, and looked at his son. "William," he said seriously, "your mother is right. There's no such thing as magic.

"You know, after you graduate, I want you to go to Eton College for secondary school, then Oxford for university, not some Hogwarts..."

What Roy really wanted to say was that Hogwarts... just from the name, it didn't sound like a respectable school.

Albus Dumbledore didn't sound like a respectable person, either!

"Dear, why Oxford? I think Cambridge is a little better," his mother Lyanna said, resting her chin on her hand in dissatisfaction.

"Hey, Lyanna, I know you're a professor at Cambridge, but... you know, Cambridge is just a preparatory school for Oxford."

The two began a "friendly" debate, while William looked utterly bewildered.

The scene felt oddly familiar... wait, hadn't he wrestled with the same question as a child in his previous life, wondering whether to go to Peking University or Tsinghua University?

William had even tossed and turned over it, losing sleep for several nights.

"Anne, what are you doing?" William suddenly turned his gaze to the little girl.

Anne went stiff, the fork in her hand still suspended in midair.

Clearly, she had just been trying to feed Bobocha the bacon from her plate.

"Anne, stop feeding Bobocha. She's already had dried fish. If she eats too much, she'll easily get fat."

Biologists had proven that orange cats and fat orange cats were two different species. The latter belonged more precisely... in the domain of pigs.

William wouldn't allow his adorable Flerken to turn into an orange pig!

Jenny said aggrievedly, "The owl stole all of Bobocha's dried fish."

After Bobocha groped the messenger owl's chest, William hadn't let it fly straight back to Hogwarts, out of concern for its safety.

But... the boy frowned.

Earlier, the owl had been lying on the floor, crawling along on its wings and dragging its two claws behind it, looking like it was badly injured... so why were its claws so strong now as it tore at the bacon?

Was it really injured?

As if sensing William's gaze, the owl shifted its big, innocent eyes slightly, then loosened its claws and dropped the bacon into the cat bowl.

It promptly lay down on the floor and began twitching, looking half-paralyzed.

"..."

William rolled his eyes. To avoid going back to Hogwarts to deliver acceptance letters, this fellow was actually playing sick!

Bobocha crouched on the sofa and gave the owl, which was still acting cute, a disdainful glance. She twitched her whiskers and looked utterly aloof.

By then, William's parents had moved from the relative merits of universities to international disputes, then jumped to how many more years Charles would remain crown prince!

In the end, they agreed that he probably wouldn't outlive the queen!

William nodded in considerable agreement beside them. The queen was a final-round contender; her only opponent was that old man.

The owl shamelessly mooched meals for two days, earning countless eye rolls from Bobocha, before reluctantly leaving with William's letter.

On its way out, it also made off with two packets of dried fish.

This infuriated Bobocha.

Though the owl liked to play sick, it brought back a reply quickly enough. But as it left again, it made off with one of Bobocha's favorite cat wands.

Since William came from a Muggle family, the school would send a teacher to visit in two days. Clearly, Hogwarts was long accustomed to distrust from Muggle parents.

Not every parent was easygoing enough to hand their eleven-year-old child over to a school of unknown origin.

Especially one that called itself a school of magic.

It was like suddenly running into a charlatan in the Celestial Empire one day who claimed to be Han Li, an expelled disciple of the Qingyun Sect, and said that your son had extraordinary bones and was a once-in-a-century genius whom he wanted to take to Yuzhang Academy for further study... someone like that would most likely be beaten until his own mother couldn't recognize him.

But the Hogwarts teacher wasn't very punctual. They had clearly arranged to arrive at nine, yet by the afternoon, there was still no sign of them.

"They're definitely a fraud!" Roy said indignantly from the sofa.

As a dentist, he was very conscious of time.

Ding-dong!

Just then, the doorbell suddenly rang.

Anne, who had been dozing with Bobocha in her arms, jolted upright on the sofa.

The orange kitten curled up on the girl's stomach was sent flying by the force.

A few seconds later, a piercing, mournful cry came from the other side of the carpet.

"Meowwww..."

That finally woke her up.

Anne trotted all the way to the front door and eagerly turned the handle. At last, she saw the wizard she had been talking about for days...

She looked up,

and up,

and up again...

"Wow," Anne exclaimed.

A towering figure blocked almost the entire doorway.

The man wore a shaggy brown suit with no tie. He lowered his head, revealing a face covered in a tangled, bushy beard, though his eyes could still be seen glittering beneath his hair like black beetles.

Compared with his bushy beard, the Giant's hair was relatively smooth... relatively speaking, of course. He seemed to have used a large amount of something like machine lubricant in an attempt to comb it into a ponytail, and it looked extremely bizarre.

To be honest, William was frightened.

This wasn't what he had imagined a wizard would look like. In his mind, a wizard ought to wear yellow rubber shoes and cropped trousers, at the very least...

Hagrid... looked more like a Giant than a wizard.

In truth, William didn't know much about the world of Harry Potter. He remembered only names like Harry and his trio, Voldemort, and Dumbledore.

As for the plot, he couldn't remember it at all.

If he had transmigrated into the world of Naruto or Marvel, he might have been able to use his foreknowledge to make preparations and avoid many dangers in advance, but that was completely impossible in the world of Harry Potter.

After all, he knew nothing about the plot!!

So, should he just not go to Hogwarts?

Don't be ridiculous. Who could resist the temptation of magic?

As for the more comfortable life offered by the world of science... only children made choices. William wanted it all!

(P.S. This newbie asks for recommendations (//?//))