Harry Potter: A Real Tale(AU, SI)

Leon was more interested in finishing his snacks than watching the Quidditch match. While he would love to get lost in the fervor of Quidditch, he liked it more when he was the one speeding recklessly- in the air or on the ground.

Hannah was explaining the maneuvers the chasers were doing and how she practiced them to an interested Susan.

'She looks more interested in listening to Hannah talk than watching the match,' he thought slurping some hot chocolate.

The match being the first of the season, it won't matter much to Hufflepuff regardless of who wins. It takes completing the qualifier round, where every team plays against the other team once, to know where their team stands and how the other house's teams are this year, performance-wise.

Leon sighed after finishing his snacks when a thought suddenly struck him.

'The castle is empty right now, and the boogeyman himself is under the supervision of every professor and headmaster himself.' Leon eyed the professor's stand to see Quirrel eyeing every shadow like something was about to pop out of it.

'If only he was as dedicated to being a good teacher as he is dedicated to his act.' Leon sighed before getting his thoughts back on track.

He wanted to use his mental exercises under the mythical creature's presence to mix it up and hope it would make a difference, after all the Un stage was still eluding him.

But with the dark lord enjoying himself inside Quirrel he couldn't daily walk up- swing- to the third floor and lay in front of the door, defencelessly.

The first time he braved going to the third floor was only because he saw that Quirrel was in the great hall, eating. And it had risks too, after all, other professors could stumble upon him as it wasn't mandatory to eat with fellow professors on normal days.

While Leon didn't mind the loss of points and detentions, he would curse himself to death if the professors or headmaster decided to take more measures to keep away people.

'The moving staircase not stopping on the third floor will discourage many students, if not the presence of Fluffy emitting from the door would satisfy anyone's curiosity just like that.'

Leon was waiting for Rose to contact him. He wanted to take Hagrid's help to meet the Cerberus.

'At worst Hagrid only visits the Cerberus once in three days and I don't mind if my training sessions are three days apart.'

At least that was his plan, he was sick of not making any progress, so he got a little desperate, not to mention that he would be getting a chance to see a murder machine who was a good boy.

Now with every professor and student watching the match, Leon was free to be a (masochist) dedicated wizard.

So, he did just that.

He stealthily slipped away from the stands and entered the castle.

'Let's make a pit stop.'

Getting the enchanted rope from Flitwick's lab and the ropes he used to swing last time; Leon made his way towards the third floor.

Standing at a distance from the door that led to Cerberus, Leon waved his wand at the enchanted rope he was carrying, the rope that he practiced animating on.

'That should do it. The rope will drag me away from the door after three minutes.'

He animated the rope to move every three minutes and if it happened to drag a stubborn little wizard away from a 7-X creature, even better.

With the rope knotted around his shoulder Leon lay on the ground and slowly crawled towards the door.

After all, being at the very edge of the Cerberus's presence will make the rope's job easy.

And just like clockwork, a powerful presence emanating curiosity, smothered him, taking away the control of his body.

Settling under Cerberus's presence, Leon started to perform the mental exercises.

One cycle…second cycle.. third cycle…seventh cycle.

The rope pulled him away, letting him control his body again.

'The cycles are a little more difficult to complete and…. I don't know if training like this is helping.'

Leon looked at the door and sprawled on the ground again.

'Well! I can't expect to see results this quickly. Let's just use the time I have now.'

While it was boring, Leon wanted to reach the Un stage as quickly as possible, he wanted to see what surprise his narcissistic ancestor left behind.

After he felt that the match was nearing its end, he left the third floor feeling frustrated and a bit relieved.

Frustrated that he was not seeing any results, and relieved that he could stop the mind-numbing exercise.

He would generally get into a rhythm when doing these exercises but the hard, cold, floor and a predatory presence trying to smother your ability to think made him feel like the time was moving in very slowly.

Leon entered the grounds and was again greeted by the murmurs of the crowd as he stood outside the quidditch field.

'Well! The snitch hasn't been caught yet. Should I go back?' Leon grimaced at his thoughts.

'I will wait for 5 minutes if not I will go back for more practice.' While he decided that and was going to follow it, that didn't stop him from wishing the match to be over.

Repeating the mental exercises over and over isn't his kind of definition of fun and as much as he knows what is good for his life and has the discipline to do it, it doesn't mean he enjoys everything he does.

After all, repeating the same thing again and again gets boring quickly.

Remembering a couple of hours in a day he dedicated to mastering spells like Spongify and Lumos maxima etc to remove all wand movement and incantation, he grimaced again.

Even when his 'discipline' failed, the rewards he would get when he cleared his second trial were enough to keep him practicing those spells.

But those were flashy spells, the mental exercises weren't as flashy.

He munched on the snacks arrayed outside the stadium, praying that someone would catch the snitch.

"Tempus."

'Time's up.'

 Listening to the sound of students, Leon walked back towards the castle his head down, sighing.

Just as he entered the castle entrance the students erupted in cheers, igniting hope in his heart.

After a minute, students slowly started to exit the stands making Leon grin.

'Awesome! Now instead of feeling bad for not utilizing my time properly; I can practice enchanting.'

Utilizing his time to the full extent was the habit that his grandfather instilled in him before he got bedridden.

His grandfather was a military man which coupled with life on a farm made Leon very disciplined though he quickly lost touch with that part of his life after his grandfather became ill. But it still left marks on his personality.

With the limited time of a day, and many branches of magic he was curious about, coupled with the tangible power they gave, utilizing time to its full extent became a core part of Leon.

'Let's go! I am very near to creating my first enchanted item…. An e-item.' Leon snickered and ran towards Flitwick's lab.

Sadly, as a firstie, he could only use the lab when someone else was using it, Flitwick didn't bother to mention it because it didn't cross his mind that people would want to skip Quidditch matches.

An older Hufflepuff gave him a scroll filled with rules for the new member. It seemed having a firstie in the club wasn't something new.

Leon spent the remaining day stuffed in the lab, he even forgot about dinner as he could feel that he was just a step away from natural imbuement, the next stage in enchantment.

"It's time, Mr Leon. The curfew started 10 minutes back."

Professor Flitwick's squeaky voice echoed in the empty lab, snapping Leon out of his enchantment fever.

"What really?" He mumbled looking around.

 "Yes, yes. Take this slip and quickly go to your dorm, Mr Leon. We will meet tomorrow."

A slip floated towards Leon as Flitwick finished talking.

'Where is he?' Leon swivelled his head searching for the diminutive professor, but he didn't find him.

The lights flickered like Leon was suddenly in a horror movie.

"You can show that if someone stops you." Flitwick's voice was heard again.

"Where are you, professor?" Leon asked and was met with no response.

'Hmm! Is it a recorded message or is the professor snickering, looking at me? I guess I shouldn't be surprised if the answer is both considering Rose's selective shouting spell on the train and her uncle's upgraded version.'

Ignoring the flickering lights, Leon packed away his things and exited the lab.

The door swung and closed behind him like the room wanted him gone.

Leon didn't think about it much as his mind was occupied by thoughts about transferring sounds like a mobile phone.

He stopped in the kitchen and collected some food before entering his dorm.

"Where were you, Leon? You shouldn't be out past curfew."

As he watched Susan walk towards him, he couldn't help but feel a sense of déjà vu.

"In Professor Flitwick's lab, I got a slip for it too." He showed off the slip.

Susan narrowed her eyes at the slip, looking upset, and hesitated for a second.

"Ok! But remember rules are there for us." She stomped towards the girls' dorm, looking irate and frowning.

'It feels like I am missing something. What's her obsession with the curfew?' Leon noticed Susan waiting for him in the common hall whenever he stayed outside up until the last minute of the curfew.

And with him planning his day, he always reached his dorm at the last minute.

Leon could see Susan was getting more upset by his behavior.

'I wonder if she would have blown up if I didn't show her the slip.'

As soon as he entered and sat down, the delicious food occupied his thoughts.

After he finished the food, he sprawled on the bed burying his face in a pillow.

'I think I know what my first e-item will be.'

Sleep swallowed Leon as he carefully planned his first e-item.

The next day Leon followed his normal schedule, the first hour practicing the new spell of the week followed by his speed casting practice.

The new spell he learned that day would play a crucial role in building his first e-item. While he had a list of spells in order of priority for him to learn, he ignored the list for today and practiced the new charm.

After his classes were finished, he ran towards the enchanting lab without any delay.

Professor Flitwick and some students were working in the lab as he entered it.

The students resumed their work after looking at him while the professor gestured him towards a desk, continuing his work.

Leon took out the items and spread them on the table.

Time flew as Leon took a firm step into imbuing. And he made sure he was ready for his e-item creation and took out paper cups from his pocket.

Enchanting the cups and a thread with sensitivity he quickly made a string telephone.

If it was all, he just made a sensitive string telephone, nothing interesting.

'It's not finished yet.' With a grin, he looked over towards Professor Flitwick.

Only Leon and the professor were present in the room.

"Tempus."

'Damn! Time runs too fast in this lab.'

Leon quickly stood at a distance beside the professor, not wanting to disturb whatever he was doing.

"Thank you for waiting, Mr Leon." The professor turned towards him after a couple of minutes.

Leon nodded. "Professor, do you know want this is?" He showed off the string telephone, two cups connected at their bottoms with a string.

"What is it, Mr Leon."

With a grin, he gave the professor a cup and created some distance between them.

Gesturing the professor to hold the cup over his ear, he whispered into the cup.

Professor Flitwick followed his instructions with a dubious look before he incredulously looked at Leon, hearing his voice.

"It's a muggle toy, professor. The best part is yet to come, and I need your help for it."

The professor eyed the toy.

"Marvellous people these muggles. The string is carrying the vibrations and when those vibrations reach the other cup, the cup's bottom vibrates in the same way the first cup vibrates when subjected to sound, thus transferring the voice."

'Damn! He is intelligent or… is it wisdom.'

Leon shrugged before cutting the thread.

Now the cups had a little thread trailing behind them. With a touch of Leon's wand, the loose threads became stiff.

A little animation made that possible, the threads try to move away from the cup with little force, making them stiff.

"I need you to charm these string ends to imitate each other."

And he did it. Leon hurried to the other end of the room and spoke into the cup. It was a success.

'Wireless communication is up. But I am still not done.' Leon's eyes twinkled as Professor Flitwick hurried towards him.

"Marvellous, your idea is very good, Mr. Leon. While the charm I cast can even let the other thread imitate subtle vibrations it is not the case for a spell cast by a.. let's a seventh year."

But the excited grin never left Leon's face.