HP: The Arcane Thief

Martina Valentino, the beautiful girl with purple hair and violet soul-stealing eyes, walked through the halls of Hogwarts under a disillusionment charm. 

In her previous life, she was a genius, but also, a shut-in geek with no social life to speak of. At the time when the worst pandemic struck her world in 2030, it made the previous one look quite tame in comparison. Scientists were unable to find any cure. 

Through some luck and a lot of hard work, she was somehow able to make a vaccine that could save millions of lives. 

But, the capitalists of her country prohibited her from revealing the formula to anyone. Money and power were somehow the priority for them. With hundreds of thousands of people dying all over the world, she had argued with them to prioritize the lives of the people first. 

It was too late when she realized she shouldn't have done that. She found out that she was going to be silenced. She was already under strict monitoring, to begin with. There was no escape. They had made these plans from the moment she had revealed her research to them.

The last thing she did was leak the formula all over the internet. She couldn't even confirm whether she succeeded or not before she died. 

The next thing she knew, she met a god who said her actions had saved millions and she was given a wish.

Of course, she chose reincarnation in the Harry Potter world. 

The god had said some warnings like the world would be different and dangerous or to choose another wish etc. But she hadn't paid any attention to that. She had just wanted to do magic and experience Hogwarts life.

Only after being reincarnated did she realize what God had meant by "different". This world was different for sure. 

So different that there was no Harry Potter in this world. 

No, seriously: WTF?!

After overcoming her surprise, she realized that her starting conditions were excellent and she even had a few 'cheats' or 'golden fingers' characteristic to reincarnators. 

Thus, she decided to live her life to the fullest with magic. She was reborn in a very wealthy and loving family which mattered a lot to someone like her who was an orphan previously.

After rebirth, she finally got a chance to enjoy her childhood and also got to experiment with magic. She made a few things for her family business too so that they stop focusing so much on their more... violent businesses.

Her school was, of course, going to be Hogwarts. Where else would she choose? She wanted to meet all the characters. 

Her favorite character was Hermione since she could relate to her a lot. And she was heavily disappointed when the brilliant girl ended up with Ron in the seventh part.

Today, in her third year at Hogwarts, she finally did meet Hermione, along with many other characters, but as expected, many things are different. Like, what the Hell is that Umbitch doing here?! And Dumbledore said she was actually competent?! Did that bitch learn magic in this world or Does she have a Voldemort sticking to her body?

'For heaven's sake, where is Voldemort's wraith in the first place?! Quirell is still teaching muggle studies with no turban and a head full of healthy hair!' She thought in exasperation.

Currently, she was once again walking through the corridors of Hogwarts after curfew, doing her routine exploring. 

She was in half the mood to go to the third-floor corridor since clearing an obstacle course sounded quite fun. It was built for children anyways. She also wanted to pet Fluffy, if he was still the first obstacle in this world. 

While walking under her invisibility, she almost got a jump scare when someone suddenly walked by her.

'What in the—?'

She quickly turned around to investigate. She could barely make out the silhouette of a boy walking through the shadows. He had a hood on, covering his hair, and his face was covered too. 

He was just walking with a slight limp in each step and without any hiding spell cast on him and yet, she found herself losing sight of him from time to time. 

"???" 

Martina couldn't understand whether her eyes were playing tricks on her or the boy had some kind of magic cast on himself. 

She turned around and decided to follow him since she had nothing to do anyway. She currently had one invisibility and one Silencing Charm on her so she just casually walked while following him to see what this first year was up to. 

Just as they reached the corner, she saw him suddenly disappear. 

"??!!"

In the next moment, she heard sounds of footsteps as a Hufflepuff prefect soon emerged from the corner. 

When the prefect had walked far away, she saw something beside the Suit of Armor move and his silhouette once again became visible, Martina also saw his amber-colored eyes which seemed to glow in the dark.

'He was using his cloak as a camouflage!' She realized. And it was so well executed that he disappeared right before her eyes!

'Hey! Wasn't that a ninja technique?!' She murmured to herself. 

Are all eleven years olds like this these days? 

As she followed him, she saw him suddenly pause for a moment, making her wonder if someone was coming again. But then, he broke into a run!

'What the hell?!' She thought as she quickly gave chase. 

It looked like he was struggling quite a lot as there was a limp in each of his steps, but he didn't stop and took a turn to another corridor, disappearing from her sight. 

Half running, she followed him in a hurry and turned took the turn—

"Aaah!" 

And tripped when something suddenly got caught in her legs. 

By the time she got up, he was gone.

****

Axel breathed a sigh of relief as he finally got rid of his follower. He wasn't actually sure if anyone was following him, but since the system said, he had believed it and got rid of them as soon as he got the chance. 

He didn't do anything more since that'd get him into trouble and he also didn't know who the other party was. It could've been just an innocent student under an invisibility cloak. 

[That was brilliant, Axel. You get 1% approval for that. Total=8%]

Axel frowned,

'Was it someone dangerous?'

[That is unclear at the moment. Unlike AR, the System's knowledge is limited to people of this world. It doesn't have permission to access that person's information. That person is under the jurisdiction of another entity.]

Axel realized who his follower was after connecting the dots. There was only one student who had such a description.

'It was that purple-haired girl, right? So, she's under the jurisdiction of another entity, right? Hm… so that's why you didn't choose her.' 

[Affirmative. AR hasn't taken her presence into consideration in any of the future events. She's a variable that can either be an ally or another enemy to be eliminated, hence the warning]

Axel nodded, but then paused since he had another doubt. 

'Wait, but didn't you say that the Akashic Records is an entity that has the records of the past, present, and future of the worlds? Then why does it not already know how things will turn out?' He asked in confusion.

[That is only the case if there's no outside interference. The future is now unclear after the arrival of that girl into this world and your acquisition of the system.]

'Alright, I got it. AR is just playing a gamble,' thought Axel as he walked along the winding corridors of Hogwarts.

'Now let's focus on finding me a place to stay,' With that, he began to look through the corridors in search of a place to stay. 

While walking alone along the dark corridors, it suddenly occurred to him that nothing seemed to have changed yet. He was still as homeless as he was 3 years ago when he was kicked out of the orphanage. 

'At least I left by choice this time,' was his only consolation to keep his fragile pride and dignity intact.

***

The next day, Axel woke up in an abandoned class that was near Slytherin dorms. 

He was tired last night so he decided to postpone trying to find an ideal location. Thus, he just cleared a place in this abandoned classroom, locked the door, set some bells on it, and crashed here after taking out his sleeping bag from his backpack.

The backpack he had was, of course, enchanted with a space extension charm and a permanent feather-light charm. 

The enthusiastic muggle-born shopkeeper had explained to him that a decade ago, most people used to use heavy metal trunks with an almost negligent feather-light charm on them. 

The enchanted ones were just too expensive and still quite heavy.

But after the economic evolution, half-bloods and muggleborns were able to buy or rent land in the Diagon Alley. And trunks with new designs, better enchantments, and cheap costs were allowed to be sold without having their shops stormed or banned under some silly law. 

And Axel was quite grateful for that. Otherwise, he'd have been lugging a heavy trunk instead of this light and handy backpack with his aching body. He can even take this to his classes. 

It was a bit expensive, but as far as he could see, it was money well spent. 

Walking out of the classroom, he went to a boys' bathroom, took a shower, and then went to the great hall for breakfast.

It was already quite late and all the tables were filled with students. Axel sat at the furthest corner of the Slytherin table, where no one was sitting.

While he was eating, a prefect came and placed a piece of paper in front of him. He had several sets of papers in his hands.

"It's the first-year timetable," he said before leaving.

Axel picked up the piece of paper and looked through it. Along with his timetable, it also contained a basic description of other subjects taught at Hogwarts. 

"Transfiguration, Charms, Flying, DADA, Herbology, History of Magic, Astronomy." 

These were the compulsory subjects. Additionally, there were a lot of other subjects you could take as well. They could be taken as an elective by him, while some had an age restriction due to their advanced level. 

"Dueling, Alchemy, Enchanting, Ancient Runes, MagiZoology, Arithmancy, Music, Politics, MagicalScience, Healing, etc."

Axel sighed as he looked at the list of optional subjects which seemed to go on forever. Enchanting, Healing, and Alchemy, which all seemed interesting, weren't available to him this year. Thankfully, dueling was a subject available for all years. 

'Hey system, how come there are so many subjects here?' He asked in surprise. 

[A decade ago, there used to be fewer subjects. It has undergone a lot of changes after that.] 

'Really? Can you explain in more detail?'' Asked Axel curiously.

[Due to the wars and inbreeding, there weren't enough students to attend other subjects and the school couldn't afford more teachers as well. Thus, many subjects were removed. 

However, now that the student population of Hogwarts has surged exponentially due to many magical families of all blood statuses migrating or sending their children out of their country to study here, and the funding from the ministry has increased. Hogwarts is slowly returning to its former glory and even surpassing it in some areas.]

'...Well, I'll be damned, this has changed as well.' thought Axel as a certain crazy woman popped into his head. No matter how much he hated her, he had to admit that she was one hell of a minister. She's changed everything in just one decade. 

That kinda makes it worse. He wouldn't have been bothered at all if an incompetent and dumb person thought so low of him.

Axel clenched his crippled fists tightly. 

'I'll definitely prove that bitch wrong,' he vowed. 'One day, I'll make her look just as weak and pathetic in front of me as I felt in front of her.'

*****

A.N.: As you just saw, reincarnators are overrated. They're awfully inexperienced and don't take the situations seriously. Wasn't she almost taken out with just a crippled Axel? A true mc is someone who knows how to use his strengths.

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