"I'm not going."
"Are we friends or not?"
"I'm not going."
"Not even a little favor?"
"I'm not going."
"You'd really let me lose face in front of the first-years?"
"I'm not going."
That was the conversation between Sean and Fred. Sean's stance was crystal clear. A first-year party sounded unbearably dull. Going there would be nothing but a waste of time.
Yet in the end, Sean still agreed.
Fred promised to owe him three favors.
A favor owed could turn into a kind of karmic bond—especially when it involved someone who mattered.
Fred's destiny was death.
Sean wanted to change that outcome through his own influence.
"I'll show up for a bit," Sean warned ahead of time. "Don't expect me to stay long."
"That's fine, that's fine! Just show your face and that's enough," Fred said happily.
Sean glanced at him and added calmly, "Don't forget. Three things before we graduate."
Fred hooked an arm around George's shoulder and thumped his chest confidently.
"Don't worry. We keep our promises."
"We? I never said anything," George replied, brushing Fred's arm away in disgust.
"Aren't we brothers?"
"Percy's your brother too."
"That's different."
The twins immediately fell back into their usual bickering.
Sean carried Jerry back to the dormitory. As soon as he entered the Slytherin common room, Theo waved him over.
"Sean, where have you been?" Theo asked.
"I went to see Hagrid. What's up?"
"You should go to Professor Snape's office," Theo said. "Mr. Malfoy wants to see you."
"Malfoy? You mean Lucius Malfoy?"
Theo nodded.
Sean paused for a moment, then suddenly understood why Lucius wanted to meet him.
It had already been a week since school started, yet nothing dangerous had happened at Hogwarts.
For Lucius, that was abnormal.
He needed to confirm personally whether the seed he had planted had begun to sprout.
The diary of Tom Riddle that Lucius secretly gave Sean had long since been tossed into the Room of Requirement. Inside that place, the diary might as well cry to the heavens for help and receive none.
Lucius's original plan was to use Sean to open the Chamber of Secrets, release the basilisk, and purge Hogwarts of impure bloodlines.
But Hogwarts remained peaceful.
Lucius was getting anxious.
So he came to the school himself.
After returning Jerry to the dormitory, Sean headed straight to Snape's office.
Snape sat behind his desk, expression as calm as ever.
Lucius stood nearby. When Sean entered, Lucius's expression flickered. He seemed eager to learn something, though he restrained himself carefully.
"Professor. Mr. Malfoy," Sean greeted politely.
"Lucius," Snape said coldly, "whatever you wish to discuss with Sean, you may do so here."
Snape knew Lucius very well.
Both of them had once served under Voldemort. Snape knew exactly what kind of man Lucius was.
By refusing to let Lucius speak to Sean alone, Snape was protecting him.
Lucius lifted his chin arrogantly, looking down at Sean. The friendly demeanor he once showed at Malfoy Manor had vanished.
"Grylls. How is your new school term going?"
Sean smiled slightly.
"Quite well. But I assume you didn't come all the way here just to ask about my campus life, Mr. Malfoy?"
Of course, Lucius couldn't reveal his true purpose directly.
Snape was standing right there. Even the slightest mention of the diary might raise suspicion.
"Why not?" Lucius replied smoothly. "I am a Hogwarts governor and a Slytherin alumnus. With such an outstanding student in Slytherin, I should have visited the school long ago."
He spoke beautifully polished words.
But the other two men in the room both knew his true nature.
"Have you read the book I gave you during the summer?" Lucius finally reached the point.
Snape's brows immediately knitted together.
"You met him during the summer?" he asked Sean.
"Mr. Malfoy invited me to his manor," Sean answered honestly.
"Lucius." Snape's cold gaze shifted toward Lucius.
Lucius immediately spun another polished explanation.
"An excellent student like Grylls deserves encouragement. I invited him to meet Draco in advance so that Draco could learn from him."
Sean adjusted his expression, pretending to look apologetic.
"I'm sorry, Mr. Malfoy. I left the books you gave me at the Leaky Cauldron. I haven't had much chance to read them."
Lucius suddenly stepped forward.
"All of them were left at the Leaky Cauldron?"
He deliberately used the word all.
Snape knew about the existence of a notebook, but he didn't know where it was. If Lucius mentioned it directly, Snape might grow suspicious.
"Yes," Sean said firmly. "I only brought my textbooks back to school."
Snape asked sharply, "What books did he give you?"
"The Stalkers of Albania," Sean replied. "A banned book about dark magic."
Lucius showed no panic at all.
In fact, he seemed slightly relieved. He shot Snape a disdainful glance.
"What's wrong, Severus? Haven't you read such books before? A young wizard like Grylls should learn magic with greater power."
Sean silently complained to himself.
You certainly know how to talk.
That book did contain several dark spells, but the strongest one had only eight magical frameworks. Compared to the Shadow of Bone Erosion Sean had secretly learned from Jovic, it was nothing impressive.
In truth, the book had always been a smokescreen.
Lucius's real goal was the diary.
Snape was completely fooled by the decoy.
And Sean deliberately avoided mentioning the diary.
Snape simply assumed Lucius had been trying to indoctrinate Sean with dark magic.
"Grylls, leave us," Snape said.
Sean nodded and stepped outside.
The moment he exited, Snape flicked his wand. The office door slammed shut behind him, and raised voices could soon be heard inside.
Snape was not the tolerant, kindly figure that Dumbledore was.
He was furious that Lucius had privately approached Sean and given him a dark magic book. The two men quickly began arguing.
After leaving Hogwarts, Lucius went straight to the Leaky Cauldron.
Tom the bartender recognized him immediately and was surprised to see such an aristocratic figure in his humble pub.
"Mr. Malfoy, how can I help you?"
"Where is Sean Grylls's room? Take me there," Lucius ordered.
"Sir… has something happened to Sean?" Tom asked cautiously.
"He's perfectly fine," Lucius replied coldly. "I simply need to retrieve something I gave him."
He tossed ten Galleons onto the counter.
Tom pocketed the coins and led Lucius upstairs to the small storage room where Sean lived.
After opening the door, Lucius hurried inside.
He searched Sean's old wooden desk. The tabletop was clean except for a wooden teacup.
He opened the drawers.
Tom stood behind him, lips moving slightly as if he wanted to say something—but in the end he said nothing.
In the second drawer, Lucius found The Stalkers of Albania.
But there was no diary.
His movements became faster. He opened every drawer of the desk.
Still no diary.
Lucius's face twisted in fury.
Luckily, he had his back to Tom.
"Where is the diary?" Lucius demanded through clenched teeth.
"What diary?" Tom asked, confused.
"The diary I gave Grylls!" Lucius's eyes seemed ready to burst from his head.
"Maybe he brought it to Hogwarts," Tom suggested.
"Impossible!" Lucius snapped.
He believed Sean hadn't taken it to school.
Or rather, he believed in the diary's power.
Once someone opened it, even if they didn't write anything inside, the diary would slowly influence them.
But Lucius believed it was merely a dark magical artifact created by Voldemort.
He didn't realize it was actually a Horcrux—containing a fragment of Voldemort's soul.
Now the diary had vanished.
Lucius was nearly losing his mind.
His plan to purge Hogwarts had failed.
Meanwhile, Sean walked into the Great Hall with the Weasley twins, surrounded by curious and admiring gazes from the first-year students.
Only about sixty first-years were present, along with the three second-years.
After only a week at school, the house rivalries hadn't fully formed yet. First-years from all four houses still chatted and laughed together.
In another month or two, that harmony would likely disappear.
"Senior, I heard you sneaked into the girls' bathroom last year. That's amazing!" a blond boy said admiringly.
"What house are you in?" Sean asked. The first-years were wearing casual clothes, so he couldn't tell.
"Cormac, shut up," Fred said immediately, exercising his authority as a Gryffindor upperclassman.
Sean thought to himself, So this guy is Cormac McLaggen.
Cormac's comment made the girls look at Sean strangely while the boys burst into laughter.
"Senior, is it true you completed the final exams just one month after school started last year?"
"Yes."
"That's incredible!"
"Will you do the same thing this year?"
"Yes."
"Senior, I heard you entered the Forbidden Forest alone during Christmas and came back unharmed. Is that true?"
"Senior, I heard you petrified your professor in the first Defense Against the Dark Arts class!"
"Senior, I heard you can eat an entire cow leg in one meal!"
"Senior, can you teach me how to become as smart as you?"
The questions gradually grew stranger.
Some were rumors, some were exaggerations, and some were completely fabricated.
But Sean's legend had already taken root among the new students.
To them—
Sean Grylls was the most impressive senior they had ever seen.
To Read 60+ ahead advanced Chapters, head over to P@treon
patreon.com/DarkVerse146