BBS - Chapter 13 : First Meet..... (Patreon)

The Bat, The Billionaire & The Shenanigans [13]

Disclaimer - I don’t own anything. Disney does, Warner Bro does, and Rowling does.

Hogwarts

–Bruce Wayne–

Just as expected, the Sorting Hat used mild telepathic probes to probe the mind of the students to find a few life changing incidents, or some major memories and based on that, categorised them into the one of the Four Houses. It was a surprisingly regressive practice to decide such an important thing using something that was so old, and as far as he could tell, there was no obvious way to change the House once the student was sorted by the Sorting Hat.

The magical school administration, as well as the students’ guardians themselves, were far too trusting of a magical artifact that could snoop around in their kids’ minds. He had actually expected the nobles to have better protections for their children, as their minds could potentially hold compromising information. 

Even so, he was not worried much since he had read much about the whole process, and as such, knew that there wasn’t much that the magical society seemed to be worried about. But he was proven wrong. The society should definitely be worried about this blatant mind violation, which was mandatory to get admission, but since he had the ability to outright ignore the probe, he was not going to raise much of a fuss.

Everyone seemed to be fine with it, so he would focus on his goal. Becoming strong enough to protect his parents. Speaking of his parents, he was going to get that magical artefact capable of long distance communication delivered in the next few months. It was expensive, but when he explained the utility to his parents, they did not hesitate before giving him a truly significant amount to buy it. 

He had to pay it all upfront as well, and since he did not want anyone, even Professor Dumbledore, to know, he had to do all the research by himself, and there was a chance, however small, that he might get scammed, but he had confidence that within the next few months, he would be more than capable of taking care of a single unfit wizard with ease.

Of course, he would much rather it never came to that, but he was going to be prepared for the eventuality.

The uncommon way of his sorting had drawn everyone's attention, but only for a while, before everyone chose to focus on the main attraction of the day.

The Food.

The House Elves had directly teleported food in front of everyone, and no one seemed to realise the magnitude of the magical feat that they had witnessed. The way the matter was teleported seamlessly, with minimal sound, with very little magic wasted, and from enough distance that none of them could see or detect the Elves.

It was possible that the castle itself was helping them, but even then, wizards as a whole did not seem to understand the sheer lethality of the House Elves. If he was not wrong, a determined House Elf could do some true damage before they were put down.

Plus, in mythology, Elves were supposed to be far more graceful, and overall, a higher level of existence than regular humans. Sure, he couldn't take fiction for gospel, but there had to be an origin for everything, right? The concept of House Elves being subservient to Wizards, and for all of it to be accepted as just something natural, just made it seem wrong to him.

He supposed it was just something he would have to research at Hogwarts. 

Shaking his head, he observed everyone around him and continued to eat. It was clear that even before coming here, there were many groups that had formed, and the impact of some of them not being sorted into the same House was visible on their faces.

But in the end, these were all kids, and thus, the concept of tasty food and making new friends made them forget about their sadness soon enough. Aside from that, he had read about the obvious rivalry between the houses.

Mostly, the Gryffindor and Slytherin Houses were the ones who participated in a fierce rivalry. Their competition ranged from Quidditch to House Points to having the best scores in everything, and more. Basically, if something could be turned into a competition, the two houses participated in it. 

It was obvious that even some of the faculty indulged them; otherwise, some of the stunts they had performed that he’d read about in the memories should have clearly resulted in expulsion at worst and outright criminal charges at best. Perks of coming from a noble family, he supposed.

Digging into the food, he immediately noted that despite its unhealthy appearance, the food was actually quite light. Even the sweets did not make him feel the heavy feeling they should. The food obviously had some degree of magic involved in it, either in the making stage or in the ingredients themselves. Or maybe his body was now that of a wizard and one of the perks involved enhanced digestion and metabolism? Or maybe it was normal for an eleven year old extremely active kid.

___xx___

After dinner, they were taken to the dorms. As expected, the Ravenclaw dorm had its own library along with a large reading action lobby, and the rooms were comfortable as well. Maybe because of the lower than expected intake of students, or maybe he was just that lucky, he got an entire room to himself.

He had no idea if the Sorting Hat had orders to sort an equal number of students into each House or not. Judging by what he saw at the Feast, he could tell that both Slytherin and Gryffindor had higher numbers than the other two Houses. Not by much, but it was clearly noticeable.

Dismissing that particular line of thought, he looked under his bed and, just as expected, his luggage had been transported here, obviously by the House Elves.

Freshening up, he noted that the washrooms in the magical world were not backwards in any sense, so he changed into his PJs and got into bed. Even so, he was unable to sleep immediately. Tossing and turning, he eventually gave in to the urge and unwound his sensory net slowly, so as not to overwhelm himself.

After all, he was basically living inside magic right now, so no point trying to push himself too hard and knocking himself into a coma. A lifetime of using those senses in a magic deficient environment had made them quite sensitive, and if the headache he got from Ollivander’s store was anything to go by, he would most likely end up with a heavy migraine at the very least if he tried to push himself inside the Magical Castle.

___xx___

As it turns out, Hogwarts was called the Magical Castle for a reason. Every single brick in this place was full of magic, to the point that it took him hours to learn to differentiate between his luggage, which was magical, and the bricks and walls of this place, which were also magical.

Generations upon generations of wizards grew up inside this place, and during their prime growth years as well, and so they had all left their marks here, or so the books told him. He was still not sure if all the books he’d read before coming here were true or not. Many of them constantly contradicted each other. It was obvious that for every single generation, things inside Hogwarts were different.

Which is why he had kept an open mind and resolved to rely on his enhanced senses and the knowledge within the massive library of Hogwarts to gain more information. Only one of the things he had trusted for years to act as the first line of defense was now functionally unavailable to him. It was such a big blow to his overall strategies. He had never expected it to be this hard, especially since he couldn't just sink into his practice for hours on end without someone sensing it.

It took him three hours to get past the walls of his own dorm without losing details, and the moment he did that, the first wizard he encountered was probably someone of his own age. He couldn't make out their details properly, and hence, he didn’t know if they were a first year or a particularly small Senior, but they reacted after a few minutes of being inside his range. So, he had to withdraw his sensory net and go to sleep, feeling the incoming headache and hoping to get away from it by simply going to sleep.

It was clear that it was going to be quite an exercise to get his sensory net back to usable levels. Even then, he feared he would then get used to the high level of magic here and then be unable to use the same sensory net in a non magical environment. It remained to be seen if he could switch between the two radically different environments without losing efficacy.

___xx___

It was the next day, and they had received their schedule, which was fairly relaxed. One of the prefects told them that since this was their first week, they were going to have a relaxed time, with breaks between classes and practicals. It worked out well for him as he had other plans, aside from simply sitting for classes.

Their first set of classes was with Hufflepuff, the most boring House of Hogwarts, as written in all the memories he read. Oddly enough, every one of them seemed to agree, even the people who themselves were from the same House, that Hufflepuff was the House that had the least amount of action and glory, as some of the Gryffindor House members called it.

He was mostly running on autopilot, as while using a Quill once more was an interesting experience, he had already practiced it before coming here, so he did not stand out, unlike the other Muggleborn kids who had to be helped by the teacher, drawing looks from some of the other kids.

Once he was done with the first set of classes, they had a large break of over two hours before lunch, after which they had the next set of classes. Perfect time for a quick little visit to the library, as he had no interest in mingling with the other kids. Plus, he knew that making friends was going to be a chore for him at best, given the difference in mentality.

So, as the others walked out of the class in groups, he slipped away from the larger groups, noting that no one noticed him leaving, before heading to the library. The classes and the library were clubbed in one section of the castle, so finding his way to the Library was much easier than he had expected.

He had also read that the castle itself was somewhat alive and was always willing to assist the student in any way it could. Sometimes, kids found themselves reaching their destination, even if they were not following the path leading up to it.

He supposed that there were perks to the entire castle being one giant magical construct that could alter its shape, structure, or make, at will. Magic was quite useful like that.

As he turned around a corner, and saw the Library in the distance, with older students walking in and out of the library, with books in hand, a slight smile came to his face, only for that smile to turn into a frown as he sensed someone walking up to him.

Then, a hand fell on his shoulder as he looked up to find a kid grinning down at him. Something about him felt off to him, as he shrugged off the hand on his shoulder.

“Can I help you?”

The kid grinned at him. “Oh, I am sure you can. Now, come on, you were headed to the library, right? I know the way.”