A week passed.
One long, humbling, magical, mentally-draining week.
Each day began at sunrise, ended long after the stars emerged, and was filled with more lessons than I ever remembered surviving in my previous life. My mother had not been joking when she said she'd adjust my curriculum.
She cranked it into overdrive. At first, I thought I'd be fine. After all, I had my old life's knowledge. A head start, right?
Wrong.
Magic wasn't just memorizing wand movements and fancy words. It was feeling. Understanding. Mastering things from the inside out. The theory was dense—insanely so. Pages of magical laws, wandless intent diagrams, rune alignments, elemental theory, magical concentration drills...
It wasn't like Hogwarts' classroom scenes in the books. It was hard work. Even with my improved memory and sharper mind, I struggled.
Mom had me working through a rotating schedule: three hours of magical theory in the morning, followed by muggle academic review—math, history, and science. After lunch came magical practice: wandless energy projection drills, control exercises, and meditation.
Then came evening: study sessions in Potions theory and Alchemy foundations, usually with me exhausted and drooping over the edge of a rune-etched desk.
The non-magical subjects—Muggle subjects—came easier. Some of it was memory, sure, but even the stuff I didn't know came back faster. It was like shaking off dust from old tools.
Math and logic games? Easy. History? I filled in blanks with better context now. Science? That clicked fast. And when I groaned about why I was learning both Muggle and Magical Chemistry, Mom dropped wisdom like a thunderclap.
"Because magic is just science wizards haven't mastered yet," she said, matter-of-factly, as she pressed a chalk line across an alchemical diagram. I blinked at her, then grinned. "Good. That means we've still got room to grow." Her expression didn't change, but I saw the light in her amber eyes as she gave a small nod.
"Exactly. You're thinking like a pioneer, little one." It made me feel proud. For all of five seconds.
Then she clapped her hands and said, "Time for physical education." I learned very quickly that Mom's definition of "physical education" was not skipping around with a wand or light jogs across the lawn.
No. No, no, no.
It was swimming laps in magically resistant water enchanted to increase drag when I got lazy. It was wrestling lessons taught by enchanted suits of armor that did not go easy just because I was five.
It was boxing, bare-knuckled until I learned to earn gloves, and gloves until I learned to use them properly.
The basement of our house was no mere cellar. It was an underground fortress—reinforced walls, gravity wards, and a magical ventilation system that carried the scent of pinewood and sweat. And dead center, glowing faintly from ancient runes carved into the floor, was a boxing ring the size of a Quidditch pitch.
"You'll learn to fight before you learn to fly," my mother said, tossing me the gloves one morning after I made the mistake of sighing too loudly during Transmutation review.
"But I" "Put them on, Callum."
I did.
She never yelled. Never screamed. But when my adult brain started leaking through too much—getting smug, getting frustrated, pushing boundaries she knew I was old enough to understand—she didn't scold me.
She trained me.
And she taught me through fists and footwork and foot sweeps that discipline mattered more than talent. That magic without control was chaos. That intelligence without humility was arrogance.
And that a soft-spoken mother with a Slytherin badge on her childhood trunk could break your guard with a left hook that made your ancestors flinch.
One day, near the end of that first week, I was in the ring again. Bruised, sweaty, breathing hard. I'd just mouthed off during a charm-inscription exercise about how the "old school methods were inefficient."
She didn't get mad. She just set down the quill and said, "You know the drill."
That match… hurt.
Not in a punishment way. It wasn't about anger. It was a lesson, clean and firm. I left the ring with my pride bruised more than my body, holding an enchanted icepack to my ribs. That was when my father got home.
He stepped into the training hall, paused at the sight of me slumped against the wall, then raised an eyebrow as his eyes traced the bruises on my arms.
He set down his coat, crossed his arms, and said in a voice that was more amused than angry: "Next time, try not to be rude to your mother."
I winced. "Yes, sir."
Then he handed me a bottle of potion that tasted like basil and pain relief, ruffled my hair, and kissed my forehead like I hadn't just been turned into a magical punching bag. Despite the bruises, despite the mental exhaustion, I went to bed that night feeling accomplished. Because for the first time in both of my lives, I wasn't drifting.
I have real purpose, discipline, real learning, in mind, body, and soul. And with every sore muscle and every page of Alchemical theory and formula I struggled through, I knew I was getting closer to the person I needed to become. Someone worthy of parents support.
Someone strong enough to help Harry.
Four years passed.
And not a day of it was wasted.
Now nine years old, I stood taller, moved sharper, thought faster. My body, honed through sparring, swimming, and ritual training, was no longer a child's soft form—it was becoming the foundation of a disciplined force in progress.
My mother's brutal-but-loving instruction had shaped my mind like a sword at the forge.
My father's deep lessons in magical law, history, and political structure helped me see that even in magic, power alone didn't make change—it took will, wit, and timing.
I had outpaced my lesson materials six months ahead of schedule. Everything Samira assigned—history, potions theory, magical ethics, Muggle sciences—I devoured. But it hadn't been easy. Even with my enhanced mind and second life's experience, the work was never simple. Magic didn't care how many degrees or hobbies I'd once had.
It asked for respect, or it gave you nothing.
But still, I had finished early.
And now, I had two glorious hours to myself.
---
I sat in the middle of my room, cross-legged, window open to the soft breeze rolling in from the countryside hills. Outside, the sky was painted orange and lavender. Inside, the lights dimmed as if the house respected my silence.
I closed my eyes and opened my mind's eye.
The system's interface flickered to life in my thoughts—clean, minimal, warm. Familiar now, like an old friend that never left my side.
[Soulbound Interface - Status Check]
> [Quest: Change Harry Potter's Life]
Completion: 0%
Notes: Target not yet influenced. Opportunities pending.
Well… that one still stung a little. Four years, and I hadn't gotten close to Harry. But I knew—when the moment came, I'd be ready. That quest wasn't about rushing. It was about impact.
I moved on.
> [Quest: Be Prepared]
Completion: 90%
Subtasks:
– Master Samira's academic curriculum: Complete
– Master basic magical theory and etiquette: Complete
– Physical conditioning standards: Complete
– Wandless magic proficiency: Novice (10%)
I stared at that number for a while.
10 percent. Even with all the training, even with four years of channeling and failure and meditation… I was still just barely scratching the surface.
I tapped my temple gently.
"So that last 10%… it's all wandless," I muttered.
No shortcuts. No cheats. Just discipline.
And wandless magic was notoriously unforgiving.
Even the Harry Potter books described how difficult it was. And those were already simplified versions of this world's truth. Wandless magic was raw magic—no wand to shape it, no incantation to give it structure. You had to feel it. Direct it. Live with it.
I sighed and closed the interface.
And that's when my mother walked in.
She didn't say anything at first. Just studied me.
"Still struggling with wandless control?"
I nodded. "I can feel it. I can touch the magic now. But when I try to move it, it's like pushing fog with my hands. I can't hold onto it."
She tilted her head, then reached into a drawer in her satchel and pulled out something that shimmered softly—leather-bound, old, and humming with quiet magic.
She handed it to me.
A tome. Wrapped in thread that glowed faintly in the presence of my magic.
"This," she said, "was your grandfather's."
I looked up, stunned. "Your father?"
She nodded. "A master of ambient magic. He never used a wand after age fourteen. This tome contains fragments of his journey—how he learned to touch magic with more than power. How he blended teachings from Eastern philosophy, Ethiopian spell weaving, and Native American magic."
I opened the first page. The script was tight, elegant, and hand-inked. On the inside cover was a quote:
> "A wand is a torch. Useful for focus, yes. But fire exists with or without it."
Page after page, I saw how he studied magic like a flowing force—not to command, but to understand. He meditated with the elements. He walked barefoot through magical forests to feel how ambient energy pooled. He used mantras, breathing techniques, martial forms.
He lived his magic.
It wasn't about control. It was about harmony.
A thought struck me then. One from my old life. A connection.
Avatar: The Last Airbender.
Control the flow. Flow with the element. Not fight it. Be with it.
I took the tome, went back to my meditation circle, and sat for hours. Hours.
Breathing in.
Feeling the ambient magic not like a weapon to wield, but a tide to move with.
The first step was fear.
I felt it everywhere—magic, thick in the walls, in the floor, humming beneath my skin like ocean water waiting to drown me. It was terrifying.
But I didn't run from it.
I breathed into it.
Let it surround me. Let it fill me. Let it be me.
And after what felt like hours of stillness, I felt it click.
A ripple of warmth surged through my bones.
A shimmer passed behind my eyes.
And then…
> [System Notification]
New Abilities Unlocked:
– Telekinesis (Minor)
– Magic Sense (Passive)
– Wandless Magic (Tier 1: Activated)
My eyes snapped open.
And I felt it.
Not saw. Not heard. Felt.
Magic.
Everywhere.
It was like I had been colorblind and suddenly discovered red. The air was alive. The magic in our home—woven through every wall and thread—was no longer invisible. It glowed around me. It felt like standing in the middle of the ocean during a still storm—vast, heavy, infinite.
For a moment, I was afraid.
Then I smiled.
Now I understand.
I stood, still trembling from the depth of it, and ran to find my mother—my teacher, my protector, the woman who'd believed I could become more. "Mom!" I shouted, heart thudding. "It worked. I felt it. I unlocked it." The tome was still in my hand. My breath short. My hands tingling with the aftertaste of ambient flow. She turned toward me slowly, eyes calm. She smiled.