In the shadowy corner of the Restricted Section,
Lucian closed New World Heresies.
Among the brick-sized tomes surrounding him, it looked almost fragile.
"So that's how it is."
He lifted his iced coffee and took a sip. The bitterness spread across his tongue, sharp enough to keep his mind clear.
1620. The Mayflower set sail. History remembers it as a pilgrimage of Puritans—but it also carried a group of madmen banished from the Old World's orthodox magical establishment.
Among them was his ancestor.
Gideon Ashford.
"Gideon… the Old Testament warrior who committed the deeds of devils."
Lucian's finger traced a faded marginal note on the page:
"They rejected the glory of Merlin and instead worshipped the sanctification of the human vessel. They believed the mortal body was a prison for the spirit; only through brutal alchemical modification could it bear power on a divine scale."
That was the theoretical root of Cassius Ashford's insane experiment.
The ritual that turned his own son into an Obscurial had been a crude, botched reenactment of that three-hundred-year-old god-making delusion.
Lucian shut the book. With a casual flick, it floated back to its place on the shelf.
"A pack of fanatics guided by medieval theology."
…
Half past three in the afternoon. The lawn on the west side of the castle.
Four house rows of school brooms lay neatly on the grass.
Lucian stood beside his assigned one and delivered his verdict:
"Center of gravity wildly uneven, no streamlining on the tail twigs, and even the most basic damping runes are worn down to almost nothing." He eyed the bare wooden handle. "Relying on brutal friction between femur and hardwood to stay seated? Is this a flying vehicle or some medieval torture device?"
"Extend your right hand over the broom," Madam Hooch called, scanning the group. "And say: 'Up!'"
"Up!"
Harry's broom leaped straight into his hand.
Hermione's rolled lazily once and refused to move.
Lucian's turn.
He didn't shout. In his view, yelling was merely a crude way to focus intent. His level of magical control didn't require such theatrics.
Besides, this "Comet 260" was ancient, with a dangerously high failure rate. He had zero interest in flying lessons; he just needed to pass.
So he simply extended his palm, fingers pressing downward.
Grey qi surged from his dantian.
The lifeless broom snapped upward as though magnetically drawn.
"An interesting technique, Mr. Ashford," Madam Hooch said, giving him a longer look as she passed. "Lacking a bit of flair, but full marks for control. Now mount up."
Lucian sighed.
He really didn't want to clamp this filthy stick between his legs.
He turned sideways, gripping the front of the handle one-handed—like holding a broadsword.
"Mr. Ashford! Mount properly!" Madam Hooch barked. "Unless you fancy sliding off mid-air and breaking your neck!"
"Straddle posture offers no meaningful advantage in lateral stability during high-speed maneuvers, Madam," Lucian replied politely. "Moreover, the surface treatment on this stick is atrocious. I'd rather not ruin my robes."
Suddenly, Neville Longbottom was launched.
Lucian noticed an abrupt, anomalous magical fluctuation inside Neville's broom.
"Ahhh—!"
Neville screamed as his broom shot skyward. At twelve feet up it bucked violently; he slipped off, face white, plummeting.
Harry cried out and started forward—but he was too far.
Lucian could save him.
He stayed rooted, drew his wand.
"Arresto Momentum."
An invisible but dense cushion of force coalesced directly beneath Neville—like an invisible net stretched to its limit, designed to bleed away terminal velocity.
But the instant the field formed, Lucian felt something wrong.
His grey qi had indeed reduced Neville's fall from lethal to near-zero speed in a short distance.
The price: the local air had been violently compressed, creating intense turbulence.
The airflow exploded outward like a palm slamming down.
Seamus Finnigan—closest to the epicenter—took the full brunt. A sudden lateral gust slammed his broom tail.
"Get out of the way! My broom's gone mad!"
Seamus's terrified shout carried a thick Irish lilt. His broom whipped sideways like it had been lashed, veering wildly toward Lucian.
The trajectory defied normal aerodynamics—yet it curved "just right" toward the edge of Lucian's deceleration field.
Bang!
Magic clashed.
Lucian grunted, forcing more qi to stabilize the collapsing field.
Then—sudden change.
A tremendous crack echoed from deep in the Forbidden Forest. Flocks of birds erupted in panic.
As if on cue, a swarm dove straight toward the two boys Lucian was gently lowering.
Neville—barely touching down—screamed again. Sweat-slick fingers lost their grip; his Remembrall tumbled to the grass.
Below, students gasped.
The birds ignored Lucian's casting entirely. They slammed into the two boys with brutal force.
The field shattered. Seamus's broom tail swept hard across the falling Neville.
"Damn it."
This was no accident.
This was the world saying "no" to his variable.
Thud.
Neville hit the grass hard. A sickening crack.
Madam Hooch rushed over, pale, scooping up the sobbing boy. Fortunately, Seamus's collision had altered the angle: wrist broken, but neck intact.
The plot had snapped back to its rails.
Lucian slowly lowered his wand. His body trembled faintly from the backlash of "the rules."
He watched Neville being carried away, disgust for this world deepening. "What a brittle, inflexible system."
But some people always find entertainment.
Draco Malfoy picked up the fallen Remembrall.
"Look at this—the big oaf's gran sent him his precious." Malfoy's face dripped with glee. He mounted his broom and rose. "I'm going to leave it at the top of that tree."
"Give it here!" Harry snatched his broom and kicked off.
"Don't, Harry!" Hermione shouted. "Madam Hooch said—"
But Harry was already airborne.
Plot inertia was overwhelming. Harry soared like an angry hawk, executing a flawless high-speed turn to intercept Malfoy.
Lucian remained on the ground, head tilted, observing.
"Exceptional dynamic vision, excellent balance," he noted objectively. "But zero consideration for wind interference on the broom. He's gambling his life on probability."
Up above, Malfoy was visibly rattled by Harry's intensity.
"What, Potter—want this?" Malfoy brandished the ball, feigning a throw.
This time, Lucian didn't use force. Since physical interference would be corrected, he'd try pure logic and language.
"If I were you, Malfoy, I wouldn't throw in that direction."
The voice wasn't loud, but an Amplifying Charm carried it clearly through the wind into every ear.
Malfoy looked down. Lucian stood in the tree shade, notebook in hand.
"Given current southwest wind speed and your arm angle…"
"Your parabolic trajectory has a very high probability of smashing straight through Professor McGonagall's third-floor office window. If you'd like to be expelled this afternoon, by all means."
Malfoy's hand froze.
He instinctively glanced that way—yes, directly toward the main tower.
Fear overrode bravado.
"You're talking nonsense!" he shouted, voice cracking. But his throw changed from a powerful lob to a panicked vertical drop.
The Remembrall slipped from his fingers, arcing high—then falling.
"Now."
Harry dove like a crimson meteor, snatching the glass ball inches from the grass.
Perfect landing.
Gryffindors erupted in cheers.
"Harry Potter!"
Professor McGonagall's voice—shocked and furious—arrived right on schedule.
The ending hadn't changed. Harry was still taken away.
Malfoy landed, passing Lucian with a face full of resentment and smugness.
"Looks like the idiot's getting expelled." He smirked. "And you, Ashford—don't think your little cleverness scares me."
Lucian regarded him like a poorly written play whose ending was already scripted.
"You're not just bad at physics," he said evenly. "Your facial-expression analysis is zero. From Professor McGonagall's demeanor when she ran over, that was excitement outweighing anger. Potter won't be expelled."
He turned and walked away, leaving Malfoy disheveled in the wind.
…
Dinner time, Great Hall.
Lucian elegantly sliced his lamb chop. He wasn't remotely surprised that Harry hadn't been expelled—instead, he'd become the youngest Seeker in a century.
"It's not fair!" At the Slytherin table, Malfoy whined to Crabbe and Goyle. "I'm going to get my father to throw Potter out!"
At that moment, wings beat overhead.
A massive, ragged eagle owl—feathers soaked, as though it had flown through a storm—lurched into the hall. It arrowed straight for the Ravenclaw table and dropped a letter stained with dark-red smears right beside Lucian's plate, nearly knocking over his pumpkin juice.
The owl uttered a hoarse, wretched cry and vanished into the night without pause.
Several Ravenclaws recoiled from the soiled envelope.
Lucian set down his cutlery and picked it up.
No sender's name. But in heart-phase vision, the dark-red stains reeked of blood and a faint trace of lingering dark magic.
He drew out the parchment.
The handwriting was frantic—Cassius's.
"They know."
"The experiment succeeded. You survived. The ghosts of the Mayflower… they want to reclaim their 'perfect vessel'."
"Hide your secret. Don't let them see your soul. Even Hogwarts isn't safe."
"—C"
Lucian stared at the lines without expression.
Then he pressed a finger to the parchment. It crumbled to dust and drifted away.
He lifted his gaze, past the noisy hall, past Snape speaking to Quirrell at the staff table, and out into the black night beyond the windows.
So fate did exist.
If he hadn't been the variable.
Now, besides fighting the inertia of this world, he also faced a pack of barbaric lunatics who wanted to slice him open for study.
"Looks like just repairing the house won't be enough."
Lucian drained his pumpkin juice. The cloying sweetness now carried a faint metallic tang.
…
Lucian didn't linger in the Great Hall.
Back in Ravenclaw Tower, he walked straight to the corner window of the common room.
Moonlight rippled coldly across the surface of the Black Lake.
He opened his black notebook.
Everything from this afternoon—including the earlier clash on the Hogwarts Express.
The protagonist trio's conflict with Malfoy was inevitable.
Neville Longbottom's fall was inevitable.
Harry Potter's selection as Seeker was inevitable.
When he tried to forcibly block the inevitable with power, the world responded with violent correction:
That toad. That unnatural turbulence. That inexplicable flock of birds.
"So-called fate is not a fixed script," his pen scratched across the page, "but a river with powerful self-repair mechanisms."
Observation Report on World Will
1. Direct interference at key plot nodes triggers "accidental events." Purpose: forcibly eliminate deviation and converge on the original outcome.
2. World Will cares nothing for process details—only that the result is achieved.
Lucian paused, gazing at the pale moon outside.
Cassius's warning echoed.
The Mayflower lunatics wanted his body because it was the perfect "vessel." The world wanted his compliance because he was an unruly "variable."
Both sought to erase the true Lucian Ashford.
He wrote the final summary:
3. Conclusion & Strategy:
Hard confrontation in an inertial world is foolish.
If you cannot stop the flood, redirect the channel.
If you cannot tear up the script, rewrite the lines.
Since the result is inevitable, my task is not to prevent the outcome—but to control the path leading to it.
Before those critical nodes arrive, through countless tiny butterfly effects that do not trigger correction mechanisms, gradually deflect the river's course. Until the deviation becomes irreversible, until new momentum forms. Then even World Will cannot force convergence.
Lucian's final line cut sharp across the page:
"On this grand stage, I am neither actor nor audience."
"I act according to my own heart alone."
Snap.
The notebook closed with a crisp sound in the quiet common room.
Lucian stood, straightened his collar.
Since the ghouls of the Mayflower wanted to play,
since this rigid world-rule system wanted to play,
then let the game begin.
Only this time,
he would write the rules.