Today's operation went smoothly, but Loren wasn't very satisfied; his original plan had been to cause a major commotion. He hadn't expected Gringotts' defenses to be this weak—or perhaps Voldemort's raid earlier this year hadn't taught them much of a lesson.
He glanced at the respectful goblin standing off to the side, then at the neighboring vaults. In the end, Loren gave up on cleaning out the lot. He had already taken a vast fortune from Bellatrix's vault; judging from the setup here, the other vaults probably held the wealth of several pure-blood families as well. Past a certain point, wealth is just a string of numbers. If he blew through everything he'd taken from Bellatrix in a short time, he might trigger inflation in the wizarding world. For now, he didn't need any more.
His gaze soon shifted to the dragon outside the vault. It had been kept underground for who-knew-how-long. If he took it away and kept it in his small world, he could greatly increase its biodiversity—and, besides, many materials from a dragon were hard to come by. His Martial Refinement (Beginner) had also stalled for ages; finding a dragon as a sparring partner sounded like an excellent idea.
With that, Loren moved into action. First he used Transfiguration inside the vault so it would look exactly as before. Then he set the rod in the door brackets to bring the vault door back, and signaled to the goblin that he was done and ready to leave.
He had already prepared a stand-in as an "experimental subject." After a quick makeover, he disguised the man to look like himself, branded him with Loren's power sigil, and then, through that mark, puppeteered him with the Imperius Curse. As for Loren himself, he suppressed his presence, melted into the shadows, and vanished from sight. Under Loren's control, the stand-in followed the goblin who had just finished checking the door, and they left the underground vaults together. One more rattling cart ride later, the stand-in, led by the goblin, returned to Gringotts' main hall, then exited Diagon Alley and hid in an alley off a Muggle street to await pickup.
Only after the goblin had gone did Loren slip out of the shadows and set about handling the Ukrainian Ironbelly in front of him.
Because he'd sent the clankers away with the goblin, the dragon was noticeably more irritable than before. Blind though it was, its other senses were sharper than ever. It quickly detected Loren's approach, swung its head, and loosed an enraged roar—then a torrent of fire blasted from its jaws to drive him back.
Loren dodged and accelerated, rushing the dragon. Before it could react, he was already at its side. A light spring, and he landed along the base of its wing, sprinting up toward the head. Feeling him on its body, the dragon bucked to shake him off. Unfortunately, both hind legs were shackled with heavy manacles; it couldn't move far and had no way to toss Loren.
At Loren's speed, he reached the thick of the neck in a blink. He shifted his weight off the dragon's spine, kicked upward, and wound his arm. He'd wanted to finish with a spinning kick, but the dragon looked so pitiful that he settled for a heavy haymaker instead. Legs hit harder than hands; with the beast this weakened, a whirlwind kick might send it straight to the coffin—and then all he would harvest was a pile of junk materials.
He judged right. The single crushing punch knocked the exhausted dragon's head sideways and dropped it into a dead faint. Landing lightly, Loren nodded, satisfied.
A quick examination let him exhale in relief: aside from malnutrition and a concussion, the dragon had no serious problem. Loren went to its hind legs and, after a brief look, simply tore the restraints apart with brute force. Whatever the goblins had been thinking, the shackles were sturdy but unenchanted, so it was easy work for him.
Once it was freed, Loren drew out his small world and stuffed the dragon inside. He put the small world back into his storage, then turned to the problem of leaving the underground complex.
In the end, he decided to copy the method he remembered Harry and the others using—dig straight out—and add some soil to the small world while he was at it. While shoveling earth into the small world, he kept his wits about him: the sections of tunnel closest to the vault he carefully backfilled and restored so there would be no visible trace from the outside. He even left that segment intact on his side; with luck he could use the same route to "borrow" a few more dragons from Gringotts later. Knowing the goblins, they'd never announce that their vault-guarding dragon had vanished; they'd sneak in a replacement—and that meant Loren could come shopping again.
Soon he was near the surface. A careful sweep told him he was already beyond Diagon Alley, under the cellar of a Muggle home. After confirming the cellar was empty, Loren rose through the floor, restored it with a wave, and left a magical marker for next time. Then he retrieved the stand-in hiding in the alley and moved on.
He checked his watch—nearly five o'clock. He pulled out his notebook and sent Hermione a message that he had other errands and would be late getting back. Message sent, he returned the notebook to storage, drew his broomstick, cast an Invisibility Charm, and shot off toward the coast.
He planned to snag a few uninhabited islands for his small world. Since he was already out, he might as well do everything at once; otherwise he'd have to make another trip, which was a hassle. As he flew, he sheathed himself and the broom in magic, forming an aerodynamic shell, and pushed to see the broom's limits. With a steady surge of power flowing into the broom, vapor cones bloomed around him: under Loren's tweaks, the Nimbus 2000 broke the sound barrier—but only just. When he tried to pour on more, the broom began to shake. The hardware gap between Nimbus 2000 and the Firebolt was too big; even with perfect external conditions, the Nimbus still lagged. The Firebolt, which would appear in a few years, could reach 1,500 kilometers per hour, while the speed of sound is only 1,224 kilometers per hour—meaning the Firebolt was a true supersonic flyer. In the Muggle world, a personal supersonic craft was unthinkable. The pity was that the Firebolt wouldn't hit the market for two more years. It was likely almost finished by now, but although Loren had the money, he lacked the connections to get one early. He'd just have to wait for release.
The blue sea soon spread out ahead. Loren bled off the magic sheath, lowered speed, and—rather than dive blindly into the water to search—went to ask local fishermen. With a bit of magic, he quickly learned which uninhabited islands lay nearby.
Once he had targets, he remounted and sped toward them. He soon arrived at the chosen spot, an uninhabited archipelago dozens of kilometers off the coast—supposedly. A scan told him there were people on it. A closer probe revealed it was a smuggler base. There were no obvious structures on the surface, but much of the ground beneath had been hollowed out. And what they smuggled wasn't anything rare or precious; the underground warehouses were mostly crammed with Farm Tools. That suited Loren perfectly. He'd been thinking of finding some stock for Peter Pettigrew to manage; now the Farm Tools delivered themselves.
After confirming the island's situation, Loren slipped beneath the waves, severed the island's connection to the seabed, and shoved the whole thing into his small world. He did the same to the surrounding islets and brought in large volumes of seawater to boot.
With that small archipelago handled, he picked up speed and moved on to the other "uninhabited" islands the fishermen had mentioned. He visited most of them and stored them away, but left two alone—each had a lighthouse, and moving them would draw the authorities' attention early and cause unnecessary trouble.
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