"It's my wand that's in poor condition, that's why the magic failed!"
"Is that so, Mr. Weasley? Then you should go to Ollivander's for a refund."
Faced with Hermione's taunt, Ron's face and ears turned as red as his hair.
He had also wanted to show off some magic just now, saying he could turn his pet rat, Scabbers, yellow.
Of course, it failed. Ron's older brother, Fred, had taught him that spell just to tease him.
Scabbers was a small rat, shedding fur and missing a toe.
It was currently burying its head in a snack wrapper, feasting heartily.
Scabbers completely failed to notice that someone was observing it with great interest.
Lucien narrowed his dark green eyes, looking down at the shedding rat.
This rat's true form was an Animagus—Peter Pettigrew.
He had been hiding in the Weasley family for over a decade, and had even been the pet rat of Ron's other brother, Percy.
Tsk, tsk, why didn't the Weasleys ever think—how could a rat live for so many years?
Lucien's thoughts drifted in another direction.
Animagus, the highest achievement in Transfiguration.
A Wizard can transform himself into an animal while retaining his magic.
I need to master this knowledge and successfully put it into practice within a year.
If I had an experimental subject to observe, it should speed up the process, right?
There are still too few Animagi today, at least very few registered with the Ministry of Magic.
As for Peter Pettigrew and Harry's father's group, they were all unregistered, illegal Animagi.
Professor McGonagall is indeed a highly skilled Animagus. Lucien could ask her for guidance and practice, but he couldn't observe her freely to analyze this Transfiguration.
But Peter Pettigrew, the pet rat Scabbers, is different!
Not only is he an illegal Animagus, but he also framed Sirius Black and betrayed Harry's parents back then.
Even if he were used for some observational experiments, how would he dare seek help, and who could he even ask for help? Kekeke~~
Thinking of this, Lucien unconsciously smiled.
He manipulated a pumpkin pasty to fly in front of Scabbers.
Scabbers looked at the pumpkin pasty in front of him, then looked up at Lucien.
He didn't know why, but despite the seemingly kind smile, Scabbers suddenly felt a chill run through his body.
Inexplicably, he didn't want to eat the food Lucien offered, but it would seem strange for a rat to refuse food.
Scabbers still bit into the pumpkin pasty, forcing himself.
Harry, who had been watching Hermione and Ron argue, suddenly caught sight of Lucien using magic to feed Scabbers, and a hint of envy appeared in his eyes again.
Although he was called the Boy Who Lived, Harry had never formally encountered magic before.
He didn't even know the simplest spell!
Harry had lived with his Aunt Petunia since he was young. His relatives were all Muggles—Muggles who hated Wizards and feared magic. No one had ever taught him magic.
As for self-study from books?
Harry would get dizzy just looking at those magic texts. The books Hagrid had bought for him at Flourish and Blotts were still brand new, packed away in his trunk.
So Harry envied Lucien and the others.
He envied Hermione, who could learn magic through self-study. He envied Ron, who was born into a Wizarding family and had been exposed to magic since childhood.
And Harry envied Lucien even more—envied how skillfully he could already use magic.
Harry didn't understand much about magic, but he could tell how high Lucien's level was among his peers by the awe Neville and the others showed whenever Lucien cast a spell.
They were all about the same age, yet Lucien could already use magic so effortlessly.
"Lucien?"
Harry pushed up his glasses and leaned forward, quietly asking:
"You seem really good at casting spells. Did you have a Wizard elder in your family teach you?"
Lucien, still thinking about how to borrow Scabbers from Ron later, simply replied:
"Oh, no, I'm from a Muggle family. All that magic I learned from books."
Lucien's casual reply stunned Harry.
At the same time, it also made Hermione and Ron, who had been arguing, stop.
"You're also Muggle-born!?"
Hermione looked at Lucien in astonishment.
Lucien's effortless spell-casting had made her assume he was the descendant of a pure-blood family—or at the very least, half-blood, with some magic-knowing elder to guide him.
But Lucien said he was from a Muggle family, and that everything he knew he had learned from books.
That meant his situation was very similar to hers. Yet if they both studied magic from books, why was the gap between them so great?
When Hermione used the Reparo spell to fix Harry's glasses, she hadn't been entirely confident; she had only been provoked by Ron, and her inherent pride pushed her to try.
However, amidst her shock, Hermione also felt a stronger sense of closeness to Lucien.
Among the four young Wizards present, Ron was a pure-blood, a descendant of one of the Sacred Twenty-Eight families, and Harry's parents had both been Wizards, and he himself was a celebrity. Hermione had originally thought she was the only pure Muggle-born.
When reading books about the Wizarding World, she had learned of the prejudice some pure-blood Wizards held against Muggle-borns.
But her strong, proud nature wouldn't allow her to feel inferior, so she had practiced spells from books for a long time, barely managing to master Reparo.
Now, with Lucien—someone also from a Muggle family, who had also learned magic through self-study—she felt less alone.
The young Witch's eyes shone even brighter as she looked at Lucien, her friendliness and sense of kinship becoming more apparent.
Ron, on the other hand, stared wide-eyed at Lucien in disbelief.
"Learned by himself? Magic?.. Magic at that level is self-taught?"
As a Weasley, born to pure-blood parents, with five older brothers and raised in an environment full of magic since childhood, Ron understood all too well the level of the Accio spell Lucien had performed.
He had successfully used the Accio spell on completely unfamiliar items, items that weren't even visible from a distance.
If Lucien had been taught by a Wizard elder, Ron could have understood, but he said he learned it just by reading books?
Among Ron's brothers, there was a dragon tamer, one who worked at Gringotts Wizarding Bank, and a Hogwarts Prefect; he knew well enough what "talent" meant.
But Lucien's…
Compared to Ron's conflicted expression, Harry's was much simpler—he just looked at Lucien with admiration.
After all, Harry didn't really understand Wizards or magic, but he thought it was incredible that Lucien could master spells through self-study.
Harry even felt a sudden urge to ask Lucien to teach him magic.
But thinking that they had only just met a few hours ago, and that they would soon be entering Hogwarts to formally study, Harry temporarily held back the thought.
Facing the reactions of the three, Lucien was quite satisfied.
Not only did he need to build good relationships with them, but he also needed to project a reliable image.
That way, when they later learned about the Philosopher's Stone and eventually went searching for it, they would think to come to him for help.
Planning ahead to access the Philosopher's Stone was one thing, but ensuring he could ultimately obtain it and use it to refine Potions was crucial.
Woo-woo—Ssh~~
A loud, piercing steam whistle sounded.
"We'll be reaching Hogwarts shortly. Please change into your Wizard robes as quickly as possible."