Harry quickly experienced it firsthand.
The growth rate of this type of dragon was faster than in the other world.
In just one week, its length had already tripled, and puffs of smoke were billowing out from its nostrils.
Both Hagrid and Hermione had read books on raising dragons, and the books said that in the following weeks, it would grow even faster.
Hagrid had set aside his gamekeeper duties because the little dragon was keeping him on his toes, with empty brandy bottles and chicken feathers scattered all over the floor.
"I've decided to call him Norbert," Hagrid said, looking at the little dragon with tear-blurred eyes. "He really knows me now, you watch. Norbert! Norbert! Where's Mummy?"
Meanwhile, Harry, who had actual experience raising dragons, continued to play the role of the strict father.
He felt that Norbert was a bit too well-behaved, not daring to rebel against him easily—not like Daenerys's dragons from before.
Norbert: Is there a possibility that I'm smarter than them?
Feeding the dragon peanuts!
"Hagrid," Harry suggested, "he's already gotten pretty big. It's time for him to go out into the wild. Dragons aren't dogs; he can't be kept in the house forever."
Hagrid bit his lip. "I—I know I can't keep him forever, but I can't just throw him away, I can't."
"What about the Forbidden Forest?"
Harry had been at school for over half a year now, and of course he'd scouted out all the places. Normal Gryffindors had sneaked into the Forbidden Forest, but he'd just gone a bit deeper.
He'd discovered a colony of giant spiders there, suspected to be Hagrid's pets—though they weren't very obedient, they seemed to have some indirect connection to Hagrid—ask him and it's just intuition. These spiders were all highly venomous, clearly illegal high-risk creatures.
Harry had also seen an injured unicorn, not sure what dark magical creature had bitten it. He'd used his powers to try and heal it with effort, but the results were mediocre—he'd barely saved its life, gaining a handful of unicorn hair and another foreign curse in return, possibly some kind of blessing or protection.
With so many types of foreign magic, they were all suppressed at the scar on his forehead. As long as their strength didn't exceed Harry's own power, they all left behind benefits while exempting him from side effects.
"No, Norbert can fly; he'll be seen," Hagrid shook his head. He really wanted to raise a dragon, but he didn't want to lose his job either.
"Well, I have an idea. How about handing him over to me to raise? I have connections outside."
Harry was referring to his subordinates; they could raise him in the black market streets first. This summer, he was planning to expand his territory anyway, adding more training grounds, and including a magical creatures training area would be pretty good.
Later on, they could release him back into the wild to live with other dragons from time to time. Anyway, if he got added to the legion roster, the legion's dragon wouldn't be able to run away.
After Harry's training, who knows, maybe he could even become a Dragon King.
Hagrid finally agreed, but he wanted to keep him for a few more weeks, dragging it out until the start of summer vacation so Harry could take over seamlessly, which would put his mind at ease.
As the end of the term approached, there was another encounter with Quirrell.
The two locked eyes for a moment, without speaking.
Lately, Quirrell had been trying his best to avoid Harry, not daring to look at him. Though he thought his acting was decent, he always felt like he was on the verge of being exposed.
Harry Potter was just too terrifying!
He absolutely couldn't treat him like an ordinary kid. Quirrell felt that Harry Potter might be able to see through people's hearts instinctively, without even learning magic.
He actually thought Snape was pretty terrifying too—inexplicably turning into a woman, and Snape accepting it so quickly suggested it was his own doing.
Snape used to often be alone with him... He wouldn't have—ugh.
Aren't there so few of us in the British wizarding world? How did it turn out like this?
Hogwarts was too terrifying, with the invincible Dumbledore.
No wonder the master never dared approach Hogwarts before. What a rotten place, the dark triad.
And the Weasley brothers knitting scarves every day, then the master would torture himself.
Ever since Quirrell's failed curse on Harry's broom last time, he seemed to have finally lost his last bit of courage, focusing single-mindedly on researching the mechanisms guarding the Sorcerer's Stone.
Hagrid's dragon egg was actually something he'd arranged, tricking him into revealing the way past Fluffy.
Snape had agreed to let him through, and he'd figured out ways to crack the mechanisms set by the other professors.
The unicorn blood-sucking in the Forbidden Forest was also his doing, to provide his master—who had high technical skills but after ten years was still just barely out of his weakest wraith form, with very weak magical power—with stronger vitality and casting ability, to deal with Harry Potter.
Back then, if Quirrell hadn't volunteered to be a dog, and during their long association hadn't been constantly tempted into corruption and ceding control, Voldemort might not have truly been able to control him.
Quirrell had done all sorts of evil deeds.
Actually, unicorn blood forcibly taken comes with a curse that leaves one half-dead, but since the master was already half-dead, it didn't matter.
Of course, it still couldn't compare to the power of the Sorcerer's Stone. The master believed that with the Sorcerer's Stone, he could reshape his body without a resurrection ritual, essentially reviving on the spot, and then he'd regain his full power from his prime.
Lately, the master hadn't been urging him to curse Harry Potter anymore either. It seemed that the troll being cleanly beheaded with one sword, and the curse he'd passed on being directly suppressed by Harry's power, had shocked him too.
It let the master know that the famous Harry Potter's title as "the Boy Who Lived" wasn't for nothing; he was very hard to deal with.
At least, it wasn't realistic for him to handle it himself.
On Harry's side, ever since their first handshake at the Leaky Cauldron, he'd known Quirrell was Voldemort's man. At the time, he'd planted a light mark on Quirrell, and sometimes he could sense Quirrell in the restricted area on the fourth floor.
If Snape wanting to steal the Sorcerer's Stone was just a ruse, then Quirrell was probably the one who really wanted to steal it.
He should act before that happened. Additionally...
Lately, the feeling Quirrell gave him was getting more and more...
Among the many powers in the scar on Harry's forehead, the original one was Voldemort's magic and the protective magic from that year that had saved him. He had a sense for Voldemort.
The first time he met Quirrell, he felt that Quirrell must be Voldemort's close subordinate, but lately, that feeling was getting fuzzier. In certain moments, he almost saw Quirrell as Voldemort himself.
Quirrell and his turban—that dual magical presence was gradually becoming one.
At first, Harry thought that perhaps through the power of the turban, Quirrell could remotely connect with Voldemort, and the two were growing closer.
Harry had even considered that if Quirrell never showed his hand, and didn't meet Voldemort directly over the summer, whether he should keep this obvious undercover agent as a lead to observe into next year. Plus, he could check if Voldemort's curse was really that effective.
Anyway, Harry could add extra protection to the Sorcerer's Stone, like briefly controlling Fluffy through the Dark Soul at close range, infusing it with divine power to turn it into a true soul-suppressing magical beast.
Both he and Dumbledore knew Quirrell was the traitor; the Sorcerer's Stone would be hard to steal.
But now, that idea had changed, because Harry had finally developed a further suspicion.
Is there a possibility that the unease Harry had been feeling lately wasn't Voldemort remotely strengthening his connection with Quirrell... but that Voldemort was possessing Quirrell himself?
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