Self-reform

It's been two years since that incident in Diagon Alley, I hadn't returned since. I've had a lot of growing up to do but I feel like I finally got somewhere. I decided not to put my heart on my sleeve and trust people only when trust is earned. I had become a lot more calculating but not too distant. I didn't want to scare anyone off, I just wanted to determine if someone was trustworthy.

I didn't just work on myself this year but I've also been working on my magic. My magic pool inside my stomach was larger and held more vast quantities of magic. I noticed at first that my magic pool was filling up rapidly but the quality of the magic was pretty low.

I could of course do more magic but the power that I wielded wasn't spectacular. But now through rigorous training with my stick and also my father guiding me helped me a lot. He said that his brother used to be an auror and he wanted to do the same thing but after his brother died he hesitated and decided to do something safer. I don't know how the regulation of magical creatures was safer in his book but he was still here and his brother wasn't. So that explained where his talent in magic came from.

My father also decided to train me somewhere else, the house just wasn't going to cut it so he made a little safe place in the forest. He warded the place and made sure nothing could come in, magical creature or not. The following months he taught me spells like Bombarda but also taught me how wards worked. Which I thought to be an excellent lesson. To go along with the wards my dad also taught me Ancient Runes. Using them was still too difficult but now I could at least distinguish them. I did try to work on some rune matrices on my spare time and I was definitely making progress!

Every day my senses heightened and I've started to feel some strange ancient magic around my father. He told me he was just a random pureblood with a squib for a mother but that didn't seem to be the case in my eyes. He must be something more, more powerful.

After all, I didn't believe these gifts that I had were all from my mother's side. I must've inherited something different, unique from my father but I just couldn't narrow it down. I also decided to leave the dark arts books for now. I read them but I didn't practice any of the spells. That was an unwise decision and I didn't really want to conjure the spirit of some random serial-killing wizard.

The concepts were interesting though and I also learned a lot. For example, there was this one passage that broadened the subject of occlumency. This helped me tremendously and now I had some small defences to keep my mind protected. I built a little castle with All Might patrolling the walls. He of course wasn't as powerful as in the anime but having the feeling of someone that powerful patrolling my mind made me feel better.

Occlumency isn't that easy as it might seem. Making fake memories every day was a grueling task which took a lot of time. Especially since your brain automatically likes to process those things while you're sleeping. So you have to trick your own mind to think about fake memories whilst you're asleep.

Also your brain is a lot easier to penetrate when you're asleep. Your mind defences of course stay intact but your body relaxes and your brain is less aware of its surroundings. That's also my theory for how Voldie got access to Harry's mind in the first place. Sure they were linked and sure Harry sucked at occlumency but I've tested it out myself on my dad (With his permission of course) and I noticed it to be a lot easier. I had the chance to unwind my secrets of my family right then and there but I decided against it. I had a feeling he would tell me on his own and it felt unfair to just take it out of him against his will.

That would've been very foolish. I also got some potions books which contained potions and poisons from 1-5th year. Apparently my dad had still a lot left over from his days in Hogwarts so I also got his Herbology book and Transfiguration book. I also noticed that these books were nearly unreadable.

And that's not because of the things being taught but the way it was written. His books just went from the next quote to the next. Nothing of the subjects were actually expanded on and were actually really surface-level even though it's all the way up to your 5th year. Wish looking back on it made a lot of sense.

Before students get into Hogwarts there was a big chance that they never went to school. Sure, the rich purebloods have their tutors and I bet that the others learnt their kids some basic things. But still do kids want a tutor to learn? No, they want to go to a school with all of their friends and run around and have fun.

The way the kids in the Wizarding Community were taught now was inadequate. Because a kid's mind is only up for new things when they are relaxed and when they're jittery and just wanna run around they don't learn they just watch the clock and wait for their class to end.

This wasn't the only thing that I noticed but it would also explain the behaviour that purebloods have. They're really seclusive, have no friends and they consider everyone an enemy to their blood. Unless there's a chance of marrying into a bigger family. They go to these charades and mixers but it's not really a friendly gathering, it's to probe other families's integrity and see if they have a suitable heir.

It's all politics and the purebloods learn it at such a young age that they don't see other kids as people anymore but pawns. To use them in their scheme and to merely look down on. This would also solve the whole thing that nearly all purebloods are Slytherin. You need to be cunning to be a politician.

I mocked up a plan, I had to outwit Voldemort and he wasn't an easy one to crack. After all he had been scheming this since he was in Hogwarts many decades ago. I also had to bank on the fact that big V was confused and was a wraith-like being. Because you could clearly make up in the last couple of books that Voldemort was only using his emotions to make decisions and not his brain. I guess rituals would do that to you.

Now back to my plan. Riddle put all his trust in the fact that the purebloods would believe that he also was a pureblood. But I had to out him to his own loyal followers. I had to make everyone believe Riddle was a half-blood with a muggle father and an inbred mother. If I managed this it would turn his fanbase on him. Angering those who had lost their family in the cause just for some half-blood that deceived them to be one of them.

Of course this wouldn't be easy. I must've not been the only one to dig in his past. Maybe they had turned up dead or missing. I had to make sure I had a failsafe I could rely on if I was discovered. But the best thing I could do is make my plan as airtight as possible so I wouldn't have to rely on a failsafe.

Maybe I could use the vampires to back me up? After all in the first wizarding war not many of them followed Riddle into battle. If I could use their distrust of Riddle I could make them turn to my side but that was easier said than done. Maybe I could control them with my eyes? After all they're different from the normal vampire and maybe they actually liked half vampires but I was pretty sure that wasn't the case.

I had to find out what my heritage was in the vampire world. If I had a big enough family name and showed my visual prowess and overall strength they would follow me. After all the vampires weren't idiots and they follow the most powerful but I don't think I'd be strong enough to achieve this in the coming years. I had to become a stronger wizard first before I could become a strong vampire.

So this was the plan that I was scheming. Not all parts were laid out yet but it was a start. I also had to take out the remaining death eaters that would still be loyal to him even though he's a halfblood. There weren't only those among them who did it for the superiority of purebloods. They did it because they liked to torture, they took relish in battle. They were absolutely terrifying.

The one thing that I was sure to work if I became as powerful as Riddle then I could make a difference. Power and fear are the greatest motivators and I wasn't scared of using them to get where I needed to be. I had a family to protect and think about. I'm okay with taking small risks but if the risk exceeds more than 30% in my mind then I would immediately back off.

My mum shook me out of my daydream and told me that she would take me to the forest tonight to learn some more tidbits of being a vampire. I hadn't had any cravings yet but my mum was scared that I would get them suddenly at Hogwarts and honestly I wasn't 100% sure either.

After dinner my mum and I flew to the forest and went to our usual hangout. There my mum taught me about the rivalry of vampires and werewolves. Apparently there have been many wars between the two species and a werewolf can still smell any vampire from 5 miles away. Luckily my dad had also warded our house exactly for that reason and this little training dojo was also placed with the exact same wards.

But there was a certain thing my mum told me that piqued my interest. ''There have been many wars between vampires and werewolves, on many occasions we actually helped out wizards who were being plagued by werewolves, in trade of blood of course. This is also the reason why were have a better place in society''

She paused to take a breath ''But there is still much unknown about werewolves, it seems some of the strongest can transform when they desire and some can transform at certain dates other than the full moon. Which those are though I am not sure of.''

So some werewolves can change at will? That definitely was new information but I didn't really know how to process it. I definitely had to be more vigilant and look out for a certain Fenrir Grayback. He seemed to be the leader of the pack and also the strongest among them. I really wasn't keen on meeting with him.

''Also if you ever cross paths with a werewolf remember to think. They're rabid dogs who are powerful but don't make well thought out decisions. You can outwit them''

My mum stood up from where she was sitting and changed into bat form. We were going to do our routine training. Which basically meant getting to grips with flying better. I could fly fairly decently now but if I wanted to go around a sharp corner I still ended up flying against a wall because of my lack of control. Also when there are heavy winds I can't counter in any way it seemed that my wings still had to grow in strength.

All this training had a really big positive though. My normal body was also gaining strength because of this so I didn't have to do any extra exercises or work out. After a while of manoeuvring around trees and trying to outrun my mum in a game she liked to call ''Outrun Mother Bat or do the dishes for a week''

As you can tell I despised this game, and that's because I always lost. My mum had so much experience on me and so much more strength in her wings that it was hard to outrun her but at least it made me develop critical thinking in stressful situations.

Suddenly a piercing howl could be heard. The whole forest seemed to shake from the howl and I looked up at the moon and stopped running away from my mum. I looked up at the sky and noticed that there was no full moon. This could only mean that there was a stronger wolf nearby that could transform at will, or there was a specific date which meant they would not only be stronger than normal but also a lot angrier. Or it wasn't a werewolf at all but I'd rather not take any chances.

I turned to my mum ''What should we do? If we stay inside the wards we might be safe but we aren't certain the wolf could smell us through the wards somehow. And if we go outside the wards the wolf will definitely smell us but maybe we can outrun it to our house.''

My mum seemed to be churning over the possibilities whilst I also sat in silence. Thinking of the best option. Staying inside the wards might be the smartest thing to do here. We don't know for certain that we can outrun it and showing it the way to our house might not be a great idea. Even though the place is warded to counter werewolves those rules might not apply for a day like this.

It was 21 december but I couldn't immediately place what was supposed to happen today. I tried to piece it together bit by bit from what I learned in geography. It's supposed to be the day where Earth's poles have its maximum tilt from the sun…

It's also known to be midwinter around this time and at midwinter the night is the longest… Wait what did I just think? The longest night? Ah that's it! It's the winter solstice, the longest night of the year. Where the days gradually become longer.

I remember in my past life always looking out for the winter solstice because I couldn't wait for the days to become longer again, I wasn't really fond of the cold. So werewolves can not only transfer during a full moon but also the winter solstice that's good to know.

My mum finally answered my question ''I think it's best to stay here, weren't sure if it's a werewolf or a regular wolf yet so staying here might be in our best interest''

Immediately a figure popped out of the night's shade. It was a giant wolf with bulging muscles everywhere. It seemed to be trying to smell something, something he couldn't see. The wolf stood on its hind legs and howled. It made my eardrums vibrate so violently that it felt like they were going to pop.

But I remained quiet. This was not the time to mess about, I had to think. If it could smell us or even break down the wards somehow we would be in big trouble. We could fly to our house but what if it just broke the wards there. Could we take him on?

It's an enhanced werewolf because of the winter solstice but my mum seems very experienced in combat. I could also try to bend it's will with my eyes but I wasn't sure if that would work on some rabid dog.

Suddenly another howl was heard but directly behind us. And the second werewolf headed to where the first was. They seemed to have some sort of conversation. They were kind of feigning in our direction and growling but they weren't looking directly at us. So they knew we were here. But weren't certain, damn that winter solstice is annoying.

The wards were layered with Notice-Me-Not charms and Repelling wards but anyone knows that any ward could be broken through with enough force and my dad wasn't really on the level of Dumbledore so I wasn't certain how strong they were.

I was already pretty impressed that they were able to trick the werewolves for so long. But you never know when they finally understood what was happening. The other werewolf seemed to have some intelligence about them. It also seemed to be a female.

The female werewolf sniffed the ground around the perimeter and clawed at the edge. She was trying to pick the ward! Picking a ward is basically where one makes a tiny enough hole in a ward to try to break through. Picking a ward is very effective when dealing with wards that have an outward direct effect. She was trying to spot a weak point in the ward and go from there.

I turned to my mother and whispered ''Should we leave? They'll find us soon'' My mother shook her head ''Have a little faith in your father, he tried his best with the wards'' Which didn't answer my question at all.

He had all the faith in the world in his father but he just didn't want to risk his life fighting against two huge angry werewolves.

And not long after that the female found a weak spot in the ward. She called the other werewolf over to her position who was also trying to find one and growled something to him. Suddenly they were using all their force they had to break down the ward.

The ground under me was shaking. Or maybe I was shaking, who knows. I again gave a concerned look at my mum but she stood firm. She clearly wanted to make her stand here. Which I didn't agree at all, if I had to fly the entire night just so I won't get harmed by these hairballs I would definitely do so.

And then it happened. The ward broke down. The female werewolf howled in pleasure. She couldn't wait to get her first taste of vampire. I stood there clutching my mum trying to pull her away and fly. But she clearly wasn't having it, it was almost like she had a personal vendetta.