Night settled over the courtyard, and with it, the charcoal grill’s hiss and pop.
Smoke curled upward, thick with cumin and charred fat, a smell that usually pulled both families to the table before the first skewer finished cooking.
Tonight, no one reached for the food.
The Grangers and the Sorensons passed the parchment back and forth like a live grenade.
The Hogwarts crest.
The emerald ink.
The words that made no sense at all.
Hermione kept reading hers over her mother’s shoulder, and Elias held his between two fingers, eyes half-lidded, as if the letter were a utility bill he’d already paid.
Mrs.
Sorenson spoke first, her voice brittle with forced reason.
“Darling, I hate to shatter your… illusions, but this is clearly a prank.”
“Yes, Hermione,” Mrs.
Granger added, her cheerfulness a size too tight.
“Where in the world is magic? Aren’t we meant to be discussing Eton?”
“Mummy.” Hermione burrowed her head into her mother’s arm, deploying the nuclear option.
Cuteness.
“I want to learn magic.”
Then she jerked upright, something clicking behind her eyes, and spun toward Elias.
“Wait. Elias, you already know magic! Show them!”
Elias exhaled.
The plan had been to wait for the professor—let the authorities do the heavy lifting.
But Hermione’s grip was on his sleeve now, her eyes bright and utterly merciless.
He picked up an apple from the fruit bowl, set it on the table in full view, and covered it with nothing but his palm.
No tricks.
No curtains.
He closed his eyes and shaped a pear in his mind: the slow curve from stem to base, the roughness of its skin against his fingertips, that faint shift from green to brown at the crown.
Under his hand, the red of the apple bled away.
The skin puckered and dimpled.
When he lifted his palm, a green pear sat where the apple had been.
“Look! Look!” Hermione shook her mother’s arm, beaming.
Mr.
Granger squinted.
He picked up the pear, rolled it between his fingers, and bit into it with the courage of a man who trusted his teeth more than his eyes.
He chewed.
Swallowed.
Frowned.
“Still tastes like apple.”
Elias let the magic go.
The pear resolved back into an apple—minus a crescent-shaped chunk.
The evidence sat on the table, half-eaten and undeniable.
The adults had nowhere left to retreat.
Mr.
Sorenson, a man who handled cognitive dissonance the way a boat handles a torpedo, cleared his throat and latched onto the only solid ground he could find.
“Elias is right. We can wait for the professor. If someone shows up tomorrow, that will settle things.”
Elias nodded and turned back to the grill, brushing more seasoning onto the meat.
The parents sat in existential silence.
Hermione hummed and came to help, small hands steady on the skewers.
Then a voice spoke inside Elias’s skull, and text burned across his vision.
[The Demon King’s bloodline is awakening…]
[Because all the Demon Kings who have appeared in this world have deviated from the standards a Demon King should fulfill, the true Demon King has chosen you as his successor.]
[Once the host simultaneously gathers any three of the Seven Deadly Sins, the Demon King’s power within the bloodline will automatically summon the Demon King to possess the body and destroy the world. Successor, please redouble your efforts to restore the Demon King’s glory!]
A status window materialized.
Demon King: Elias Sorenson
Pride: 86
Wrath: 61
Sloth: 107
Greed: 67
Envy: 32
Gluttony: 45
Lust: 82
Ability: [Transfiguration LV.2 (226/500)]
[Hint: Achieving this Original Sin is successful when the Original Sin value exceeds 120.]
Elias stared at the numbers.
Put aside the minor detail that a handsome, intelligent, morally upright reincarnator had zero interest in destroying the world.
This stat sheet was an insult.
When had he ever been arrogant?
Pleasure-seeking?
And sloth—one hundred and seven?
That was slander.
Actionable slander.
Transfiguration in combat.
It had worked.
[Pride +1]
Heat unspooled behind his sternum, sharp and electric, hunting for a target.
[Wrath +1]
Damn it.
He bit the curse back, forced his jaw to unclench.
The rate of increase was obscene.
At this pace, he’d trip into world-ending territory over a bad parking space and a second helping of dessert.
He was not some deranged apocalypse enthusiast.
He was a man who wanted to eat his barbecue in peace.
He devoured a skewer in two vicious bites.
A pleasant heaviness spread through his stomach.
The meat was still on his tongue, and he already wanted more.
[Gluttony +1]
Elias closed his eyes and foresaw the death of his blissful, eat-and-sleep lifestyle.
The next morning, eight o’clock.
Both families gathered in the Sorensons’ living room, the air thick with anticipation and the particular discomfort of adults forced to confront something they couldn’t file away.
Elias had been dragged out of bed on a holiday.
He slumped against the sofa, eyes heavy, while Hermione sat beside him with a map of England spread across her lap.
She traced roads with her finger, muttering.
Hogwarts wasn’t on the map.
She checked again anyway, her brow tight with focus.
At eight-thirty, the doorbell rang.
Hermione dropped the map and ran.
The door swung open.
A man in black stood on the threshold.
Black robes, black hair, a face carved from the sort of gloom that fairy tales reserved for evil wizards.
His hair was greasy.
His expression suggested the doorbell had personally offended him.
The adults sat ramrod-straight.
Hermione’s steps reversed until her shoulder pressed against Elias’s arm.
The man smoothed his robes, the fabric rustling like dead leaves, and stepped inside as if the awkwardness were a color of wallpaper he’d long stopped noticing.
Perhaps, for him, it was.
This was how Muggles behaved.
It was practically protocol.
Elias rose.
He offered a chair, poured a cup of tea, and set it down without a word.
The man lowered himself into the armchair.
For a single, unreadable moment, his gaze held on Elias.
Then he spoke, and his voice was a low, spooling thing, the kind that didn’t waste itself on pleasantries.
“My name is Severus Snape. I am the Potions Professor at Hogwarts.” He paused, letting the words settle over the room like a thin frost.
“I will answer some of your questions about magic. After that, I will escort you to Diagon Alley to purchase your school supplies.”
Mr.
Sorenson cleared his throat.
“Is there really a school called Hogwarts? It sounds…”
“Fanciful?” Snape did not smile.
He drew his wand—a quick, economical motion, no more than a finger’s twitch—and pointed at the untouched teacup.
The porcelain shimmered.
A mouse sat on the saucer, whiskers twitching.
The adults blinked.
Mr.
Granger leaned forward, but the room’s reaction was muted.
They’d seen an apple become a pear over barbecue coals.
What they didn’t know—what they couldn’t know—was the massive gulf in difficulty between a controlled transfiguration in a quiet living room and a spontaneous one on a grill table.
Their baseline for impossible had already shifted.
Snape’s eyes narrowed, just slightly.
He cast again.
The teacups and teapot lifted from the coffee table and began to dance, spinning and dipping in a silent waltz of porcelain and steam.
“Transfiguration,” he said, as the objects pirouetted, “and Charms. Both are taught at Hogwarts. As are Potions, Defence Against the Dark Arts, Herbology, and so forth.”
The explanation took time.
By the end, Snape’s voice was dry as old paper, and he reached for the tea with something almost like relief.
The families believed now—not just in Hogwarts, but in a world full of such schools—and arrangements were made to visit Diagon Alley the following day.
As Snape moved toward the door, Elias caught his glance.
It held something unexpected.
A flicker of surprise.
Perhaps even a thread of respect, though it wore a strange, guarded shape.
The professor halted.
He looked at Elias, and for a moment the room seemed to contract around them.
Then Snape spoke, so quietly it might have been meant only for himself.
“Sorenson. Study hard.”
He was gone before the words finished landing, leaving Elias with the distinct and unsettling impression that he had not been offered encouragement so much as a warning dipped in the thinnest possible courtesy.