Black sat beneath a small tree in a secluded part of the wood.
A vivid green snake lay coiled on the ground before him, watching him warily, its tongue flickering.
He hesitated, then extended his right hand towards its head.
The snake struck.
Its fangs sank into the back of his hand.
Black winced but didn’t panic.
Instead, he reached over with his left hand and gently stroked the head of the snake still clamped to his right.
A moment later, it released him.
Its aggression subsided.
When he offered his left hand, it slithered up from the ground and curled obediently around it.
Then it changed.
The snake became a dead branch.
Black had Transfigured it himself.
The bite had been part of a small experiment.
Apparently, an animal created through Transfiguration retained its natural instincts unless he actively controlled it.
With his magic directing it, however, it would obey him.
There was one other discovery.
The snake had no venom.
‘Perhaps that’s because I’ve only mastered basic Transfiguration?’
He looked down at the branch in his left hand, encouraged despite the limitation.
A moment later, he was holding a gleaming sword.
All this from basic mastery.
It felt as though he could turn whatever he held into anything he could imagine.
He was quickly growing fond of that feeling.
A throbbing pain in his right hand interrupted his practice.
The snake might not have had venom, but its fangs had been quite real.
Blood was seeping from the punctures.
Black returned the sword to a branch and set it aside.
Pointing a finger of his left hand at the wound, he murmured, ‘Episkey.’
The punctures began to close before his eyes.
He smiled as he watched.
However many times he saw it, healing magic still fascinated him.
Once the wound had closed, he plucked a leaf, wiped the blood from his hand and dropped it on the ground.
Then he went back to practising Transfiguration.
A breeze stirred through the trees.
The bloodstained leaf skittered away, carried little by little deeper into the wood.
Black had not been practising for long when a strange sound came from the shadows.
A low growl.
The sort of sound a predator made.
He stopped at once and peered between the trees.
It was too dark to make anything out clearly, but he had the distinct sensation that something was watching him.
Something dangerous.
Heavy footfalls thudded towards him.
Something was charging.
Black braced himself, then stared.
There was nothing there.
Another footprint appeared in the earth.
Then another.
Invisible.
He cried out and threw himself sideways.
Something heavy crashed down behind him.
Had he stayed where he was, it would have landed on top of him.
He would have been lucky to survive.
Black scrambled to his feet, watching the deep depression in the ground.
The air shifted, as though an invisible curtain were being drawn aside.
A creature appeared.
It had silvery-white fur and a lean, almost bear-like body, though it was tall and stood upright like an ape.
It stared at Black with naked hunger, as though he were a plump roast chicken.
He had barely had time to take it in before it vanished again.
A magical creature.
And it was hunting him.
Black remembered the bloodstained leaf he had carelessly thrown away.
So that was what had brought it here.
The heavy footsteps resumed.
It was coming at him again.
This time, Black was ready.
He thrust out both hands and released the magic he had been gathering.
Trees on either side bent sharply towards him.
Their branches lengthened into vines, weaving themselves into a net across the creature’s path.
It crashed straight into them.
An enraged roar erupted from the tangle.
Then came a series of sharp cracks.
The vines were snapping.
The net couldn’t hold anything that strong for long.
But it didn’t have to.
It only had to slow the creature down.
Enough layers of vines would buy him time to escape.
Black had no particular wish to run, but he was still young.
He had the skill to cast the spells; what he lacked was enough magic to overcome a creature of that size.
If I had just a little more…
His hands kept moving.
The surrounding trees shook violently.
More branches became vines and snaked down to wrap themselves around the thrashing shape inside the net.
Weakness spread rapidly through him.
A wizard’s magical reserves were generally tied to physical stamina, and he was burning through his at an alarming rate.
The moment the creature was thoroughly swaddled in vines, Black turned and ran.
At the edge of the trees, he encountered someone he hadn’t expected.
Hermione stood staring at the enormous writhing bundle, which was still roaring and struggling to break free.
‘What’s happ—’
Black sprinted past her.
‘Run, unless you want to get killed!
There’s a huge tiger back there!’
Hermione froze for a moment.
‘A tiger?
How could there possibly be a tiger here?’
But he was running as though his life depended on it.
She ran after him.
‘What on earth is going on?’
Everything had happened too quickly for her to see what was tangled in the vines.
It might have been a tiger.
It might have been something else.
Whatever it was, that furious roar hadn’t sounded like any ordinary woodland animal.
Tiger or not, it was dangerous.
Hermione ran fast.
Her mind, meanwhile, was full of questions.
Leaving aside what the creature was, why had the boy been in the wood?
And what was going on with those vines?
Even if there really was a tiger, how had it become wrapped up in them?
Black glanced back and was relieved to see her following.
That was why he’d called it a tiger.
He needed her to run, not wander closer for a better look and end up as the creature’s next meal.
It would be a terrible waste to lose such a useful source of—
Such a nice classmate.
Thinking of his system, he muttered under his breath.
‘Pity there isn’t a starter pack or something.
Might have given me a way to deal with that thing.’
He kept running.
‘But as it is…’
Apparently, his system didn’t come with a starter pack.
He would have to concentrate on getting stronger and leave creatures like that alone for now.
He could settle matters with this one later.
[Keyword detected: starter pack.]
[Starter Pack received ×1.]
[Open now?]
Black nearly tripped.
Again?
He hadn’t received a starter pack because he hadn’t said the words?
‘System,’ he muttered, ‘did you forget to give me the instruction manual?’
When he got back, he was going to say every damned phrase he could think of that had ever persuaded a system to hand over something useful.