Chapter 12
Harry was almost drooling imagining it. Hot food whenever he wanted! For Harry, to whom starvation was an intimate friend, this was huge!
Ping!
Due to your experimentation, you have found a loophole in the system! Your Int is raised by 1!
Harry smiled at this and looked back at Diggle. He needed to move since Diggle had paid at the counter and was coming out of the shop.
Ping!
Quest Alert!
Follow Diggle without getting caught!
Reward,
50 Exp
10G
Failure,
Cupboard
Ignorance of self
YES/NO?
It was a no-brainer. He was already doing it anyway. Harry quickly pressed yes and crossed the road, tailing Diggle, sticking to the shadows and trying not to get noticed. Each time he felt that Diggle had even an inkling of an idea that he was being followed, Harry quickly ducked into an alleyway out of sight. Staying careful, Harry slowly started decreasing the distance between them.
Ping!
"What now?" he hissed through his teeth.
Skill created!
Sneaking, Lv-1 (20%)
Allows you to sneak up on someone.
10% chance of not getting caught.
10% chance of a critical strike.
That seemed very useful, Harry decided. He swiped the screen away and saw Diggle looking around with a frown on his face. Harry stilled, realizing that Dedalus sensed someone following him. Thinking quickly, he quickly walked past him, overtaking him and ducking into the next side alley, before looking back to see what he was doing.
He might've been sneaky, but 10% was still 10% after all. He was bound to fail sometime.
Dedalus pulled out a stick with his right hand just like the one Vance and the others had; a magic wand; and was discreetly waving it at the area behind him while looking aroun. After a few tense seconds, he started walking again, apparently satisfied with his inspection. He passed Harry's alley without noticing him, and with a sigh of relief, he walked out of the alley and started following the purple shirted man again.
Ping!
Skill leveled up!
Sneaking, Lv-2 (10%)
Allows you to sneak up on someone.
15% chance of not getting caught.
15% chance of a critical strike.
'Nice,' he thought and hung back and followed Diggle at a discreet distance, mingling with the crowd and sticking to the shadows.
And so he tailed Dedalus Diggle all the way along the Charing Cross Road, where the stout man entered a dingy looking pub, which the rusty sign called 'The Leaky Cauldron', which, much like those FLOO shops, most people seemed to avoid entirely. Their eyes seemed to gloss over it and onto the next store whenever they looked at it. Warily, Harry followed him and looked through the stained and dirty glass windows of the pub and saw the patrons greet him as he vanished towards the back of the pub.
Ping!
Quest Success!
Follow Diggle without getting caught!
Reward,
50 Exp
10G
Information
Harry swiped it away. He didn't have time to look at it now.
He didn't dare go inside. He was 10 after all and a pub full of drunk men was not the best place to be for someone like him. So he stood outside the pub and waited for him to come out since he couldn't observe anyone through the glass no matter how hard he tried.
Or so he intended to do until a man walked out of the pub, opening the door for a fleeting moment, letting the conversation inside spill out. His Gamer's Mind separated all the voices and with crystal clear clarity, he heard,
"How are you Arch-"
"A bottle of firewhiskey Tom!"
"The ministry is taking a big fat dump on all over wizards and witches ever-"
"Lily Potter's son coming to Hogwarts this year isn't he Matil-" The woman's voice was cut off as the door closed.
Harry was shocked to a standstill. He looked around, knowing that he couldn't open the door himself, he desperately hoped for something . . . anything to open the door. Suddenly, a strong breeze came and blew open the door as a brown screen popped up.
Ping!
New Skill discovered! You have discovered your skill as a magical!
Accidental Magic Lv-1 (43%)
Allows you to control your magic in short sporadic bursts. You can try to use it in any way you wish but it may not obey your every command.
Cost-20 MP per minute
30% chance of Harry using a randomly selected magical ability when in a situation of great distress
Harry couldn't care less at that moment.
"Aye. I tell ya Jemma, James and his friends were big troublemakers in my day. If little Harry is anything like him. . ."
"True that. Though he cleaned up pretty nicely when he got together with Lily."
"Aye that woman could clean up anybody. True spitfire she was."
"I heard from Minerva that poor Harry is growing up with muggles. The Boy Who Lived! Muggles!"
"The poor lad. Must be hard for him. Lily was a good mother to him for the time he had her."
"Her eyes used to light up like tho-"
Harry used a foot to keep the door open and remained outside that dingy pub till sunset, thoughts of Mr. Diggle all forgotten. He stood there, mindless of the pain in his legs as he listened to the patrons talk about his parents and magic and their school times, soaking in all he could about his mother and father and the life that he never had.
Despite the tears streaming down his face, it was the happiest day of his entire life.
I always did have a soft spot in my heart for this chapter, especially for the ending, so I hope you like what I've done with it. There were a LOT of issues with it, so I had to fix it up. I took some time off writing and finished the plot planning and framework of Book 3, just cos I was feeling inspired. That scene with Vance in the last chapter really got me going. More updates coming tomorrow.