The following day, Harry woke up early and left a note for Blaise to tell him that he was going to the Great Hall for breakfast. After practising his daily Occlumency practice in the Room of Requirements, he made his way to the Great Hall to grab a bite to eat, he was immediately accosted in a corridor by Neville Longbottom of all people.
Harry suppressed sighing in exasperation at the sight of the boy who lived. The Longbottom scion called out to him, "Hey, Potter, we need to talk."
The Potter scion groaned in exasperation. Why wouldn't Longbottom just leave him be for once? The boy just kept going after him again and again. He had saved his life in that damn forest because of a detention that the Gryffindor caused, and the idiot just wouldn't let him be.
Harry simply took a deep calming breath and answered back, "What is it, Longbottom?"
"You saved my life in the forest," he stated.
Harry shrugged, "Maybe I did, maybe I didn't. You can never know what could have been without it actually occurring. Magic is very unpredictable. You can never know the outcome. You're living proof of that, after all."
He was just bullshitting, to be honest. Truth be told, Harry was angry at me for getting involved with Longbottom's messes. He wasn't the boy who lived. He wasn't the Gryffindor golden boy. He was a Slytherin; he was defined by his ambition and cunning, not his nobility and bravery. Being forced to join one of Longbottom's adventures was a sobering experience. Yeah, Harry wanted absolutely nothing to do with him, and for good reason.
"Just stop it, Potter. I know you like to save vague things to distract people," Longbottom exclaimed, "just for once in your life can you be serious in a conversation with me? I'm not really asking for much."
Harry pretended to look away and then looked back, "Hm, did you say something? Sorry, I wasn't really paying attention."
The young Gryffindor palmed his face and released an audible scream of frustration. Serves him right for almost getting them killed for no reason. Honestly, Harry knew that he was a bit too mature to mess with Longbottom like this, but damn, wasn't it satisfying.
The pudgy boy just glared at him once more, "Potter be serious for once."
"Be serious about what exactly?" Harry retorted, "Do you want me to talk about how for some forsaken reason we were sent to the FORBIDDEN forest for a detention? Just to put that in perspective, people get detentions when they're caught alone in the forest, and they just made us do the same for detention of all things. But that's not the worst of it, we were sent to look for something that killed a unicorn. You have no idea how abominable that act really is, and yet someone thought it was a good idea to go after something willing to do it, something with nothing to lose. But no, that's not enough, you had to scream like a madman the moment we saw the creature, almost getting us killed. Believe me when I say that you don't want to be serious right now."
"I know that you're angry, Potter, but we have something to settle here," Longbottom protested.
"No, we don't. Just stay away from me. I don't want anything to do with you," the Potter scion stated.
Yeah, it was a scummy thing to say, but Harry had enough. He didn't want to get entangled with Longbottom's shit all the time. He was now on Dumbledore and Voldemort's radar and that was terrifying. He was a curiosity before, but now, he was under the spotlight. Being vastly outclassed in the forest was a wake-up call. He wasn't close to being ready to be involved in this mess. He needed to focus on battle magic. It was out of self-preservation. An academic he might be, Harry still treasured his life.
"Where the hell do you come from, judging me? I am the boy who lived…" the Gryffindor started.
Only for Harry to finish for him, "and that means absolutely nothing and it's sad that you think it does. You survived the killing curse, that was true, but don't think for one second that it was your doing. A baby, no matter how powerful, doesn't have enough magic to block a stinging hex, let alone a killing curse. What happened on Samhain was your parents' doing, no matter what the general public wants to believe. Even if you were Merlin reborn, you wouldn't have had the power to block any spell. I have no idea how they did it, and they most likely sacrificed themselves to power whatever protection against the killing curse you had, but you weren't involved at all."
The boy completely froze while Harry finished his rant. He just stayed silent for what felt like a minute, "so, I didn't stop the killing curse?"
.....
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