Eccentric Wizard Chapter 5: Sorting part 1 (Patreon)

Beta read by n1ch, Shigiya, Solitary heart and 8kagi.

Next update is Snafu, tomorrow.

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-Train stop-

The train's rail wheel screeched itself to a slow halt as we reached our final destination.

People pushed their way toward the door and out onto a tiny, dark platform like a herd of sheep. I decided to wait a bit and not get accidentally squashed by the crazy horde of rambunctious kids.

My body shivered in the cold night air. Then a lamp came bobbing over the heads of the students, and I heard a familiar voice of the lovable giant from the movies.

“Firs’ years! Firs’ years over here! All right there, Harry?”

When he called out the name, I immediately zoned in on the so-called 'Boy who lived'. He looked a bit different from what I remembered, more scrawny than I expected and pale-skinned. Must be due to spending most of the time under the stair's cupboard. As expected, he was accompanied by the redhead Ronald Wesley and surprisingly, Neville Longbottom.

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"Pft, Longbottom…" I couldn't help but snicker at that sort of name.

From the looks of it, the boy was still searching for his toad. 'Hang in there buddy, you'll definitely find your pet soon enough.'

Now, onto Hagrid, I had to crank my head all the way up just to see his face. The man made people like Shaquille O'Neal and Yao Ming look like midgets. 'He should be near 3 meters tall or less.'

Anyways, the giant certainly looked happy and tried to be friendly with us. He tried to be as less frightening as possible to the new ones. I knew this guy's heart was as big as his size, in the movies, I always cheered whenever he would be on screen. He was and still is, my favorite character.

Hagrid’s big hairy face beamed as he motioned us to follow him. “C’mon, follow me—any more firs’ years? Mind yer step, now! Firs’ years follow me!” He even had that thick accent of his.

Draco was nowhere to be seen.

Hermione was probably making sure no one forgot anything inside the train, knowing her character.

The kids pushed each other making some slip and fall, we followed Hagrid down what seemed to be a steep, narrow path. It was so dark on either side of them that a few even muttered that there must be thick trees there. Nobody spoke much. Neville, the boy who kept losing his toad, sniffed once or twice. Whether he was crying or had a cold was unknown to me.

“Yeh’ll get yer firs’ sight o’ Hogwarts in a sec,” Hagrid called over his shoulder, “jus’ round this bend here.”

There was a loud “Oooooh!”

I was one of these people, the view in front of me was just… breathtaking.

The movies couldn't do it justice.

The narrow stone path had opened suddenly onto the edge of a great black lake—reflecting the full moon on the surface—Perched atop a high mountain on the other side, its windows sparkling in the starry sky, was a vast castle with many turrets and towers. An ancient and magical palace filled with wonders beyond anyone's imagination.

I was truly living in a fairy tale.

"No more’n four to a boat!” Hagrid called, pointing to a fleet of little boats sitting in the water by the shore. I carefully boarded the small boat which looked as ancient as the castle and made me feel like I would sink or fall at any moment. I had a deep fear of the ocean, and sitting there made my heart beat like an engine.

'Even after dying once, I never got over my phobia…'

I was joined soon after by two familiar faces and a new one. Draco looked like he had eaten an entire lemon with his sour expression. Hermione just silently sat opposite to me and didn't even glanced at my brother once. The third was another girl with blonde hair and was actually someone I knew personally.

"Hey there Miss—cough! Hannah, it's been awhile hasn't it?" I almost greeted her formally out of habit. Now that Narcissa wasn't here, I didn't need to be that formal.

"Ja-Jarius, ni-nice to meet you again," said Hannah with a flustered expression.

I remember Lucius talking about the Abbot family, how just like us, the Abbott family was one of the so-called Sacred Twenty-Eight. But with Hannah here, she was actually half blood, meaning she had some Muggle blood inside her. Of course, this made her receive a rather disdainful attitude towards the other families, including my own. It was the reason she was a bit anti-social and naive.

"Everyone in?” shouted Hagrid, who had a boat to himself which looked comically small for the giant. “Right then—FORWARD!”

There was an initial tugging feeling and the fleet of little boats moved off all at once, gliding across the lake, which was as smooth as glass. Everyone was silent, staring up at the great castle overhead. It towered over us as they sailed nearer and nearer to the cliff on which it stood.

"Heads down!” yelled Hagrid as the first boats reached the cliff; we all bent our heads and the little boats carried us through a curtain of ivy that hid a wide opening in the cliff face. We were carried along a dark tunnel, which seemed to be taking us right underneath the castle, until they reached a kind of underground harbor, where they clambered out onto rocks and pebbles.

As I was spectating the surroundings, I saw a small amphibian swimming near my boat.

"Oh? Well lookie here." I rolled up my sleeves and quickly snatched the toad from the water. "Got ya!"

"What is that!?" Hermione asked

"Ew! You splashed some water on my face!" Draco said, wiping his face with his robe.

"It's a toad, remember the one you were searching for?" I searched for Neville and immediately found him with Harry and Ron. 'Well, giving him the toad straight away is boring… I'll give it to him a bit later.' A plan formed in my head.

"You're not giving it back to him?"

"Of course I will, wait till we get done with the house sorting."

After that, we walked through a passage with Hagrid's lamp being the only light source illuminating our surroundings. The walking continued for the next few minutes till we arrived at a big wooden door.

"Everyone 'ere? Good? Aight!”

Hagrid raised a gigantic fist and knocked three times on the castle door.

Bang!

Bang!

Bang!

The door swung open at once. A tall, greyish black-haired witch in emerald-green robes stood there. She had a very stern face and of course, she was none other than professor Minerva McGonagall—The strict yet kind teacher.

“The firs’ years, Professor McGonagall,” said Hagrid.

“Thank you, Hagrid. I will take them from here.”

She pulled the door wide. If I hadn't been reincarnated as a Malfoy, I would have found the place to be enormous, but now… it was about the same size as our hallway back home. The stone walls were lit with flaming torches, the ceiling was too high to make out, and a magnificent marble staircase facing them led to the upper floor.

We followed Professor McGonagall across the flagged stone floor. I could hear the drone of hundreds of voices from a doorway to the right—the rest of the school must already be here—but Professor McGonagall showed us into a small, empty chamber off the hall. These kids crowded in way too much, standing rather closer together than they would usually have done, peering about nervously.

"Welcome to Hogwarts,” said Professor McGonagall. “The start-of-term banquet will begin shortly, but before you take your seats in the Great Hall, you will be sorted into your houses. The Sorting is a very important ceremony because, while you are here, your house will be something like your family within Hogwarts. You will have classes with the rest of your house, sleep in your house dormitory, and spend free time in your house common room.

I wanted to ask if they had any internet but remembered that I was still a decade away from such technology. Even if I traveled into the future and ended up in the twenty-first century Hogwarts—things would most likely have stayed the same.

“The four houses are called Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw and Slytherin. Each house has its own noble history and each has produced outstanding witches and wizards. While you are at Hogwarts, your triumphs will earn your house points, while any rule-breaking will lose house points. At the end of the year, the house with the most points is awarded the house cup, a great honor. I hope each of you will be a credit to whichever house becomes yours."

Yeah, I may not care about much but I'm for sure making my house get that cup. Why? Because I wanted to.

"The Sorting Ceremony will take place in a few minutes in front of the rest of the school. I suggest you all smarten yourselves up as much as you can while you are waiting.”

Her eyes lingered for a moment on every student. Some grew nervous and dusted their robes, others combed their hair with their fingers and a few just looked downwards; unable to meet her gaze.

When she locked on to me, I just gave her a peace sign. She reminded me of a stern but loving grandmother, I couldn't really fear her with that mindset.

She frowned at my action, guess in her eye, I was being rude or something.

"I shall return when we are ready for you,” said Professor McGonagall. “Please wait quietly.” Then she left, leaving a bunch of unsupervised eleven years old on their own.

'Well she did instruct a bunch of eleven year old kids to stay quiet, like hell that'll work.'

And as predicted, the first one to break the silence was none other than Neville… surprisingly.

"How exactly do they sort us into houses?” he asked Ron.

"Some sort of test, I think. Fred said it hurt a lot, but I think he was just joking.”

Oh did he? Interesting.

"He's right you know," I chimed in beside them. When Ron saw my face, he immediately frowned heavily. "Apparently, they extract some blood by cutting your palm in a bowl which will ignite in flames. Depending on the color of the fire you'll be sorted in a different house." Many of those who weren't familiar with the ceremony gasped in horror.

Heh, gullible fools.

"That's not all, when your house is chosen, a red hot mark is then marked onto your skin. And unfortunately, since burn wounds are easily treatable in the wizarding world, many students have to get the mark many times a year. Very painful indeed." I could see Harry's face going all pale while Ron looked like he was ready to vomit at any moment.

"Shut up, Draco!" Wait what? "Fred told me that we had to wrestle a troll, there was no mention of blood or fire anywhere!"

"Hey Weasley, you got the wrong person!" I went inside the crowd to search for someone.

"Hey! What are you doing!? Stop dragging me!" And pulled Draco out of the crowd.

"This is my adorable twin brother, Draco. The name's Jarius Malfoy, it's a pleasure to meet you!" I extended my hand to Ron as both he and Neville became slack jawed. Harry meanwhile, looked at me with wooden eyes, and kept going back and forth between the two of us.

"There are two of you!?" Ron shouted while pointing at us.

"Why are you so shocked? If I remember correctly, you Weasleys have a set of twins as well—Fred and George, if I remember correctly. We don't even need to go that far," I pointed at the two girls behind me, another set of twins. "These two are twins as well. By the way, hey girls! Nice to meet you! It's not everyday I get to meet other twin siblings, I hope we can be friends." I gave them another round of self presentation and forced Draco to do one as well.

They giggled, one of them came forward and shook my hand with the other one following her sister's action.

"Hi, I'm Parvati Patil and this is my sister, Padma Patil. We would be glad to have you as a friend." Parvati looked to be the most outgoing of the two, her sister merely remained quiet and nodded at me.

"Anyways, your brother was right as well, Weasley. The troll trial is only for those who believe themselves to be cut above the rest in terms of knowledge and magic. They would have to duel against the beast in order to pass the trial and immediately jump to the third year classes. My ancestor, Lanius Malfoy was such an individual, look up the records if you don't believe me." That last part was a complete lie, there was no Lanius Malfoy, I just created a fake name to give my statement more credibility. Like if anyone here will remember the name in the next hour.

Neville was already on the floor and some of the students even began panicking. Even Hermione—for all her intellect—fell for my words. "What!? You can't be serious! This violates many health and safety codes, how can the ministry accept such a—"

"—He's messing with you all," muttered a voice above our heads.

Several people jumped in fright when they saw a transparent bluish ghost head of an obese fellow.

"Welcome to Hogwarts, my dear students! I'm Friar, a former Hufflepuff house member. You will all be part of the sorting hat ceremony, so don't worry—there is no blood involved." Friar said while laughing. He had a rather jolly attitude and recounted stories of his past, also, he kept talking about someone named Peeves or something.

"Mr, Friar, I believe it's time for you to move along. I didn't even hear the door open and somehow, the old lady was once again where she stood. "The hat sorting ceremony is ready, follow along, all of you!" We formed a line with her other institutions and followed her inside.

The inside was just like in the movies, both a strange and splendid place—filled with mysteries in every corner. The ceiling was lit by thousands and thousands of candles that were floating in midair over four long tables, where the rest of the students were sitting. There was no hot wax falling on anyone's head, it made me wonder if there were any candles at all; or if this was just an illusion.

These tables were laid with glittering golden plates and goblets. At the top of the hall was another long table where the teachers were sitting. Professor McGonagall led us—first years—up here, we were then instructed to form a line facing the students. The hundreds of faces staring at us felt a bit unsettling. I could feel the stares I was getting from the Slytherin side. Ignoring them, I gazed upward and saw a velvety black ceiling dotted with stars.

I heard Hermione whisper, “It’s bewitched to look like the sky outside. I read about it in 'Hogwarts, A History'.”

"Just how many books did you read before coming here?" I couldn't help but ask.

"All of them, even most of the first year material, I also am secretly planning to study the second year and third year syllabus." She said with a rather smug look, looking rather proud of her achievement.

"Ya got issues, girl. I swear you're addicted to studying."

"Why thank you!"

"That wasn't a compliment," my eyebrows already started twitching. If she was born as a Malfoy, Lucius would have been the happiest father in all of the wizarding world. Aside from her ideals and moral compass, nearly all of her traits were that of a pure Slytherin. Well, not that it matters since she was going to choose Gryffindor anyways. Personally, I should have tried convincing her to join Ravenclaw or Hufflepuff. The former because it suited her desire to study like a loon, and the latter because she would easily be able to make friends.

Slytherin was a big no no, it was not the house which was a problem, but rather the people in it. They would just bully her nonstop and might even force her to leave Hogwarts; they were that mean. Again, not all of them were bad, I wouldn't be surprised if she made a friend or two with time and effort.

"Stop staring at the ceiling, she's back."

Professor McGonagall silently placed a four-legged stool in front of the teachers table, below the stairs. On top of the stool she put a pointed wizard’s hat. This hat was patched and frayed and extremely dirty. Resembled something my aunt would have worn while she went out torturing people for fun.

Yes, she was that messed up. At least, that's what Lucius and Narcissa hinted at without explicitly wording it that way. One could even argue that Lucius preferred her locked up in Azkaban for the foreseeable future, but Narcissa still held her sister close to her heart.

Suddenly, everyone around me gasped when they saw the thing moved and folded lines turned into something looking like a mouth and eyes.

Then it was my turn to be surprised when the hat started to sing!

“Oh, you may not think I‘m pretty,

But don’t judge on what you see,

I’ll eat myself if you can find

A smarter hat than me.

You can keep your bowlers black,

Your top hats sleek and tall,

For I’m the Hogwarts Sorting Hat

And I can cap them all.

There’s nothing hidden in your head

The Sorting Hat can’t see,

So try me on and I will tell you

Where you ought to be.

You might belong in Gryffindor,

Where dwell the brave at heart,

Their daring, nerve, and chivalry

Set Gryffindors apart;

You might belong in Hufflepuff,

Where they are just and loyal,

Those patient Hufflepuffs are true

And unafraid of toil;

Or yet in wise old Ravenclaw,

If you’ve a ready mind,

Where those of wit and learning,

Will always find their kind;

Or perhaps in Slytherin

You’ll make your real friends,

Those cunning folk use any means

To achieve their ends.

So put me on! Don’t be afraid!

And don’t get in a flap!

You’re in safe hands (though I have none)

For I’m a Thinking Cap!”

Professor McGonagall now stepped forward holding a long roll of parchment. If I remembered correctly, we would be called by alphabetical order.

“When I call your name, you will put on the hat and sit on the stool to be sorted,” she said. “Abbott Hannah!”

A pink-faced girl with blonde pigtails stumbled out of line, put on the hat, which fell right down over her eyes, and sat down.

“HUFFLEPUFF!” shouted the hat.

The table on the right cheered and clapped as Hannah went to sit down at the Hufflepuff table. The obese ghost from before who looked like he had died from diabetes, clapped his hands along the rest of the house ghosts.

'Can we even hear them clapping?' Like, they didn't have a physical body, so how did they produce any sound? Magic... Most likely.

"Boot Terry"

"RAVENCLAW!"

"Bulstrode Millicent"

"SLYTHERIN!"

"Finch-Fletchley Justin”

“HUFFLEPUFF!”

One by one, everyone was called to the front and was sorted to their respective house. The sorting was surprisingly balanced, there weren't too many people sorted in a single house compare to the others. For some reason I thought Slytherin would barely get anyone, but I was proven wrong when there were already two people sorted in the house.

That was a pleasant surprise, not everything was so one-sided as I had initially thought it would be.

"Hermione Granger"

Hermione walked to the stool and hesitantly put on the hat on her head. An unsure expression marred her face.

The instant exclamation of 'Gryffindor' didn't happen and that made do a double take as I saw Hermione closing her eyes and began muttering something under her breath. I couldn't hear anything from so far away.

"An unusual descision, not everyday someone ever asked me such a thing. You have the traits but lack other aspects, yet you still insist—Interesting, indeed." Hermione's face frowned, and her muttering stopped. "Alright, alright, no need to get so touchy with me, missy. This will not be an easy road, I wish you the best and trust me—you'll need it."

What was going on, why was it taking so long for her to be sorted in Gryffindor?

Did something happen which I wasn't aware of? The only difference between this reality and canon Harry Potter was that she sat in the train with me instead of Harry and Ron. But that shouldn't have been enough to change her mind, Hermione was someone who was always set on her goals. She planned to be a Gryffindor so why change to Slytherin?

Have I really changed that much from a simple five minutes talk!?

"SLYTHERIN!"

"I knew that girl was trouble, being friends with him," groaned Ron while pointing at me. "At least she ain't in Gryffindor."

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What the fuck!?

That's your future teammate, Ron! She isn't supposed to be in Slytherin in the first place!