Throughout her school years, Lily Evans had gone to temple every day during her holidays (to make up for all the days during the year that she couldn't go because she was attending a boarding school) and considered herself to be a fairly devout follower of the Merciful Goddess. Once she was out of school, she was able to go to temple as she pleased... until the war made that impossible. Lily, Potter by this time, decided therefore to set up a shrine to the Merciful Goddess in the house – in the room right next to the nursery, so that she was able to tell her baby boy about the goddess that she followed and offer prayers for her son while she fed him, or when he'd woken up in the night and needed calming.
"You need to make and file a will soon Lily," a voice said as Lily was chanting a prayer over her son in the middle of the night.
Lily's head snapped up, her chanting silenced by the appearance of the goddess that she revered.
"Merciful Goddess," she greeted, almost breathlessly, dropping to her knees before the divinity.
The deity smiled. "Stand up Lily Potter," she said softly. "I'm not one of the stuffy gods you know."
Lily obediently stood up, smiling shyly, before the first statement really sunk in. "A will, Merciful Goddess?"
The purple-eyed woman nodded, her large earrings jingling softly. "I can't give much of the future away, but I highly recommend a will. And don't worry about Harry," the goddess promised with a smile. "I'll personally arrange for his care."
Lily's eyes shone with hope, gratitude and barely held-back tears. "Thank you, Merciful Goddess," she whispered. "I can never thank you enough."
"Let me hold the boy," the Merciful Goddess instructed softly, holding out her arms for the baby.
Lily obediently passed over the child, who was still fussing a little, but not as much since the first words from the Merciful Goddess had distracted his mother from her chanting.
"I give you my blessing, Harry Potter. When you come to me, then you will be called Ko Shin," the goddess declared softly, holding the babe to her chest and bending slightly to kiss his head before handing him back to Lily. "And for you and your husband, a place in paradise until your time for reincarnation rolls around."
"Thank you, Merciful Goddess," Lily said, bowing her head again over her now sleeping baby boy.
When she raised her head, the deity was gone.
~oOo~
"From the day I was born until the day I die, the only side I'm on is mine," the three demons declared, before putting their last adversary out of his misery.
Behind them, a blonde Sanzo priest nodded his agreement to this statement.
Green eyes blinked open as the dream faded. He'd been travelling with those same three demons and blonde Sanzo priest for as long as he could properly remember, longer even, though the Merciful Goddess would regularly grant him a 'memory' of when his parents had still lived. Only occasionally his own memory though, which made those dreams more interesting. Less often, and as was the case this morning, she granted him dreams of his 'travelling companions' before he'd know them. It was rare that he got dreams of Kougaiji, Yaone, Dokugakuji and Lirin, but he got a few of those as well. Always interesting little lessons in his dreams from the Merciful Goddess. Not always pleasant, but always interesting and educational.
"From the day I was born until the day I die," Shin muttered to himself. "Yeah, that sounds about right," he allowed, then swung his legs off the bed he was sleeping in and planted his feet on the floorboards.
It was a cheap inn, but the floor didn't have any splinters and the beds were soft with extra blankets available to stave off the cold. The extra blankets helped with blocking out snoring and dream-induced mumbles as well, as all five of them were sharing the room this time. The cheap inn was also small and full, which was why they were sharing. Even if it hadn't been full, there weren't enough rooms in this inn for all of them to have a room to themselves. It was a very small inn.
But then, it was a very small town, so small it wasn't even a blip on the map and probably didn't actually qualify for the label 'town'. It was better than camping though, even if they were all in together, if just for the soft beds.
Shin was the second person awake that morning. He usually came in third unless someone was injured, but Sanzo had been in a mood last night when he went to sleep, so it made sense he'd sleep a little bit later. Hakkai was still the first one up though. Goku liked sleep almost as much as he liked food, and Gojyo was only interested in staying up late if there was drinking, smoking, gambling or women involved. Since Shin had joined the group, Hakkai had forced Gojyo and Sanzo to cut back on the smoking, and when they were sharing a room there couldn't be any womanising. They were out of beer and no one in the locale seemed to have any either, and gambling without smoking or drinking wasn't quite as much fun. Gojyo was also not a morning person, his circadian rhythm having long been set to seeing him up all night making money gambling before getting laid and then sleeping until noon. These days, he usually surfaced only just long enough before Goku to be able to look like he'd been awake much longer and be able to rub it in the monkey's face.
Careful to be as silent as he could, Shin dressed, packed, and headed downstairs to the dining area where Hakkai was already drinking coffee.
"Good morning Shin," Hakkai greeted with a smile. "You're up earlier than usual."
"Good morning Hakkai," Shin answered, returning the smile. "I think it's just Sanzo sleeping a little later actually. You saw how he was last night."
Hakkai nodded, humming soft agreement, half a smile on his lips. "I think it might be because of how long this quest of ours is taking," he said. "You just turned ten, and we were travelling for a couple of years before the Merciful Goddess brought you to us. I think we were all expecting we'd have reached our destination by now."
Shin agreed with a silent nod.
"That Hakuryu disappeared last night and didn't look like he'd be hurrying back isn't be helping his mood any," Gojyo said groggily as he stumbled into the dining room, joining them.
"Gojyo!" Hakkai greeted with a surprised smile. "Down before Sanzo when he isn't injured?"
"Oh he's awake," Gojyo answered as he pulled out a chair and slumped down into it, half-sprawling over the table. "He's just stuffing himself with smokes before breakfast. I couldn't stand his shitty cigarette's second-hand smoke, so here I am."
Shin clamped his mouth shut and let his sides shake silently while Hakkai chuckled softly. There were few things as amusing as Gojyo being driven out of a room because of smoke, considering he'd been a chimney himself before Shin had been thrust upon them and Hakkai had insisted that they 'not smoke around the baby'. Gojyo hadn't even needed to be told, he liked kids and Shin had (according to Gojyo, Hakkai and Goku) been a really cute baby, but Sanzo had needed regular reminding. He really didn't like anyone, especially smelly, messy, loud infants (he had disagreed about Shin being a cute baby rather vehemently, but he was loathe to use the word 'cute' at all in the first place).
"It is odd for Hakuryu to just disappear like he did last night," Hakkai admitted, mildly perturbed by the strange occurrence.
~oOo~
It was well into the afternoon of the next day before Hakuryu returned, and Sanzo scowled to see the company the small dragon had brought back with him. Not any of Kougaiji's group, the sour-tempered priest would have welcomed someone to shoot at, but rather the small dragon was in the company of the Merciful Goddess.
What was really weird was that she came bearing mail of all things.
"Shin," she said, holding it out to the boy.
Shin's hand shook as he accepted the letter. The envelope was made of thick parchment, rather than the lighter, plant-based paper they were used to seeing. Seriously, who still used animal skins to write on these days? Even if it was possible to re-use it, it was still animal skin, however it got treated and shaved. He knew though, from the 'memories' that the Merciful Goddess had granted him in some of his dreams.
"What's that Shin?" Goku asked, leaning over the table to stare at the envelope.
"Even you should recognise a letter when you see one Monkey," Gojyo prodded in his usual abrasively teasing way.
"I don't recognise the wax seal," Hakkai said, frowning at the two in such a way as to cut off any fighting before it began. No one really used wax seals any more either, not even on the most official of documents, not since stamps had been recognised as much more efficient to use. "The writing is odd as well."
"It's English," Kanzeon explained simply. "The language of the people that Shin was born to."
And if she hadn't been granting him dreams of his parents and their friends, then Shin would be completely lost with reading and speaking the language that was confronting him now on parchment.
"Not gonna do the kid much good then," Gojyo said flatly, shrugging in frustrated dismissal of the missive.
Shin shook his head while the Merciful Goddess explained about the kappa being wrong on that point and exactly why. The boy proceeded to break the seal, open the envelope, and withdraw more parchment from inside.
"So what's it say?" Goku asked.
"I am invited to Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry," Shin replied.
"What?" demanded Sanzo, glaring from Shin to the Merciful Goddess. "You had us taking care of a magician all this time?"
"Not only that, but I made sure you wouldn't reach Gyokumen Koshu's palace until Shin got this letter," the Merciful Goddess answered. "You'll have your quest wrapped up within the week, and then I'll take Shin and whoever wants to come with us to Britain."
"Even Lirin if she wants to?" Shin asked, a sneaky grin on his face. "Or Kougaiji or Dokugakuji or Yaone if they want to?"
"I said whoever," she answered with a shrug. "It's up to you to invite them though," she added firmly, tapping the boy on the nose. "I've responded for you, by the way. You're going, like it or not."
Shin nodded silently and read through the list of things he was going to need when he attended this school. It really was a good thing that he knew English from the dreams, or he'd be screwed when he got there.
~oOo~
For the rest of the party joining him on this jaunt to a far away land for the sake of an education he wasn't entirely convinced that he needed (Hakkai was a pretty good teacher after all), the Merciful Goddess just flipped a metaphorical switch in everybody's brains so that they understood and spoke English as though they'd grown up with the language. Not necessarily the accents, but they wouldn't have any communication problems at least.
As it happened, all of the demons wanted to come too, even Kougaiji's mother who they'd unsealed when they killed Gyokumen Koshu (and retrieved the founding scriptures and put a stop to the resurrection of Gyumaoh) wanted to come. This turned out to be a really good thing, as it meant that when they visited Gringotts (and what kind of dumb-ass named the bank Gringotts?), Rasetsunyo asked all the right questions to get all sorts of useful information from the goblins. They got portkeys to the Potter Estate made, Shin was made Head of his family owing to him being the last of his family (a move which had a lot of interesting bonuses attached to it), and Rasetsunyo even volunteered to stay behind and sort through all the accounts and dry business involved in same while the rest of them got on with the shopping. Who knew the demon queen was such a head for business? Of course, her status as a demonic royal went a long way towards convincing the penny-pinchers to be at the very least civil.
Hakkai claimed the book list and went to collect the texts, as well as seek out any other books that looked useful or interesting. They were all going to be learning about the new culture after all, the more books the better. Kougaiji led Sanzo and Dokugakuji down Knockturn Alley, looking for anything interesting. Goku and Lirin claimed a table at the ice cream parlour and proceeded to eat their way through every flavour available – slowly though, they didn't want to get a brain-freeze. Gojyo found himself a seat in a pub and proceeded to order 'firewhiskey', start a poker game, and glean gossip from the witches and wizards already in attendance. That left Shin in Yaone's charge (Kanzeon had just left them there, rather than hanging around for the shopping trip), and the first order of business was the apothecary. After all, she was one, and she wanted to see how these people plied the trade (it helped her cause that Shin was interested too).
When they eventually got around to the wand shop (a place called Lau's Lengths that the goblins had recommended, even if the man who ran it was a bit... perverse shall we say? Better than Ollivander's, which all came with Ministry tracking devices), everybody else was there to meet them, even Hakuryu who had been advised to stay out of sight of the general wizarding population (apparently it was illegal to keep company with a dragon in this country).
"Welcome to Lau's Lengths; how much are we compensating for today?" asked a cheerful looking man of roughly thirty-ish (probably) as he appeared from the back rooms. He wore a navy blue coat cut in a very similar style to the green shirt that Hakkai wore, though much longer in both the sleeve and the body, and his black hair was in a similar style to Sanzo's.
Gojyo choked on bitten-back laughter at the question that had been asked in the same tone as the general shop inquiry of 'how can we help you today?' It was a priceless moment. He wasn't the only one trying not to laugh either. Everyone except Sanzo (who was scowling rather than laughing), Lirin (who was too innocent of such things despite her impressive chest), and Yaone (who was blushing furiously) were quietly sniggering, chuckling softly or holding back guffaws. Even Shin, who should have been too young to understand the innuendo (except that he'd been raised by Hakkai, Gojyo, Sanzo and Goku, with extensive exposure to Lirin, Kougaiji, Dokugakuji, Yaone and all sorts of people in the towns they stopped at along their quest, and therefore understood a lot of things that ten-year-old kids shouldn't).
"Shin needs a wand, and the goblins recommended you," Lirin stated after having given everyone around her a Look that said she thought they were all nuts. She also pointed to Shin, so that the man knew which one of them was the customer.
"And I'd be advertising, not compensating," Shin quipped as he stifled his sniggering.
The man raised an eyebrow. "Well, that is interesting," he said, a sly smile spreading across his face. "I am Lau, and I am delighted to have a customer come to me for their very first wand and be so confident. Children seem to all go to Ollivander for a best fit wand these days, of course, he's also British, which may be why he gets more custom than me, being a foreigner and all," Lau said with a dramatic sniff before grinning again and pulling out a measuring tape.
It turned out that there were several factors that were involved in simply discovering the ideal length for a person's wand: how tall they were, how long their limbs were, how large their hands were, how wide their shoulders were set, the length of one's nose, and the distance between their eyes were all important measurements to know to get the best wand length. According to Lau it was a matter of arithmancy. Wand wood was determined by the time of year a person was born in relation to the seasons, moon phases, and approximate time of day (or night). For Shin, being born a few minutes away from midnight on the thirty-first of July in (naturally) summer, and on the night of a waning gibbous moon (four nights after the official full moon, Lau had a calendar), meant that his thirteen-inch long wand (the aforementioned arithmancy) would have to be made of alder wood. None of their group pretended to understand how Lau determined this, but he was the professional for a reason, so they let him get on with it.
"Now, Ollivander will tell you that 'the wand chooses the wizard'," Lau said as he brought a case out from beneath the counter. "This is a falsehood, but not an outright lie. More a gross over-simplification. Ollivander makes lots and lots of wands and when a witch or wizard comes to buy from him the process is to go through all the possible-fit options until a wand is found that resonates with the wielder's magic. This is the 'choosing' Ollivander talks about, but because his wands are all ready-made there is rarely a perfect fit out of his shop," Lau explained as he opened the case, unfolded compartments and pulled out drawers. "Your magic will resonate with a magical amplifier of some kind. Without an in-depth psychological profile, I can't tell what kind, and I'm really not that interested in handing you a fifty page long quiz so that I'll have a vague idea of what you'll be best suited to. This is my sample chest. I want you to touch each of these until you find something that gives you a tingly feeling, then I'll pull out the appropriate chest and we'll find something that resonates with your magical core properly."
The core for the wand ended up being one of the primary flight feathers of a pegusus (a dapple-grey Arabian of excellent breeding in this particular case; Lau said it's owner had named it Piccolo) and one of Goku's hairs, which surprised everybody (especially Lau). The wand was quickly assembled anyway, and then the group portkeyed away to the Potter Estate.
~oOo~
Shin brushed his hair and tied it back with a simple black ribbon. No need to draw attention to himself by using some ridiculous coloured bow after all. Besides, black would match the appalling uniform he was being required to wear as a student to this stupid boarding school. Shin's black horse-tail of hair fell to his hips, just like Kougaiji's hair did, and Goku's when he went 'ape-shit' as Gojyo put it (the Merciful Goddess said he just 'regressed' to his most primal state). Difference was that Shin had to tie his hair back or it got literally everywhere, and the two demons didn't have any problem with theirs. Bastards.
Who was he fooling? He liked those bastards.
There was a knock on his bedroom door. "Ready to go Shin?" Hakkai asked, poking his head in.
Shin smiled. "After ten years of travelling with Goku, I think I know how to pack up and be ready to move out at a moment's notice by now," he joked.
Hakkai laughed. "Right," he agreed. "Hakuryu is waiting out front to take us to the station."
"And then you're all going to catch another train to bring you back here while Hakuryu comes with me so he can find the place as needed," Shin finished, slinging his bag over his shoulder. Even with all the books, uniforms, and extra (ridiculous) paraphernalia, Shin was still able to pack efficiently.
The fact that the bag had a bottomless charm and a feather-weight charm on it helped too of course.
~oOo~
"Now remember Shin, these people don't know that the Merciful Goddess has given you a new name," Yaone said as she embraced him on the platform like so many mothers farewelling their children, telling them to be good and to write. "And they are ignorant of the truth of many things. Do not hold it against them, merely teach them."
Shin nodded as he returned the embrace. When Yaone released him, Kougaiji took her hand in his and held her close as Lirin tackled the boy.
"You write!" she ordered. "If you don't, then I'll come and beat ya up!"
Shin laughed happily. "I promise," he said. "Though I'd honestly appreciate you coming by anyway Lirin," he added, kissing her cheek as he pulled her arms from around his neck. "And don't go blowing up my family house, alright?"
"Pfft!" Lirin scoffed, waving a hand at him like he was being foolish, completely dismissing his concern.
Rasetsunyo chuckled softly. "Don't worry Shin," she said. "Everything will be fine on our end."
Shin smiled gratefully up at the demon queen. In the short time she'd been free and he'd had the chance to get to know her, he'd really gotten to like her. It certainly helped his understanding of Kougaiji's obsession with freeing her all those years.
"Thank you," he said, bowing before her.
"And if any of them start getting too bored, I'll hire them for you," she said, bending slightly to kiss his cheek in farewell.
Shin laughed. "That's a great idea!" he said happily.
A tap on his shoulder turned him around and there was Gojyo, holding out a deck of cards, a grin on his face.
"Don't forget to keep in the habit," he said firmly. "Don't want to win too easy when you come back for the holidays, and if you don't practice your poker face then it will be too easy."
Hakkai just smiled and shook his head at his friend while Shin accepted the slim box and stuffed it into his pocket.
"And don't forget to practice your fighting," Goku added, rubbing his face a little. "Or I'll race off after you and kick your butt."
"Get on the train already Squirt," Sanzo said sharply, interrupting before Shin could think of an answer for Goku. "We're getting stared at, and it's almost departure time."
Shin nodded and grabbed his bag. "I'll see you all soon," he promised, then dashed for the nearest door onto the train, waving over his shoulder the whole time.
"He'll be just fine," Kougaiji said firmly.
Dokugakuji laughed. "Yeah, but I'm fairly sure we're all gonna miss him."
~The End~