What Doesn't Kill Me, Makes Me Stronger Chapter 1: Persevere, a harry potter fanfic

What Doesn't Kill Me, Makes Me Stronger

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter universe nor its characters. Familiar characters and references you see here belong to their respected authors and owners. The authors will be mentioned below so as to ensure that they are well credited and recognised.

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Chapter 1: Persevere

"My given task is accomplished Lord Greengrass." I said as walked to his table and handed out the parchment to my instructor.

He tore off his gaze from the documents he was currently reading and silently took hold of my given parchment and gazed upon my writing. This was my calligraphy assignment and my task was to write a 9-inch essay, in beautiful handwriting on a given topic. The topic this time was – Asphodel Roots. While I didn't know much about it, I had filled the parchment to the best of my ability with the information about its structure, appearance, locations where it is found and its various uses in potion making.

After a few moments of contemplative silence, looking at me, Lord Greengrass commented, "Next time, improve your handwriting and write the other rudimentary and supplementary uses of the ingredient."

Nodding to his suggestion and looking into his eyes, I replied, "Thank you, fathe- "

I suddenly felt an intrusion into my mind.

My memories flashed before me.

I am 6 years old, writing, writing.

Holding my right hand in pain, writing.

I couldn't scream, knowing screaming would only increase my punishment.

I am writing.

There are no familial ties while training. Lord Greengrass is my instructor.

I am writing. I am writing with my own blood.

My hand held a blood quill, which was extracting blood from my veins.

I am writing. I am writing with my own blood.

There are no familial ties while training. Lord Greengrass is my instructor.

I am in so much pain. My hand feels like it would burst now. This is torture but I couldn't stop now.

I am writing.

There are no familial ties while training. Lord Greengrass is my instructor.

There are no familial ties while trai-

The memories stopped and I fell on my knees while holding my right hand. I knew there was no pain in reality but the phantom pain from the incident two years ago triggered. Slowly, mentally, ordering the phantom pain to go away, I looked at Lord Greengrass who was back to reading his documents.

"Make sure to give me a proper assignment next time." I heard him speak and without looking into his eyes, I bowed and said,

"Thank you, Lord Greengrass"

I didn't look up and after a few seconds I heard him say, "Leave me now."

And I promptly left the study room and slowly closed the door to his room.

Feeling as though my whole life-force was drained, I took a few seconds to just stand outside the study room's closed door. After feeling somewhat well, I noticed my clothes were soaked with sweat with sitting with my Lord Greengrass for hours, and so deciding to take a shower, I methodically walked towards the attached bathroom in my room and turned the knob, to open the door.

Entering the bathroom and stripping out of my clothes, I let my gaze fall into the mirror in front of me and blond hair and bright green eyes looked back. My name was Adrian Greengrass, son of Eugene Greengrass and Adrianna Greengrass and I was the heir to the Ancient and Most Noble House of Greengrass.

Walking towards the shower, I slowly activated the warming rune in the pipe and let my thoughts wander as warm water fell over my body.

It had been 8 years since Voldemort had been 'defeated' in the wizarding world. Thankfully, unlike many protagonists, I didn't lose much in the war. The Greengrass family had always been a Neutral one, favouring what was beneficial to them, while we would have been forced to choose sides if the war escalated any further but in current time our wealth and prestige didn't suffer because of the backlash from the end of the war.

All around the world, Harry Potter was celebrated and hailed as the Boy-who-lived and while the majority of the world thought he was with Dumbledore, preferably being trained, I knew where he was and what was the supposedly 'saviour' forced to do.

I started thinking, I had to prepare, for it was only 7 years remaining when Voldemort would rise to the surface once more and with only a couple years of time, the war deciding the fate of the wizarding world would start again.

I knew all this despite the fact that I was just 8 years old.

And how do I know all this you ask?

Well, this isn't the first time I had lived.

XXXXX

In my previous life, I was an orphan by birth. I didn't know who my parents were and frankly, I didn't care. I didn't care if they were dead or had abandoned me, I preferred to live in the present than to ponder upon supposedly what ifs. I was thankfully in a well to do orphanage with several other children. The orphanage was one of the biggest in the town where I lived and most of the orphaned children were stationed there. Even though there was no lack of monetary funding, one of the main rules of the orphanage was that – the orphanage will only provide the money for necessity not luxury. This was also the place where my pragmatic and manipulative nature was born and honed.

We, the orphans, were allowed to do menial tasks, like selling newspapers, tending to shops in mornings, maintain lawns of nearby houses, delivering vegetables, doing shopping for nearby houses, etc. after taking permission from the matron of the orphanage. The matron of the orphanage also cared enough about us so as to personally meet the employer to ensure that the orphans did not find themselves in a bad company who could employ them to do illegal tasks for money. The matron was well respected and adored by the population of the town for her kind nature towards the unfortunates like orphans while also being strict when we did something wrong. The population also commented that only due to the matron's personal involvement in our lives, we - the orphans - didn't turn into some kind of criminals.

The matron was in her late thirties and had been serving the orphanage for a decade. It is said that she herself was an orphan by birth and later when she grew up and graduated from college, she fell in love with a man, married him and later moved out of the orphanage. A few months later she had a son with the man and was finally happy in her life.

But a few years later, everything started crashing down. She found out that her husband was starting to deal in drugs despite having a stable job and she tried to convince him to stop, at least for the future of their child, but the man refused to budge, lost in his greed for money. She later filed a divorce and fought for the custody of her child who was around 3 at the time, stating her husband's drugs deals. But in the court, she failed to prove her husband's involvement in the said drug deals and due to her not having any kind of job and hence lack of ability to properly raise her son, was awarded a divorce but lost the custody of the child to her husband.

Broken-heartedly, she arrived at the doors of the orphanage and was warmly welcomed by the then matron of the orphanage. She then started serving the orphanage and stated that the children in the orphanage were now her own sons and daughters, though a few months later it was later found that her husband was found dead due to drug overdose and her son was also found dead reasoning to dehydration and malnutrition.

It was that incident which led to her hate towards criminal activities and she wanted her children – us, the orphans – to stay away from such. At least that's what she told me when she found my 13-year-old self, stealing a new toy from my roommate. She said that what started as mild stealing for satisfying the curiosity to see a new toy could later turn into an obsessive need for getting anything new by any means possible, hence turning me into a criminal and she didn't want her son – me – to become such.

But truthfully, I didn't stop, what didn't kill me made me stronger. I just became smarter, I thought about what gave me away the previous time and then planned beforehand so as no clues were pointed towards me. I started living pragmatically, thinking before doing any work and even started to manipulate and blackmail my fellow roommates to give some of their monthly stipends to me in return to not rat out their secrets and using them to get what I wanted. Truth is I didn't feel bad doing such since I had soon learned that in this competitive world, only improving oneself mattered, Survival of the fittest so as to speak. In school, I studied smarter not harder and found myself in the top tier in academics. By the time I finished high school, at least to the outside world, I was one of the most adored students in the school and the matron too had no complaints towards me since I didn't break any rules, some of my school teachers even offered to write recommendation letters for colleges. Life was going well, and like everything, it soon crashed.

I still remember, a few days after my high school graduation, I woke to sounds of police sirens, gunfire and unnecessary shouting from the entrance of the orphanage. I rushed there and found the matron and all the other orphans at gunpoint of a masked terrorist, while his partner was shouting to the police below about something to free his companion. Apparently, the couple of terrorists were from a terrorist organisation and a fellow companion of theirs' had been captured and to make their demands come true, they had decided to take the orphanage hostage. By the time I had reached near the matron and other orphans, the one with the gun had pointed his gun towards the matron and pulled the trigger.

I didn't know what I had done, I didn't know what my body had done, but the fading life-force proved such that I had performed my last, final action in this world. I had jumped in front of the matron and taken the shot meant for her in my heart without any thought. I was supposed to be pragmatic, logical, intelligent but I behaved like a fool, like an idiot at that moment. Since I had arrived late and the terrorists didn't see me, I could have signalled one of the police officers from the window and they could have entered the orphanage from there, I could have jumped out from the window at least saving my own life but idiotically, I rushed towards the gunfire saving the person who had practically raised me as hers when I had no one in this world, the only person for whom I remotely cared in one small corner of my heart like a child loves his mother, even though the matron didn't care for me much specifically and just saw me one of them. But even in my dying, final moments, I practically threw away my entire life, my upcoming college life, my future, everything, I died without regrets.

I don't remember much after that, I was apparently floating in the air, slowly drifting farther and farther into the sky, I could hear some screaming, as the terrorists shot the matron next, and more gunfire, more killings and finally the big explosion enveloping the entire orphanage, killing the terrorists and all the orphans.

XXXXX

I slowly turned the shower off and proceeded to dry myself using a towel. Draping the towel, around my waist, I exited the bathroom and moved toward the closet. Opening it, among the myriad of shimmering cloaks, tunics and vests, I selected a purple acromantula silk shirt and black trousers. According to my father, even in my own house, I wasn't allowed to wear anything less than that of one befitting a pureblood heir.

Dressing up, I allowed my eyes to roam towards my present surroundings, my room. My room inherently was simple, I had a table in which I did most of my studies in one corner of the room, the closet containing my clothes in the corner on the other side, a big king-sized bed to sleep in in the centre and the door which led to the attached bathroom adjacent to the closet. At least, I wanted it to be such, but Lord Greengrass felt the room not to be worthy to that of the heir of the house and so he decided to remodel it according to his preferences. The room was enlarged and while the structure of the room was basically kept the same, the empty space created by the enlargement was filled with novelty trinkets bought from various shops, a cleansweep 7 broom in a custom-made showcase, a bookcase with common magical theory books and a few framed picturesque, moving sceneries. I knew most of them were useless to me and were only kept so as to create a positive impression on the guest, it was also specifically creepy since I also knew that the some of the trinkets contained several monitoring charms which would automatically give away mine and if I had any guest's every movement's status report to Lord Greengrass.

The only precious thing I had in the room, was the picture exactly facing the bed, so I could look at it every time I wake up. It was a picture of a smiling blond-haired couple holding two bundles draped in white cloth. It was the only picture I had of my whole family, the only scene I had ever seen of a smiling Lord Greengrass and also the only picture I had of my late mother.

After dying in my previous life, everything was hazy, everything was bright, everything was dark, everything was cold and everything was warm. The earliest feeling that I had was of sucking something warm and losing control of my bowels and the earliest memory I can remember was of seeing a blurry female face feeding me and cleaning my excreta. It was only after I was about 3-year-old, I had any sort of semblance of control over my thought processes. I wasn't a slow child by any chance, I had started walking by the age of 10 months and speaking, though only single words by 7 months of age or so I am told now, it was only by the beginning of my 3rd year in this life, when my brain had somewhat developed and I was beginning to have thoughts, I started feeling something was wrong. It was a confusing existence, I felt something was missing, something had happened, my hands should be bigger, my face should be different, my surroundings should be different and finally my memories of my previous life started merging with that of my current conscience.

It was painful, oh, so, so painful, I would often cry loudly and wake my nanny while holding my head. The nanny would speak to my father, Lord Greengrass, who would just dismiss them and tell her to do the work she is assigned to. It was only after a particularly painful and crippling headache in which I had apparently created a seismic blast from my body, which had shattered all the grass items in my room, woke my sleeping sister in the neighbouring room, threw away the nanny towards the wall and shook the floor planks so the vibration was felt in my father's room across the hall, in my first bout of accidental magic, had my father decided to take me to St. Mungo's for a check-up. Apparently, it was found that the neurons in my brain were transmitting information at the highest speed possible and most of the blood in my body was pumped towards my brain and new neurons were created at an accelerated rate. The doctors were surprised since it was not an ordinary ailment and they apparently had no immediate cure for it, the only solution they had was to wait for my brain to finish developing and let the natural magic in my body do its job. The magic in my body was also constantly concentrated in stabilising my brain and such the amount of magic present in my baby body, as small as they may be, were never full. Since such a predicament will only increase my magic reserves down the line, Lord Greengrass let me suffer for it and while he was about to take me away from the hospital, I had enough presence of mind to start crying again while holding my head, the doctors coerced Lord Greengrass to at least give me some harmless painkiller potions, then the man agreed so as to no harm to befall his investment.

It was only after I was around 5 years old did the headaches stop and I had fully assimilated my past memories. But now, even after 3 years, I barely remember much of it, unless it was either very essential to my past, or will be essential to my present life's future. It is like learning the alphabets when we were kids, we do remember the alphabets because they are useful, necessary but we do not remember who taught it to us, with whom did we learn it first, which was our first word, where did we first recite them, etc. In my current age of 8, I don't even remember my name in my past life, neither the names of the matron or the fellow orphans I interacted with, the only information I want to remember is that of the current life I am living and the various Harry Potter books which I read in my past life which would inherently help me now in present.

But my past life doesn't matter anymore, I am Adrian Greengrass now and that is all that matters.

While researching about my family, I found that my father and mother met and fell in love during Hogwarts years. My father was of a minor pureblood and my mother was the heiress of the Ancient and Most Noble House of Greengrass, an old pureblood family. While my mother's parents were reluctant about the marriage at first, it was only after my father became a member of the International Confederation of Wizards (ICW), did they agree him to betroth to my mother while continuing the Greengrass family name. My father then starting working as a delegation from Great Britain to ICW while my mother stayed home and worked on spell creation, which was also her hobby. They were very happy and later when it was found that my mother was pregnant, my father was overjoyed and apparently threw a huge party in which he invited both his and her Hogwarts' friends.

As the months passed on, my mother started growing weak, since the birth of a magical child was very taxing on the mother. It was the mother which nurtured the magical prowess inside the baby and the magic inside the mother's body basically created the magical circuits inside of the baby. Even though she had become very weak, so as to my father had to take an unplanned vacation for a couple months from his job, she persisted, determined to bring her baby into the world.

And she was successful and after 9 months of enduring tremendous pain, the delivery date had arrived. The doctors proceeded to deliver the baby but complications arose when not one but two babies were found in the womb, a boy and a girl. Even though my mother had to divide her magic to nurture both of us twins' magics, and was suffering from severe magical deprivation, she held strong and we proceeded to be a happy family and that particular picture was taken. We were born on April 31st 1980 and I was named Adrian after my mother's name Adrianna and my father chose Daphne, meaning Victory for my sister. My father even proceeded to boast about how Eugene – lucky – he was. Both my parents were happy, at least for the moment.

A few days later, it was found that my mother could no longer handle the stress of magical loss created by her magical deprivation, and her body was slowly cannibalising herself. I had also found out that my father apparently spent three days and nights beside my mother without eating any food, and only left her hand when it was cold and she was no more.

Later down the years, I realised I had not only lost my mother that day, I did my father as well.

Since my mother was now dead, my father became the sole inheritor of the Greengrass name, prestige and fortune and he apparently wanted us to elevate the name of the family my mother was from and was ready to go to the utmost lengths so as to make that come true.

He wanted to make me an heir who would take the Greengrass family name to greater heights and trained us as to not embarrass the Greengrass name. He beat us when we made mistakes, he punished us, monitored our every action and wanted us to be nothing less than perfect who would make his wishes come true.

But thankfully, I was not alone this time, I had someone who became my emotional support as I became hers. While I was alone in my previous life, at least in this one I had someone to share the suffering and someone to rely on.

XXXXX

It was the time for dinner and Lord Greengrass and I were sitting on the family table, he was reading some documents from work and I was idly looking towards the Floo network in our mansion waiting for Daphne.

The Floo network was, I found out while reading, complicated and not as pretty as it was mentioned in the books. It was not as simple as just throwing some dust, saying the name of the location and arriving there. The magical Floo powder reacted to the Floo network energy, and utilising the wizard's magic would turn the wizard into a tiny particle. The particle will be transferred towards the predestined destination at very high speeds and after reaching the opposite Floo place, the particle will then proceed to turn back into the wizard and teleportation will be successful. It was pretty easy in usage but enough Floo powder needed to be thrown into the Floo place and the person has to have enough magic for the teleportation, so essentially, an injured person couldn't travel via Floo, Flooing more than a single person at a time was also dangerous and also a person has to leave the destined Floo place, so as to let the other person come. More than a few deaths, per year, were registered due to hazardous Floo accidents.

Also, while a single Floo network was connected to every other one, it was not as easily accessible. If it were, instead of ambushing an enemy house, one could just go to their own Floo place and say the name of their enemy house's name and viola, infiltrating the enemy household had never been easier. But in truth, it doesn't work that way. Expressive permission had to be given to be welcomed at another person's Floo place. If a person does not have the permission to enter the Floo place of the house, then on the easy spectrum, the Floo will just not work and on the hard spectrum, the person will be transported but will be thrown to the dungeons of the house in which they were attempting to enter. While some places like Ministry of Magic and Diagon Alley are mandatorily connected to every Floo network, the reverse wasn't true. A person's specific magical signature had to be registered in the particular Floo place and if guests were expected, then there should be a person on the other end of the Floo place, so as to allow the access to the guest on their side.

I was broken out of my musing with the spontaneous appearance of green flames indicating Daphne had arrived. Daphne Greengrass was my younger sister by 3 minutes or so. She had blond hair and sapphire blue eyes which she had apparently inherited from our father, while I had inherited my green ones from our mother. Exiting the Floo place, she gracefully walked towards Lord Greengrass. As per one of the numerous rules of the house, she bowed before our father and started reciting what all she had accomplished in the dance class while she was there and only after a subtle nod of acknowledgement from him, did she walk towards her seat in the table, beside mine, and sat down. Sitting beside me, she gave me a small smile and we waited for the food to arrive.

With the snap from Lord Greengrass' finger, the documents he was reading disappeared and food prepared by the house-elves appeared before our eyes. The dinner was a very silent affair and was meant to be like that in our home. While having dinner together wasn't in the rulebooks, it was a tradition which my late mother insisted having and hence was diligently followed.

After we had finished our dinner, Lord Greengrass stood up from his seat and started moving towards his study. While going, without even looking at me, I heard him say, "Heir Adrian, meet me in my study in 10 minutes." and like the empty plates now disappearing from our views, we watched as he moved away from us.

I felt my hand gripped tightly and I looked to my left and saw Daphne looking at me with concern, I squeezed her hand back and with a reassuring look said, "It's okay, I will be back soon. You go and try to sleep."

Carefully standing up and moving my hand away from hers, I slowly but gracefully walked towards his study. Apparently walking was also one of the fields in which I was monitored and graded on and if he doesn't find me doing as he wished, my punishment will be doubled and he will have no qualms to exploit my only major weakness.

After knocking on Lord Greengrass' door two times, and only after hearing an order to enter, I allowed myself to stand in the same place as I was this morning. As soon as I looked into his eyes, he wasted no time to blast upon my occlumency shields. Apparently, he wanted me to start upon the family magics, but couldn't till I had raised and perfected occlumency to the level that no one could invade my mind and exploit information, and the best way to do that was by him assaulting and exploiting my mind repeatedly and painfully. And no, no, it wasn't done out of some concern or anything. It was done only so as a mandatory protection to preserve the secrets of the Greengrass family and so that no one could exploit the family secrets or magics from my mind.

In my mind, Lord Greengrass was repeatedly, hammering my shields at different places at regular intervals while checking the time needed for me to repair the cracks formed by his assault. It was a torture since my head felt like it was about to explode and I couldn't even drag my eyes away from his since I knew what the punishments and position were to be faced later for such insolence. But while trying to repair those cracks, my mind wandered off and I thought,

'All the root of problems is this man in front of me. If I just kill this man, then Daphne and I could live much peacefully and happily. Yes! That's what I should do, I will kill him and then I can even sell this manor and all the grimoires in the family at a high price. With that Daphne and I could leave this place and live happily- '

'Wait! What?'

I quickly realised what happening and closed the lid to my thought and let all my thought fade away. It was all his doing, Lord Greengrass was now using legilimency, projecting his thoughts into mine while making me this that it was all my doing, the wizarding version of Inception if you will. Though I was caught surprisingly unprepared, I was at least ready to waive off the situation which I had faced numerous times during his training.

After a few minutes of waiving out foreign thoughts and preventing intrusions, Lord Greengrass apparently satisfied, receded from the chambers of my mind. It was painful, as my head throbbed and I could feel sweat dripping down my forehead, but I had to look strong in front of my enemy. A few seconds of silent inspection from him and I was patiently waiting for his words.

"Leave me."

"Thank you for the lesson, Lord Greengrass." I bowed while saying and started to walk out, keeping in mind to walk properly, out of the room and slowly closed the door to his study.

As soon as I closed the door, I did my usual ritual of standing still outside the closed door and started panting and taking breaths heavily. It was pure torture, I knew it. Every time I entered this room, I felt drained and exploited, the person in the study wasn't my father who would give motivations when I failed and acknowledgments when I succeeded, no the man in the study was my Lord, with me being a minor in age, had all the powers over me, who only wanted to fulfil his wishes and would go to every length to make those come true. I had no delusions in my mind, if the man ever thought that I was no longer useful to him, he could just easily disown me from the house and could even kill me while illusioning it as an accident. Truth is, he had no pride in my accomplishments nor any sorrow at my failures, the only way he saw me was as a tool to fulfil his wishes. As a knife to both lather butter on his toast and to cut open vegetable and meat when needed.

But despite all this he knew, I had to obey his every command, else any dissatisfaction on his part will be exploited in the form of my only weakness.

XXXXX

After a trip to the bathroom in my room to wash my face with water and to wipe the sweat on the forehead, I changed into my designated sleepwear and slowly climbed over to my bed. Finding Daphne already there, covered in blanket and sleeping soundly, probably with all the exhaustion from the dance class, my hand trembled, not wanting to disturb her, but I had to do it, at least for her safety. I slowly shook her shoulder, attempting to wake her up.

She groggily opened and locked her blue eyes with my green ones.

"Is it time?" She quietly said and I simply nodded.

"Remember, clear your mind of any thought and just focus on the intrusion." I said and slowly, subtly and almost painlessly entered Daphne's mind. Focusing some small blasts in the shields and testing the reaction time, I proceeded to give a few pointers.

After feeling somewhat satisfied by her shields at the moment, I projected my thoughts on her mind.

'I am going in from the centre'

'Okay'

Feeling the centre of her shields weaken, I focused simultaneous blasts on the sides of the shields to divert her attention and pain, while slowly creating a needle sized hole in the centre of her shields. With that, I slowly started entering and accessing her memories.

I felt her hand painfully constricting mine, but I continued on. She knew that if it was getting too painful, she could just look away and I wouldn't mind, but she endured it both for herself and for me.

Trust. Trust was considered crucial between a teacher and a student of mind art, and trust is what we both had in spades for each other. Accessing her memories, I didn't delve deep, just proceeded to flash what had happened in her dance class today in her mind. Truth is I could have easily delved deeper to find any, if not all secrets, but I didn't because there wasn't any. We had nothing to hide from each other, we trusted each other explicitly, we shared whatever we knew with one another and we knew if there was someone who would understand us, it was the other one.

Receding my magic from the depths of her mind, I reached the shields and helped her to make the shield again in pristine condition again and slowly exited her mind and looked away from her eyes.

Finding her holding her head, I placed my hand on her temple and proceeded to massage them.

"Daphne, it will be okay. Sleep peacefully." I said as she turned my side and placed the back of her head on my shoulder while I was massaging her forehead.

The legilimency and occlumency exercise we just had, wasn't needed, but we both understood it was necessary. Lord Greengrass had from the time we had gained some maturity said that he would spare no time for Daphne. He had declared that he had no use for her and she was the unwanted one in this family. So, he would spare no look at her, spare no time for her, wouldn't hear any of her pleas and she was ultimately the discarded one.

Due to such a lack of attention from him, she tried to strive harder, did tasks meant for me, even before I had finished, completed my calligraphy assignment even better than me but Lord Greengrass didn't even acknowledge her presence. It was only after I had started playing with her and sharing whatever Lord Greengrass had taught me with her, he acknowledged her presence, by severely beating me in front of her.

She cried, oh, she cried, while I screamed while trying to hold a strong face in front of her, but he didn't stop and slapped me even harder to educate me about what would happen to me if I shared any more information and knowledge with her and educate her about what punishment I have to face, if she continued to associate herself with me. Coincidently, it was also the day she did her first bout of accidental magic. She materialised a spherical shield in front of my body, so as to stop Lord Greengrass' hand from reaching me.

After that day, he beat me a few times more though when I shared some knowledge with her but later when he realised that I would not stop myself from associating myself and sharing whatever he taught me with her, he somewhat accepted her presence. Though he allowed me to teach her, allowed her the access to the family library and even set up classes so as to properly train the heiress of the house, he strictly stated that he would take no direct involvement in her teachings.

It was only in the recent years, that he acknowledged her as the heiress of the house and had allowed her to sometimes attend whatever he was teaching me. But he didn't necessarily look at her and acknowledged her like the daughter she was, but more or less that of a worker or subordinate to him.

He would at any random time, bump upon her occlumency shields and proceed to test, break and extract any information from her mind, leaving her in tremendous pain and only after feeling either bored or satisfied would leave her mind's premises. So, to save her from this painful exercise, I took matters into my own hand. Every night, I would proceed to teach her of the little occlumency I learned and experienced. I would painlessly intrude her mind's premises while simultaneously increasing my legilimency skills and her occlumency skills. And it was working. The human body was peculiar and what didn't kill us, made us stronger. My repeated invasion of her mind, made her body to adapt to the intrusion and due to her studying about occlumency from the library and my intrusions, her occlumency shields ever stronger than ever. Still, it was not of much use against a skilled legilimency artist like my father, but it was still work in progress.

In Lord Greengrass' eyes, Daphne was unnecessary for his wishes and dreams to be fulfilled.

But in my eyes, she was my most precious person.

She has endured all the pain, all the suffering together with me. After I saw her taking same classes as me and taking same punishments as me, I begged her to stop, I had no choice but to be the heir but she had. She could live her life the way she wanted, and unless she embarrassed the family in any manner, Lord Greengrass wouldn't bat an eyelash at her and her behaviour. She has the choice to stop being the heiress of the Ancient and Most Noble House of Greengrass, but she didn't. She chose this life because of me.

She even researched and created pain relieving and quick healing potions from the Greengrass library for me when I would get be in much pain, but she refused to budge. She chose to suffer.

She chose to suffer with me. She chose to suffer along and beside me.

I knew she was mentally scared because of the less than normal childhood that we had. We had become more mature because of our sufferings, but I had an excuse, I was reincarnated, I had faced, grew up and had experienced a childhood before. What was hers? Nothing. She was just a normal child, who was in peril and was faced to mature way too fast.

But she had me beside her like I had her. She was my biggest strength.

I knew it. She knew it. And also, unfortunately, Lord Greengrass knew it.

Being the Lord of the house, we were currently minors in, he had all the power above us. He had all the power over Daphne and so, he had all the power over me. He had turned what was my greatest strength into my greatest weakness. If I refused to comply and follow his demands, he could do whatever he wanted to Daphne.

He could disown her from the family, making her social status in the wizarding world just above muggleborns.

He could betroth her to anyone, anyone if he so desired. The lowest of scums and Daphne would be forced to marry him.

Or worse, he could just lend her, to anyone. For money, he could give her to some low-life, scummy, bastards for a night and they could do whatever they wanted to her.

While, I was sure he wouldn't do any of these to Daphne because she was also the heiress of the house and doing so will destroy his reputation in ICW, making him to lose his job and would slander the Greengrass family name, he so desired to elevate, it was the power, the power he had on us by which he could do it, terrified me.

I knew it. She knew it. And most unfortunately Lord Greengrass knew it, that Daphne was also my biggest weakness. My Achilles heel.

I removed my hand from her head when I felt her form go slack on my shoulder and gently kissed on her forehead and turned my head towards the ceiling of my room.

Truth is I was still the pragmatic and manipulative child I once was in my previous life, but I was mistaken. I hadn't interacted much with the world than my fellow orphans, matron and teachers in school, so in my limited territory, I thought that I was the king, but in reality, I wasn't.

Here, my opponent was my father, and given my circumstances, I couldn't even hope to try to outsmart or even manipulate him. He had much more power over me. I couldn't manipulate or scheme against the man when he could just read it straight off my brain. It was useless. The only salvation was that I had been able to successfully store all the information regarding Voldemort, Harry Potter or my reincarnation in the deepest recesses of my mind, covered with an additional shield, that unless he went specifically searching for those, they would remain undiscovered.

But I wasn't sitting idly, I was accumulating power, I was studying, practising, applying and gaining knowledge every day, each passing day, made me somewhat stronger, smarter and when the right time and circumstance would come, I would overthrow him with the same power and knowledge he so desired me to have. But for now, I will learn, I will obey and I will persevere.

Power. Power is what ran this world, power was the blood and fuels of this society. Voldemort wasn't wrong when he said that there was no good and evil, the only thing that mattered was power and those who were too weak to obtain it.

Speaking of Voldemort, I often found it odd in some fanfictions in my previous life, that a 12-year-old protagonist would figure out the anagram of his real name, while in the politics-oriented society, with every major family having several spies to dig out any discriminatory information about other families, couldn't figure out the anagram or what had happened to a fellow Hogwarts student. The protagonist would then proceed to spread the knowledge that he is, in reality, Tom Riddle, a half-blood and all the 'Dark' alliances would be broken and Voldemort would lose all allies and such. But in reality, the truth couldn't be farther from that.

In the real world, everyone knew who he was and what he was. But he had something which this society wanted and desired – Power. Why would an heir from several centuries old pureblood house matter when a half-blood could destroy him in seconds? Power is also what if Lily Evans was alive, help her be some-what respected in the society, because despite being muggleborn, she had power. Dumbledore was also a half-blood but was equally respected and feared and was awarded multiple titles because he had what was needed in this society – Power. Power made people listen. Power made people follow. Power made people respect. Power made people fear.

The only reason purebloods were more respected and favoured was also due to power. If not from the children, more so than the family treasures. The older the families, the older they had stayed and cultivated in magic and the more spells or knowledge they have in their family grimoires. In this power-hungry society, accumulating power and becoming powerful is all that mattered.

So, that is also the reason why pureblood children were taught occlumency, so that family spells and knowledge could not be exploited from the recesses of their minds.

That is the reason why I let Lord Greengrass invade my mind repeatedly. What doesn't kill me makes me stronger and once I had mastered occlumency and I have access to family grimoires. I can have the power necessary to oppose him.

I was a survivor and so I will survive this suffering.

I once read somewhere that – 'In a war, There Are No Winners Only Losers, just survivors that live to talk about it is all.'

I have learned, only the ones with power can make the rules here. Only the ones with power can rule here.

I knew war was on the horizon and it was coming in a few years of time, so I have to strive and persevere to obtain the only thing crucial to mine and Daphne's safety and survival - Power.

I will endure all the necessary torture, all the pain and all the suffering. I know Lord Greengrass is only the closest enemy I can see now, but farther down the line, there are more, much more powerful and deadly people I have to face. But even if I fall down once, even if I lose once, I will grow stronger because of it.

Because,

What doesn't kill me, makes me stronger.

AN: Looking for a beta, if interested PM me.

The tone of the fic will neither be dark or light, it will be neutral grey

I know in this chapter, there was much of the MC's past and info dump and less of interactions but believe me, it was necessary and will not in coming in later chapters. The MC will live in the present and all the interactions will be henceforth in upcoming chapters. And yes, Adrian is the only character from past reincarnated.

I often find it odd in some fics, that a baby just born would have a perfectly developed brain, perfect vision to recognise parents and perfect memory. Truly, I ask you, do you remember everything since birth? Do you remember the taste of milk from when you first sucked it? Do you remember the feeling when you soiled yourself? Do you remember saying your first word? Do you remember how to stand for the first time on your legs? The truth is no, a baby's brain takes time to fully develop and with another set of memories implanted in the baby's brain, the brain should rightfully burst. And here I come across fics which make world domination plans from the moment they open their eyes (Just kidding I love the fics, especially A World Full of Monsters by Fahad09) …

Since Daphne is a Greek name meaning Victory and the rest of the names of Greengrass family in canon isn't given, I decided the family names to be of Greek origin; Adrian means Wealthy, Adrianna is Rich and Eugene is Lucky.

The idea of Eugene Greengrass is inspired by Nathaniel Greengrass in the Harry Potter and the Gift of Memories by The Engulfing Silence.

All suggestions, reviews, criticism, remarks are welcome. Share with me what you think in the reviews.

First written on 2nd April 2018
Edited on 3rd April 2018 – Minor grammatical tweaks