And here's the tenth chapter for your enjoyment, folks!

* Review Response:
ultima-owner, no, not really. But Filch still tolerates him way better than other students.
lordamnesia, Jostanos, Ranmaleopard, thank you for your reviews, folks!
VentXekart, Harry will (eventually) reveal Zero, but it wouldn't happen until a bit later.
Darkscythe Drake, Eclipse Factor is a biological agent (possibly, of Ancient Belkan or Al-Hazardian origins) that transforms mages into living weapons, known as "Drivers". Eclipse Drivers suffer from significantly increased lust for battle, possess very strong personal Anti-Magic Field and have access to special Magic System at the cost of more-or-less losing ability to use their original one. Also, pretty much every Eclipse Driver seen in FORCE is a selfish jerk. I've altered the canon Eclipse Factor to significantly reduce the effectiveness of its AMF, made it consume Driver's mana when canceling enemy spells and changed the condition for Eclipse Drivers to continue functioning normally from [kill someone once in a while] to [have a fight against a strong opponent once in a while]. As for the pairings... I do have something in mind, but it will have to wait for a while as Harry is a bit too young right now.

* AN: Special thanks to my friend, Skelekitty, for beta-reading this chapter.

Disclaimer: "Harry Potter" and "Mahou Shoujou Lyrical Nanoha" belong to their respective owners. No profit is being made. The same goes for any other media that might be used as the sources of ideas and inspiration.

"speaking"
"telepathy"
「Devices speaking」
'thinking'
"spells"

Additional Disclaimer: The authors of this story in no way approve murder as a solution to interpersonal conflicts.

Power of Eclipse
Chapter X: React and Engage

The next couple of weeks passed without anything really notable happening, at least as far as Harry was concerned. Of course, he was still feared by the school's populace but… Who cared about the idiots who couldn't realize that he wasn't some inhumane monster that attacks people without a provocation?

Onto the more important matters, Zero has finished reading through the basic Arithmancy textbooks he had checked out from the Hogwarts library and asked him for the more advanced texts on the subject. Harry didn't actually know exactly what the silver-haired Strosek was working on, but trusted her to tell him when she ready. Meanwhile, the young Eclipse Driver continued to go about his daily businesses, attending his classes and generally doing his best to stay out of trouble: detentions he'd serve otherwise would be too irritating and annoying.

And speaking of the classes he had to attend, they were still pretty damn boring. Not even in Charms or Defense Against the Dark Arts the professors showed any bits of Magic that Harry could consider 'interesting' or even useful… Then, one day in the early October, professor Quirrell decided that it was the time to move onto a topic infinitely more interesting than the basic and quite useless hexes:

"A-Alright, class." The stuttering professor began. "Over the past month, you h-have been introduced to the c-concept of personal Magical d-defense and learned some basic h-hexes that, nevertheless, might save your health or even your lives one d-day." A few people around the classroom snorted, apparently sharing Harry's doubts about actual usefulness of those spells. Ignoring them, the turban-wearing wizard continued: "But there are more dangers in t-the world around us than dark wizards and witches. Wild animals too c-can present a real danger to someone unprepared." Now, this sounded like an interesting topic, the green-eyed Eclipse Driver thought. "But, before we begin, let me announce t-the results of the the written test you've had the previous week." Professor Quirrell said as he picked a stack of parchments from his table.

Caring neither about his own results nor about those of his classmates, Harry simply tuned out the stuttering man as he announced the grades he had given for the test. Finally, after what felt like an eternity, he was almost done:

"And, f-finally, miss Susan Bones." Professor Quirrell said. "I wish, I could give you more than one 'Outstanding' f-for your test. You've done a fantastic job d-describing the defensive uses of various hexes. It was a pleasure to read your work."

"Thank you, Sir." The red-haired witch replied, blushing slightly under the praise she was given.

"I h-have a book discussing the suitability of low-level hexes and jinxes for competitive d-duelling somewhere in my collection. If you're interesting, I c-can lend it to you, Ms. Bones." The DADA professor offered.

"I'll be honored, Sir." Susan replied.

"Then p-please stop by my office after the classes." The turban-wearing man said. Then, after a small pause, he continued, now addressing the whole class: "Now then, let me give you a brief overview of w-what I will teach you over next few lessons. We're going to cover w-wargs, iron boars and golden-horned deers. And, if time allows, I'd like to give you a lecture on trolls."

"Trolls, sir?" One of the Ravenclaw students asked. "Aren't they very dangerous."

"An already-enraged t-troll is indeed a fearsome beast." Professor Quirrell confirmed. "B-but should you run into one that isn't, it is not t-that hard to avoid a confrontation with it: trolls are creatures intelligent enough not t-to rely on their animal instincts, yet stupid enough to easily fall for t-trickery."

"I see." The same Ravenclaw said. "Thank you for explaining this, professor."

"If there are no further questions, let us being." The turban-wearing wizard said. "And, today we will be talking about wargs, also known as g-great wolves. They are..." And so he went on to describe what wargs were, what were their differences from normal wolves, and what one should do in case of meeting one of those beasts. It was actually a pretty interesting lecture and Harry found himself wondering, whether there were some wargs somewhere in the Forbidden Forest: those giant spiders he hunted right now were good and all, but he needed some alternatives, especially since it looked like the spiders would be hibernating during the winter.

~/ *** \~

Inspired by professor Quirrell's lectures about the wild beasts one can encounter in the magical areas, Harry spent the next couple of weeks exploring the Forbidden Forest beyond the domain of the arachnoid monstrosities he usually 'hunted' in. And while he had no luck with wargs, the green-eyed Eclipse Driver did run into an iron boar. The beast was every bit like what the turban-wearing professor said it would be. It was huge, had mean tusks and even meaner temper. Of course, a fight ensued.

And what a glorious fight it was! The boar was very strong and surprisingly fast and agile for its bulk. What's more, its hide - supposedly also Magic-resistant to a degree - and the layer of fat underneath it were thick enough to render Harry's trusted knife all but useless, forcing him to resort to some riskier tactics in order to put the beast down. Something easier said than done since the boar gave as good as it got and, if it wasn't for the Eclipse Factor and the powers it gave him, Harry was sure he would've bitten the dust several times. Exhilarating!

That iron boar was far from the only interesting beast the young Potter encountered in the dark depths of the Forbidden Forest. Indeed, the woods were home to many fascinating creatures. Like that strange hump-backed monstrosity with armor-like purplish-brown skin, tentacled mouth and a number of golden horns forming a crown around its ugly head. Or a tribe of miniature green-skinned long-nosed humanoids - individually they might've been rather pathetic, even if one took their primitive weapons into account, but fighting off a whole swarm of them was quite a challenge… And then there was a wandering herd of ashen-furred bipedal giants with long and sharp saber-like claws…

Those were just the most interesting of the beasts Harry had ran into so far. And he was yet to explore even a quarter of the Forbidden Forest! Yes, agreeing to come to Hogwarts was the right decision, even if he now had to deal with the annoying students and idiotic teachers: after all, where else in the world could he find such entertaining creatures to fight? Certainly not in the boring hellhole of Surrey.. The free food and shelter were just a bonus.

~/ *** \~

Between attending his classes and exploring the Forbidden Forest in search for more interesting and strong beasts to fight, Harry lost track of time, and so, before he knew it, it was Halloween already. The castle was now decorated with hundreds of jack-o'-lanterns and garlands of life-like bats with more of them swooping around in the larger halls like black clouds. Several animated skeletons acting badly-written miniatures appeared around the castle, while a few ghosts entertained the students with stories about their deaths and unlives.

Unlike his yearmates, Harry didn't care about the festivities one bit, but he was definitely looking forward to the feast. There was no way in Hell he'd willingly skip a meal as plentiful and delicious as this. And so, on the evening of October 31st the young Eclipse Driver joined the rest of Hogwarts' students in the Great Hall.

The feast just got into full swing when Professor Quirrell unexpectedly came sprinting into the Great Hall, his turban askew and terror on his face. Everyone, Harry included, turned to look at the terrified DADA professor, who reached the professors' table and slumped against it.

"Troll!.." The man gasped between uneven breaths. "There is a t-troll in the dungeons!.. Thought you ought to k-know..." And with that he then sank to the floor in a dead faint. Almost instantly the Great Hall descended into chaos, and it took Professor Dumbledore several charms that produced loud bangs to restore some semblance of an order.

"Prefects!" The headmaster rumbled. "Lead your Houses back to the dormitories immediately!" The Hufflepuffs were quite surprised and more than a little dismayed by this order, many of them wondering whether Dumbledore even remembered that their dormitories were in the dungeons, exactly where the troll was supposed to be. The prefects even started arguing among themselves, trying to decide, whether they should follow this order or not. Harry, meanwhile, has already made up his mind: he wanted to fight this troll.

And just as the green-eyed youth was trying to think up a way to slip out of the Great Hall unnoticed, a crowd of younger Gryffindors passed by. Wasting no time, he quietly joined the Lions and used them as a cover for his escape from the watchful eyes of the professors. Soon enough, the Gryffindors reached the main staircase and began climbing up the stairs. That was the moment he stealthily broke away from them and set out for the castle's dungeons instead.

Alas, Hogwarts was a immense castle with equally-boundless dungeons, which made finding a single troll in there quite a difficult task. After a while, though, Harry got lucky and came upon the beast's trail: while the corridors were a bit too bare for the troll to leave noticeable destruction in its wake, the air there was still poisoned by the creature's foul body odor.

Following the smell, the young Eclipse Driver soon reached one of the few stairs connecting the dungeons with the aboveground portion of the castle. So, the troll decided to explore a little? Well, he didn't have any problem with that, beyond fearing that the professors might be able to find his smelly prey and take it down before he had a chance to fight it. Thus, further reinforcing his muscles, Harry sprinted up the stairs, hoping that the troll hasn't been dealt with yet.

Another half a minute later he finally caught up with the beast. And, just like it was described in the books, the troll was a hulking twelve feet tall humanoid monstrosity with dull granite-gray skin, lumpy boulder-like body and small, completely-bald head that looked both ugly and stupid. In its long yet heavily-muscled arms, the troll held a huge wooden club - actually just a randomly-picked tree trunk rather than a purposely-made weapon - that dragged along the floor with a loud scraping noise.

Summoning his Combat Protective Clothing, Harry drew his trusty knife and charged at the troll. And being too fast for the beast to react to, he had no trouble landing a hit on it. The said hit, however, resulted only in a superficial wound as the troll's thick hide proved itself to be quite knife-resistant... Jumping away to avoid being smashed by the troll's club, Harry let a grin split his face. This was going to be a great fight!

Not giving his prey any time to recover, the young Eclipse Driver attacked again, this time slashing its wrist. He managed to do some real now, but, alas, it wasn't enough even to inconvenienced the troll much. What a tough foe! Alas, Harry had to remind himself, he didn't have all day to play with the beast; he needed to off it and be gone before the Professors showed up... Looks like it was the time to start fighting seriously.

Dodging a powerful but sluggish club swipe, Harry flooded his muscles with mana to empower himself even further. Then, he launched himself straight at the troll, aiming to cut its throat. Unfortunately, this attack failed abruptly when, at the last possible moment, the troll head-butted him, sending him crashing onto the ground and making him drop his knife.

While his Combat Protective Clothing did shield him from the brunt of the impact, Harry still ended up with a bad concussion and a mother of all headaches. It was so bad that he didn't notice the troll's club descending towards him until he barely had enough time to roll aside and save himself from becoming a bloodstain on the floor.

Forcing himself back onto his feet, the young Driver quickly backpedalled away from the raging beast: Eclipse Factor needed some time to fix the damage he has taken, and he himself needed to come up with a new way to combat the troll. Which was easier said than done, as the troll refused to give him any breathing room, continuously advancing towards him while swinging its crude weapon wildly in hopes of smashing him into a bloody pulp.

In its mad quest to reach him, however, the troll moved away from where Harry's knife lied about on the floor, thus giving the green-eyed youth an opportunity to recover it. Picking a moment, he dashed past the beast and picked up his weapon. Now, it was the time for the round two. And knowing that attacking the troll from the front was not the brightest of ideas, Harry decided to try his luck with assailing it from behind.

Dashing past the beast again, he did a sharp slew and jumped on its back, intending to quickly cut its throat. The troll, though, refused to stand still and let Harry do his trick. Instead, it immediately started trying to shake him off. After a few seconds, it succeeded when it slammed itself back-first into the wall, nearly squashing the young Eclipse Driver to death and making him lose his knife again. And while his Combat Protective Clothing had once again saved Harry's life, being smashed into the wall still left him with another concussion and lots of bruising.

It took the green-eyed youth quite a few moments to recover from this, and by the time he did, the troll's club was already fast approaching his head. And having no way of dodging this, Harry was forced to 'sacrifice' his arms to preserve his very life. In a flash of pain, the club smashed the bones in his forearms into tiny pieces while also sending him flying across the corridor...

Completely unaware of what was going on outside of her cubicle, Hermione Granger was crying her eyes out. Yes, it's been a few hours since her ...altercation with Ronald Weasley, but his words had cut her heart so deeply that the she just couldn't stop.

Then, suddenly, there was a loud crash. Forgetting about her misery for a moment in favor of sating her curiosity, the bushy-haired witch opened her cubicle's door and peered outside. And saw a boy. Acting instinctively, she immediately drew her wand and sent the nastiest jinx she knew off towards this trespasser. A second later, just as her spell fizzled out of existence, Hermione realized that she has made two big mistakes.

First, the boy clearly didn't enter the girls' bathroom out of his own volition. If anything, it looked like someone or something had thrown him in there through the door. And, second, the boy she has just tried to jinx was Harry Potter. The very one that almost killed a fellow student for trying to curse him as a prank. Worse still, her little mess up right now didn't go unnoticed by this short-tempered overly-violent Hufflepuff.

Now she could only pray that whatever had thrown Potter into this room occupied his attention for long enough for the Professors to show up. Friendless bossy know-it-all or not, Hermione had no desire to die just yet…

Harry had just begun recovering from crashing through a thick wooden door when he felt the Eclipse's Anti-Magic Field destroy a spell of some sort. Turning his head in that direction, he saw a frightened girl in Gryffindor robes, who was trying her best to go down the drain. Sending the best glare he could muster right now her way - mostly to keep her out of his hair; seeing how he was in the girls' bathroom right now, her violent reaction was ...forgivable - Harry returned his attention to the more pressing problem: the troll.

The beast was lumbering towards him, ready to finish him off. And seeing how the Eclipse Factor's base rate of healing wasn't enough to fix his arms in time, Harry knew he had to use the Reacted mode if he wanted to walk away form this battle alive.

"Zero, react with me." He commanded within his thoughts.

「Understood, Master.」 The silver-haired Strosek replied telepathically, and a moment later the green-eyed youth felt a surge of power spread through his battered body, greatly increasing his regeneration rate and boosting his Anti-Magic Field to unprecedented levels. All this power, however, also woke up the dark entity that existed deep within Harry's mind ever since he became an Eclipse Driver. And it craved to take control over him and destroy everything in sight.

Having no desire to surrender his body to that thing, Harry fought against it with everything he got. And, with Zero's help, he was able to overpower it and banish it out of his mind after several long seconds of struggle… This unexpected and unwelcome distraction dealt with, he turned his attention back to the troll, which now was almost within a spitting distance from him. There was no more time for him to waste.

Paying no heed to the protests of his body, the young Eclipse Driver pushed himself back to his feet and got ready to continue the fight. And the beast didn't keep him waiting: quickly covering the remaining distance between them, it raised its tree-trunk club for a strike and… Suddenly, Harry found himself reliving the memories that simply couldn't have been his own.

He stood amid the chaos of a battlefield, facing down a towering golem of rock and metal summoned by an enemy Zauber. Around him, partially obscured by the raging dust storm, the warriors of his tribe were fighting similar golems, some winning against the magical constructs while others struggled to stay alive… Whispering a quick prayer to the safety of his comrades under his breath, he pushed all of the unnecessary thoughts out of his head and concentrated on the golem in front of him.

Sidestepping the downwards swing of an oversized morningstar, he quickly rolled forward to avoid the follow-up swing. There, he delivered a powerful punch to the back of the golem's knee, shattering the stone and causing the whole thing to lose balance and collapse onto its back. Not giving it a chance to recover and repair itself, he immediately attacked the construct's head, aiming to destroy the control crystals within it. A thick metal helmet the golem wore was a formidable defense, but it still couldn't stand up to his might, and within just a few strikes he turned it into a twisted piece of scrap metal, while everything underneath it was reduced to breakstone. And now that the golem was no more, it was the time for him to deal with the Zauber who summoned it…

The flashback ended as abruptly as it began, and Harry found himself back in the corridor, standing in front of an angry mountain troll. And, apparently, barely a fraction of a second has passed while he was reliving that strange 'memory'. His mind took another moment or two to completely catch up with the reality, but he still had more than enough time to easily dodge the troll's attempt to crush him with its club.

Hoping to replicate the success of the unknown man from the 'memories', Harry quickly moved past the troll, before kicking the back of its knee as hard as he could. The hit wasn't powerful enough to actually hurt the beast, but the sudden loss of support did make it lose its balance, causing it to fall onto the floor with a loud thud.

Liberating the troll's club with an application of brute force, the green-eyed Eclipse Driver picked it up and smashed it against the troll's head with all of his might. That, turns out, wasn't enough to even knock the beast unconscious, much less kill it. Quickly recovering from his shock, Harry then proceeded to strike the troll again. And again. And again… After maybe a dozen hits, he finally managed to break the troll's thick skull and kill the poor creature.

Letting go of the club, Harry took a couple of steps back, before sinking onto the floor. The fight was over and his adrenaline was now dropping rapidly, leaving him all spent and tired. Alas, it was not the time for him to rest just yet as he heard voices fast approaching his location. Either his battle attracted the Professors' attention, or the adults finally realized that the troll had left the dungeons awhile ago. In any case, Harry needed to leave and fast.

Forcing himself back to his feet, he quickly picked up his knife and then dashed away, hoping that he won't run into anyone on his roundabout way back to the Hufflepuff dormitories. And just a few moments after he left, Professors McGonagall, Flitwick and Snape entered the corridor from the opposite side.

"Merlin, what has happened here?" The Transfiguration Mistress exclaimed as she saw the dead troll and the signs of a fight surrounding it.

"Someone has killed the troll for us, and it doesn't look like it was done with Magic." The half-goblin Professor observed as he studied the beast's corpse with some obscure diagnostic spell. "The cause of death - as you all can see - is head trauma, inflicted with a large blunt object, the troll's own club. I can also see a few superficial wounds, likely made with a large knife, on the areas that would be reasonably close to the ground."

"The troll was killed by Potter, I just know it." Professor Snape muttered under his breath, though his colleagues still heard him clearly. Noticing their reactions, he elaborated: "I can't think of any other dunderhead foolish enough to seek out a mountain troll on their own and daring enough to face it without a wand. I have no idea how he managed to kill the beast, though. That is a feat well beyond a single wizard."

Hermione, who still hiding in the girls' bathroom, overheard the professors' conversation. A troll had found its way inside Hogwarts?! It was hard to believe that something like that could've happened in the safest place in the Magical Britain. And it was even harder to believe that someone managed to take it down, especially without Magic. But it also explained everything that had happened over the past few minutes so neatly…

A part of Hermione wanted to approach the Professors and tell them that it was that brute Potter who did it, but her more rational side held her back. First, she would definitely be questioned about what she was doing there, and that was something the bushy-haired witch didn't want to talk about. And, more importantly, while he was a violent savage that followed rules only when it was convenient to him, Potter wasn't stupid. He would know it was her who ratted him out, and his retribution was something she would rather avoid.

And so Hermione continued hiding in the bathroom, waiting for the Professors to depart so that she could leave this place herself and return to the Gryffindor tower.

~/ *** \~

"Alright, Zero, do you know what has happened to me when we entered reacted state back then?" Harry asked telepathically as he pulled the drapes of his bed in the Hufflepuff dormitory shut. "When the troll was about to attack us again, I saw… I guess, memories of a battle that most certainly aren't mine." After a moment, he decided to elaborate: "I saw it as if I was the one fighting there, but I was older, and… What I was fighting alongside other people against a group of mages and the golems they summoned."

「This unit has no definite answer to your question, Master.」 There was a short pause, before the silver-haired Strosek added. 「It is not impossible that you might carry some form of a genetic memory.」 Now this was interesting.

"Genetic memory? As in, memories of my ancestors? Is something like this even possible?" Harry asked. He had heard about memory-manipulation charms being available to wizards, but… changing memories of an individual was one thing; preserving memories within one's DNA was something completely different.

「Indeed, Master.」 Zero confirmed. 「And it is certainly possible. According to this unit's database, at least two distinguished bloodlines of Ancient Belka had different forms of genetic memory as their defining trait.」 There a brief pause, before Zero added: 「In addition to this, there exists an unconfirmed theory that a clone of a person might be able to access the memories of their original from before the genetic material was taken.」 [1] The green-eyed Eclipse Driver let out a sigh.

"I don't think I've been cloned from some warrior of ages past." He said. "And what are the chances of me being related to royals of Ancient Belka?"

「While it is impossible for this unit to confirm or disprove this, such possibility does exist, Master.」 Zero told him. 「You will need to stop by medical center on an Administered World and have them run a blood test on you to get a conclusive answer to that question.」 Harry let out an unintelligible noise, but, nevertheless, agreed that it might be a good idea to ask for a bloodline test if and when he managed to reach the Administered Worlds. After all, he already planned to go there in hopes that the people there might be able help him with the anger issues he had thanks to the Eclipse Factor.

[1] In the later chapters of the Vivid manga there is a scene where Vivio briefly sees memories of Olivie Sägebrech, whom she had been cloned from.

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