Waking up in the Hospital Wing was not a pleasant experience. My chest burned, my limbs felt heavy and my breathing was shallow. I felt like Hell and my eyelids were heavy.

But I was alive!

My eyes flew open as I sat up quickly and tried to get a handle on where I was. The Hospital Wing wasn't all that familiar, but it was better then being in the woods. At least I could recognize where I was.

"Yuri!" I turned to the multitude of voices bombarding me. I grinned at the sight of Harry, Ron, Hermione, Gwendal and Conrad all together with slightly disheveled looks. Conrad was the first to compose himself, straitening himself out and shaking his head. "Welcome back, Yu-ri." He said in a teasing tone.

I simply grinned. Relieved to be back into the land of the living. I grinned at everyone, responding, "Tadaima!" The Golden Trio looked confused at the sudden Japanese, before Hermione light up with recognition and whispered the meaning to the other two. I breathed a sigh of relief, leaning into my pillow.

"You gave us quite a scare. Madame Pomfrey thought you had been hit with a curse that makes the heart stop beating for a few seconds. It's usually used to fake someone's death." Conrad relayed, he sounded nonchalant about it, but in reality he was reporting to his King. By the look in his eyes, I could tell that he was going to have a chat with me after everyone else was gone, save Gwendal. "You've been asleep for two days." I internally winced. Yeah, I was going to get a talking to.

"In any case, we're all glad that you're back, mate," Ron slapped me on the back, not as hard as he usually did, which made me grin. "Got some, er-" He hesitated looking somewhere that I couldn't see from my position. "Gifts . . .from admirers."

I felt a headache coming on. Groaning, I held a hand to my forehead. Admirers? That was practically a code-word for 'fangirls'. This week was going to be Hell. Another thought occurred to me as I thought of the only reason as to why I would be having fangirls in the British Wizarding World, seeing as being a Champion hadn't helped much. "Wait . . .you mean people know about the 'incident'? How did something, that I would think would be top secret, get around the entire school?"

A chuckle was heard from the other side of the room. "Ah, young Mr. Shibuya," said a wise, old voice that could only belong to the Headmaster, "As much as we try to keep secrets in this school, I seem to find that all my plans are thwarted by particularity talented and resourceful students."

Dumbledore turned to Harry who blinked and shrugged, "Everything that happened between you and that strange man was a complete secret. So, naturally, the whole school knows." I looked at both of them blankly as Dumbledore and Harry were sharing similar looks of amusement. I felt like I was just given a quote from somewhere, but I knew I would never be able to place where it came from.

So, instead of contemplating over what they told me, I sighed and resigned myself to being at the center of attention again. Only this time with . . .fangirls. Shuddering, I brought the blanket I was given up to my chin in slight fear. Maybe I would give the 'gifts' to Hermione to check for love potions. I could trust her to recognize one if she saw it on a chocolate. Or maybe I would just give them to Murata as revenge for making me wear that ridiculous goblin suit.

I watched as everyone seemed to stream out. Harry, Ron and Hermione stuck around to give me an update to what I had missed. Apparently, Mr. Crouch was in a coma due to an overuse of Confusion and Sleeping potions and whatever he had said to Harry had alarmed Dumbledore and the rest of the staff.

I was more concerned with his soul. It was exactly like Moody's. There was no way that should even be possible. No two souls were alike. Of course, there were bonded souls. Like Nicola and Hube. These souls were so intertwined that it was difficult to separate the two, unless you knew the people themselves. Hube's soul held many scars that were continually being healed by the light of Nicola's soul, while Nicola's soul got brighter every time it touched Hube's soul. I could tell the difference, even though they were connected. It was obvious that there were two separate souls.

The only explanation that I could come up with was that Moody was not . . .Moody. Or that he was in disguise then he tried to kill me. Given that Dumbledore trusted Moody, I would guess it was the former option. Still, I needed to talk to everyone else about my thoughts first. This situation was so confusing that I couldn't set my thoughts straight.

I looked over at Conrad and Gwendal who were both looking at me with somber expressions. Conrad's hand was on my shoulder in a tight and protective grip as he tried to keep his composure. Gwendal was reached into his inside pocket and took out his knitting supplies. On the outside, it looked like he wasn't particularly worried, but by the way he missed a loop and had to restart his project, I could tell he was distracted.

"You really can't stay out of trouble, can you Shibuya?" I looked over at the voice to see Murata standing there with a slight frown and the reflection of his glasses hiding his eyes. ". . .It seems like the situation is worse then I thought . . . ." I silently agreed with him, looking up at the ceiling as I laid on my back.

My gut was tingling in annoyance. Specifically it was tingling on the spot where the spell hit me. "It wasn't a heart-stopping spell." I said simply, under my breath. Everyone heard me but Madame Pomfrey who was hustling herself around in the background.

Gwendal was the one who acted. He pulled the curtain around my bed to give us some privacy and Murata cast a silencing charm around us. "Your Highness?" asked Conrad, who had let go of my shoulder but was now looking at me with intense emotion, something I was not used to seeing on his face.

I smiled to let him know it was alright. "I'm alive so it's fine. The spell didn't work." Alarm shot across everyone's face. Conrad put his hand on my arm and held it tightly in worry. A sigh made it's way though my lips. "It was the Killing Curse." I couldn't lie to them, or even withhold information. I knew from the anger radiating off in the room that whoever had cast it would be on the receiving end of both Gwendal and Conrad's swords. I sweat-dropped at the tension building up in the air. Ignoring the angry men, I turned my attention back to the ceiling.

Why didn't the curse kill me? I mean, sure I'm the Demon King and all, but according to Murata there have been plenty of demons on Earth who have died from the Killing Curse. I thought back to my ancestor, Mamoru Shibuya. Was this the famed 'way to block the Killing Curse'? If so, it wasn't really 'blocking' it. More like reversing the effects.

I turned to my side, forcing Conrad to let go of my arm and tried getting comfortable. There was no point dwelling on it now. Maybe I would ask Harry about it . . . .or not. I really didn't want to talk about it. The cold feeling. My soul coming out. Those people . . . .

I shivered and closed my eyes, decidedly trying to get some sleep. The Third Task was coming up in a month and I needed to be prepared.

I trained with Harry, Hermione and Ron for the upcoming task. At first I wasn't sure if I should, being a competitor and all, but Harry insisted. He had been a bit of a worrier every since that encounter in the forest.

"It's my fault." He said simply when I cornered him one day, "If I hadn't run off to get Dumbledore . . . ." He glanced at me under his glasses. "I heard it from Madame Pomfrey. You were hit with the Crutiatus Curse, right?" I shifted from side to side, uncomfortable with remember what had happened to me. "You're my friend, Yuri. You would probably do the same for me if our positions were reversed." I had conceded at that point, as I had no argument.

Neville had practically turned into a Mother Hen. To ease his mind, I helped him out in the Green House. It was nice to garden again. Ever since I learned about the names of the flowers Cecilie had cultivated, I had taken the habit of going outside with Greta and watering the plants. I had never done anything extensive, like Neville was prone to doing, but it was nice to walk about outside as well.

What was odd though, was that the magical plants seemed to grow with more vigor when I was around. Or at least, that's what Neville told me.

"Look at this, Yuri." He pointed out, showing me a plant that held deep purple flowers, "This is a rare plant used to help childbirth and regrowth, called Cresco. It's used to create Skele-grow." I remembered the potion. Harry told me about having to drink it after losing his bones in second year. I watched with fascination as Neville poked the plant with his stick, "It requires a lot of sunlight and warm climates. Unfortunately, both of those things are scarce in Scotland."

I tilted my head in confusion, "Why don't you just use magic?" I knew it was really easy to create both those things with a flick of a wand.

Neville shook his head, "That's the problem, it's extremely sensitive to magic. There's another plant called Incresco that starts out as this plant, except infused with the magic of Dragon's blood and whatever magical residue we have in the air. You have to use such spells at a distance or else it might absorb the magic available. Of course, the magic levels of lumos versus the magic levels of Dragon's blood is like night and day, but you can't be too careful."

I nodded, reaching forward to stroke a petal. I pulled back when I felt a sharp warmth come from it. "Ah, see. Now it absorbed your magic." I looked over at Neville, who was observing the plant. "Well, this was supposed to be turned into an Incresco anyway, so I suppose it's alright. But I've never seen a plant take to a foreign magic so quickly. It must like you."

I wasn't too sure how I felt about it 'liking' me, but if I helped Neville out then it was fine by me.

Me: I'm almost done with this fanfic. A few more chapters that I might upload today and then all done! Consider it a late Christmas present, or something. I have been writing this since I woke up, so be grateful!