What Happened Next?

While the Diagon Alley was in chaos, I was surrounded by disarmed, angry, disgruntled, Ministry Goons. "What is the meaning of this? Are you declaring war on us, Mr. Velarion?" The Minister, who I could see, was visibly terrified, yet willing to hold his moral high ground. "Since you have decided to stop accusing me of things, I did not even know of, and started accusing me of things I actually did, let me introduce myself again; I am ARACXUS VELARYON, LORD of the ancient HOUSE VELARYON of the GREATER ELF DYNASTY. I am here to investigate the attacks on my people, and have found the kin of these lands guilty of theft. I am here to apprehend the Criminals on the following counts: theft of Material Property, theft of sensitive information, trespassing on Sacred Grounds, and the most Heinous crime of Slaughter of our Magical Creatures and Familiar kin."

The Minister looked angry with every utterance of my word. "What elf dynasty, this is trespassing on our ministry grounds, and what investigate who gave you the authority? And I never heard of any Velarion House. Surrender yourself and your punishment will be lenient." He looked like he gained some ounce of courage, from their numbers. But alas! It was not meant to be. I hissed at my familiar what they told me, and he gained an aggressive stance. "I would like you to see you try. In case you are unaware, my familiar is a Basilisk, a Snakekin who has seen 1000 natural cycles. He is, shall we say, very protective of me. And even without him, my Magic is more potent than yours, and I do not need a magical focus to cast spells." I showed them the collective loot of their wands. They lost their courage after that. The Minister looked like he was going to speak, but he was interrupted.

One Unspeakable, who had a feminine body frame, looked excited and said, "Is your Familiar really 1000 years old? Does he know of our history? Did you just speak Parseltongue, Lord Velaryon?" I chuckled. "Yes, he said, he is something of a Guardian Beast for one of your schools, what was it, oh yes, Hogwarts. I found a few of my unbound cursed kin, who lived in a castle and they told me stories of a Beast kept by a Parseltongued Wizard. My House Velaryon, and thank you for saying it right Ms Bones, is connected to all reptilian kin. For us, it is our honour bound duty to free our kins, care for them and protect them. I was going to visit the Dragon Reserves next, but the wizards there, arrested me. I responded, in kind, without retaliation, but alas, I feared for my life, when that wizard, thought something about some concoction, thinking about wringing truth out of my mind."

I finished my answer, while replying to the Unspeakable, Ms Bones, while at appropriate times, pointing out at one my interrogators. Why was I speaking so differently, and acting out like this. There was method in my madness. But I'll tell you about it later.

One of the Aurors asked me accusingly, "Are you a Legilimens? It is illegal to read minds of Ministry Officials. And you trespassed into Hogwarts? That is impossible. No one can break through Hogwarts' wards. You are lying." At this, before anyone could see, I covered the distance between him and me, touched his arm, and before he could shake me off, I sidealong elf-apparated inside the Castle Walls. Then after a brief moment, I reached back to his place, let him go, exactly where he was, and came to my original place, all silent, without any pop, without even dust floating at my reappearance. The Minister then looked at the Auror curiously, and he simply nodded and then flinched when I looked at him. "Was that proof enough, Mr Goyle? And yes I am a Legilimens, and I did not know your laws, your restrictions. Anyone in my country, who wishes to prevent Mindreading, as you so called it, simply erects their mental shields up. Since no one I met was doing that, I thought this is a free country. No one informed me otherwise. As for your accusations, you owe me an apology, or accept my challenge for the Honour Duel." He looked visibly terrified, muttered a quick apology and scampered towards the back.

I now looked at the Minister, "Well, will you apologise for your Vassal's Actions, or face me in the duel. My Honour demands it." He said, "I owe you no apology, and you cannot threaten me with giant snakes." Here, he was interrupted by Ms Bones, who informed him of the nature of a Basilisk, that he was a so called guardian beast for Salazar Slytherin himself, that creatures who live that long are beyond 6X danger level, more than even dragons, and that until the beast himself recognizes your strength, he cannot be your familiar, since it is a honour bound relationship. He turned pale and apologised to me. Appearing Satisfied, I enlarged the room to the size of a Ball Room, so that my Familiar could stretch himself.

Ms Bones looked excited that he was not going back immediately, and stood nearby. Almost all Aurors waited there along with the minister watching in awe, as after expanding the space, I let out earth elemental spell to repair the enchanted walls. Here another Unspeakable gushed out in surprise, "He is doing Elemental Magic wandlessly and chantlessly. And the Wind and Lightning is actually elements. He can control multiple elements without any wand. Only Faes can do that, no human, not even Merlin can do it."

The other Unspeakables were visibly awed too, but the Minister had a question, "Are you not human Lord Velarion? You look human." Well, valid question, you see, from the fan-fiction I read, I assumed any kind of Physique Card you use on yourself, you turn into that being, and then you could freely change the form. If it was some sort of human enhancement, you use the card, and your base human form gets changed. Not to me! When I use my Animagus cards, before the cards got 'absorbed' into me, I could mentally choose what to add to my body. It wasn't like a Character Creation System, but more like an intuition. It is hard to describe, because it had no quantified number to increase or decrease.

Even now, if I concentrate hard enough, I could hear everyone's heartbeat, I could smell their perspiration in the air. I could tell if a man 30 feet away is twitching from the corner of my eye, I could almost taste fear and nervousness in the air. Yet, when I selected the attributes to add, it gave me no direction of what to add, but if I imagined something to be added, and it was available, I got it merged into my very being. It wasn't like patchwork, adding abilities over each other, and causing a collapse in the long run. After every successive addition, from even the Animagi forms, I added from all the Lords, except Lord Black, increased my reserves, my control over magic, and widened my core and magic channels within my body. All this before my First Maturity, my biggest boost yet, for which I recently found a ritual. But more on that later!

The Minister asked a valid question, because despite my claims, I did not have a grey flaky skin, it was pale, not like a vampire, but healthy. My hair were long, reaching beyond the nape of my neck, and were like spider silk, smooth, straight, blacker than the colour itself, and each strand so visible, lustrous, that I thought I would become Narcissus, staring at the mirror. My eyes were amethyst, and glowing in my elf form, my nose like the beak of an eagle, and soft pale lips resting over a strong chin and a defined jaw. I was beauty personified. My ears were normal, but wing part was slightly tapered, giving me a dangerous look. "You must be confusing me with my cursed kin, Minister. We look just like you, we eat just like you, and we mate just like you, as my alibi will very well state. My cursed kin were bound in eternal servitude for their misuse of sacred magic, and so they gained that form, when the essence of the sacred magic itself was taken away from them. Now that the misunderstanding is clear, may this be the bond of our friendship. As a gesture of goodwill, here are the accounts of crime of the criminals, I am looking for. In return, I grant you three favours in the name of my House Velaryon." He looked genuinely interested, if his surface thoughts were any clue. He took my Long Report, I fabricated, and passed a copy to each of the Head of Departments available there.

Ms Bones approached me here asking questions about the Basilisk, where I found it, how I opened it, if I had any other animals. I promised her some surprise later, and gave her all the facts of Slytherin and his views. I told her I could try to summon Slytherin here himself on the Samh'ain night. She promised to pass along the news to the Wizengamot, and the Department. While this conversation was going on, an Auror came on a broom, and jumped down to inform everyone of Boggarts attack in the Alley.

Showtime!