Notice: I do not own Harry Potter or any of the related intellectual properties. I just like to write a lot of drabble.

Hello, my lovelies. The PSA is long. Read only if you want to, or otherwise scroll down to Chapter One.

So I was planning to release this for Christmas Eve, but I will be very busy later this month. I decided to push and get this out early. The next book should land at the end of August next year, and I promise that the next book will be long and entertaining. The characters in the next book will go off on a holiday to look for obscure things, that is all I will say.

Some things to note before you read (based on comments):

· This series is a subtle Crack-Fic.

· All of this drabble is leading up to Harry bringing his might down on his enemies. His absolute power must be the product of many back-breaking years of work and scheming, as he is helped by his family and friends.

· The 'crack-ness' of this fic is justified by the presence of all powerful deities, which supposedly have preferences for certain people (a deliberate jab at the my God vs your God issue in the real world).

· The plot is full of literary Deus Ex Machina style mechanics if you think deeply about the issues.

· We aim to roast both sides of the political spectrum. Why? Because I like George Carlin.

· We discuss some real tidbits of History, Orwellian nightmares, Technological advantages, Industrialisation and Cultural Assimilation. We also explore moral ambiguity and the creation of child soldiers that are technically swimming in war crimes.

· Might makes right is a common theme here, and we discuss subtle neo-colonisation disguised through technological control of the Wizarding markets.

· Many ridiculous tropes are supposedly justified – Hadrian is Harry's other name, Wizards are stupid, Harry is Lord this-that-what-the-other, Death Eaters are one-dimensional – look for all the common Harry Potter memes, they are all here. It is a joke, relax.

· Expect heavy Sci-Fi memes to pop up occasionally.

· Caricature is how we roll.

· This fanfic is in an AU where there are differences concerning canon characters. Some people are older, some are younger. Chapter Two of Book one discussed these things in detail, but people forgot.

· Magic has a slightly different order and structure where nothing is permanent and there are limitations. Wizards need to use magic regularly, to refresh spells on external objects.

· Harry is building off some of his previous preparations, in year one. This book is not as long, because he has actionable intel and surveillance.

· We try to fix a lot of the broken ideas or characters that JK Rowling implemented, while we acknowledge that those ideas gave us this wonderful universe in the first place to use (a real case of irony).

· The engineering is pausable as the pathways and choices are related to actual ongoing research.

Other Housekeeping:

I was accused of misrepresenting Indian culture. I would like to make my case, as I did not appreciate it.

I am Indian and Hindu, by the way. However, I live in the Caribbean and my ancestors were carried there almost one hundred and fifty years ago by the British (to be exploited for sugar cane production, that is a long story). Our 'Indian' culture took a different turn, and now I had the challenge of trying to write an Indian O.C. who was relatable to the folks in the Motherland (India) and elsewhere, even when the names and even customs had changed for us, as a diaspora community in the Caribbean.

I don't want to hear any nonsense about Cultural Appropriation. This is my culture too.

I have decided that whatever criticisms have been listed in the comments (by people from India in particular) will be retroactively included and updated after I am finished with school (May, next year). I plan to remaster Books 1 and 2 as they have errors. Some of them are related to grammar and language usage, and other errors have to do with plot pacing, genuine misunderstandings with the Harry Potter lore, and other pending cultural issues.

I still think I was very brave to go down this route. I wanted to see if people would stay away from the story as it was too…odd. Would people take well to occasional insights into another culture that wasn't their own? In the end, I was surprised. My other question is if the people who are complaining about Indian Misrepresentation are doing anything to positively represent their people? Show me your story, please.

End of rant. And so we begin:

Chapter 1: The British love tunnels

Harry and Hermione had been invited to consult for a special Gringotts project. Their appointment with King Ragnok was scheduled for later that evening. Until then, the pair would perform their usual after mission debrief. As they discussed their last encounter, they considered the data they had captured.

"Well, how many signatures did we get?" asked Harry.

"Exactly three hundred and twenty? Now I will have to look at the commonalities and extrapolate what the Horcruxes might look like. The signature represents Quirrell and Voldy as a single entity" Hermione replied.

"Brilliant. I am already modifying the Thunderbolt Chassis. Going two hundred per cent bigger. I want to seat about twenty individuals. I am wondering if we can do something to prevent the thing from drinking so much fuel. The two trainers are almost done, those aren't difficult." Harry explained as he began to modify the protego moulds with the arithmantic settings.

"I could remember when I suggested charming the inside to get a bigger space. But I understand why you didn't go that route." Hermione countered as she scratched her chin. Her eyebrows were slanted, as she continued to scribble mathematics on a whiteboard.

"The issue is that if you destroy any item that has a pocket dimension, it spills all of the contents out into the open. Charmed fuel thanks have been a great help, but I want to move away from pocket dimensions. I want the chassis to take either spell fire, bullets or anti-aircraft shells and stay mostly intact. So the traditional approach wins here. There is another issue that I discovered yesterday in any case that makes pocket dimensions problematic," Harry responded as he paced up and down the workshop floor.

"Oh? Spill the beans then, Harry?" Hermione asked.

"Never in the recent history of Magic in England, have so many high powered magical devices been put together in such proximity. When I am crafting items, my magic lets me know which direction I should take. I want to believe that even when a single item has a single spell, the overlapping magical fields cause some type of trouble. The magic from one item bleeds into another."

"That makes sense. Like, in the design of integrated circuits, there is a whole discipline where they try to quiet a circuit. Noisy power can disrupt information transfer. Did you have problems with that, so many years ago?" Hermione asked.

"Yes, I did but….ah crap. How did I miss that? So we have the equivalent of magical Noise analysis. Just peachy…." Harry retorted as he considered that he had discovered an entirely new magical field of expertise, and he would have to develop the theory from scratch with Hermione's help. And this implied that he had many more problems to troubleshoot.

"Maybe we can copy some established techniques that are already used in electronics?" Hermione suggested.

"Maybe our new magical transistors are a bit noisy. Might be an issue with the high frequency switching. Will have to investigate that. One more thing for the books."

"Any other notable complaints, since you are on a venting spree?" Hermione joked.

"Well I tried to make an anti-friction charm, and that never worked. So it seems that magic can easily manipulate gravity and the weak nuclear force, but the electromagnetic force and the strong force? Those are a bit of a pickle. I can shear atoms off in a limited fashion, but I cannot control large reactions."

"Have you been able to go as far as subatomic particles?" Hermione enquired.

"Electrons? Sure. Inside a nucleus? I wish.

As for the friction issue, I prefer floating superconducting arrays to eliminate friction. And if we get the thrusters to run purely on plasma, that will be great. Every so often I tweak the reactor, but decomposition reactions will eventually reach a limit. We will have to look into magically assisted cold fusion or something similar." Harry explained.

"Maybe we need to look at your mum's research. She was pretty sure that the Wingardium Leviosa activates Gravitons. Wingardium Leviosa cannot take anything to orbit sadly. Maybe we need a spell that creates or nullifies gravity, directly. That way we could create thrust without spewing hot air and plasma." Hermione suggested.

"The question is the efficiency of the spell. We might have to create one with the right intent-modified rules to specifically target the science. It seems that small spells can be created, easily. But if the energy requirement is large, we will have to stick to the runemathimancy. I don't like the idea of a hundred word spell to do something specific. Having a mispronunciation blow us up, is not where we should go…" Harry countered as he dug around in his toolbox.

"I love that word. Makes my job sound mysterious. Too bad it is scribbling boring equations on paper, all day!" Hermione laughed, as she asked Invictus to take a picture of her work.

"You alright Mione? You look nervous?" Harry asked.

"Gah, it is kind of annoying to wait on the acceptance letter," the blue haired girl complained.

"Relax Mione, we got full A's. It will be fine." Harry explained as both of them were waiting on acceptance letters from Imperial College in London. Hermione was more than deserving, but could sometimes get paranoid about school. She rubbed her temples, and Crookshanks came over after sensing that his owner was distressed.

"We better take that holiday before we start uni?" Harry suggested as he considered that they both needed a break. The recent fiasco was still on their minds – they had seen Lord Voldemort in the flesh, after all. Hermione understood the suggestion between the lines and continued, "Maybe we can call the others. Clementine's cottage is more of a country house. It can hold ten, easily. Not a bad idea. So yes, we can all take that one week holiday, after we are done with Gringotts business this evening. Why don't we go to the kitchen?"

"Oh yes. I am in the mood!" Harry replied.

"What is our itinerary looking like, for the hols?" Hermione asked.

"Well, we have three weeks left in June. And then July and August. So eleven weeks. So holiday this week, five weeks of combat training, your run against Magorian at week seven, and our production rush in weeks eight, nine and ten. Then preparing that lot for Hogwarts while we get prepared for uni week eleven. We have some events dotted in between those things too." Harry suggested.

"Well, we better get busy," Hermione countered, as she took a large stretch, and picked up Crookshanks for a cuddle.

The disembodied form of Lord Voldemort continued to roam over the English sea. He eventually veered off into France, Austria and Croatia, to arrive at his preferred forest in Albania. Here, he had found the famed Diadem of Lady Ravenclaw, many decades ago. It had taken him much effort and manipulation to obtain the item - He had to worm his way into the heart of the ghost of Helena Ravenclaw during his entire time at Hogwarts. To cement his immortality, he created another Horcrux. The woman who was taking an evening stroll in the woods had not seen the killing spell.

To secure his soul anchor, the Dark Lord had carried the diadem to Hogwarts and asked the Room of Requirement to hide the item. That evening, he also applied to teach Defense Against the Dark Arts. He was quite surprised that Dumbledore knew about his little group – he had been suspected of not having the noblest intentions. And yet, the Headmaster seemed to forget about him for quite a while, as he continued to exercise the duties that came with his various titles.

The Knights of Walpurgis eventually became the Death Eaters, as time passed.

Voldemort often wondered if Albus was senile. After all, he seemed much too busy to interfere with his long term plans. And when he as Lord Voldemort, had truly stepped into power, he was already forgotten for many decades. Tom Riddle was in his late forties, and it seemed that Grindelwald had exhausted Albus Dumbledore. The old man was tired of fighting and had lost much of his charm and power.

And yet for all his power as the Dark Lord, he had lost not merely three days ago.

The disembodied spirit began to wonder about recent events. The altercation that had happened three days ago was alarming. He had landed at least three Advada Kedavras. And yet the armour had stalled the attack? The Imperio did nothing as his mind was protected by iron walls. Never, had he seen such mental fortitude – the spell had been flicked off like a mere annoyance, in a split second. And worse, the mental defences were full of his most hated thing – mathematical sums. A thing he had dreaded as a child at the Muggle primary school. His multiple attempts at Crucio never even hit his hated opponent.

That was not possible. No muggle armour could stall the killing curse. And how could his mind be that strong?

No – perhaps he had missed. His host was a weak and unremarkable wizard, and he had not been able to cast properly. Lord Voldemort had not expected the halberd, and the Storm-Lord had neutralized his Fiendfyre with some type of throwable rock. The Storm-Lord did not seem interested in fighting with spells. Rather, he relied on weapons. And while primitive, he had easily removed his host's head with a lot of ease. He was also capable of sidestepping all of his spells. He was agile and physically fit, and was brave enough to hurl petty insults at him too. No, this Storm-Lord was the real threat. Voldemort considered that the most powerful of his followers would not be able to handle this new aggressor. No, he would have to be dealt with, indirectly. Lucius Malfoy would have to use his connections.

The rumours had pleased him - Draco had attempted to kill the mudbloods in a broom accident. The boy was on the right path. Daphne Greengrass was an interesting witch – she was driven by ambition. She seemed rather open to serving the Dark Arts. She would be a powerful recruit when he was flesh once more. Her achievements were impressive – the rumours suggested that the Greengrass were biding their time, as they openly played the part of a neutral house. The observations of the Slytherin children had been useful, as he listened to the gossip at the Hydra. He also mulled over recent Wizengamot sessions. The new Lord Black needed to die. He would be punished for sullying a noble house, by taking a pro-muggle stance.

As he arrived at his favourite grotto, the maledictus Nagini greeted him. In her past life, she was a kind but oppressed woman who had suffered her fair share of pain. Eventually, she had succumbed to her blood curse and she lost all her memories. As his essence drifted in the air, he considered his next course of action. He possessed Nagini and began to slither around the area.

He would possess an infant. Then, he would acquire a wand and he would perform a blood ritual that would allow him to become a homunculus. A unicorn's blood along with Nagini's venom would suffice to nourish this diminished form. The unicorn's blood would nourish him, and Nagini's venom when saturated with Dark magic would ensure that the unicorn's blood would be trained sufficiently. From here he could be sustained with smaller dark rituals that demanded human sacrifice.

The final ritual would provide him with a reincarnated form – when he had toured the world, he had come across the ritual in an ancient Phoenician manuscript. He had used the Imperio to ensure that the script was translated into English before killing the Linguistics Professor and burning the manuscript. While the original enchantment was not in English, Voldemort reasoned that his intent would provide him with what he needed.

"Bone of the father, unknowingly given, Flesh of the servant, willingly given, Blood of the enemy, forcibly taken."

This ritual required a servant to provide flesh, and there was none in his current employ. Perhaps he could attract a person who was attuned to the Dark Arts, with enough murder. He explored the local magical village and wondered which of the children would make easy acceptable targets.

"Welcome Harry, Hermione and Sirius" Bloodaxe replied, as they entered the Potter lobby, at Gringotts.

"I hope business is good, and I hope we make Silverdagger suffer." Harry laughed.

"Indeed Harry, indeed. Doom is coming for him. The King is awaiting you. We have made a lot of progress recently. As to why, well you will see for yourself. I want us to surprise you, for once." Blood grinned.

"Surprise us then?" Harry laughed.

Ten minutes later, Harry and the rest were in the Goblin Trolley Kart. Then, they began their journey into the depths of the Gringotts' tunnels. After a forty minute trip, a plastic tunnel was seen. Harry immediately realised the nature of the project – he appreciated how quickly the Goblins could work when something was a priority issue. Harry smelled the damp air and he knew that they were heading to the Gurak tunnel, where he had built the rifle.

"Holy hell, you guys put down this many plastic tunnels already?" Harry asked.

"Yes. Plastic tunnels have become the highest demand product that we sell among the conclaves. I am proud to say that Timilf advanced your initial design by adding a steel honeycomb to the internal structure, among other enhancements."

"Oh Bloodaxe, that is fantastic!" Hermione replied.

"She was inspired by the rebar present in concrete. She and her fellow workers also have gotten quite good at using graphene and boron nitride nanotubes to enhance the plastic. Her new improvements have almost quintupled the strength of the plastic. We have almost three hundred goblins manufacturing at least thirty segments daily. Her stored magic in your emitters allows Goblins without the expertise to produce the item. That innovation has been crucial for our rapid development." Bloodaxe reasoned as he looked at his dataslate.

"Oh look! We are coming to the end of the tunnel." Sirius commented.

The kart stopped and the three individuals emptied into the Gurak excavation. Unlike the last time, most of the cave had been systematically stripped. Goblins were using large amounts of graphcrete to place tunnels all over the cave. Steel billet was being flowed into protego based moulds, and the area looked sturdy and well reinforced. There was also a cacophony of welders and grinders as the groups worked under the illumination by using the solar power system that had been installed, earlier. King Ragnok was dressed in his usual regalia, but he wore a muscle weave, in combination with a pistol with some of the lighter nano-laminate armour. The honour guard was similarly equipped, and they were not too bothered about the group's presence. If anything, they were excited to find out what the pair of them would cook up now – the honour guard was aware that King Ragnok considered both teenagers to be good friends. Large amounts of wealth and convenience were flowing in Goblin society recently and Molly's coffee cups littered the area.

"Ah, Harry! Hermione! Lord Black! As you can see, we have been busy." King Ragnok laughed in a grating tone of voice, with a smirk.

"I like what you have done with the place. You took every scrap of gold and all the jewels out?" Harry asked.

"It is completely empty. From this cave, we managed to get two hundred and fifty million galleons worth of gold and about thirty million worth of precious gems. We are currently preparing the biggest ruby we discovered as a power storage crystal. We have enough to support the failing market for the next five centuries."

"King Ragnok, do not bank on Wizarding England's stupidity. They can bust your entire Gold reserves if they had to, let us hope they will change eventually?" Harry laughed.

King Ragnok smiled, and the honour guard howled. The sentiment was appreciated. It would not be wise to underestimate the stupidity of the English wizarding market. They were not proponents of free market capitalism, and they had a history of stagnation.

"Your majesty, what is the approximate size of the ruby?" asked Sirius.

"Perhaps a little bigger than Mr Lupin? And he is quite huge, by anyone's standard," King Ragnok replied.

"Let me get that reactor sorted out and we can have a good time with it. Anyway, what do you want our help with?" Harry asked.

"We would like your expertise with a small test. Timilf has designed a new hoverkart, based on the work that she did on the Thunderbolt wing. She wants some help with the runes, and she made a slight change to the material composition. She explained that the mass of the entire segment is being used as an intermediate power storage buffer."

"I think that is brilliant. If the reactor failed, the passive power storage will keep the system running. I like it. Hermione, think we can give them some juice from the reactor in the Thunderbolt? Can you make a jump into this cavern?" Harry enquired, as he stared at the tight space.

"Easy. A lot of space. As long as I get the coordinates nailed, yes. Let us talk to Timilf, and I can look over the runes. Maybe a light version of RuneOS might be good for this?" Hermione wondered.

"You want to try the reconfiguration sub-routine? The one we built for the auto-assembling helmet that we scrapped?" Harry enquired.

"Yes. I like that we have the equivalent of a configurable magical microcontroller on each tunnel unit by itself. I am thinking about collision avoidance and other things that we already have for the Quidditch camera drones. I have some leftover modules from the drone swarm project too and we can combine those three pieces with.….."

The discussion continued as the pair considered what could be adapted for the current situation. Sirius made himself handy as Hermione taught him what was needed. He also helped with the power tools.

During the next two hours, The Goblins apparated into the different segments and installed the superconducting pads. Then Hermione jumped the gunship into the cave with perfect accuracy and the pair improvised a power cable. The experiment was quite useful, as the reactor output had topped out and could not produce any more magic. When the system was charged, Hermione asked Daphne to transport into the workshop and pack certain runic modules into a case. Grace apparated the equipment into the cave and began chatting with Hermione, as the girl had gotten more sensitive to Grace's mental presence.

"The uber is here!" Grace yelled in Hermione's mindscape, as she made her way to Hermione's shoulder.

"Hey, you. What have you been doing?" asked Hermione.

"Teaching our young dragon to fly. She can do five hundred meters before she gets tired. She is improving. She was playing hide and seek with Astoria and Ginny. She can't speak complete sentences, but she understands when she is spoken to, easily now. Astoria insisted that she had to try a Big Mac."

"Good, let her have fun. I promised her that we would locate her real parents eventually. We have no idea where she comes from. Probably Norway like you Grace, but that isn't a lot to go on."

"Hey, my favourite monkey is staring at you. He probably wants to ask you something?" Grace quipped. Hermione was now looking at Harry and he asked, "Mione, maybe our friend should see this? Good for her to know?"

Hermione smiled, as she spoke aloud to the group.

"We girls were talking about her. Gracie has been teaching her to fly. Maybe we can give the rest of them a laugh. King Ragnok, I was wondering if my Dragon could come by for a looksie? I would like her to learn about the Goblins. A good learning experience for her."

"Oh yes, I do want to see how my subjects will react. You have become well known for causing surprises around here. Bring her, I would like to see her again?" King Ragnok suggested.

The Goblins in the cave were rather surprised when Grace apparated the dragon into the cave. The honour guard had immediately become alert until the dragon walked over to her "mother" for pets, after respectfully bowing her head to King Ragnok. Hermione was now pointing at various people and structures and teaching the young creature words, to expand her vocabulary. King Ragnok appreciated the interaction because it meant that dragons were supposed to be part of the Wizarding Society.

"There is much dragon Lore that has been lost. If your unusual relationship with the dragon hatchling will help us learn more, this is indeed a great gift," King Ragnok suggested.

"You know about that, I had a word with the centaurs. After some initial distrust, I went to Magorian's hearth and I had a smoke with them, before debating them on some philosophy. Hermione was ahem, volunteered to race Magorian with no armour assistance." Harry explained.

"That is something we will have to see. I will write to him and ask if we Goblins can come along to watch. Lady Granger, please do win as we Goblins love to place bets. I would like to bet on you." King Ragnok insisted – he was one of the few people who knew how quickly the girl could run from Pensieve memories.

"No pressure then, I guess?" Hemione laughed.

"I would say that is a lot of pressure. Magorian's speed is known to us." Bloodaxe grinned. Hermione scratched the dragon's head and spoke to the creature who seemed rather fascinated by everything.

"Sweetie you can fly around, just don't harass anyone. Be respectful, you might learn something?" Hermione suggested, almost as if she was speaking to a child. The small dragon began to fly around and after some initial concern from the workers, settled in as she examined everything. Harry and Hermione then prepared the runes for the trial test of the new hover kart. One hour later they were ready.

"Normally this journey takes about forty five minutes. Time to test it?" Timilf explained, as Hermione, Harry and Timilf sat in the hover kart and switched on superconducting fields at a strength of only ten per cent. As every segment was powered on it pulled the kart in incremental steps. The pulses seemed to occur in a jagged start-stop motion.

"Still a bit jumpy. Adjusting the timing.." Hermione replied as she took Timilf through the specifics. Now the pulses were barely noticeable. Harry was managing the power flow and decided to see how the system dealt with high power draw.

"Alright, you two. Trying the power at fifty per cent….and…."

The hoverkart began to hum with power as it exponentially increased its speed.

"Holy shit!" Hermione yelled as the hoverkart accelerated to what averaged to be 300 kph. Now all the members of the kart were plastered to the seat. Harry realised that the tunnels were not deep but were dug in tightly wound spirals, and this made sense - This was the easiest way to move massive amounts of material without fighting incredibly steep angles. Sometimes even with magic, one had to take a sensible route for building large objects.

"Timilf, did you guys dig downwards into a spiral? I only just noticed?" Harry asked.

"Correct. A diameter of about two hundred feet and thirty levels downwards." Timilf replied as she tucked into a sandwich.

"So, a circumference of six hundred feet. And thirty of those…..that is about six kilometres of tunnel to the Gurak excavation, in metric measurements. And then they branch out too? My vault journey took so long, was wondering about the average speed." Harry considered.

"Perhaps they took many detours. It depends on which excavations are active. We are planning to build a transit that takes us directly to the surface vertically. Customers can use those to get down and back after withdrawals. We want to abolish the coin storage in the vault, as the system is inefficient. The other enclaves are complaining." Timilf countered.

"You want to move to a facsimile of the mundane banking system?" Harry asked.

"We are even considering ATMs. I think King Ragnok wants to ignore the complaints from the other enclaves and implement the system, anyway. We are considering paper bills too. And multiples of five and ten. We might even ask Ms Lovegood to design them, as we have used her talent on and off." Timilf explained.

"That will be nifty. Our money should be magical. Maybe he should go through with that. We can assist with providing magic for the user experience of the ATM. The more time you can save, the more money Gringotts will make. Cutting in-time visits at the bank for most people would help Gringotts run more efficiently." Harry commented as Timilf nodded. As Hermione continued to tune the runes, now the chop and the bumps had been filtered out, and they were in the lobby in a minute and ten seconds flat.

"Hey, I think we are close to the main lobby! That was quick!" Hermione explained.

Harry and the group hopped into a new hoverkart and took the same journey downwards to test the entire length of the tunnel at full speed. The changes had propagated over all of the tunnels, where other Goblin teams had done installs of the necessary items in parallel. The pair were now back at the Gurak excavation and the entire journey had taken approximately 100 seconds. Now, King Ragnarok was discussing additional optimisations that they could make.

"No bumps, very quiet if you exclude the sound of the wind. We can silence the kart too, that will help with the comfort." Hermione explained to King Ragnok.

"Excellent. Timilf is using the composite material and she has repurposed it to build flexible housing. I will ask for the Goblin nation to come out in their full numbers over the next three months. With six thousand workers we should be able to retrofit all the existing wooden karts. And I will be happy to pay them overtime from the gold that we minted. The enhanced lighting devices? We need small ones. You prefer phoenix feathers, yes?" King Ragnok asked.

"I have an affinity for them, yes?" Harry asked.

"Very well Harry. We will need ten thousand units. We will supply the best components. And we need one hundred metric tonnes of the Graphcrete additive. Supplied gradually over five years. The casting of the concrete is new to us, as we used to transfigure stone. That takes too long, we do find the mundane solution sensible, cost-effective and excellent for high-strength structural pieces."

"That should not be a problem. The additive is only slightly different to my standard powders. Those machines are still running at the manor. When I get a quiet month, I can manufacture it in bulk." Harry replied as he scratched his head.

"The development of the segments has been split at eight per cent each for the five of us here and Griphook. After all, it is your innovation. The other Goblin Enclaves have put in orders and we have an initial demand of two hundred thousand units. We have the interest of twenty-five branches. It will take us twenty years to manufacture that many items at our current rate. We do about thirty segments daily." King Ragnok explained.

Harry now had a sneaking suspicion about the real issue for the evening.

"What is the cost of a segment, and what do you plan to do to meet demand?" Hermione asked.

"Two hundred and fifty galleons. I expect the demand to increase as the other branches install them into the tunnels and they begin to use the hover karts. That figure is just initial interest. Gringotts India, China and Africa are huge and if the initial trial works out, the order numbers could be in the millions. Each of those countries has at least one thousand individual smaller branches." King Ragnok explained happily.

"That makes sense. They have to service eighty five million wizards collectively. That is what commerce looks like when you have a population that numbers in the billions and the magicals are a couple million easily. We will revisit the project and we will see how we can automate the production of the segments. It is good for the environment that we are using plastic waste from landfills." Harry commented.

King Ragnok decided to explain the real conundrum, which was the manufacturing speed of the process:

"If the majority of the Asian and African branches of Gringotts ordered three thousand units each, which is reasonable for how large these places are, individually we are looking at one hundred and eighty million galleons each. At a projected 9,000 units a year, we would need one thousand years to meet the demand. And it could be far more. And this is the other problem I wanted to discuss until you got busy and run off to the tunnels.." Lord Ragnok grinned.

"If we can get the manufacturing up to one million units a year, we can just all retire and live off the compounded interest from the stock exchange. A decade and we are done." Harry wondered.

"I think that will be a good option for you and Harry. The main problem is transporting the plastic from landfills. The portkeys can only handle so much." King Ragnok commented.

"Maybe we need to melt the plastic on the spot and get rid of the air spaces. Maybe a fleet of automated drones, Moine?" Harry wondered.

"How about if we just take all the plastic trash that England produces? Having the machinery and tooling for that could be beneficial for a lot of humanitarian projects. Those are the real long term aims after we get rid of Dork Moldypants," Hermione explained as she considered her Seitan and Tofu project. She also thought about flash-forged plastic houses.

"As for the manufacturing of the segments, they probably flow the material into a collar-shaped protego field. The entire middle of that mould is a space that cannot be used as the plastic hardens. What if we reengineer the segments as polygons? Say about twenty-four sides. And we cast the individual panels separately and we join them. We can make them with slots and we can compact the manufacturing area." Harry wondered.

"That sounds reasonable. We can do all the panels in a vertical orientation at a much higher density. Then we develop a specialised charm to join the slots. We can even ship them collapsed, like IKEA furniture. The other Goblins will have fun assembling them. As long as we are sure that the joined pieces are structurally sound. Maybe we can develop a new method to do plastic welding with magic?"

King Ragnok laughed as Harry and Hemione worked up a reasonable and clever plan to speed things along. The solution did not require any revolutionary new ideas. Rather it was a clever set of optimisations from people who understood manufacturing innately. The pair immediately began to work on the solution, and they offered to spend the next couple of days in the cave. They would test a small pilot program of the solution.

"If we get this figured out, we can just release small domestic things and we can focus on weapons and armour development. We can also do more missions to places, where we can do some good?" Hermione wondered.

"Definitely. I think we have enough money honestly, and after the war is done we can restart our research. For now, I think uni and the training our recruits is enough." Harry replied he began to shape the new protego fields with his wand, while Hermione scribbled calculations. Hermione buzzed Daphne.

"Oi private Greengrass, you around?" Hermione asked.

"Yes? Having some midnight coffee. This Blue Mountain coffee is the absolute bomb. I think that is the expression, right?" Daphe asked – she was new to slang language as she usually spoke very formally to people, in public.

"Correct. That is the expression. How do you feel about getting some hands-on experience with some runes? How about a visit to a Goblin mine?" Hermione suggested, cantankerously.

"Oh please yes!" Daphne replied as she was very excited.

"Let me speak to your father. Is he up?" Hermione enquired.

"He is?" the blond girl replied, as she dialled her father into the group call.

After Hermione and Harry had cleared Daphne's late-night excursion, she was apparated to the cave by Grace. Daphne was surprised to see the type of heavy construction that was occurring deep underground, and she found herself humbled to meet the Goblin King after Hermione and Harry had schooled her on the proper greeting.

"Yes King Ragnok, Daphne is my apprentice! She already managed to top the Runes and the Arithmancy Owl with perfect scores. Got offered scholarships for each field!" Hermione beamed while hugging Daphne. The snake was not too accustomed to people in her personal space but was gradually warming up to being affectionate with people, other than her family.

"Excellent Ms Greengrass. We Goblins have benefited from Harry's and Hermione's expertise. You will learn much from them. We hope you enjoy your stay. The last time these two were here, they created their rifles. It was quite entertaining. I will be leaving as they work on improving our manufacturing facilities." King Ragnok explained as he left the cave.

"Best wishes King Ragnok!" Daphne replied as Harry and Hermione began to explain the new set of challenges that she was required to solve. She overheard Harry and Hermione as they discussed another issue:

"Guess we are cancelling the holiday at Clementine's country house?" Hermione asked.

"We can take a break and spend the weekends. Drag the bunch of them along. But yes, we should prioritise this here. We don't say no to galleons do we?" Harry joked.

"I like the rush of working down here!" Hermione laughed.

The production issues were sorted out within a week of intermittent work in the Gurak Excavation. As the following five weeks passed, the team at Peverell manor were drilled every day on the obstacle course. Some days focused on strictly target practice with guns. On other days, it was target practice with wands. Then, the group were given jetpacks and were trained to fly small, controlled distances on a tether. They were often forced to 'jump-jet' across various elevated surfaces. They practised jumping through windows, alighting on rooftops, and executing controlled drops. Harry and Hermione liberally bruised their students in hand-to-hand training, and Neville was forced to hold off Harry's halberd with a sword. Daphne, Tracey and Luna had to fight Hermione, as they continued dagger practice. Luna decided to personally set targets for her accuracy with a bow, and Remus decided to drill Ronald, as he preferred kickboxing. Most of the group began to see some accelerated growth, although it was not as pronounced as the pair. And while the training continued to tax their bodies, their minds were not left behind. The group was forced to participate in practical learning. Many of them were projects that the pair had already done and Harry and Hermione knew what to tailor to force their students to engage in critical higher-order thinking, all day long.

As the tuition and the exercise continued, Daphne and Fleur were taught to fly. Bill occasionally joined the classes. Ronald became the star marksman as he began to tap his quidditch training and his wandless magic to lead targets with his DMR and an experimental beam sniper rifle. Tracey loved using Remus' micro-cannon and Daphne preferred the pistols and SMGs. The classmates of the 'fantastic five' were relaxing while they were accumulating battle experience, bodily strength, magical efficiency and academic excellence. For the parents and grandparents, there was much approval. Ophelia had barged into Daphne's room and saw the girl examining her biceps and the faint six-pack on her abdominals.

"Well daughter, you are surely getting a workout on the obstacle course. I can see those abs on you. You look good. How does the Gringotts project?" Ophelia asked.

"Almost finished mother. We just have some optimisations to do. I can't complain. My behind is bigger and much firmer. I am going to need new robes. And that is going to be an issue with those charming Slytherin scions."

"As if you needed any more admirers, daughter. Even your father is seeing improvement. I saw some of the other witches sizing him up in Diagon alley, and I was not pleased!" Ophelia laughed.

"Can't blame you for being territorial." Daphne joked, as she sat down and began to shop for some fashionable pieces off Amazon.

"Is the flying class to your liking?" Ophelia asked.

"Yep. I am very talented at it, or so Mione says. Ronald is the best marksman, and Neville is the best with the sword. Luna is still looking for a preferred weapon, but she seems to like bows for now. Tracey likes big cannons. She might be the squad demolition person. But me? Mother, I am the pilot among the five of us. "

Ophelia grinned. Since when did her daughter use the word Yep? The woman continued to examine what Tracey called 'Hipster Daphne', which was carefree Daphne when she was surrounded by Harry, Hermione and her other friends. She was the girl who liked Star Wars, looked at memes on Reddit and admired cat videos all day long. Of course, pureblood Daphne was still there. If you managed to see her outside of her trusted friend group, you would not be able to tell the difference. Ophelia liked how carefree Daphne was now – she suspected that Daphne had always been worried about the blood curse. That was a long dead issue now. She had other goals in mind, now.

"Your father is taking me on a ride. If we see any interesting places or fast food joints, we will tag them. Anyway, I want you to help me with something in the greenhouse. Can you do a rune array for…" Ophelia asked as she explained the problem. As the conversation at Greengrass manor ended, a certain elf attempted to penetrate the Peverell wards, after many failed attempts.