'Ow,' I thought as I pulled my face off of the cold flagstones and pulled myself to my knees. 'Okay… A dark, damp, stone room… Interesting.' I flicked my wrist automatically expecting my wand to appear like it always did but that was ruined by the distinct absence of the cool, polished wood between my fingers. I felt my left hand clamp around my right wrist and swore violently at the feeling of my dragonhide coat and bare flesh as I pushed my coat's sleeve up instead of my holster that I kept there.

"Damn it! I just need a wand!" Lo and behold, the familiar feeling of polished and finger worn wood snapped into existence in my hand. I gulped at the cold radiating off the wand, realizing what it most likely was. I just sighed and raised the wand, "Lumos Sphera." I whispered, watching as a ball of light drifted from the fifteen-inch wand to settle at the ceiling. The only thing I could do was sigh as I saw the familiar form of the elder wand in my hand… my young hand! There were none of the scars or wrinkles one picks up in a lifetime of police work on my hands and I felt amazing! "Well… Death did say I would have the Hallows and be seventeen again. But where's the bloody cloak and stone?" I muttered as I looked around the room for the two of them only to stop short when I realized I couldn't see my hands anymore. I gulped as I thought about being visible again and I was, I glanced down at where my holster used to sit and noted that even with the holster gone that there was a silvery mark - not unlike a scar - depicting the symbol of the hallows sitting there.

I shook my head and started working my wand through a series of quick and dirty proximity wards tied with something similar to what Hermione called a SONAR charm. That woman has been saving my ass for years now and is still doing it even when I rightfully should have been with my ancestors. Anyway, she wanted to be an unspeakable after graduation, or maybe even a lobbyist for equal rights, but Shacklebolt gave her an offer that was even better in her eyes - a chance to be a part of the newly formed Auror R&D department, head of it even. She declined headship since that meant that she would have been strictly limited in what she could have helped create - and boy did she create. She only stayed until I became head auror though since she had apparently been taking classes at a muggle uni and managed to get into Law School and risen up to become one of the Wizengamot's most successful Barristers to have ever lived - in fact I almost pity Astoria since I just know Hermione's going to want to try the case.

Grinning at the thought, I summoned one of her more impressive creations to me with a simple "activate!" in parsel after sensing that I was in what probably amounted to a true dungeon. The battle armor she created for the Auror's Dragon Corps (Aurors who had been members of the Order of the Phoenix, or who had fought Voldemort himself, were assembled into the magical world's version of SWAT and I headed the strike group before my promotion to head Auror. If it wasn't for the Dragons, I wouldn't have been able to take down Zabini) solidified around me from out of special mokeskin pouches and pockets hidden in my coat. The dragonskin coat was the mark of the Dragon corps and so Hermione decided to take a riff off of that in the design of her armor, except for the singular fact that my coat wasn't dragon hide at all - it was basilisk hide. The first basilisk I had killed when I was twelve was too badly decomposed for it to have been much use except for it's bones and fangs, this Basilisk had been terrorizing Greece when I killed it. Some idiot Dark Lord who could - unsurprisingly - speak Parsel up and decided he was going to make himself a Basilisk. It ate him…

Surprisingly, it ate him nearly a hundred years ago and had broken free of the Dark Wanker's secret hide out in oh-five. Greece called me in.

I snorted at the memory as my goblin steel barbuta slipped over my head and the visor shut with an audible click. Grinning, the armor snapped and clicked as it slid down my body like water - encasing me in what was quite possibly the best armor money could buy, paid for by House Black. I gave a vicious grin (quite invisible behind my visor) as the bands of steel encasing my ribs and chest tightened down to almost a second skin while my arms were coated with mail as greaves and tassets appeared over my jeans - sue me, it was my day off and I wanted to be somewhat comfortable to see my kids off to Hogwarts… Still ridiculous that the knife Astoria stabbed me with punched through the basilisk hide coat like it was butter, I shuddered at the memory but got lost in my thoughts again rather quickly. Hermione said she got the idea from the Roman Legion's style of armor while the helmet was a play on the French bascinet and Greek barbutes, Ron said the damn thing was all-around brilliant. The armor around my legs and arms were also Goblin steel but anything that was exposed or needed a greater range of flexibility was protected by basilisk hide - on my armor at least. Speaking of, the Greek basilisk was only a fraction of the size of Juliet - which was what I had lovingly dubbed Salazar's Basilisk when I went back down there to collect some of her venom - but was still larger than the horntail from fourth year. I shuddered slightly as I thought about how I had to take the damn thing out - blindfolded and reliant on Hermione's SONAR spell I had used to find the lay of the land in this place.

The door in front of me, while lacking any obvious handle or lock, was made of what looked like solid oak. I frowned and pressed my gauntlet to it and reached out with my magic feeling for something. My frown only deepened as I felt the lack of the usual suspects but still whispered Alohomora with my wand in my hand. I saw a pulse of silver flow from my wrist as the wand disappeared and the pulse of silver washed over the wooden door. I felt my jaw slacken at the obvious use of Wandless magic but stepped through the newly opened door anyway. I rotated my wrist and watched as my shield materialized from what looked like thin air - strangely enough, it wasn't a conjuration. It was more of a play on the expandable space idea that Hermione used liberally throughout her life. The shield was connected to a small slit in a strip of hide fashioned into a circle that was stitched underneath the left cuff of the coat while the shield itself was designed to stick to the Auror's arm after it was deployed. I've seen these save more lives than any protego I had ever seen.

Anyway, I was constantly sending pulses of magic off of me to act as a sort of quick and dirty proximity ward - it was no trade for the real thing but it would do for now - after casting sense warding spells on myself and sound silencing spells on my steel shod boots. Also, it wasn't like anyone could see me either since I willed myself invisible once I slid out of the room. I made my way down the long, dank corridor to the steel door looming like a prowling gargoyle. I pressed my hand to the door and raised my eyebrow at the again seeming lack of any wards or defenses on the door before something clicked with me.

'The magic of this world could be completely different from Earth's. This Galbatorix is supposed to be stronger than Tom and, assuming the worst and this is his fortress, I'd expect him to protect his own home.' I chewed on my lip for a beat before I made a decision and directed a wordless finite through the door. Metal squealed in protest as the bolt and innate magic of the door wrestled with my own magic. With a thought, I sent an alohomora into the door and, with a snap like thunder, the door threw itself off its hinges and onto the floor like it was tossed by an angry giant. I blinked, utterly stunned by what just happened.

I cast my best proximity ward through the door followed by about twenty different standard spells to see if the room was completely safe. It was, but it still looked like a death trap. The room I entered was a large circle with twelve doors (not including my own) and about thirty meters from wall to wall, I sighed and knew I was in for a long day. I pressed my hand to the floor and started chanting streams of spells, made much faster by the fact that I didn't have to actually make any wand motions as spell after spell flowed into the granite floor. By the time I was finished, the room was a veritable fortress ringed with aversion, proximity, warning, and offensive wards to give me time to get the hell out of here. I couldn't apparate yet - I had no idea where I was. The first thing I needed was a map, fast. So, knowing I was going to have a long time of it, pushed open the first door on my right.

"Storage room," I muttered darkly. The place was almost as bad as the Room back at Hogwarts before I… well, before Crabbe, torched the place with fiendfyre. The only bright side? This room was probably about half of the size of the Room of Lost Things. I sighed and turned to the door but caught a glimpse of something out of the corner of my eye. I turned to the old rucksack and grinned, I didn't have any supplies and it wasn't like this place's owner needed it anyway. I picked up the old rucksack and unceremoniously dumped it over. I watched what fell out with slight interest, there was a flask, a rock, a length of rusty metal, and a spoon in the small pack. I frowned at it before groaning in realization - flint and steel with a spoon? This is ancient camping equipment. I sighed as I summoned the elder wand again, preparing myself for what was probably going to be the most draining spell of the day.

"Reparo," I muttered, watching the old bag knit itself whole once again before I cast the next spell. "Capacious extremis, maximus," I snapped and prepared for the typical drain on my magic. It came but something utterly strange happened simultaneously, I could feel my magic running down my arm and into the wand but it felt like… Well, the best I could say it felt like was that someone had a cup of water and was pouring it out but it wouldn't empty because it was being constantly refilled by a much larger pitcher. The magic of this world was resupplying my own power before it could even drain a little bit. I felt my eyes widen as power kept flowing off of me, sustaining the spell much longer than what I thought was possible - the record for holding this spell apparently belonged to Dumbledore and he could only hold it for ten seconds. Twenty seconds passed, then thirty… Forty-five… after a minute and a half of the draining spell, I finally released it without even breaking a sweat. The thing about that spell? The longer you hold it, the deeper your bag of holding (as Hermione insisted on calling the damn things, what was so wrong with 'bottomless bag,'?) would become. Expanding the bag also wasn't linear, apparently, it was exponential. Though that's all relative, I suppose. The bag still allows you to call whatever it is you need from it whenever and it'll appear in your hand when you do.

Still has nothing on my mokeskin pouch Hagrid gave me all those years ago that I still wear around my neck to this very day. I touched my chest where it was sitting with a small smile but stood up and opened the rucksack all the same and called "Pack!" Immediately, the room exploded into a whirl of activity as things leaped from where they were sitting and hurtled into the pack, things that obviously weren't meant to fit in a gap half a meter by twenty centimeters large but they did. It took about five minutes for the room to be stripped absolutely clean of anything except dust. I shrugged the pack on my shoulders with a grin, vowing to go through all of this whenever I escaped this hellhole. But first I was going to stea… liberate everything I could… I glanced around the room with a malicious smirk on my face as I summoned all the dust in the room and solidified it before transfiguring it to granite, carving a message on it, and conjuring a pedestal for it in the middle of the room.

I stepped back into the hallway with a wide grin on my face, pushing open the next door to find absolutely nothing but a small desk and comfortable chair. That was a minute-long process as I had to hit each drawer with a finite before they would ever open but came out of it with a few notes and a couple of pieces of what I assumed to be slate. I left the room but before I did I gave the chair a good look… It may not have been my leather swivel chair in my office but a good chair is just so hard to come by these days! I summoned it, and the desk for spite, before I tried the next room.

There were only a few things one could do when faced with what I was standing in front of… Squeal like a little girl, swoon, or grin ferally. I did the last as I stared at the armory a hundred and eighty meters long and sixty wide full of axes, spears, halberds, hammers, daggers, and - strangely enough - swords made with steel of all different colors. I took one of the few sheathed swords from the rack and drew it, the black blade was about three feet long and feather-light with a silver hilt.

"You are mine now, you beauty, you," I said with a broad grin, my voice reverberating behind my helm's visor. I looked up again while strapping the blade to a loop the armor created specifically to hold the sheathe. Hemione was always a few steps ahead of us in that regard… I think she thought I would wear the sword of Gryffindor but I never did like that sword - it may be in my mokeskin pouch but it's just too small for me. Ah well, the past is past, I now have an awesome new sword and was already calling for the room to "pack!"

It didn't take anywhere near as long for the well-organized room to fly into the bottomless sack and leave the room completely bare - save for the bolted down racks, I would have taken them too but it's just too much of a hassle in the long run. I turned on my heels and walked out of the room, already headed to the next one. I pushed the door open with a bit more force, almost straining to open it. And I could immediately see why. All my life, I had thought the singular most impressive sight in the wizarding world was my first trip to Gringotts. Piles of gold stacked higher than my head, jewels, books, and other things strewn about the floor like they had just been shoveled in there. This was similar.

The room I entered had tons of gold inside it - literally. There were heaping piles of coins stacked from the floor to the vaulted ceiling high above - not that I really cared how much there was, I'd take it all anyway. The only issue? Gold was much harder to spell than any other metal on Earth while lead was quite possibly the easiest, that's why the Philosopher's Stone was such an impressive invention. I sucked in a breath and braced my feet, mentally preparing for what I was about to do. The elder wand appeared in my hand as I stretched out my hand with my rucksack directly underneath my wand. "Pack!" I shouted into the cavernous treasury and watched as the gold all but disappeared with a markedly intense drop of my magic. I fell to a knee, panting as the strain made me see stars - but I was conscious and could feel my reserves flooding back to full already - I almost could have sworn I was going to get magical whiplash there for a second. It took me a few seconds to catch my breath but I managed it as I felt the first feather light pings on my proximity wards, someone had just bounced off the aversion ward. I swore lightly and jumped to my feet - I had to find a map or a door, immediately.

I threw open the next door and stopped in my tracks at the sight of the multifaceted, multicolored gems in small alcoves around the room ranging from the size of chicken eggs up to that of a pumpkin (obviously not Hagrid's, that is…). I waved my hand, not even saying the word to make the gems flow into the bag. I felt something brush against my mind but I clamped down on my occlumency like it was a wall, I don't want to know what this Galbatorix guy's powers include but if he can send a mental probe without seeing me? That was terrifying, assuming it was him at all. I gulped as I darted out of the vault and into the room beside it. I growled as I saw the room was just a library but - if there was one thing I learned from 'Mione it was that - knowledge was powerful, after all. En Masse, the bookshelves all leaped from the floor and into the mouth of the rucksack, taking up even more of my time. I hurried from the library into the next room but didn't even go into the room that - as far as I could tell - was just a pond and a bunch of mirrors… Or so I thought, on closer inspection it looked like the room was created from one long, solid piece of glass. I bore my teeth in an approximation of a smile and slammed the door as hard as I could and heard the sound of tinkling glass as I threw open the next door to find something equally useless at the moment but much more revolting.

A torture chamber.

I felt my jaw tighten as I looked at the hooded man drawing his knife down the back of a silent man. I snarled and raised my wand and barked "bombarda!"

The torturer exploded like a water balloon. I curled my nose. I knelt in front of the man tied on the rack but realized he was much too far gone to do anything for him, he was dead before I probably showed up in this world… Pity.

"Take him and have mercy on him," I whispered as what felt like a cool breeze tickled my ears. I turned from the pair of corpses and went back to the door chamber. I threw open the next door in the rotation and found myself shocked to my core. If the torture chamber was revolting this was an abomination. There were men and women tied to the ceiling being eaten by something of the likes I had never seen, things that I'm sure even Hagrid would call to be exterminated. There was one poor woman in the corner who was obviously alive and was screaming in horror mixed with agony as four hopping, skipping, massive, maggot-like things crawled on her body until two of them jumped up and dove into her shoulder and thigh respectively. I raised my wand and felt my anger rise with the volume of her screams.

Everywhere I looked in the room was a picture of devastation. Cages full of monsters, people hanging or strapped down, other monsters free to roam… It was too much.

'Stupefy,' I thought, sending the suffering woman into the arms of the void. I reached out with my senses and found that of the three people in there that only one could possibly be saved but even as I thought that I watched the last two bugs dive into her ears. I felt my jaw tense as I felt her drop to the border of life and death immediately. I raised my wand again with fury in my eyes, praying that these people would forgive me.

"Fiendfyre," I whispered, focusing all my power on holding the fire down and letting the power build. A spark grew at the end of my wand, growing brighter and brighter until everything had turned to look at me. There was a beat where everything stopped, a perfect calm that lasted right up until the Cursed Fire roared from the end of my wand like demonic dragonfire. I didn't stop to watch the end of the carnage, just praying that the Phoenix that erupted ended those people's suffering quickly… I hated to leave them to die but they were all but dead anyway if what I sensed was true, there was nothing I could do. I slammed the door shut and slammed my gauntleted fist against the stone works with tears running down my face.

"Thank you…" a voice said behind me, I felt my eyes widen as the spectral forms of the five people who were just being brutally tortured appeared behind me, floating midair. The woman smiled at me, her long red hair flowing down her face and moving to expose her ear. I lifted an eyebrow at the sight of the obviously sharper, longer ear. She smiled and disappeared without another second passing - just winking out of existence with the rest of her friends who also had the enlarged ears… Interesting…

I couldn't think on it any longer as I pushed open the next door as I threw as many protective wards as I could over the door, but not locking it - whoever opened it next deserved the full wrath of the fire, though it would be extinguished after making it ten meters out of the room. I shoved the next door open and grinned slightly at the sight of the hundreds and hundreds of maps rolled up on shelves - the most important one being pinned to the table in the middle of the room. I pulled my visor up to get a better look at the map, granted I didn't have to and probably could have gotten a better one with it on. The helmet was designed to sharpen details, find heat signatures, detect traps, and give a wider field of view for combat scenarios but it wasn't great for, say, reading a map in great detail. Thankfully, Death apparently fixed my eyes too - would be a bit awkward to need to still rely on those after moving dimensions.

I squinted down at the map, seeing a stylized black circle around a city named Urubaen.

'Huh…' I wondered, 'bets on if that's where I'm at.' "Accio smaller map of…" I read the title and called out "Alagaesia!" and immediately three smaller rolls of parchment smacked into my hand. I tossed them into my pack and looked at the map again, tracing a line with my finger into the massive desert around a mountain range apparently called the Hadarac with another mountain range to the south - obviously much larger - and the forest to the north.

"Alright… Three jumps then," I said grimly bringing my visor down with a click. "Two in the Hadarac and the last to get me to this… Du Weldenvarden… Why does that sound like something Ron would say in the loo?" I shook my head and walked out of the room, sending a small flicker of fire on the main map and another spark into the racks. I didn't stay to watch them flare up and engulf the room in fire. 'Two to go,' I thought as I pushed open the door to the second to last room, I blinked at the darkness and cast a quick Lumos Sphera - feeling my jaw fall as I looked at the three pedestals in the room. But it wasn't the pedestals that held my attention but what was on them.

"Dragon eggs," I breathed, "oh Hagrid would be so excited to see you…" I whispered as I placed my hand on the crimson and sapphire eggs. I picked up the blue egg and slipped it into my mokeskin pouch gently, the green egg soon behind it - these were too valuable to be potentially lost to the backpack. I took the red egg and just as I was about to put it in my pouch, there was a sound like shattering stone mixed with a ringing bell, a note so pure that I almost felt honored to hear it. I glanced down and saw that I was right to feel that way as a crack appeared on the face of the shell. I placed the egg back on the pedestal and held my breath as the little guy made more of those beautiful notes before his head popped out of the egg. His ruby eyes met my green right before he tried to finish clambering out of his shell. I laughed lightly as the little dragon fell to the floor with a small squeal before sitting up indignantly, looking at me like I did something wrong. I pulled my helmet and gauntlets off to sit in front of the little dragon, he looked at me appraisingly for a few moments and gave a sharp, approving hoot as he strutted right up to me and pressed his head into my left hand.

I felt like ice had been dumped down my spine as my magic reserves swelled to nearly thrice what they were before. But there was pain, oh yes there was pain. I felt the icy agony sweep through my body as my left hand cramped horribly. Thankfully it passed in a matter of seconds as the little dragon looked all too pleased with himself. I shook my head and picked up the dragon and put him on my shoulder, reaching to pull on my gauntlets when I caught sight of the silver oval on my left hand.

"Great… You did this, didn't you?" I showed the dragon my palm and he threw his nose in the air as if to say "of course I did! Deal with it!" I rolled my eyes, donning my helm. "Oh, right… better clean this up," I said, gesturing for the shell pieces and summoning them up into the pouch as I went for the door. But, just as I was about to push it open, I felt my Aversion ward shatter like glass. Without thinking, I twisted on heel scant moments before the last door was thrown open to reveal a large, spiraling staircase and a furious yet confident Galbatorix…

XXX

With Narrator…

To be King, one must be strong. Powerful. He must appear to be enthroned on a mountain of gold, to be as immovable as the Earth herself. But King Galbatorix - the High Lord of the Broddring Empire, and a Dragon Rider - was panicking. He knew he was lax in the security in this area but that was no failing of his. He had warded his city to be able to tell if anyone had entered through the gates or any of the so-called secret entryways the elves made. No one entered - or left - his city without him knowing, which was the source of his terror. Someone had gotten into his palace and wrecked Earth and Stars knew what terrors upon his powerbase all without his knowledge until he felt a presence in the dragon hatchery.

Perhaps it was caution, mayhaps it was paranoia, but Galbatorix was convinced that those eggs - especially the azure female - were the future of his empire and thus had them protected with as many wards as he could affix to a certain location. All of them had been tripped.

The King was furious that this could have occurred just under his nose… But it did. The king snarled as he pushed the door to the hatchery open and could only stare in horror at the trio of empty marble pedestals. The King could feel his heart rate jump as he scanned the room for magic and minds - trying to determine if the thief was there still. He was unsuccessful. Shaking his head, the king marched toward his scrying chamber - one of the finest in the land, crafted from the labor of the most skilled craftsman and mages the kingdom had to offer. Shattered to pieces.

Galbatorix stared at his scrying chamber in horror, thankful that it still appeared to be completely functional but the door's mirror was shattered into shards with most of the ceiling's mirrors. Thank the moon and stars that the far wall's mirrors were relatively intact, he just would not get the same degree of picture that he was used to. The King sat in the water up to his chest, willing the water calm with his magic. He focused on the three eggs. He had no such luck save to see the azure and jade eggs floating in a field of grey with shards of crimson among them.

The King looked at the image in confusion, had he not traveled the length and breadth of his kingdom? Would he not be able to see them in his own city? Surely, no thief could have made it past him in his own castle. The king stood up and went for the door, first to the bare library, the dry treasury, the deserted armory… With each door, Galbatorix's rage and fear spiked tremendously. What kind of mage could do this?

Galbatorix shoved open the door to his storage room, and was stunned to see the room empty save for a single pedestal with a plaque propped up on top of it. The king snatched up the plaque and read the simple message: "Thanks for your stuff! Prongs Jr."

The whole Kingdom would know Galbatorix's wrath after he stormed out of the storage room only to find his study empty with the desk and his favorite chair gone. The King was fighting panic by the time he opened the door to his menagerie but instead of his abominations he only found a fight with the eldritch horror that was Fiendfyre, though he managed to put the weakened flame down with nary a scratch. The panting, raging King was even more infuriated when he found his head inquisitor - or what was left of him - dead on the floor and, more horrifyingly, the fact that the majority of his Eldunari were gone. He never thought that the wards he had installed could have failed so miserably against anyone, he was the strongest mage in the land! Though, in the King's defense, he could have never expected or planned for the powerhouse that is Harry Potter - the newest Dragon Rider of Alagaesia… Who was even then standing up in the sands of the Hadarac Desert with an unhappy baby dragon curled up in his arms.

XXX

To those concerned that Galbatorix has been neutered like in first version, please keep in mind that I do actually have a plan for this. Next update will be coming to you on November 9th, 2020 and every three weeks after that (please keep in mind that the holiday season is fast approaching so these deadlines will be sort of flexible).