Hello again Internet! Neolyph has returned to bring you the chapter you all have all been waiting for! The start of the Hogwarts arc! Loved the response on that last chapter. Finished it at like 4 A.M, so I wasn't too sure of the quality. God that one got long on me. Anyway, thanks for all of the reviews, everyone seemed to like it. This story is kind of how I let off stress, so I'm glad that people are enjoying it. Anyway, thanks to all who read, review, follow, and favorite.

The polls are in! This story will be a WBWL story. End total of the poll at time of writing is 135 Yay, 61 Nay. With double the votes, WBWL wins. Setup for it will begin this chapter. I apologize if this turns some people off. I will try to be intelligent about it. No character will act in a purely irrational manner. At least, I hope not.

Now, for reviews

Thundramon: You really think the first chapter was the best? I still wince when I read some of the stuff in that chapter. As I saw it, Zelretch promised Harry a family, so this is his way of fulfilling the bargain. I figured Harry could do with an actual lordship, and if he can get revenge for Illya while he's at it, that's just icing on the cake. Lorelei is a disciplinarian, but she does essentially worship the Denial of Nothingness. I've never read another fic with Jubstacheit in it, but he didn't really do enough to be declared OOC. All he really did was lock his door. I might have to get a bit creative with growth. It will likely be more character-wise and learning more applications of his existing abilities. I am going to do at least Philosopher's Stone. I have an idea that requires it. Nope, WBWL.

PhaseHand: Might be a bit quicker than a year or two. All depends on how much exposure Assassin gets to the Einzbern homunculi.

madcow360: I don't think he really needs to shut down the tournament. He literally annihilated the Grail. The man won.

Im a guest: Oh you better believe it's real. May the GAR be with you as well.

Squadpunk 2.0: Not in the Potterverse. I tore through canon trying to come up with something he wouldn't just steamroll, but I couldn't. Instead, Potterverse is going to be his safe dimension, where he doesn't have to worry about shit actively trying to kill him. That will be every other universe.

GreyMan19: Just wait till Harry finds out about those

Yo: Worshipers do not a god make. Otherwise, that insane motherfucker from the Jonestown massacre would be eligible for a heroic spirit summoning.

FuZzvKiNgZz: Yeah, it's kind of hard to keep to be a moody kid when you are surrounded by people like Assassin and Illya. We'll see about Bellatrix.

AzureStorms: I think that the difference is that my character isn't some self-insert fetish-fuel OC. I don't intend for this story to be taken super seriously, and I don't think I could if I tried. I mean, I try to write big emotional scenes like end of chapter 9 and start of 10, but then I try to write characters like Assassin and I just can't make it dramatic anymore and things get comedic again.

Delta8: A more thorough explanation of his reality marble will be provided this chapter. It's not quite as OP as you're thinking, though it eventually will be.

duskrider: Harry will have to be capable not to leave Assassin around the army of young, impressionable women bearing an infatuation with him. If he doesn't, he'll end up with whatever the maid version of the Sisters of Battle is.

Pikminman101: I originally just wrote the cult stuff as theoretical laughs, but the more I think about, it'd be fucking hilarious if it actually happened, so I'm jotting it down as a definite maybe. No Lorelei in the harem, she had too much pride, even for a Denial of Nothingness user. I'm not sure about a Lancer. I like Cuchulain quite a lot. Maybe he'll get re-summoned. I'll try a lemon and run it by my beta at some point. If he green-lights it I'll put it up. Won't happen for a while though.

Stilphyell: Don't know about her. May get a Lancer though. It'll depend.

Undeen: Oh it's a definite possibility.

Mangahero18: Quite so. I'll try to balance it as much as possible though.

Chapter 11: Magic or Magecraft?

The Clock Tower was in pandemonium. News had arrived that Harry Emiya, the ten-year-old wielder of two True Magics, had decimated the Einzbern clan, one of the oldest and most respected magi clans in history. Not only that, but he had usurped both the position of clan head and the army of homunculi the clan possessed, something that had quite a few Nobles up in arms, despite his status as a True Magician. That was a thing to be feared, even discounting the True Magician business. The Einzberns were known to be especially paranoid, even for magi. Every homunculus they kept could fight at least on par with a Clock Tower Enforcer, with the upper tiers being on the level of low to mid ranked Servants.

And a ten-year-old now had their undying loyalty. Many wondered if he actually planned on taking control of the Clock Tower, for it was the first time in Magi history that someone had amassed that much power. And since the Clock Tower was the organization who chose whose research deserved to be funded, well it would hardly be surprising for someone with as much power to try and take control of the assets that would grant them unlimited possibilities for their research.

Not to mention the fact that Lorelei Barthomeloi had done nothing about his blatant murder of an entire respected clan. When the young magus had come back to the Clock Tower, she had actually bowed slightly at the waist as he passed. Not a single reprimand was issued, not even a respectful request to avoid repeating the massacre. A silent agreement was passed between all Magi in the Clock Tower that day.

Never even think of crossing Harry Emiya, now Einzbern. Not if you valued your and your clan's existences.

-Break-

The week following his takeover of the Einzbern clan had actually been rather stressful for Harry. Had Monica and Caster not helped him out, he might have gone slightly insane, or at least more insane than the Reality Marble in his head, and his close proximity with Zelretch had already made him. He didn't care what anyone thought, actually having to go through the paperwork required to set up payrolls for one thousand and a half young women, or at least beings that looked like young women, was something he hoped he would have to do only once. Even with his knowledge of healing, he still had phantom pains in his wrist after signing everything!

Once everything was sorted out, he had raided both the Einzbern library, and Jubstacheit's personal one, the Head of the family traditionally keeping the most advanced material separate from the rest, if only in case someone managed to raid their library. Suffice to say, he learned a great deal more than he originally did about alchemy. He gave both his Servants and the Einzbern maids free access to whatever reading materials they desired, although at first only a few had come forth, since entire lives of submission didn't simply go away like that. He estimated it would take a few more months before the Homunculi began feeling more comfortable with their new situation and started requesting things of him.

One thing that he did catch was Assassin slipping a book entitled, "Essays on Mental Partition" under her dress. He didn't really know why she was interested in it, but if she wanted to learn about it, he would let her. It still slightly terrified him to think of what she intended to do with what she learnt, given that she thought of him as a God that she had to serve to the best of his ability, but he could hardly begrudge her the right to learn.

He was actually somewhat concerned about letting Assassin have too much access to the Einzbern maids. As the only person in their entire lives that had given them anything resembling happiness, he discovered that they had become rather... infatuated with him. He feared that letting Assassin, who he discovered possessed A-rank Charisma as a hangover from her days as a charismatic zealot, mingle with a large amount of devoted, impressionable young women would lead to results he didn't even want to consider. The fact that Zelretch had taken to call the Einzbern Homunculi his "battle harem" also didn't help his paranoia. Sighing, he turned back to his book and tried to block the thought from his mind.

One thing had caught his eye in his readings about alchemy. It was a book he found that contained information on the alchemic practice where a magus imbued an inanimate object with a certain degree of intelligence. Well, perhaps "intelligence" was the wrong word. It was more like programming a computer. It couldn't learn, but it could do anything you had instructed it on how to do. The more complex you got with it, the harder it was, but the more intelligent the final product was. The best example he could find was Lord Waver Velvet's Volumen Hydragenum, which was considered the hallmark of success in the field. He wasted its potential however by simply using it as a menial servant, when it could easily become as dangerous as a fully-fledged Servant if he so wished.

Harry had a much better idea for it. His near-death experience had made him realize just how much it hurt those close to him to see him harmed. As such, he had resolved to take measures to better protect himself, and also those close to him. Since he was now immortal, there was little that could truly harm him, even though there were still things that could seriously do so, however he was much more worried about Sakura and Illyasviel, even if they always had a Servant around to protect them.

He began by entering his reality marble. Extensive testing had discovered three things, the first was regarding the archway. Without the presence of the horcrux it represented, it had instead become a portal to what was essentially Tom Riddle's brain. He could actively root around in there and uncover a wealth of information. The second was the central workshop, which he discovered he could mentally manipulate to suit his needs and whims, making working there significantly easier. The third subject he looked into was the tree that served as his link to Akasha. Zelretch had promised that he would be able to use it in time, but for the moment it was almost entirely useless. He found that by eating an apple from the tree, he would undergo a very painful sensation and then find that he had complete and total knowledge of something. The only problem was that he couldn't choose what it gave him information on. The first attempt had given him the complete Akashic record of comedians from the Philippines. The second had given him the complete Akashic record of Matthew Delicâte. After that, he stopped trying. He had access to the entirety of the universe's knowledge and information, but couldn't choose what it showed him.

He entered his workshop and started laying out plans.

The first step in his plan was to create a large amount of mithril. The reason for his choosing the substance was that it naturally permitted the channeling of prana through it. Mithril attracted prana like copper attracted electricity. It was a highly valued substance, with the entire Barthomeloi family only able to acquire enough to make a gauntlet, which Lorelei wore at all times. With his True Magic, it proved little trouble to make a lot of the substance. By alchemically modifying the structure, he changed its properties to keep it in a constantly liquid state, capable of becoming solid at will, sort of like Volumen Hydragenum.

However, instead of forcing it to stay in a humanoid form like the maid golem, he had other plans. As he began the programming of the materials, he added two advancements with the help of Caster. The first was the option to manipulate itself at will, allowing it to switch between a liquid metal form for himself and a humanoid form for if it operated independently. He saved himself the trouble of designing a humanoid form and simply stole the appearance of Volumen Hydragenum, as both a tribute and shortcut. He had no intention of using it as a maid like Lord Velvet, but it never hurt to have if he needed it, and he hoped that if it came to it, that the appearance would confuse an eventual foe long enough to give his creation an advantage. The other modification was the truly necessary one; he had Caster set up a mental link with the now intelligent metal, similar to the empathic link he held with his Servants. Volumen Hydragenum had no such thing, and it had proved to be quite necessary when the maid had gone on a rampage, claiming to be a killer robot coming from the future. He hoped that with the addition of the link, he would avoid such behavior, as he was not about to leave his creation unchecked.

His plan was to wear the material like an intelligent suit of armor under his clothes. Mithril was strong enough to block nearly any physical attack, and by manipulating the flow of prana in the material he would be able to deflect and redirect any magical based attacks. The empathic link permitted him to passively move the liquid coating in tune with him, so it simply felt like a second set of silver skin. The suit could also automatically be used as a weapon. He added two types of protocols for the suit to have. The first was based around imbuing the suit with the information necessary for protection, how to act as armor, how to magically decrease its density when not in use so that it was nearly weightless, when to become solid, how to redirect magic, and so forth. The second set of protocols were based around offense, different automated attack patterns, how to identify threats to him and how to respond, how to increase density of certain parts to increase the mass of the weaponized portions, search patterns to locate targets, etc.

When all was said and done and the completed item materialized in his reality marble workshop, he had quite possibly the most impressive Mystic Code he had ever created, with the exception of his homunculi, but he didn't really count them as Mystic Codes. In honor of his new ownership of the Einzbern clan, he decided on a proper German name.

"Panzer."

-Break-

A fist flashed towards Harry's head and he jerked it to the side, narrowly avoiding being hit. Unfortunately, this left him off-balance, as evidenced when a foot struck out and buckled his knee from behind, causing him to fall. Perhaps taking hand to hand lessons from both Mr. Kuzuki and Bazett at the same time was a mistake. As he picked himself up off the ground, spitting dirt out of his mouth, he recalled how this had all started.

Souichirou Kuzuki had become his third grade teacher one year. Years of association with a dangerous man like Zouken had allowed him to pick up the warning signs that all his classmates had missed, or dismissed as odd quirks His teacher was a killer, and a trained one at that. It was visible by the way he held himself, the way he acted, and the way his eyes were always void of any emotion, showing that he was more a killing machine than a true human.

Apparently, he wasn't the only one adept at reading people, because Mr. Kuzuki had pulled him aside after school and asked him what he intended to do with the knowledge of his activities. When Harry had replied that so long as he didn't threaten him or his loved ones, then he would do nothing, and that it wasn't his business, the impassive teacher seemed to grow some measure of respect for him, and he had patted him on the shoulder. As soon as the hand made contact, Harry's structural analysis kicked in, revealing that the deadly teacher possessed forty-five medium quality circuits. Needless to say, after a long discussion brought forth by this knowledge, Mr. Kuzuki had promptly resigned from his job as a teacher, and instead joined the Clock Tower, quickly becoming a respected Enforcer thanks to his almost supernatural skills.

Bazett Fraga McRemitz, as he later learned was the name of the young woman recovered from the Fuyuki Church, was already a Clock Tower Enforcer. She had despaired that she would likely be forced to abandon her career due to her missing arm, but Harry had taken pity on her, not to mention it never hurt to have and Enforcer in your debt, and alchemically crafted another for her, stronger than the old one. She had thanked him profusely and run back to reclaim her job.

When he had run across the two sparring, now apparently a romantic couple with their own version of foreplay, he had politely asked them to instruct him in hand to hand. It was little wonder that they had met, since both had reputations due to their unparalleled skills. Bazett was quite infamous for her abilities, and Kuzuki had been incredibly gifted before he had learnt Reinforcement. With such abilities, it had only been a matter of time before they met, and traded blows. Ironically, it was their martial prowess that had drawn them closer, despite their different backgrounds. With teachers like them, it was little wonder that he was pushed to excel.

Which led to his current predicament, face down on the ground. This had been the process of the last couple of days. He would show up, and they would pulverize him for an hour or two. That wouldn't happen this time.

This time, he had brought a secret weapon.

He removed a small vial from his pocket, carefully concealing it in his sleeve. He uncorked it, letting the metal flow out of it, enveloping his entire body in a cool sensation, like being immersed in water, but without the motion resistance. The vial held much more than it should have, only being the size of his thumb, but such was the nature of alchemic alloys combined with magecraft. As he was wearing gloves, his entire body was stealthily concealed in armor, with the exception of the neck up. He had programmed Panzer to flow up and protect his head if necessary, but it wouldn't do to reveal his trump card too early. Some might consider using such a trick disgraceful, but Enforcers usually went by the principle that any trump card was good to use in a spar, so long as it didn't endanger their sparring partner's life. It helped them learn to think on their feet when there was suddenly a new variable in the fight, and such things had helped lower the number of dead Enforcers when they were faced with unexpected situations.

He stood back up, facing down the couple. They really were a match made in Akasha. Both were unparalleled fist fighters, each with their own unique style. Kuzuki fought like a snake, with distracting moves, constant swaying, and quick, precise strikes on pressure points. Bazett was less refined, but far more powerful, with heavy-handed punches, kicks that could crush cars, and a headbutt that once sent him flying. It was the perfect team, one of them distracting their opponent with precise, but unpredictable strikes, while the other crushed their resistance with blows that even when parried, left lasting damage. He shuddered at the idea of facing them outside of a spar, even as powerful as he was the idea was enough to scare the crap out of him.

"Panzer, Schützen," he whispered under his breath, initiating the armor's defensive protocols.

The second he was back on his feet; they came at him again, each a blur of movement as they sped to deliver their respective strikes. They both claimed that there was no time for recovery in combat, so the second he could move, it was back in action until the appointed two hours were up.

Bazett rushed him, runes stitched into her clothing lighting up to augment the power already given by her reinforcement, transforming heavy blows in terrifying blurs that could crush solid concrete. He had any number of counters to it, but the point of this training was to be able to operate without them, so he got by with matching her augmented power, but not surpassing it. Until today that is.

As the red haired Enforcer threw another jab at his face, rather than flinching back as he normally did, he instead caught her fist with one of his hands. Panzer's impact protocols ensuring that the force was redistributed through the armor and into the ground beneath him. Bazett recovered from her surprise admirably by wrenching her fist out of his grip and following up with a kick towards the ribs. Once again, he simply took the hit, the kinetic energy flowing through the armor and harmlessly dissipating into the hard packed dirt of the sparring arena floor. He let out a smirk of pride at the success of the armor, which nearly proved his downfall.

His distraction with neutralizing Bazett caused him to lose track of Kuzuki, who slipped up behind him and delivered a reinforced pointed strike at the base of his neck. Fortunately, his armor was paying attention, the silver coating sliding up in a flash and taking the strike instead, which would have broken the assassin's fingers had they not been reinforced. Both Enforcers shared a look before backing off.

"Someth'n you want ta tell us there, 'Arry?" the Irish woman asked, looking amused. Kuzuki simply looked on impassively, though the gleam of curiosity was unmistakable in his eyes.

Harry gave them a roguish grin, peering around to ensure that nobody was watching before removing his shirt, revealing the armor. Bazett seemed intrigued, stepping forward and giving the metal an experimental poke, resulting in it rippling. Harry had to mentally tell it to stand down, as it had interpreted the action as an attack.

"What the bleedin' 'ell is this Lad?" she inquired, scrutinizing the silver liquid.

He looked up at her proudly.

"It's my Mystic Code, I call it Panzer."

"What does it do?" inquired Kuzuki, who was eyeing the metal, as if deciding how much of a threat it was.

"It's basically the ultimate armor. It attacks, it defends, it can even operate independently of the user. I'm still troubleshooting it, which was why I brought it here. Figured I'd surprise you with it. What do you say, want to help me test it?"

Bazett got an eager gleam in her eyes at the prospect of a proper fight, instead of the beatdowns she usually delivered. While she didn't mind such things, as she saw them as an opportunity to learn how cornered fighters acted, she much preferred to have opponents who could actually fight her, something that very few could provide in the Clock Tower. Due to her style of fighting in close quarters, there were already few people who could spar with her, as most Enforcers, while decent in close quarters, much preferred to deal with supernatural threats in the distance, where they at least had the possibility to retreat if their hits proved ineffective.

"You betta not disappoint me, Lad, or we gonna have a probl'm," she said, stalking back to the other end of the arena, Kuzuki matching her.

Seeing them tense for attack, he took the initiative.

Attempting to test the nonverbal commands, he closed his eyes and willed the armor to obey him, and it did.

Two gleaming whips flowed out from the base of his neck, elongating until they were roughly fifteen meters long each. They floated, poised, like scorpion's tails ready to strike. Bazett made the first move, dashing forward, but forced to dodge to the side as one whip snapped by, narrowly missing her and causing a massive crater where she had been. He had toned down the force it used so that it wouldn't kill them if struck, but other than that the armor was acting entirely by itself, without his input. As Bazett dodged the follow-up strike from the first whip, the second flowed around the side, hitting her in the back and knocking her on her face. She rolled with the hit, jumping back up and renewing her charge. As she did this, Kuzuki stealthily slipped off to the left, but the armor was having none of it. A slim tendril slid out from his pants leg like a snake, winding its way over to the stealthy magus, before tightening around his ankle and lifting him off the ground, dangling him in the air. One of the whips did the same to the still evading Bazett, holding her next to her boyfriend.

"Well Lad, col'r me impress'd," Bazett said with an appreciative look at the metal tentacle suspension her, "Would y' mind too terribly lett'n us down now though?"

He'd call this a successful field test.

-Break-

It was one month before his eleventh birthday that Harry first successfully used the Kaleidoscope without the assistance of a coordinate rod. He traveled to what was apparently his home dimension, arriving in the middle of London. Fortunately, it was a rather nondescript place, so nobody noticed his arrival, nor his departure several moments later. He excitedly told Zelretch the good news. The Wizard Marshall congratulated him, saying that he should be back and practice, so that he'd be able to easily travel between the two dimensions. Harry nodded happily, and with a whirl of color was gone.

Zelretch watched his young apprentice and grandson leave, feeling for perhaps the first time in his life, a touch of parental pride. He imagined that the Magus Killer felt something similar whenever he heard of his adopted son's accomplishments.

You know, he thought, the kid's eleventh birthday is coming up, and he did just make a major milestone in his apprenticeship. Maybe I should get him something. What do ten-year-old children like though? Candy? No, that is an awful present from someone like me, and knowing Harry, he'd call me a pedophile. Toys? No, the kid would be happier with a new book on energy transference or something. Books then? No, the kid's already got enough books. Making him a bit antisocial to be honest. A puppy? Yes, there's an idea.

I entirely agree, came a warm, motherly voice with no discernible origin, " need to reward my champion. I think a loyal companion should, as humans say, "do it".

The mad cackling that emerged from the Kaleidoscope's office caused roughly half of the magi in the Clock Tower to take a month long vacation.

-Break-

As Harry was making his fifth practice run between his home dimension and the Clock Tower, something went slightly wrong. He could feel the metaphysical coordinates he was locked on to shift. He wasn't entirely sure where to, but after a quick check, he just knew what, or rather who, the cause for the subtle change was.

Zelretch.

The flashing of lights that was the Kaleidoscope dimmed down, and he found himself in a forest. Well, it was less a forest and more a barren, frigid wasteland. The environmental control built into Panzer activated, and the armor that he now wore almost at all times heated up to warm him the armor didn't cover his head, he was forced to make do with some standard heat magecraft, although he dared not play with it too much. Using magecraft as a makeshift heater was the best way to get careless and accidentally cook himself, so he made sure to carefully monitor what little heat he used to warm himself.

He called up his mental link with Caster, and after explaining the situation asked her to scry his coordinates. A brief moment later, he learned that he was in the Northern part of Siberia. Sighing, he attempted to call up the Kaleidoscope, and wasn't surprised that he couldn't. Something was here that Zelretch wanted him to do or find, and the old bloodsucker wouldn't allow him to leave before he had done what his adoptive grandfather wanted. He peered out into the snow, attempting to deduce what he was here for. It was hard to see anything at all through the white.

Except for the red eyes that is. Those stood out rather clearly in the snow.

What he had originally taken for a large snow bank stood, revealing a wolf with fur the color of bleached bone. The wolf could have been the complete inverse of Midnight. The aura released by the wolf reminded him of Berserker, nothing but bloodlust. The wolf stalked over to him, until it loomed only a foot away, its breath steaming in the snow. A part of Harry told him to be very, very careful at what he did now, as he had recognized the being in front of him, and while Gaia seemed to consider him her champion, he wasn't exactly sure the beast in front of him had gotten the memo. And he wasn't exactly tempted to see if Primate Murder, the Beast of Gaia, knew not to eat him on sight.

As he stared into its red eyes, there was a flash of color in front of him.

He looked into his hands to find three items.

The first, a box of dog biscuits.

The second, a massive leash and collar, with the words, "Primate Murder. If found, please return to Clock Tower, London. Ask for Zelretch, Harry, or Lorelei."

The third, a book titled, "Dog Training for Dummies," and a sticky note in Zelretch's handwriting that read, "Good Luck, Love Gramps and Gaia. :)"

The realization slowly dawned on him as he looked up at the massive beast.

The Beast of Gaia, he thought.

The massive wolf stared at him, drool dripping from its massive fangs as it salivated.

Wait, salivated?

He followed the wolf's gaze and realized that it was staring a hole through the box of dog biscuits he was holding. He moved the box slightly to the right and the massive head before him followed.

"Oh Root," he thought, his hand reflexively snapping to his face. The Beast of Gaia was nothing more than an oversized, eager dog?!

He projected a comfortable armchair and sat down in it. He opened the box and tossed one to the Beast of Gaia every once in a while, which it snapped up with gusto. When he ran out, he simply projected another box. With nothing better to do, he opened the book Zelretch had sent him, noting that several sections were bookmarked and highlighted.

This was going to be a loooooong day.

-Break-

Harry was wrong, it wasn't a long day. It was a long week. Even with an animal as intelligent as Prim, as he had started calling her after determining the wolf's gender, it still took a week to get her to understand the basics, like 'sit', 'stay', 'kill', 'don't kill'. The last one had taken some serious effort and several now-deceased Siberian natives, since it was what she had been created for, so he supposed it took longer for her to understand that one. Prim had grown incredibly attached over the week, never leaving his side and wrapping herself around him like a blanket when he slept. A run-in with some rather unpleasant Siberian trappers had been an excellent opportunity to try out the 'kill' command. Poor bastards didn't stand a chance. There was a flash, and Prim didn't need to be fed that day. On a side note, he decided that the next time she wanted to lick him, he would have to wipe off her face first. Blood was a nightmare to clean.

It had taken him about four hours into the training to realize that he could simply form a familiar contract with the beast. Most magi would have been dead long before getting near the wolf, but he suspected that his connection to Gaia had been the reason the wolf hadn't simply killed him on the spot several hours prior. He had placed his hands her head, and with a glowing light, he possessed the Beast of Gaia as a familiar. He idly wondered how the Magi at the Clock Tower would react to that bit of knowledge, as he was aware that Zelretch had started a pool on the number of aneurysms news of his "exploits" would cause next. Still, after that, Prim seemed to understand much better, making the overall training much easier.

He discovered that the wolf was more like Midnight than he imagined when he tried out the 'stay' command and teleported to Moscow. When there wasn't any news footage over the next thirty minutes about a giant, white rampaging wolf in Moscow, he had teleported back, with a sigh of relief. He didn't know what he would have done if Primy hadn't understood, and set foot in Moscow despite his command. He didn't think the Clock Tower would have taken the news of the Beast of Gaia rampaging in the Russian capital very well.

When he arrived, Prim was still sitting there exactly where he had left her, looking at him expectantly, her tail waggling as soon as she spotted the biscuits in his hand, so for good measure he gave her a couple, before taking a few steps back.

"Alright, now come," he commanded. A white blur and he was pinned to the ground, being washed head to toe by an enthusiastic wolf that had missed him. Prim and Midnight would really get along, he mused.

As he looked at the wolf laying at his feet, her head resting on his lap as he read his book, a thought occurred to him. He concentrated for a moment, and when a black blur hit him instead of a white one, he was sure of his success. As he endured a second washing, he heard Prim let out a thundering bark and a growl of warning. He climbed out from under Midnight and placated Prim with a scratch behind the ears. A wet nose tapping his other arm to remind him who was his wolf first had him giving the same treatment to Midnight. A brief moment of concentration later, and the black wolf was his familiar as well.

Pretty soon, the two wolves got along like sisters, as fortunately both were female. He dreaded to think what would have happened if they had been able to reproduce together. Aside from playful competition for his affection, there was no conflict. A day later and Midnight was following the same commands as Prim, the process heavily simplified without difficulty of getting ideas like 'don't kill' in her brain and the familiar spell.

The two massive wolves sat next to each other, both looking pleased as he presented them with collars. Prim's was the one Zelretch had sent, Midnight's was an identical one with her name on it instead of Prim's. He was trying to envision how he would get back to the Clock Tower when the obvious answer occurred to him. The only other problem he could think of was their size. They might not be able navigate some of the hallways of the Clock Tower, what with both being roughly the size of rhinos.

This would be a perfect chance to try out those wizard spells!

He concentrated hard, directing as much prana into his hands as he could. To effect inherently magical beings like Direwolves, along with a Beast of Gaia, and since it was the first time he tried something like this, a lot of prana was needed. Actually, the amount of energy he ended up using would have been enough to wipe Eurasia from the surface of the Earth had he released it as a burst or a destructive spell. Instead, he placed one hand each on his wolves, and intoned the spell he had learned from Tom's memories.

"Reducio."

Like air being deflated from a balloon, the two wolves slowly shrunk until they were only about torso height for him, the size of very large dogs. Both seemed to take the transformation in stride, as he grabbed them by their collars, more for show than anything, they obeyed him perfectly by this point, and called up the Kaleidoscope.

Access to it had been restored the day after he started training Prim, since he had understood the point of the exercise. Although he truly wondered what Zelretch hoped for when he had left him to train the wolves.

With a flash of color, they were in the main hall of the Clock Tower. Several nobles jumped in surprise at his sudden appearance. Ignoring them, he went up to Zelretch's apartment to give him a piece of his mind, Prim and Midnight obediently padding at his heels. Their presence did earn him some wary looks, as most familiars were smaller animals, and having two wolves with him in the corridors of the academic institution was bound to attract attention.

Ignoring the whispers, he made his way to Zelretch's quarters, a section of the Clock Tower most people avoided on principle, just in case the True Magician got bored and decided to prank a poor, unsuspecting passerby. Not bothering with knocking, he opened the door and entered, finding the old man sitting in an armchair sipping some tea.

"Ahh, Harry. How was your trip? Eventful, I'd imagine," grinned the aged Magus.

Harry put one arm on the wall, acting like he was leaning against it. The alchemic array on his left arm for deconstruction lit up, disassembling the chair under Zelretch and causing him to fall over, spilling tea all over himself.

"Next time you feel like dropping me in front of literally the deadliest being on the planet in an attempt to tame it, a heads-up would be nice," he growled. Sure, he hadn't truly been in danger since even if he had died, he could have just reconstructed his body, but it was the intention that counted. One did not put him in potentially dangerous situations without getting punished in return, especially if it ended worrying his loved ones.

"Well if I told you kiddo, it would've made a horrible early birthday surprise."

He just sighed. Only Zelretch would consider stranding him in Siberia with nothing but the Beast of Gaia for company a good birthday present. He was so not looking forward to his next birthdays. He wouldn't put it past the old man to strand him in an entirely female world during puberty if he thought Harry needed to "get laid", and he quite frankly dreaded to think what his deranged mind would come up with for Christmas.

"Well it worked, didn't it?" the old man defended himself, motioning towards the white wolf beside him, who was looking at the Wizard Marshal with a hungry gleam in her eyes as she let out a threatening growl at the human that had displeased her Master. Not wanting his new pet to eat his teacher and pseudo-grandfather, he started rubbing her behind the ears. Prim calmed down and happily leaned into his side, nearly knocking him over with her still immense weight.

"I see you also picked up another pet while you were at it," smiled the master of the Kaleidoscope, clearly aware of just who and what the black wolf next to him was. Then again, the voyeur might have spied on another universe just to see how things had gone.

"That I did. Made familiar bonds with both of them," he replied in the way of an explanation.

Familiar bonds with the Beast of Gaia and a wolf that was technically a figment of his imagination.

Why couldn't his life just make sense?

He blamed the old man sitting in front of him, still soaked in tea and giving him an insane smile like he'd read his thoughts exactly.

-Break-

Never let it be said that the Kaleidoscope was one that neglected his family. Once his grandson had left, a flash of the Second Magic had the room back exactly as it was. Taking a sip of his tea, he opened the book he had been reading on Wizarding laws regarding guardianship. He planned to remove the Dursley's guardianship of Harry and give it to Kiritsugu instead. While there was little they could have done to harm Harry with how he was now, he knew that his adopted grandson would be trying to refrain from killing them after only a few hours in the same world.

Finally, he found the section he was looking for. As the boy's physical guardians, as dictated by one "Headmaster Dumbledore", who had convinced Harry's parents to leave him with his Aunt and Uncle, they possessed the right to pass over guardianship to another if so desired. If the new guardian was a muggle, Dumbledore retained magical guardianship. However, should the new guardian be magical, both magical and physical guardianship were bestowed. He imagined that the Dursleys had never been informed of this legal clause, as Albus Dumbledore relied on their ignorance. After all, given how they wanted nothing to do with Harry, they would have tried dumping him with the first magic user they could find just to get rid of him if they had been made aware of this clause.

All he had to do was convince them to sign a piece of paper.

Shouldn't be too hard, he thought.

Not with Harry there at least.

-Break-

Harry stood in his apartment, with the Homunculi, Sakura, Illya, and the Servants. They were going to his home dimension to get the matter of his guardianship sorted out, and all the females present seemed strangely eager to meet his former, "lovely" guardians. The trip also doubled as a sight-seeing tour. Sakura and Illya had been found capable of Wizard magic, so they fully intended to go to this "Hogwarts" school with Harry, although he wasn't sure how the wizards would react to them basically demanding to sleep in the same bed as him. With how backwards their society was, they were likely to make a fuss over it over some stupid sense of propriety. He really didn't see what the problem was, truth be told. He was still too young to feel interested in those kind of activities, and even if he had been old enough for them, well he hardly thought it was others' business to butt in such matters.

Extensive research into the two magical systems had shown some interesting conclusions. A wizard's magical core operated essentially as a single, massive circuit. Unfortunately, they were incapable of channeling the prana they generated through their bodies, so they improvised with wands. Thanks to this, they possessed large amounts of prana, but couldn't really make much use of it. It was like trying to drain a bathtub with a drinking straw. A magus with large a large amounts of circuits by comparison was like a fire-hose hooked up to a hydrant. They had to be really good judges of how much pressure they were tapping, or things went bad very quickly.

Due to the limited amount of prana available to them, the Wizards had surprisingly made a jury-rigged system based off Caster's Divine Words. It was why so many of their spells were based in Latin, and why they had to be so specific with what words they used while a Magus could do incantations in any language they wished, with whatever words they wanted. However, this also severely limited them to the constraints of the system. Because of their greater control over their magic, any magus could perform wizard magic, but not vice versa.

After several quiet minutes of waiting, Zelretch strolled in with Kiritsugu in tow. Both were wearing suits and ties, apparently prepared for legal negotiations, although he wouldn't have put it past the old man to wear a clown's outfit, just for the laughs. Harry himself was dressed in a white dress shirt and slacks. Illya wore her white and purple skirt, along with a white hat as it was getting told. As apparently, possessing red eyes bore some silly superstitions in the Wizarding world, Zelretch, Illya, and the Homunculi had all used a color changing charm Harry had learned to turn their eyes various colors. The Homunculi had landed on purple, while Zelretch and Illya went with blue.

Sakura was wearing a purple dress, with a red bow tied in her hair. She had insisted on coming on this little trip with him, and Illya had jumped on the bandwagon. Knowing that six Servants and the Homunculi would be enough to keep them safe, he had reluctantly conceded, aware that it was futile to argue with them when they were set on something.

Zelretch called them all together into a large circle. Harry would have done it, but he still lacked finesse with the Kaleidoscope, and they hardly wanted to land in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. He could transport himself and limited numbers of objects just fine, but large groups proved trouble, as they tended to throw off his coordinates. It was better to leave these things to the professionals, even if said professionals were arguably insane.

One moment later had the large group standing in dirty alleyway. The Servants immediately astralized and took up defensive positions around them. Harry made sure to tone down Berserker's aura. It was useful for clearing crowds, but not for subtlety. It was the same reason he didn't bring Prim with him. The Beast of Gaia hadn't received enough training to not send the entire city running. Instead, he had removed the reduction charms on her and Midnight, and left them to run free in the Einzbern forest. They would provide extra security for the castle, and since the homunculi maids weren't really human, Prim wouldn't go trying to kill them either.

Zelretch led the way, apparently having already mapped out the route beforehand. He led them to a seedy looking tavern called "The Leaky Cauldron." Inside wasn't much better. It was like he stepped out of modern London and into a tenth century bar. It was dirty, smoke filled the air, and it smelled like burnt food, making them wonder why these people had magic if they didn't even use it to keep things clean.

They passed through without incident, with the exception of the barman, who gave them a curious look, and most of the male wizards in there who were giving Leanna, Monica, and Joy slightly lecherous stares. Maids were a very rare thing in the wizarding world, as anyone who could afford one could also afford a house elf, who were much harder working and didn't require salary. Because of this, the low cut French maid uniforms the homunculi wore along with their stunning, exotic features made them just about the most attractive women most wizards had seen.

In the back room of the bar was a worn down brick wall. Zelretch whispered some instructions in his ear and Harry stepped up to it. He removed his glove, revealing the silver metal of Panzer covering his hand. He tapped the center brick, the two above it, and then two across from it. The wall shifted, opening into a quaint little shopping district. As the wall receded, he could just picture a group of Clock Tower nobles throwing a fit at such a frivolous waste of magecraft when a simple door could have sufficed. It was the same as using the Kaleidoscope to transport himself to another room because it was more impressive to appear out of thin air instead of opening a door. Bloody idiots.

The group made their way through Diagon Alley, ignoring the looks some of the more curious wizards and witches were shooting at them, primarily the maids, although a fair few witches were glaring at them and muttering about "proper clothing". They arrived at the steps of an ornate bank. As they walked up the stairs, he could feel his Servants and the Homunculi tense at the sight of the armed guards flanking the doors. The guards themselves were something as well. Goblins, they apparently were. Ugly little things. Right as they reached the threshold, the guards crossed their weapons, blocking their path, making the Servants ready themselves for a fight. Granted, even if they were magical creatures, even the Goblins would be hard-pressed to fight against a group of Servants, but still.

One of the goblins, some sort of officer judging by the ornaments on his armor, scrutinized them. His eyes were staring at where the Servants were, as if he could tell that something was there, but not what. A decidedly magically sensitive race, if they could detect the prana of an astralized Servant. The guard seemed to make up his mind, and stepped back into line. The guards uncrossed their weapons and the group went in. Zelretch approached one of the open tellers.

"Pardon me, Master Broadfang," he read the name plaque in Gobbledygook on the goblin's desk, perks of being a True Magician, "A moment of your time."

The goblin nearly fell off his chair at being addressed by name in his native language. He inspected the group before him. Two men were there, dressed in muggle suits, one being old and clearly off balanced while the other had the look of a veteran warrior, looking around, surveying exits and the like. In the back were three incredibly attractive women in maid uniforms. Goblins held a very different view of beauty than humans, but these were undeniably some of the most attractive women to enter Gringotts. Between the men and the maids were three children.

In the center was a youth wearing glasses with a small purple fringe in his ebony hair, tastefully dressed and wearing gloves. On his left, holding his hand was a girl in a purple dress, with matching purple hair. An uncontrolled metamorphmagus perhaps? Or a girl whose parents had caved to her demands for a more "exotic" hair color? Holding the boy's right hand was a young girl in a white and purple outfit, looking up at him innocently. He wasn't fooled though. All three of these children had steel in them, he could see it in their eyes. The maids as well had some form of combat training, from the expert defensive formation they were casually making around the children. It was quite refreshing to see people who actually knew what they were doing, instead of the stuffy, arrogant fools they had to cater to most of the time.

He looked back at the old man that had addressed him and gave him a respectful nod.

"What can Gringotts help you today, sir?" he asked, significantly politer than he usually was. This group intrigued him, and at the very least they had had the courtesy of using his native language and name to address him, therefore he would return the courtesy, so long as they proved themselves to respect the rules of Gringotts.

"I was wondering whom I might speak to regarding the matter of acquiring an adoption form? I understand that due to your specialty in inheritance magic, this bank handled that sort of thing."

"Ahh, yes. You'll want to speak with Master Stoneblood for that. He is the head of that department," the goblin said, motioning over an apprentice to act as a guide.

"This one will show you the way."

The apprentice motioned them to follow, and led them through a labyrinth of corridors until they arrived at a large ornate door. He rapped on it three times, waited a respectful moment, and then opened the door. They entered a large, but rather spartan in its decoration, office. Sitting behind a desk was an old goblin, with a few white hairs sticking to his otherwise bald scalp. The apprentice ushered them in, then closed the doors behind them.

"Master Stoneblood, I presume?" inquired Zelretch in Gobbledygook. If the goblin was surprised, he didn't show it.

"I am. What do you require?" he demanded in a stern voice, not even looking up from his paperwork.

"I would like to arrange an adoption between two consenting guardians. I understand your office handles that."

The goblin wrenched open a drawer and removed a small stack of parchment and several quills.

"Sign the child's, the current guardians', and the future guardians' names in the indicated sections. Leave the papers with a teller when you have them filled out and signed by both parties. The adoption will be processed as soon as the signatures are considered valid. Good day, and may your gold flow forevermore."

With that, the goblin returned his attention back to his work.

-Break-

Number 4 Privet Drive was not a place Harry had fond memories of. As he looked back on it, he started remembering the beatings, the starvation, the torture. Apparently, he had given some indication of his distress, because Sakura gave his hand a comforting squeeze and Monica laid a hand on his shoulder. He gave them an appreciative nod as they walked up to the house. Zelretch was once again leading, holding a binder containing the legal forms, already filled out with the exception of the signatures, and several pens.

They reached the front yard, pausing for a moment. Once they were all ready, they marched up to the door. Zelretch rang the bell and they waited. Several moments passed before the door opened to reveal a pudgy ten-year-old. He gave them a look over before turning and yelling over his shoulder.

"Mum! There's some weird people here!"

Petunia Dursley, a woman who resembled a horse more than a woman, came to the door, wiping her hands on an apron. She gave them a sour look, as if they had committed some great faux pas by knocking on her door. Then again, if Harry remembered right, she prided herself on being "normal", so strange people coming to knock on her door in broad daylight was definitively something she wouldn't appreciate.

"Alright, Duddykins, why don't you go into the kitchen and get yourself some biscuits? I'll talk with these people," she said, ushering the obese child away. She returned, looking at them expectantly.

"Well," she demanded, "What do you want?"

"If it's not too much of a bother, ma'am, I have some legal matters regarding your nephew, Harry, that I need to discuss with you. Is your husband home?"

At the mention of Harry, Petunia's face turned into a hateful scowl.

"I don't see what you could possibly be here about. The boy is gone. Ran away some five years ago and we haven't heard from him since. Good riddance to bad rubbish I say."

"That's why we're here, ma'am. We've recovered your nephew, and would like to arrange his adoption into another family. We have found a loving father willing to take him in. We just need you to sign some forms."

Petunia gave them a suspicious look, before cautiously stepping aside and permitting them into the house. The house was almost sickeningly neat. Everything looked like it had been bought as a perfect set. Every room looked like it had been purchased whole from an Ikea showroom. There was not a single speck of dirt anywhere, as if the occupants of the house spent every available scouring the remote recesses of it for dirt to purge. There was no character, no personality.

Harry's aunt ushered them into the kitchen, where Dudley was occupied with stuffing himself on an entire tray of cookies, along with a gallon of milk straight from the jug. She motioned them towards the kitchen table, where Zelretch and Kiritsugu took a seat. Petunia called Vernon down from upstairs, and he grudgingly came down. The man was even worse than his son. He looked like a walrus had been crammed into a cheap suit. The two had a brief, whispered conversation, apparently explaining the situation. After some rude insults towards the guests that they apparently thought they wouldn't hear, he and his wife sat down across the table. Zelretch removed the forms from his binder, explained that they would lose all parental rights and responsibilities for Harry once they were signed. Vernon nearly lunged for the pen, scribbling his name down as fast as he could.

The second he lifted his pen from the paper, Vernon screamed. His signature was carved in the back of his hand.

"Oh, I probably should have mentioned. You just signed with a blood pen. That signature will scar, but that shouldn't matter too much. Harry," he said, turning to him, " Was there anything you wanted to tell your aunt and uncle?"

The Dursleys' eyes all went wide as they put two and two together, realizing that the strong, aristocratic child before them was the weak, scarecrow thin boy that had disappeared all those years ago. And that the stony glare he was giving them promised retribution for their treatment.

"No, but I believe some others here do."

At his words, six people materialized out of thin air as the two female children and the maids drew their weapons and lunged at the Dursley adults, Dudley having already been knocked out by Kiritsugu. Police would later respond to a 999 call reporting screams coming from the house. They would arrive to find the two owners of the house nearly beaten to death, with the son in a nearly catatonic state. Upon waking in the hospital, the Dursleys found that they had no recollection of the events prior to the attack. From that day on though, Dudley had an unexplained irrational fear of people in maid uniforms, little girls, and women in general.

Harry was going to kill the Dursleys at some point, but not today. That beating wasn't the extent of their pain. He was just getting started. He was going to draw it out, enjoy it, savor it.

Root, by the time he was done with them, they might just kill themselves.

-Break-

Harry sat in the Leaky Cauldron, reading a newspaper. In honor his upcoming birthday and enrollment at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, the Daily Prophet was doing an expose on the live of the "Boy-Who-Lived", Orion Potter. The newspaper contained the whole story, how the Dark Lord attempted to kill James and Lily Potter, sneaking into their house in the night. It talked about how He-Who-Shall-Not-Be-Named restrained the two parents, intent on making them watch their children's demise. Supposedly, the Dark Lord then cast the infallible Killing Curse on Orion, who somehow reflected it, killing the Dark Lord.

He said supposedly because he had Voldemort's memories of the incident. He had rendered the parents unconscious, when an idea occurred to him. A particularly evil plan. If he made an innocent child a horcrux, the child of his staunchest supporters at that, Dumbledore would never be able to bring himself to destroy it. He initiated the process, but something went wrong with the it. He had never performed the ritual on a living being before, so he wasn't entirely sure what happened. Next thing he knew, he was being blown across the room by the backlash, which caused two scars on the child in the crib adjacent to the one he'd been using. The scars on the child's forehead were two long, parallel lines, only a centimeter or so apart.

He impacted the wall, and that was the last thing he knew.

Zelretch next to him filled him in on the rest of the story. Apparently, the parents had awoken to find the Dark Lord dead and Orion crying. Harry had been rendered unconscious by the horcrux process. They had called Dumbledore, who had arrived and surveyed the scene. Looking at the scars on Orion's forehead, he had declared that they were the symbol for equality, an = sign. This was the Dark Lord declaring Orion his equal. He had then gone over to the sleeping Harry, touching the scar on his forehead and jerking back at realizing what foul magic it was.

Dumbledore had reached a conclusion then. This child would need to be kept from Orion, so that the Chosen of the Light would not be corrupted. It had apparently not occurred to him that with the proper instruction, Harry might very well have developed into a stable child, able to block the Horcrux's influence. That, or he simply didn't want to take risks, and decided that the "Savior" couldn't be allowed to be put in close proximity with someone that might be influenced to kill him.

He had sat the Potters down and explained what needed to be done. He told them that their son Harry was stricken with a taint that would corrupt his soul and morality. Orion Potter would usher the world into the light, but as he was marked as the Dark Lord's equal, he also was at risk of straying to the dark. He explained that Harry needed to be taken away and raised separately, and that Orion needed to be showered in love so that he would feel no ill-will towards the wizarding world. He claimed that he knew of a family that would take Harry in and raise him, but that for security they were not to know where it was. The Potters reluctantly agreed, handing over Harry to Dumbledore, who whisked him away.

The Potters ended up perfectly happy, raising the hero of the wizarding world. They ended up having another child, a daughter named Ivy, who was the spitting image of her mother, and a year younger than Harry. They had spoiled Orion rotten, allowing him to bask in the fame and glory of his position, and only stepping in when he clearly stepped out of line, and even then, only sometimes. Appearance-wise, the only difference between Harry and Orion as babies was that Orion had James' eyes while Harry had Lily's. Now, they were practically polar opposites. From what Zelretch told him, Orion wasn't going to be the savior of the Wizarding World anytime soon, mostly due to the fact that he was used to get anything he wanted handed to him on a silver platter.

Zelretch continued the tale, explaining that after removing him from the Potters, Dumbledore actually had no idea whether the horcrux would influence Harry's personality or not, nor who should raise him. He had thought back to young Tom Riddle, and his journey into darkness. Permitting that to happen remained his single greatest regret in his very long life, so he was decided not to repeat his mistake. Guilt wracked him every day, every time he heard of the atrocities committed by the Death Eaters. What was worse, he didn't actually know if he could have helped the young Dark Lord. It was the ancient "Nature vs Nurture" argument. Are people born evil, or do they have evil thrust upon them?

As he looked at the young child in his arms, an idea had popped into his brilliant head. He would be able to prove it. He could prove once and for all that there was nothing that could be done about young Tom Riddle. He would place the child in a bad situation, as identical as he could to Tom's, ensuring that he grew up unhappy. Then, once the boy got to Hogwarts, he would do everything possible to turn the boy to the light. If the boy turned good, he was wrong, and Tom's turn was his fault. If the boy turned evil, he was right, and there was nothing he could have done. The boy was going to be dark anyway, so why not try to turn him to the light, and prove a point while he was at it?

Now, he just needed a suitable family to place the boy in.

Hadn't Lily once complained about her recently married sister, who despised magic? Petunia, wasn't it?

She would do.

-Break-

Harry laid in his bed at the Einzbern castle with the girls. It had been a rather... satisfying day. He'd been permanently removed from the Dursleys' clutches, legally at that, had begun his campaign of revenge against them, and ensured that the Servants would be able to come to Hogwarts. From Zelretch's descriptions of Dumbledore, he wouldn't have put it past the man to hold the ability for his Servants to come to Hogwarts as some sort of leverage once he learnt of what they could do, that is if he didn't claim that they were "Dark" and tried to have them sent back to the Throne of Heroes. To counter that, he exploited a loophole he had found while reading "Hogwarts: A History". "The sacred bond between Master and Familiar is one of the most revered of relationships in the Wizarding World. That is why Section C, Paragraph 4 of the Hogwarts Charter declared that no wizard or witch shall be denied the right to bring a familiar to Hogwarts, provided that Gringotts has confirmed the existence of the bond." He had then looked up the definition of a wizard familiar, which was defined as any being, mundane or magical, that shared a wizard's magical signature.

He'd had the goblins at Gringotts perform the test on him, with an inheritance one while he was at it. The first test had confirmed that twelve intelligent beings shared a familiar bond with him, unheard of for a wizard, as only near-sentient beings at best had bonded with magic users, sentient beings such as Veela more often than not taking steps to ensure that they couldn't be bonded as familiars. Who knew how much wizards would have tried to kidnap their kind had such a thing been possible?

He knew that all of the Servants, plus the wolves made eleven, but he couldn't figure out the twelfth until he absently picked at his glove and remembered Panzer, which he had created and bore an empathic bond with. He was just glad that the Einzbern homunculi didn't show up on that list, or things might have gotten weird. Twelve sentient beings bonded to him was already going to be a pain to explain once it was known, and he held no illusion that it would eventually happen, so he didn't need to have people claiming he was running around forcefully bonding people to him, which was bound to happen if the Homunculi had all bonded with him.

The goblins had filed the necessary paperwork to ensure that Dumbledore couldn't pull anything to have his Servants removed. Fortunately, the paperwork, while available to anyone within the Ministry, only detailed the number of bonds, and that the beings were all sentient and humanoid. The goblins had much more accurate files, but they also notoriously hated wizards, while Harry seemed to have gained a small degree of respect from them with his refined, but humble aristocratic manner and no-nonsense attitude when doing negotiations. Any attempts to retrieve the full files from the goblins would be met with an army of tiny, green lawyers and armed guards.

He had been rather surprised upon receiving his inheritance test. Somehow, he had been made heir of both House Slytherin and House Ravenclaw, which while welcome, made little sense to him. He asked the goblin who brought the results, but he was equally confused. It wasn't until an older goblin brought out Salazar Slytherin's will that things were explained. Apparently, as a proponent of wizarding tradition and power, one of Salazar's biggest fears was Line Theft. As such, he wrote a clause into his will that should the line die out, and a false claimant appeared, whomever slew the false claimant would become the new Lord Slytherin and be able to continue the line. Apparently, Voldemort was not related to Salazar, or at least too distantly to be considered his true heir, because the ancient magic enforcing the will had activated upon his defeat, making his killer, Harry, the new Lord Slytherin.

The Ravenclaw business had been explained by tracing the line tree back a couple dozen generations. At some point, the houses of Slytherin and Ravenclaw had been merged, but the heir of Slytherin at the time hadn't realized, lacking the cunning of his ancestors. When the Lord title was passed down to Harry, all attached Lordships came with it, making him heir to both houses. It was rather confusing, even for someone as analytical as him, but nobody ever said that wizards didn't know how to over-complicate things. What he had understood was basically that due to some administrative mumbo-jumbo he was the heir to two highly respected Houses, so he wasn't about to complain.

At the moment, his lordships weren't of much value, but he could elect regents to represent him on the Wizengamot. As two of the four oldest families in Britain, they were given enough votes to form their own majority block in the voting process. If necessary, he could swing vote anything that came before the Wizengamot, completely anonymously. Zelretch took about five minutes to stop laughing when he found out, cackling about the chaos he would be able to create with his votes if he decided to. That man enjoyed messing people far more than was reasonable, and in case of people as inept and pigheaded than wizard Lords, it was made all the sweeter by their total lack of understanding of just who they would be facing.

He yawned, as he felt Sakura snuggle up next to him, mumbling in her sleep. He was the only one still awake, with the exception of Assassin, whom he still couldn't figure out if she slept at all. The black haired Servant had been rather displeased with his frequent stays abroad, and compensated by firmly attaching herself to either him or his shadow whenever he returned. She followed him nearly everywhere, and even somehow dialed up her usual antics. The only place she didn't follow him was the bath, opting to wait outside instead at his insistence, and even then, he was fairly certain that she astralized and activated her presence concealment before slipping in unnoticed after the door was shut. His other Servants had been similar in their displeasure at his training trips, but to a lesser degree of clinginess.

His eleventh birthday was in a week, and he was expecting his, Sakura's, and Illya's Hogwarts letters any day now. After adopting him, Kiritsugu had ensured that Sakura and Illya were also adopted under him, significantly simplified by the fact that there were no guardians to contest it. As such, they were now on the Hogwarts roster as students in the same year.

Normally, the whole "other dimension" thing would make receiving mail an issue, but Harry warded a dropbox at Gringotts to receive all mail addressed to him or anyone else in his family and filter it. Any mail he would want to read was sent through a Kaleidoscopic link to wherever he was. Zelretch had been really proud of him for setting that one up.

Deciding that whatever else was going on could wait until morning, he closed him eyes and entered the realm or Morpheus.

-Break-

A week later, the day of Harry's eleventh birthday, he woke up in the most comforting position known to man: embraced by his lovers. Birthdays had never really been a major ordeal under Zouken. Whenever their birthday came by, he and Sakura would bake a small cake and spend the day in each other's company. Once the Homunculi were created, they became a part of the process as well. Apparently, the girls were determined to make his first birthday with them special, as the second they realized he was awake, he was stormed by a shower of "Happy Birthday" kisses.

Thoroughly disoriented, but happy all the same, he was dragged out of bed in his pajamas by the excited girls and into the main hall of the castle. A blindfold was slipped over his eyes during the process and all he could hear around him were various feminine giggles. Finally, he was brought to a halt, and the blindfold removed from his face.

"HAPPY BIRTHDAY MASTER!" came a deafening chorus.

He blinked, orienting himself to the light. His eyes came into focus to show the entire maid staff of the castle proudly standing before a massive handmade banner that read, "Happy Birthday Master! Love, your humble Servants, The Maid Staff," in addition to a cake that nearly reached the ceiling, certainly enough for everybody there.

He gave them an odd look, causing some of the maids to grow concerned that they had overstepped their bounds, before a massive smile broke out over his face, tears of joy forming in the corners of his eyes.

"Thank you all. This means a lot to me, doing something like this. Thank you, I mean it."

A lot of the maids cooed at how adorable he was acting, and all of them looked relieved that they hadn't overstepped their bounds. While they were growing more comfortable with their new leadership, they still had trouble with adjusting, as Harry had very different views on what they could and couldn't do from their previous owners.

He turned to the rest of the girls, seeing their satisfied smiles and realizing that this had been a collaborative effort.

"Thank you all as well. Let's make this the best birthday party we've ever had!"

What ensued was perhaps the liveliest event to ever occur within the noble halls of the Einzbern castle, a party that would have made the Einzberns roll in their graves had it been possible. Cake was cut up and passed around to everyone, a process he had to utilize his alchemy to speed up,as cutting cake for over a thousand people was not something done quickly. Saber and Berserker had gotten into a cake eating contest, demolishing almost two cubic meters of cake. Saber had looked rather smug after her victory.

After cake, presents were passed around. Sakura had gotten him a small, heart shaped locket containing a picture of herself, Illya, Kiritsugu, Zelretch, and all of the Servants posing happily.

Illya had given him a cook book as a joke, which got a good laugh out of everybody. Although with the way she kept glancing hopefully at him, he had an inkling that she wouldn't mind some of his homemade dishes again.

Kiritsugu had given him one of his Origin bullets. With Denial of Nothingness, he'd be able to replicate it, possibly even modify its properties with time.

Lorelei had sent a package containing an old key and a letter stating that she was giving him free access to the Barthomeloi family library, quite possibly one of the most intimate gestures a traditional magus could make.

Bazett and Kuzuki had sent him a book on various MMA styles and a note to read up, or they would, "Kick his lily-white arse next time we see him."

Zelretch gave him a signed copy of the Kama Sutra with a conspiratorial wink. This did not earn him popularity points from the blushing and embarrassed women surrounding him, and the old Magus had run away, laughing like a maniac, when his Servants had tried to express their displeasure at how inappropriate the present was. In fact, by the time he had gone back to his presents, the book had suspiciously disappeared, probably hidden by one of his more conservative Servants, or, the unfortunately possibilty, borrowed by Assassin.

Leanna, Monica, and Joy had banded together, creating a fluid that would allow Panzer to look and appear like flesh when seen and touched, so that he could wear it at all times and not have to conceal it so much. Upon touching the fluid, the liquid mithril absorbed it, changing and matching his flesh tone. An experimental poke revealed that it now felt perfectly like skin. He was rather impressed.

Archer had taken him outside and shown him some of the more dangerous weapons encountered during his career as a Counter Guardian so Harry could replicate them.

Berserker had made a rather considerate offer to kill Kiritsugu, roaring and swinging his rock-like blade at the former Magus Killer, which he politely declined, earning himself a grateful nod from the man.

Saber had apparently worked some shifts at a maid cafe and bought him a top-of-the-line pressure cooker, accompanied by a blushing request to make frequent use of it.

Assassin had given him a photo album containing rather... explicit and candid photos of herself along with a whispered promise of a much better present that night. He would apparently have to utilize Saber as a shield against the amorous Assassin again.

Caster gave him a binder containing her personal notes on bounded fields, a subject she was a master of.

Finally, Rider presented him with a large framed photo of himself and everybody else standing in front of the Einzbern castle, enchanted with a wizarding spell to make it move. He wasn't sure how she got the picture, as he didn't recall posing for it, but he suspected Zelretch.

He spent the rest of the day talking with the countless maids there, joking around with his family, playing around with Prim and Midnight, and just generally having a great time.

Right as the day was dying down, three letters popped out of existence in front of Harry. Each addressed to the same location.

Harry James Potter

Gringotts Wizarding Bank Dropbox #44567

He opened up the letter, and the first lines ensured him that a new adventure was beginning.

You have been accepted into Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.