The Chronicles of Camelot: The Snake, The Boy and the Chamber

by blackshadow111

The world is a far older and better place than the muggles believe. Harry Potter knows this very well indeed. Watch as the heir of Alexander and Arthur takes a world rotting in its mediocrity, and turns it into a utopia. With unlimited resources, an icy, brutal ruthlessness and an unparalleled mind, no one can stand in his way. Amoral, Political Harry. Dead, but the rewrite is up.

22. Chapter 22

Well, don't ever tell me that I don't take care of y'all. Here's the latest chapter of this story that you all love.

Edit: Chapter beta'd by Joe Lawyer (who is not a bloodsucking bug at all).

It felt good to have the world at one's fingertips. Well, felt was really too strong a word, to be honest, but yeah. It was good.

Harry was currently in the main study of Potter Manor, programming a series of commands into simulacrums that were going to substitute for him for the next three weeks. Truth be told, he didn't really consider what he was doing to be the best possible alternative he had, given that he'd be basically trying to operate a grand prix racecarthrough peak traffic using a remote control and a three inch video screen, by delegating things to his doubles when his plans were at as delicate a stage as now.

The workload he was looking at right now was nothing short of crippling. Althric had just launched six new divisions. Phoenix Auctioneers was about to start a selling spree involving names like Cimabue and Duccio and Sassetta. The shadow war about to go into the beginning stages of its ultraviolent phase. There was Operation Sonnenritter, the matter of the Russian consolidation, and a dozen other things just off the top of his head. His input and direction, his personal attention, was required in all of these matters, and yet, it was impossible. He'd already blown up nineteen binding matrices in an attempt to leash his raw powers so that he didn't casually combust anything just by looking at it funny.

The ironic fact was, especially so for someone whose every waking moment was about increasing their power and influence, the powers he had received were vast, in fact too vast for what he could handle easily. At least at the moment. Just as what had happened earlier, with the animals , he needed time, time and practice to get a handle on them, so that he could master and tame them, rather than the other way around. That meant using the item world, and about eight to ten years of subjective time inside. With the chamber's time dilation powers at their highest levels, three weeks were more than enough, but those three weeks away were a great deal of bother. One of the problems with an enhanced awareness and extensive memories of time past was realizing just how little it would take to bring everything he'd worked so hard to achieve crashing down around his ears.

Well, it was what it was. Power demands and all that… All that remained was to handle the matter and push forward.

Harry finished up with embedding the last of the command spells into the simulacrums, then standing up. A final exertion of magic sealed the deal, making the whole enchantment structure undetectable and unchangeable. Wouldn't do to let anyone hack in, after all, and take control. Who knows what they would do with level of power.

Harry popped off as soon as he was done, appearing in the innermost halls of the chamber, where the time acceleration was fully charged and ready to be activated. He looked at the item world device , and the large number of items that he'd assembled to be put through. The most important things, obviously, were Ravenclaw's diadem, Hufflepuff's goblet and Slytherin's locket, especially with the vast, vast amount of magic that they'd been put through already. He'd spent well over ten million galleons apiece, in potions, crystals and other components for the magic al parts of the job, not to mention the seventy hour sittings that were required to properly carry out the changes.

Truly, it was in situations like this that the Nevernever and its intrinsic properties truly shone. Harry had worked and massaged and cajoled all the magic on the items into place with a level of delicate precision that would made any neurosurgeon proud, but the lofty goals that he was reaching for with each item meant some rather unavoidable complications still needed to be removed; this was an excellent way to both sort them out and gain a better handle on his new powers.

And then there was the absolute lack of any limitations or restrictions or improbabilities that came with chaos magic being used on this scale and in this manner. At its core, magic was generally devoid of any true impossibilities or real limits in what it could achieve, but even that being true, in virtually any other endeavor, there were logistics, limitations on resources, worries about feasibility, etc.

Not in the Nevernever, in the heart of chaos magic. Here, the intent, and the intent alone, mattered. If you wanted there to be a broomstick that could reach the moon in half a second, then mostly all you had to do was to cast some spells on it, even haphazardly, with the intent of reaching the moon in half a second's time. After that, everything that would cause the intended outcome to fail was a defect, and all of those could be dealt with by going into its 'item realm' and killing the defects' conceptual representations. Defeating or killing the representation of the defect, meant the item's defect was cured, even if the true means by which it was cured was wildly beyond even the understanding of the casting magical. It was said even a God's understanding could be outmatched by what the powers of untamed chaos magic could achieve. Of course, if you didn't want to fight countless representations over unimaginable amounts of time, it behooved the magical to put some effort into casting the magic to the best of their abilities from the get go.

Chaos was to magic what magic was to science, and this was one of the finest examples.

Harry gave one final look at the pile of pot metal, piece of shit swords that would all be legendary mystic codes soon enough, before entering the portal.

And then he just…let himself go. It was magnificent…to let his power flow freely against an endless sea of enemies, with no regard for attracting attention, or for collateral damage, reshaping the landscape, cracking the Earth asunder, boiling the oceans, and setting fire to the atmosphere. It was freedom at last.

There were demon hordes a plenty to slaughter and giants to tear the heads off of, inferi to take command of and vampires to burn and/or enslave, there was bountiful prey for both the dire wolf and for the Basilisk to delight in killing, there were even true hell gods manifested that were a challenge even for his new immortal powers, and mountain-sized elemental dragons to slay.

The author sadly lacks both the inclination and the aptitude to describe in detail just what went on; needless to say, it was debauchery at its highest levels, an orgy of violence and bloodlust. Quite literally lust in many cases as more than a few 'defects' in the various items had taken the form of the most beautiful and flexible succubae. Creatures who could only be defeated in the most time tested and ancient of ways…at least that's what Harry decided.

Sometimes as many as six at a time…for days on end.

Still, that was one matter. Becoming the closest possible equivalent of Death of the Endless was another.

Afterwards, Harry would have readily admitted it to anyone who asked; this was the hardest challenge he had ever overcome, and that was saying something. The sheer power he could now wield was so far beyond anything he had been able to grasp in the past that controlling it was a continuous struggle, often futile, like trying to convince a powerful wild animal with desires of its own to heal. And that was without factoring in the Thunderborn powers he had been born with. Simply put, there were four commonly wielded elements in the world. Fire, Water, Earth and Wind. Harry had extremely potent affinities for all of them, along with a whole lot of magical talents that he hadn't had the foggiest idea how he came to possess.

Well, now he did. Because really, the prophecies of the Thunderborn…they explained everything.

Harry made time between the battles and orgies to meditate while in the item world, reaching deep into his soul and magic, seeking to gain an understanding of just how he came to be everything that he was. It was a level of introspection that defied the limits of time and the flesh, giving him glimpses into even higher realms of thought and reality. One of the first steps he'd taken to answer his questions was to browse through every database at his disposal, trying to search for any historical references to the Thunderborn and their various incarnations.

The result… well, it wasn't as if there had been a dearth of references to it. Quite the opposite, really, if the results of him cross-referencing the data with his divine memories were anything to go by. Almost every magically significant culture to ever exist on the planet had had prophecies heralding him , and they went quite a long way to describing him pretty accurately. Hell, some of them referenced things Harry had only just begun to consider!

How all this connected to the element thing was actually right in the name. Yes, that was right. Thunder-born. Harry hadn't pondered it much at first, thinking it merely a cool sounding name that the Gods had taken poetic license with, but after the first time lightning descended around him to vaporize the Water demons he'd been surrounded by, he'd grasped the truth behind the name rather handily.

There wasn't really much to say about it. He could control and manipulate Thunder and Lightning, and from that, electricity in all its forms. This was the much touted 'fifth element,' which had been within, from what he'd always known, the exclusive domain of gods like Indra, Zeus and Thor. Well, the prophecies said that 'the one marked of it would tame it,' and that'd been that. He didn't really care all that much, apart from dedicating a great deal of frantic effort and a good portion of his time to mastering the power in question. It was an undoubtedly useful ability and a rather cool one too; summoning lightning bolts from the sky was the stuff of badass Gods after all. He had an image to maintain!

No, what interested him even more were the prophecies themselves. Harry remembered when he'd discussed them with Salazar and Grindelwald.

"So, let me get this straight. Just about any warning, any prophecy that deals with someone coming…"

"Is about you. From the moment Sammael accepted you as his heir, you became it. The one subject of every major prophecy ever written or known that deals with a person becoming a savior, a conqueror, or any other permutation thereof…that's you." Salazar seemed just a bit too smug saying that.

"But that's…" Harry tried to interject. He liked power, and quite a lot of it, but not if it painted as big a bull's eye on his arse as something like this suggested!

"What? Insane? Yes, it is. But nevertheless, this is the will of magic."

"Fuck the will of magic, and fuck Sammael. I need a way to manage this ."

"Won't work, lad." Was it just him or was Grindelwald just a bit too amused saying that?

"The last one to try and mess with something like this was the Westerosi, and you remember what happened to them, don't you?"

Harry remembered only too well. It'd been the mad king Aerys Targaryen who'd tried, proving once and for all just how much of a stain he was on his bloodline, by using magic in a number of disturbing and disastrous ways after getting his prophecies, trying to neutralize the Thunderborn before he arrived. That, by itself, woudn't have been a problem. Many had tried and failed before him. The trouble was, he actually did have just enough power to do something on that scale. Not enough to prevent the coming of the Thunderborn, of course, that was as close to impossible as anything ever got. No, what he'd managed to do was to affect the fabric of reality enough to split the legacy.

Instead of one, two children had become the heirs, and the result… had not been pretty.

One was the son of the crown prince, Rhaegar and Lyanna Stark, a scion of the bloodline that was now the house of Black. The child had been called Jon, and he'd grown up rigid and hard, an honorable man to his last breath, an expert mind magic specialist, and a wielder of Fire, Wind and Water. He'd been a very, very talented young man, winning a war that he hadn't even been a player in till the very end. The ultimate example of the civilized and fair ruler, he was the subject of one of the prophecies, the so called 'Prince that was Promised.'

The other had been born of Daenerys Targaryen, sister to the aforementioned Rhaegar, and her husband Drogo, a Khal, a warlord to make even Attila quake. The child born… he was named Rhaego, and suffice to say that it had not taken more than two decades for that name to be synonymous with terror throughout the known world of the time. He'd been heir to the second half of the Legacy of the Thunderborn, subject of his own prophecy that named him 'The Stallion Who Mounts the World.' An master of Fire and Earth manipulation, he'd razed entire cities in a breath.

Needless to say, the outcome was something anyone could have predicted. Barely had Jon settled on the throne when his blood-cousin/soul-brother came. And neither were in the mood for a family reunion. The clash could be called a whole lot of things, but most importantly, it had sunk the entirety of both Westeros and Essos, both their proud civilizations reduced to dust and ashes before the end.

"Yeah… I get it."

"So, what do you want to do about it?"

"Well, I do, of course, accept it, but what I'd like is some explanation as to what exactly this means."

Salazar and Darius just nodded, wanting the same answer, but not knowing much more than they had already told Harry.

It was the Sharr lord who spoke then, "The best as I can tell, the Legacy of the Thunderborn comes with a selection of powers in any and all fields of magic. The Thunderborn is the chosen of magic, her champion, sent down to topple the structures and rules imposed by Order, Destiny and Fate, and remake the world in Magic's image."

Salazar took over from there. "Yes. From what our studies could reveal, this is all part of the eternal clash between the primal forces of existence, basically a pissing contest between the most powerful elements of the universe, other than the Eldritch gods."

"But… I thought that Magic had been conclusively proven as the most powerful force in this existence."

They nodded. "It has. But that power does not always translate all that well into actual influence over reality. To explain… consider your own situation. You are, speaking in terms of raw personal power and only in those terms, the most powerful being on Earth. And yet you may not move openly. Tell me, why is that?"

"Because I'm not the only powerful being on Earth… And the others, the Flamels, the Asians, Darius' old club, they've all had a lot more time to entrench themselves… they've been playing this game for far too long. I mean, I can win in the end, I know, even if everything goes wrong. But it's complicated, tricky, and requires that everyone underestimate me till the very last moment, unless I want all the unnecessary hassle. The second they realize who and what I am, what powers I can wield, they'd call down their gods, their ancient armies, and, y'know… all of that."

"Exactly. Now imagine the same thing on a cosmic scale. All of them, Death, Fate, Order have existed since the dawn of Time, contemporaries of the big guys themselves. They were ancient when Magic was first created. It stands to reason that they'd be hesitant to accept their younger sibling's suzerainty ."

"And so they've been trying to put the 'newbie' in her place ever since." Harry surmised out loud.

"Pretty much." Grindelwald answered a wry look on his face.

"Say… this doesn't mean that I can't use the gifts of the other deities , does it?"

"No, thankfully." A new voice answered. Harry looked around, seeing the master frame being occupied by another of his Sharr ancestors. "As you know, the immortal soul is an entirely different matter from the cosmic forces and the Eldritch gods. The concept of the soul was born out of the amalgamation of each and every one of them, and as such, no one other than itself has the power to affect it on a level deep enough to do something like taking away its intrinsic gifts."

Harry nodded. That was a relief. To understand why, one would need a background on these matters. Everything that made a soul what it was had once been under the purview of one of the cosmic forces, much like how the different aspects of magic were under the purview of the Eldritch gods. Imagination was a spark born of chaos, just as Meticulousness was created from Order, and Obedience was a 'gift' from Fate. Other things, that made any person what they were, Ambition, Lust, Hatred, Defiance, Mischief, it was all created from the primal energies of the universe and formed into souls by the Eldritch gods.

But Magic, as a force, was aligned closer to Chaos than it was to any of the other forces, and as such the gifts of Chaos, Imagination, Mischief, Defiance, etc., tended to be stronger within magicals. By no means was this an absolute thing; there were no such things ever, let alone in something so esoteric. Instead, it was only a very rough generalization. But it was all they had.

How this mattered was that if being the Thunderborn aligned one that closely to Magic, there had been a possibility that the gifts provided by the other energies could be lost. Thankfully, it was not so.

He eventually returned to the original matter of the conversation. "But still, do you mean to tell me that even the prophecies that were all fulfilled already are about the Thunderborn?"

"Yes, child." That was Salazar again, in a particularly flippant tone.

"You should be honored, you know. You are the Stallion, the Prince, the Dragon reborn, the Kalki, and, well, all the others. They're all you. That is one of the powers of the Thunderborn legacy, you know. Once a prophecy is attached to it, it stays attached, till all of them, every one of the attached prophecies, is satisfied at once."

"Well, excuse me if I don't want everyone who really likes the status quo to be after my head."

Gellert scoffed. "The status quo is overrated, lad. Trust me."

"The hell I will." Harry muttered, just like all the other times, hundreds easily, that the painting had said those words since he'd known it.

"Well, if I am heir to all of that, the least I can do is to milk it for everything it's worth. Okay, Selene. Prep a full list of all prophecies that could be attached to this title. Take your time and be thorough, you've got three weeks."

"Acknowledged, Harry."

Well, that'd been that.

It had taken Harry all the subjective time that the room had been able to grant him after that. His time was well spent training in his necromancy, in his powers over thunder/lightning, fortune and a dozen other things, even mastering the skills that came as Dumbledore's memories were slowly absorbed and analyzed. It was a huge undertaking, took strenuous effort, and equal parts patience and willingness to have a thousand failures before that first success.

But it was done.

Here he was now, three weeks after the death of the most powerful wizard of an age. The third task had come and gone, and Harry was now the newest champion of the Tri-Wizard tournament.

Harry sat still for a second, as he browsed the memories that he'd received from his simulacrum about the third task.

The night was dark and full of a strange mystery, as if the very surroundings of the ancient school understood the event that was happening. The maze dominated the Quidditch pitch, all grassy and green, with a strange sinisterness radiating from it, like a long asleep monster dreaming of prey.

Looking closely, Harry could detect the many magics that had been layered into this place, the alien natures and earthly powers that had been brought together by the finest spellsmiths in Europe. There was the obvious Earth magic, used to grow it, and then there was the myriad collection of mind-magics, spells to befuddle the mind, to turn up into down and left into right. There were the animal defenses, Hagrid's skrewts, the Egyptian things, Harry's slave spiders, and so many more creatures, each more alien, dangerous and sometimes disgusting, than the last.

Speaking of alien and disgusting creatures… Harry turned his gaze to the various politicians in the audience. He understood that this was one of the best turnouts this tournament had had since its inception. He figured that his work in the first task may have had something to do with that. He looked at the President of Magical France and the French Finance Minister, and amended his statement a bit. For them, Delacour may be just as good a reason to attend, being the daughter of the latter and goddaughter of the former.

A similar argument could perhaps be made regarding Lord Vassily Petrovich Krum, not to mention His Majesty Fedor VII, the King of magical Bulgaria, the two being the father and close friend respectively of Viktor Krum.

Of course, there was a story behind Fedor's attendance, involving a bottle of wine, a drop of Shadow Mamba venom, his drunken moron of a father, Harry's victory in the Vienna Tournament and a sworn vow of a favor owed. But that was a political matter. Everyone involved had been enormously benefited. Well, other than the sot, but he hardly mattered.

Of course, there were those whom even Harry had to be careful of, especially now, as he currently was just a pale replica of the original.

There they were, Senju Tsunade, deputy to Hiruzen Sarutobi, President of the Council of Forty-Six from the Whirlpool shogunate, right hand of shogun Namikaze himself, Li Chang Yen, First Mandarin to the Celestial Emperor, Orlando de la Cara Levarre, a Triarch of the Knights of Aragon, Arjun Karmaveer Rajendra Singh Tyagi, the Commander of the entire Lucknow Army, Faisal Mohammad bin Ibrahimazeez, quite probably the most senior and most dangerous spymaster for the Persian Emperor, Andrew Alexander Kabot, third lector of the House of Life, Michael Carson, Vice-Archon of the Council of Lincoln (named after the only magical president muggle America ever had, not the village in England) … it was quite the list. It seemed that Harry's show of power with the dragon in the first task had made a lot of important and powerful people nervous, and they all wanted an in-person assessment of his abilities before he got even more powerful and seasoned with age.

In other words, Contingency 1.6 .

Well, he'd made numerous plans for this possibility a long time ago; all that remained was to put it into action and see how things developed.

Harry continued to look through the crowds, putting faces to names. For the (very) few he didn't know, he pulled them out of the many, many open minds out there for future analysis.

Eventually, the time came for the third task to begin. Leading with Ninety-four points, Harry went first, strolling in with nary a care. He made a point of magnanimously waving to the crowd, making a show of it. Hey, that was the whole point, after all!

Harry made sure every camera his company had floating around caught it, as he schooled his features into a mask of utter seriousness. With that, the show was on.

Harry moved rapidly now, his walk shifting seamlessly into the prowl of an apex predator, while also radiating kingly confidence in every step he took. Thanks to the arrangements he'd made beforehand, it wasn't long before the first beast came before him, a minor Balrog summoned straight from the nineteenth circle (Dante, bah, what did he know?).

The sheer lack of effort that it took to dispatch that creature wasn't even worth mentioning; suffice to say that it was barely ten seconds later that Harry continued ahead, not a hair out of place or drop of sweat on his brow. This was more or less the pattern he set, till he'd penetrated through four layers of the labyrinth. After that, things got a bit more interesting. What faced him there was a pool of water that was, ignoring every law of physics, somehow spread across the entire junction of six paths while being no more than five feet in diameter. Harry would have had some small bother with this particular obstacle, but what made it interesting were the squid-like mini Chthulu things that were crawling out over a dozen at a time. Harry cast a whole series of spells at them, from fire to thunder to simple destruction, all to no avail other than generating pretty fireworks for the salivating fans outside.

That was fine. Even as minor to the point of near insignificance as these ones were, daemons were not dealt with that easily. Harry paused for a few seconds, before he called forth a portion of his true power, and willed the fabric of reality to tear itself apart, before reweaving it in a pattern more pleasing to him. There was a ripple, as the reverberations of the collision between what- was and what-should-be and what-should-not-be washed over the grounds and the school. Harry let them, consciously opting not to make the extra effort that would have hidden it. That was the point, after all, of doing something this energy inefficient and attention-grabbing.

When the twisting of magic ended, what could be seen was that the pool was no more, the abstractual magic keeping it intact having been shredded under Harry's power. That was it for the squids as well, the magic keeping their presence anchored in the world now gone.

Unwilling to be proven a moron by sticking around and looking proud of himself, Harry forged ahead. The next were a group of Green Trolls, the kind that regenerated from all physical wounds in seconds. Harry disabled them in three seconds flat, simply by not even trying a physical assault and instead crushing their minds and reshaping them into extensions of his will. Sending the lumbering brutes after the other two, he strolled ahead, looking as nonchalant as ever to the intently watching crowd.

Next to die were thirteen harpies, biting and clawing and trying to rip him into pieces right up to the moment that he turned them to stone with a look and then into dust with a slight knock.

Other things came after that, things that he allowed to seem a challenge, right till he appeared to pull solutions out of his arse. Acromantulae, Skrewts, Shoggoths, it didn't matter what came, they died all the same, till he reached the cup.

There it was, glowing with an inner fire, looking utterly resplendent in the faint moonlight.

Harry moved towards it, subtly checking for traps or monsters. He detected and dismantled over a dozen hidden enchantments, all the while neutralizing the airborne magics with his own breath-spells.

He was barely a dozen meters from the cup, when his senses alerted him to the approaching danger. Of course, that was too late to entirely avoid the danger. Harry felt them, the power of the spells as they manifested all around the maze corridor. He moved slightly, causing a slew of Alchemical magic to miss him minutely. Moved his hands through a blaze of gestures, he neutralized six separate summonings before they went through, while simultaneously manifesting the gaze of the basilisk to petrify the seventeen Minotaurs that had been trying (very, very badly) to sneak up on him, thanks to the mirrors that manifested around him with but a flicker of thought.

It occurred to him that this was really not fair to Delacour and Krum . They hadn't done anything to deserve being made to look like fools, going against him as he breezed through this whole thing. Of course, this being Harry, that thought was followed by the simple observation that that was their problem, given that he had scaled back his plans on that particular front a long time ago.

One way or the other, the result had never been in doubt. The Tri-Wizard tournament was won, the people that had come to watch were satisfied, the people who'd watched it at their homes through the Peverell Broadcasting Service were satisfied, and the ones here to evaluate him had been thoroughly baffled.

All in all, just as he'd planned, right down to the donation of the prize money to a pre-chosen charity.

It was then that he allowed the spells he'd crafted over himself to disappear, while dropping the link with the original. He'd cast them just in case, as a measure against the people that he'd just delivered a big fat 'fuck you' to, after all.

But it seemed like they were actually here 'just to watch,' so he'd gotten away with it.

And that'd been that, allowing him to avoid direct confrontation for another respite, which thankfully meant that he'd avoided it for the foreseeable future, at least for now. In simple words, Harry was done. He'd proven himself in both business and the scholarly fields, becoming the youngest self-made billionaire ever and proudly joining the ranks of the youngest Dragon-Slayers, Conquerors, and Archmages of all time.

What remained was to use all that for his own benefit. All those achievements gave him a very nice resume, and a credible street rep, if one wanted to go by slang.

Now, now he needed to use it. To turn those accolades into political capital, and finally start on the things he'd long planned for Britain itself.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

His name, as far as anyone interested was likely to find out, was Hershey Walling, a 74 year old retired transport enabler for the allies in the Great War. As far as the world was concerned, he'd spent somewhere between a decade and 15 years deep in Germany, working to hide portkey signatures and concealing apparition pulses, before returning to work as a senior signals analyst in the Customs Agency of the MS of A, countering those very concealments as others did them against his country, before eventually retiring with a decent packet of savings to France, where friends he'd made in the war, now senior government officials, had arranged a citizenship and a good house to enjoy his well earned retirement.

At the moment he was sitting in a nice coffee shop in the magical section of the Rue de la Paix, sipping on a mocha-flavored latte with extra cream.

It was to this man that the fair-haired young woman, sitting a table away, working on an assignment on an Althric PPC (portable personal computer), turned her attention every few moments.

She didn't look like the type to be interested in older men and in any case, appeared far too studious to be concerned about that when she had an assignment in front of him. Eventually, Hershey noticed, and had to ask. "Hey, young lady. Is there something I can do for you?"

She started a bit, an embarrassed look appearing on her face.

"N-No, nothing, I was just working, for my ass-"

"Hey hey, no need to get nervous. I don't bite, you know. I was just asking." He said in a comforting tone.

Apparently mollified, she spoke in a much more relaxed tone. "Well, it's this assignment, you know. It's on the war with Grindelwald, at least in name, but there's all sorts of irrelevant question in it."

"Oh? Like what?" He asked, hoping for something, anything, to relieve the tedium his average day was often characterized by.

"Well about Germany, mostly. Some stuff about history, some about current affairs, it's a jumble of topics." She said in that same slightly embarrassed, slightly peeved tone.

"Well, why don't you ask me a few of the questions? I have quite a bit of experience with Germany." He persisted.

"Oh no, I couldn't dream of bothering you like that! Anyway, I've done most of them; it's just this bit in the 'Rhetorical history' section that's got me stumped." She said, frustration dripping from her tone.

"Huh? What sort of section is that?"

"I know, right? It's as if they're picking courses and syllabi out of a hat!" Her voice almost oozed the innocent frustration and annoyance by now, just like any other student when faced with a ridiculous question set by their professor.

"Anyway, ask me the question, I'll see if I can help." He asked again, hoping to alleviate his own boredom and her obvious frustration.

"Well, if you insist. The question is… Who was greater than Frederick the Great?" she asked, with her voice the very embodiment of innocence.

And with that, Hershey Walling ceased to exist.

It wasn't a death, and it wasn't an obliteration. No, the term that best fit was 'molting,' when the outer skin was peeled off, shed, to reveal the truth of a creature in all its glory.

Herman du Rorchmann, Seventh Knight to the Sun King, Primary Acolyte of the Order of the Black Sun, Oberführer of the SS, in the personal staff of Gellert Grindelwald himself, looked over the girl again with different eyes. He pierced the veil around her, part magic and part excellent acting, and grasped the truth.

And it amazed him. Everything was fake. Her innocence, her delicate inquisitiveness, her sweet allure, all of it combined to hide what should have been right in front of him. This was no student; this was in fact a very, very dangerous, very well trained operative, and she was here for only one purpose, it would seem.

Because those exact words, that question… they were no innocent inquiry. No, it was a call to arms, a reawakening to the old times. Decades ago, when his country, his world had been falling down around his ears, a man he worshiped as his own personal god had told him that someone would come someday, bearing those words on their lips, and they would act as the herald to a new age, a new era when magic would rise again, to cast down those that sought to inhibit her, and he would be a part of it all.

"Barbarossa" he answered, and beheld it, as what he had already surmised became plain. The matter of piercing through her veil became irrelevant as it willingly parted, allowing him full view of the sharpness of this particular weapon.

"I think you know how things go from here, sir," she said, while starting preparations to leave.

She withdrew a small packet from her satchel, a plain black affair that had some very powerful wards woven into it from what he could see, and passed it to him over the table, as casual as you please. No one would give it a second look. She placed a single card on top of it, written on it were the words 'two minutes.' She followed it with the simple spoken words, "Okay! I think I've got all I wanted, thank you so much. I hope we see each other soon!" She then began walking casually away from the table.

He realized that there was an active spell in their immediate vicinity that would project a perfectly normal conversation to the other inhabitants of the café. None of them would realize anything was unusual, so long as he left the place within two minutes.

He did.

Later, in an alley, several blocks away, he looked into the innocuous packet, finding a portkey, some money, a letter, and a passport in it.

He took the portkey, speaking 'Barbarossa,' as he knew the password would be.

He disappeared.

Operation Sonnenritter had begun with this old man's return, along with that of over two thousand others, the last remnants of the Sun Court, the organization left behind by Gellert Grindelwald. Some were retirees just like him, their missions simply to develop and enhance a network of contacts over a long period of time. Others were family men, having fostered huge clans that would now be sworn into the service of Grindelwald's heir, and yet others… well, they all had their own uses.

All were dedicated to the same cause, a dedication that went beyond, way beyond, anything even a mere half a century could hope to have eroded.

And now, in the letters they had received, their orders had made things clear to them. Their time had come, the time when the fourth reich would rise and put an end to the mess that was muggle kind. Just as they had been told it might be, the place where the banner of the Black Sun would rise again was not Germany, as it had once been, that too their orders clarified to them. No, the land was Russia, and it was there that the grandson of Gellert Grindelwald, one Vladimir Tremelinsky, had taken power.

Needless to say, this also their orders had clarified for them.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Politics was not a good, clean game.

It was a fact well understood by people all over the world, and the people assembled here, in the hall of Castle Morrigan, on Isle Monteris, were no exceptions.

The people here were an assembly of the various pureblood lords and ladies, elected warlocks and high level officials, industrialists and businessmen. They were presided over by His Lordship Justice Julius Alconceyus Morrigan, Earl of Shrewsbury, newly elevated Chairman of the Judicial Committee of the Wizengamot, full voting member of the Conclave of One Hundred Families, Senior Member of the British Delegation to the ICW and several other titles. These were, as they liked to consider themselves, the watchdogs of British Wizarding Politics, the ones who stayed out of the always present conflicts and kept the balance of power from shifting irrevocably in any particular direction.

And right now, they were worried, very much so, all on account of one Harry James Potter.

Because whether anyone wanted to believe it or not, whether anyone accepted it or not, the fact of the matter was that there was a very, very grave threat present. The three newly anointed lords , and Potter with his three lordships, they were a threat. They were a threat not just to the group here, but to the whole country.

At this point a fairly important question would be who exactly were these people? What were their motivations? Their reasons to act in concert like this?

The answer was complex. Why did the sun rise? Why did water flow? Why did fire burn?

The fact was, these men and women had been born into politics and business, raised on intrigue and manipulation from the very moment they could walk and talk. This was all they had ever known, and this was what they were all very good at. This was, after all, what the children of the High Clans did. Oh, it wasn't a magically binding thing, no. Contrary to popular belief, their forefathers hadn't been stupid enough to think that a person's respect for their ancestors would extend to their choices being taken away from them long before they were born, certainly not when spells to consign long-passed souls to purgatory existed.

If you were good at sports, or at music, or at anything else, you were free to do that, within reason. Proxies for politics, agents for businesses, it was a well refined system. Even here, there were several professional quidditch players and at least one world renowned singer. But that wasn't the point.

The point was, no one should have too much power. No one should be able to dictate the way the Ministry worked, and no one should be able to call themselves invincible. That was their policy, the very reason behind their existence. They were the neutral faction, the ones no one took on, ever, because no matter the level of the conflict, every side's strengths eventually waned, while theirs endured.

But nowthey were under threat.

For several hundred years, ever since the House of Morrigan had first cajoled ten other houses into forming a pact to abstain from any vote that didn't directly affect them, they'd been keeping the other forces fighting amongst themselves, weakening them so that the neutrals remained powerful no matter what changed in the political landscape over time, and now all of that was under threat.

Because Harry Potter's star had risen far too fast, and far too high, for them to contain it, and now his power in the Wizengamot was a thing not just to fear, but indeed, it was something to be outright terrified of. Everything they and their ancestors had long worked for was in jeopardy.

And that brings us to the present, where an argument was raging fiercely. "I am telling you, something needs to be done about this! They have an army, Julius. A fully trained, blooded, professional army, that could come down on anyone here at any time!" The man's name was Marcus Dorclesworth, a multi-millionaire businessman dealing in the supply of raw potion ingredients to the vast array of hungry apothecaries and potioneers present within Britain and its protectorates.

Well, he was that for the moment, but truth be told, the wizard wasn't sure how long he'd continue to be. He had already lost three longstanding contracts in the last month alone, and prices for animals and herbs were getting steeper by the day.

But that was not the point right now.

He violently gestured again to the hologram hanging in the air. "Look at this! They took Russia! In a matter of months! Russia, where every mother's son for nearly a century was a trained, ruthless fighter from the time they could hold a wand in their chubby little fingers! None of whom wanted to be taken over by foreigners, and yet they still won!"

"We know, Marcus, we know," one of Dorclesworth's oldest rivals said.

"You be quiet, this is serious!" The man responded angrily. It was a credit to the man he insulted that he held his peace, understanding the importance of what was being said and refusing to let petty offenses distract them.

Meanwhile Marcus continued for well over half an hour, outlining the various exploits of the Ouroboros legions, and repeatedly emphasizing the danger to the balance of power, and far more relevantly, to these people, to themselves.

And to give his due credit, the danger was considerable.

To understand this, one would have to appreciate the context. Whether or not anyone admitted it, the simple fact was that diplomacy, money, influence, all were good, powerful things in their own way, and proper handling and use of them could make or break nations; it could turn around fortunes and do a whole host of things. Yes, it could, and that was all good, except for one tiny problem that threw it all right out the window.

Boots on the ground were still boots on the ground.

No matter how well or ruthlessly they managed to haggle, or wheedle, or trick, or threaten in the arenas of politics and business, if the enemy could have armed soldiers take them at wand-point, or simply kill them, then that was just about it.

Of course, it wouldn't be that simple. Circumventing the ancient royal decrees that prevented forceful seizure of power would be a nightmare, and someone or other would escape and turn it into a bloody and brutal civil war. But none of that mattered to these people.

No, what mattered was that they would still be dead, and that was a rather insurmountable problem.

All of these facts and many more besides were bluntly conveyed in the ingredient tycoon's diatribe, lasting as it did just over a full forty minutes.

In the end, all Morrigan could do was to nod in agreement, having considered most of these facts and now thinking over the new ones that had been raised. Slowly, he responded, "But what do you suggest we do, Marcus? I mean, we probably do have the vassals to raise a small army if we pool all of our resources together, but what about the money to train and equip them, or the time for all that?"

To this, it was Amos Diggory, one of the senior-most members of their group, who answered. "Won't work. The problems you raise are there, but we don't have the numbers either. I don't know how they freed that many people from their farms and looms and mines, but I, for one, have barely enough vassals to develop my estates."

"And it is the same for all of us, I would say." Morrigan said, as if he hadn't forgotten this fact just moments ago.

"There is a solution for that, though," Dorclesworth said, an odd glint in his eye.

"And what is it, pray tell." It was the old rival again, this time with some actual interest.

"Simple. We use the goblins." Marcus said.

Instant pandemonium.

Those who understood what his words meant were screaming because of the stupidity of his idea, and those who didn't were screaming because everyone else was, resulting in a scene, if not quite a din, then perhaps a rather uncomfortable level of 'noisy.'

Eventually things settled, allowing for the idea to be presented and explored properly.

"I say that we have no other realistic option! They have too much power and even if we pooled all our resources, it still wouldn't be enough for a direct confrontation. We need a counter, or we'll be trampled!" He said, pushing ahead with his idea.

"And I say that it is rank foolishness! Siding against our own kind with the goblins, it's not just treason; it's a betrayal to the whole wizard species!"

"It's no betrayal! It'll only be a temporary alliance of convenience!"

"It's still-"

Morrigan was suddenly aware of the extensive and ancient wards over the castle being suppressed brutally and efficiently, as an incoming portkey overpowered them.

He rose to his feet, starting to pull out his wand, but it was too late.

BOOM!

The noise deafened all ears, exploding seemingly from all directions at once.

He shook his head dimly, before realizing that the south wall had been disintegrated. Visible in that direction was a group of wizards, dressed all in black, moving through the empty space with purpose, spells already blazing at their wand-tips.

It was obvious, even to the untrained eye, that these were wizards on a mission, as they moved through the assembled entirety of the neutral faction, eyes searching over the crowd.

Even as the people present started to raise their defenses, the wizards started striking them down.

Spell after spell was released, penetrating ramshackle shields and cheap body armors, while going through hastily conjured barriers. Julius detected twenty of his seventy-odd guests die within the first half dozen seconds, with the death toll only escalating afterwards.

It was well after the thirty-second mark being passed and the death toll crossing the halfway mark, that fifteen of the intruders fell to a well placed mass curse , starting the neutralization of the raiding party. Even then several more died, till finally whatever spells were suppressing Julius' wards fell, allowing the magic that had defended this domain for such a long time to come back into full force.

He realized that the intruders had detected it too, when as one, they placed their wands to their temples, before the leader yelled out: "Now the neutrals shall fall like a house of cards! We die, for Harry Potter!"

They exploded.

Fifteen more died.

Half an hour ago

His name was Nicolai Volkanov, one of the last platoon leaders left of what had once been the mighty army of the House of Alexandrovitch.

Right now he was in a muggle ship, cruising around what was a stately manor, albeit with defenses that he could have powered through just as easily as a sledgehammer 'broke' an eggshell. If he'd had the right resources, that was. If any of the people here had the right resources.

Here they were, the rag tag remnants of the Russian internal armies, the last of the legions, as Doyle would have put it. Barely a year ago they had been dire enemies, all of them, and now they were all united, having found common ground against the menace that had taken away everything from all of them, the foreigners called the Ouroboros Alliance.

The bastards had come and ripped apart all of their masters, upset the balance of power, and setup that puppet Tremelinsky on the throne of Russia, ruling as if it was his divine right. And now here they were, the last of the free warriors who had drowned Russia in blood over the last several decades.

About the only comforting feeling left for them was that they would soon have their revenge. They had just learned, through their benefactor , of the meeting of the Ouroboros that was taking place here, on this Isle Monteris.

One thing that worried Nicolai here was his absolute lack of ability to read or understand English. It seemed that the bastards had used some sort of spell, using the primary leylines, that prevented any of them from learning any other languages, and such was the power of the Russian leylines that even here, far away from their homeland, no number of inception lozenges bore any fruit.

Still, that didn't matter. They would soon have their revenge.

He started the final briefing for his team, speaking in rapid Russian.

"Okay, people. We need to act fast and hit them hard. Units 3 and 5 have the wards. Use the suppressants, make it in, and start killing the targets off the list. Nothing fancy, just make sure you kill as many as you can. The rest of us, the same, but much quicker. Understood?"

"Yes, sir!" The answer came, loud and bold, making him thankful for the silencing spells on the ship.

"Okay, let's go over the list. Target one is…"

The rest, the author is sure his readers now understand.

XXXXXXXXXX

Mid-June, One week after the attack on the neutral faction

"So, it's done then?" Harry asked.

"Yes, your grace. A 70% death toll for the neutrals, and the Russian rebels were slaughtered entirely. A total success for us, that is to say."

"Good, good. Arrange a million galleon bonus, distributed evenly among the planners."

"At once, sir." The smooth, vaguely feminine voice of Selene responded.

"And the consequences?"

"As predicted, sir. His whole support base has been decimated; Morrigan had no choice but to rush into Bones and her lackeys' arms."

"He offered her the Minister position?"

"Yes. With full, unconditional support, to boot."

"We'll see about that." Harry offered amusedly.

It was here that the man Harry was waiting for, Michael Hawkins, entered the room. Harry had promoted him to coordinating seven whole segments of his information network here at home, and the man was proving his worth quite well.

In this particular case, however, it was Harry who was going to be briefing him.

"Hello, sir. You called?" His voice was courteous as ever, albeit sprinkled with inquisitiveness.

"Ah yes. Sit, sit. There's something you need to know. Hard Knock is a success."

"Oh, sir?"

"What, you doubted it?"

"Well, no, sir, it's just… well, may I be candid?"

"Please."

"It was a dangerous gamble. Yes, the men didn't speak a word of English, and yes they were drugged up to the nines… but there was still a lot that could have gone wrong."

"Well, you are, of course, entitled to your own opinion. More relevant right now are the consequences. Bones is now wedded to the neutrals, and I need you to keep an eye out for the investigations into us and our operations, that will quickly follow."

"Yes, about that. I actually wanted to talk to you about it." He placed a piece of paper on Harry's desk. Harry looked it over, it was a copy of an order to start an investigation into a set of memories deposited by one Julius Morrigan to Amelia Bones. Below the text of the order was the signed signature of the latter, and a wax seal representing the office of the Director.

Harry looked it over, closely examining the signature and comparing it with the samples he'd long ago tracked down and memorized. Yup, the authenticity was not in doubt.

"Well, don't worry yourself, Hawking, this was expected."

"Sir?" He questioned, in a tone that caused Harry to interpret the single word into 'What the fuck is wrong with you?'

"When I had that moronic Russian scream out my name, what did you think would happen?"

"Well…I-"

"It was rhetorical, my friend. Don't worry, this has been thought out in great detail. The investigation will be carried out, but do you think that the memory can ever be proved genuine?"

"Um…yea- wait. Oh. Oh, I see." This was what Harry found good in the man. No wasting of words, no slow pondering. He used his IQ of 180 quite well.

"Yes. The specialists of that branch are all Obliviators on secondment to the DMLE, and you know, of course, of the file on the Chief Obliviator, not to mention all his deputies. It's amazing, how far people will go to entertain their sick fantasies when they think they can erase it all away afterwards, no?"

"Yes, your grace, it really is." The man was grinning now. He had cause to be. It was he who had noticed the oddly confused couple, and it was he who'd had the bloody mindedness to arrange a checkup of their son, and then recommend that Harry pick up the tab for his healing from multiple obliviations and severe rectal infection.

Of course, having extracted the memories, the first of many as it turned out, they had re-obliviated all three of the family, but as a recompense (Harry tried to do this wherever possible, given that he was very much aware of karma being an actual, tangible thing), they had been set up for life, in true Harry style.

In any case, given that the case had given him a lead that had resulted in over a hundred potentially career destroying 'discoveries,' he was inclined to be quite generous.

"Good. Another marvel is that depending on circumstances that have yet to develop, I may just let the memories be proved genuine.

The grin disappeared.

"But then they'll have a case!"

"I know. And in short order, there'll be an order for my arrest. I do believe I'll be sentenced as well."

"What! But they can't sentence you, not you, on something that flimsy!"

"Oh, but you forget, Michael, that Julius Morrigan is still Chairman of the Judicial Committee. Newly appointed, yes, but he is still the Chairman, empowered with the right to visit upon anyone he deems deserving, in any ways he deems appropriate, the High, the Middle and the Low justice."

"If that is the case, then why are you so relaxed? And actually considering not killing the case before it begins?" Hawkins was calm now, his phenomenal brain having caught up with his emotions.

Harry considered the merits of his actual reasons, those being that Morrigan held those powers at the discretion of the Chief Warlock and that 'Dumbledore' was just as likely to let anything serious happen to Harry as he was to dance naked on his desk in the ICW offices.

Actually, he needed a better analogy, with the old man's questionable reputation. But anyway, he considered the merits.

Nah. The man was good, skilled and to be trusted, somewhat, but not that much. That secret belonged firmly in the same bracket as the truth about Aries, Erebus, Damien and Vlad, as in the bracket that would not be revealed to any person who wasn't Harry till… well, till eternity's end. He went instead for a simple answer.

"Why shouldn't I be? Despite all that, there's no motherfucking thing they can do. After all, where would they put me? They can't kill me either, not unless they want a civil war. Damien owns Azkaban, the Ouroboros will never allow funding for a new Grade-A prison to clear the Wizengamot, and anything lower might as well be a hotel room. Can't get Morrigan and company to fund it themselves, cuz that smacks of abduction, once again leading to civil war, and they can't put me under the control of a foreign nation, or it won't just be civil war, it'll be the end of the ministry, and the whole bloody wizengamot. That much is the bloody minimum of what the articles of unification establish."

The man's eyes darted here and there as he worked out the conclusion. "So that leaves…"

"Nurmengard. And I admit, if they actually are stupid enough to put me, an Arch Necromancer, at the place where that many people died, including my own great grandfather, then this whole thing will be even easier than I thought before. Granted, the wards Dumbledore cast prevent that to an extent, but not to the extent of stopping an Arch level practitioner."

Again, the man was nodding, not having found any fault in Harry's logic .

"Of course, I thought out all this way before I considered sending that team to them. Them… I suspect it'll take a few days at the minimum."

"Oh, I do believe you overestimate them, sir. A week and a half at the least would be my bet." And there was the suave operative back.

He went on. "And of course, it doesn't matter if all they can do is to wring their hands and recant their verdict. The scandal will be enough to vacate both their offices."

"Exactly. Assuming, of course, that they don't decide to keep the evidence for later." Harry said, although he was considering the possibility of creating another identity, or a 'defector' from the Ouroboros (Hades' memories having given him certain possibilities with Damien, for example), and appearing with any one of the dozen or so miracle solutions he'd planned out.

Still, he had to focus on the present.

"Well , that's enough of the future. Now, if you'll kindly get me a list of the likes and dislikes of every member of the Judicial Committee, another one with the same for every officer within the DMLE with over 10 years of administrative experience, and another one with…"

One hour later

Harry was…happy would be the best word, he supposed, although it was a bit of an exaggeration, what with him being unable to feel and all due to his iron clad occlumency. Dumbledore was dead, Russia was conquered and going well, Althric had just made another seventy million via three major contracts, the Sun Knights had all reported in, fresh out of familiarization and retraining, ready for reinsertion into their roles within the SS (the new one, his Serpent Sworn, not the old one), the households had all obeyed their old orders and had passed loyalty tests with above 90% scores, with the experienced fighters adding nicely to his ranks, while other service roles were also supplied well, and most important of all, SPEED had reported 0% squibs in the first generation. He was most pleased.

He already had his people preparing potions, along with tests, and blood-quills, ready to evaluate the lot of the children, along with DNA samples from the most powerful families he'd managed to track down (the last was now a rather pathetically easy task, to be honest. Summon a spirit, ask it where it buried its father, and the name of its children, ask them where they buried the parent, rinse and repeat. In the cases where, for some reason, someone else had been the one to do the burial, then it was as simple as tracking them down and asking.)

Of particular interest to him was the house of Romanov. He knew they weren't extinct, couldn't be extinct in fact, being an eldritch family. But the most likely possibility was that the survivors were all squibs, passing on the blood and magic, but being unable to use it themselves. That sort of thing happened occasionally to the eldritch houses, magic only knew why.

What Harry needed to do was to find an appropriate DNA sample, get a suitably talented kid, and then get a spirit of that family to direct an adoption ritual with all the rites, that he himself, or someone out of the appropriate section of SPEED would assist with.

That would secure him access to the illustrious Romanov library, for one thing, and the huge array of weapons, creatures, powers and all the other things an eldritch family had accumulated over time (the fact that he himself would also be adopted magically into that family was so obvious that it didn't even deserve mention).

There wasn't really any better collection of blood magic anywhere else in the world, for one thing.

Harry turned his attention to the matter of the neutral faction. Hawkins' mention of vacated offices had reminded him of the recent condition of the magical world, with over fifty extremely powerful positions now being vacant. To be completely honest, there wasn't all much that could be done with the noble families and the inherited fortunes, given that in most cases the families were just as well indoctrinated in the matters as their late lords.

As far as the thirty three elected seats were concerned, those on the other hand…

Fourteen were not worth considering, of course. With the amount of influence that several of the aforementioned families enjoyed over those, they might as well be their personal fiefdoms.

That left nineteen wizengamot seats, which would make a very nice addition to his ranks. He already had thirty-eight people lined up, all of whom were bound with a slew of weak magical bonds to obey him (the detection tests were funny like that. Having been designed in the past with powerful vassalage links in mind, they could detect even a single strong bond with pathetic ease, no matter how well hidden. Many, many weak bonds though…not really. Like a single strand of fiber, it could be broken easily, but a few hundred fibers, twisted and woven together, now that could form a strong rope.)

One seat was earmarked for Lockhart, of course, but even accounting for the few other exceptions, about a dozen were truly up for grabs by the people he was supporting (with magically binding agreements that the loser would then go away to do something constructive that he'd dictate to them, of course. He wasn't stupid). Elections were far too unpredictable for his tastes, really, but he was confident that with near limitless campaign funds and extensive propaganda machines that both dwarfed the competition's by several orders of magnitude, things would go his way in the end.

Speaking of Lockhart… the man had recently made his 'Grand Return' to the civilized wizarding world, with yet another book, based on several minor adventures that Harry had actually had when he'd been capturing magical creatures for use in the Russian campaign.

Harry figured it would require just a bit more effort, maybe a few 'active measures' before the man was seen as a serious candidate for the Office of Minister. Well, only time would tell, really.

One week later
Hogwarts

It was time.

Harry had just been informed by the wards that Hogwarts was finally empty. It had taken him a great deal of time and effort to arrange this, even now, in the middle of the summer vacation, what with the numerous staff, teachers and other people that were always there. Well, to be totally honest he could've simply done it the ham handed way and simply told them to go away temporarily, but that would have been a surefire way to get tongues wagging, so this was what got done.

Because this task was a very important one.

Harry sighed for a second, before going properly to work.

With a flash, he erected wards around Hogwarts, wards that cut it off utterly and absolutely from the outside world. Nothing, not a single iota of magic or a molecule of air could pass the barrier, because the task was just that delicate.

He began. With a small pulse, his magic was fully unleashed in all its glory, washing out of him in cresting waves, crashing against the newly erected containment wards. He let it run wild, to saturate the whole place deeply, with the wards of Hogwarts being bent and twisted to allow it. It was akin to soaking a dry sponge by using an ocean, only here his power was literally flooding each and every nook and cranny of the millennium old magical castle.

And once he had it all, once there did not exist a single inch of Hogwarts that Harry was not linked to in the most intimate of manners, he acted.

A smell of ozone started to permeate all the rooms, while the air of the building and around it seemed to shimmer, as if the whole place was inside a giant heat haze, or was a desert mirage. Reality buckled and twisted, strange monstrosities peeking in from the outer darkness for just a moment, before being blasted into oblivion. Existence rippled, the mighty magic that covered this and every other land trying to desperately rebel, as Harry Potter crossed all known boundaries and harnessed the powers of the high heavens, powers that the world had not borne witness to in many, many millennia, not since the age of man began.

Hogwarts changed, the building, the forest, the very land that comprised it becoming truly malleable, twisting and changing under the onslaught of pure magic, ready to be bent to Harry's will.

Such was the might of the power Harry had just unleashed, the power of Creation itself.

Harry wasn't slow to act after that. Within seconds the chaotic, fluid nature of his surroundings swirled, rising and falling yet still under his yoke of control. The laws of physics, of reality and magic all seemed to cry out in unison as Harry Potter rewrote them all, at least as far as this little bit of land was concerned.

The look of Hogwarts had remained mostly the same, the same castle set in the same ground, having the same recognizable features. For those who had the eyes to truly see, however…

Hogwarts had originally been a semi-sentient Genus Loci, with a quite decent level of intelligence, as far as things like that went. It was the result of four Grand Mages of Eldritch houses pouring all they had into it, and it showed. Hogwarts had been like a mother to its students, anticipating their needs, taking care of them wherever it was appropriate, and making sure things were maintained well.

Now… now it was all of that and more, just perfect.

Unless Harry willed otherwise, no student would want for anything again in the castle. The power of the leylines under the school (seven secondary and four lesser ones) had been amped up dramatically, with the conduits that they ran through being streamlined and enriched with his own magic. Power now saturated every single square inch of it, making the whole thing look like a miniaturized sun to those with mage sight.

Even the wards had been changed dramatically. Previously they had been powerful, being able to hold off vast assaults for ages, a testament to the power of the founders that created them. A millennium worth of powerful Headmasters had added to it as well, adding in little subversions and enhancements, closing off certain portions of the castle as the culture changed and they became politically incorrect (like the orgy rooms, for one thing. Yes, Hogwarts had orgy rooms. Yes, that meant exactly what it sounded like. Yes, the founders had been awesome.)

Well, they all went, crumbling away as Harry basically hit the 'restore to factory settings' button for the whole castle.

And as soon as the original wards were the only ones there, he started the other bit of work he'd planned. He stripped away all control links from any and all enchantments upon the school (it was just a side effect, really. A minor advantage that he'd barely thought about…oh, okay. That had been the whole point.) The spells tied to the houses of Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff were the first to go, of course, but not even the Gryffindor and Slytherin links were spared. The only controls to the wards were soon the ones tied to Harry personally, before he created two new ones, one to his bloodline and the other to the position of Headmaster.

And that was just the tip of the iceberg. What harry was doing, essentially, was to turn Hogwarts more or less into a huge, much enhanced version of the Room of Requirement, albeit, of course, subject to certain conditions. That was, in essence, the crux of the matter. To that end there were literally thousands of enchantments that had to be layered into each other, matrices tied together and magic pumped into them for power, a task that it would have taken anyone else months upon months, if not years, to accomplish.

Harry, being Harry, had set aside a leisurely afternoon.

And miraculously enough, it proved enough. The last of the magic was laid on, the bindings completed, and the wards finally upgraded and empowered, to a point that was usually reserved for war-time fortresses that were meant to break entire armies upon their walls.

A month later
The Wizengamot

"The nine thousand, seven hundred and fourteenth meeting of the Wizengamot of the Magical Realm of Great Britain is now called to Order! Presiding is Chief Warlock Albus Dumbledore, Convener is His Grace The Duke of Gryphonsworth and Parsellsia, First Scribe is…" the Master of Ceremonies' voice was loud and clear, filtering throughout the entire chamber.

Not that anyone was paying attention of course. This was the first meeting since the attacks had begun, and everyone had their own stories to share. The neutral faction had been devastated; three Cabinet Directors had been attacked in their homes, another two in full public. One was dead, another catatonic. Diagon alley had suffered over a million galleons worth of damage in one of the attacks on the Directors. If the attacks were not enough, there had been a great deal of movement on the political front too.

The neutrals' losses had created vacancies across the board, and if rumors were to be believed, three senior committees, two councils, and four high-ranking offices in the ministry were all considering one single person for recruitment; something that, if it happened, would prove the single greatest accumulation of power in one person since the sixteenth century, when the goblin rebellion led by Ungbralsk the Grimy had caused one man to become both the Chief Warlock and the Minister of Magic at the same time. Making it far worse was the fact that this person wasn't even an established character in the Ministry, with a long track record of decisions that could be analyzed and picked apart in depth. No, in fact this person was a brand new entrant into the world of politics, till now being just a trainee Auror. Another thing that was equal parts reassuring and worrying was that he was also the youngest full Auror, at a mere fifteen years of age, the youngest since Alastor Moody had become one at sixteen, and by all accounts, had the ear of both his company's captain and the Captain-Commander.

Or perhaps they had his ear, because this was not, after all, just any ordinary person.

Oh no, Harry Potter most certainly was not any ordinary person.

It had been a shock to many to see the young scholar-entrepreneur entrust his responsibilities at the company to the Board of Directors, and jump headfirst into politics. Of course, the shock had been nothing compared to what had come after.

Because he hadn't entered the meeting in as simple a way as just strolling into a wizengamot session, like the Heir of Longbottom had done a couple of months ago. No, it had been something far more impressive.

The details were still spreading, shrouded in mystery and obscured by rumor as all such details are, but one fact was clear. The Council of Fifteen had met, and several pieces of legislation had been proposed to it.

Of course, 'proposed' was truly all that happened, as contrary to popular belief laws were not made in single meetings. But the proposals were there, and by all accounts, they were all the kind to incite extraordinary controversy and fierce debate.

Of course, it was anticipated that one way or another, the truth would be revealed in this meeting. Till then all that anyone could do was wait with bated breath.

Speaking of waiting, it was now over. The last of the announcements had been made, the formalities completed and the room sealed, which meant that the meeting could now begin in earnest.

Silence descended over the assembly, as a tall, slender figure strolled to the middle of the chamber, each step the slow, deliberate stalking of a born predator.

Even as Harry Potter came to a stop, pausing for a few moments to pull out a folder bound in what experienced eyes could tell was the finest black leather and bearing the Potter family coat of arms done in gold on it, the voice of the announcer droned solemnly. "The floor recognizes His Grace Harry James Potter, Duke of Gryphonsworth and Parsellsia, and the convener of this meeting."

The young aristocrat turned slightly to face the Chief Warlock, after flicking a small acknowledging smile at the announcer. "My dear lords and warlocks of the wizengamot, I thank you for taking time out of your busy schedules to attend this meeting. I know how turbulent these times are, as a matter of fact that is the cause behind this meeting, so I shall endeavor to be brief. Lord Voldemort has returned."

He rolled his eyes at the palings, the gasps and the small shrieks that started off in the wake of that announcement. He had to say, on some sick, twisted and demented level, Voldemort should be admired for what he had accomplished here. Granted these people were by and large outright cowards, but even then… to incite utter terror at the mere mention of his name… now that was something to admire.

He looked up, as the magically animated puppet of his (that'd had all of its defects removed via the item world) that played Dumbledore spoke out. "Well, I would say that that is just a bit too brief. Can you please elaborate, your grace?"

Harry sighed a bit, before speaking. "Of course, sir. I'm sure no one here is unaware of the numerous attacks that have been taking place these days." He paused, to let the nods and affirmative sounds make a round or two around the room. "Well, a few weeks ago some people in my employ succeeded in capturing one of the attackers. Preliminary questioning revealed him to be a full-fledged and marked death eater. Now even that could have been explained away, except for one little thing. He had been marked for less than a month. More intrusive questioning, even under veritaserum, failed to refute this, and a scan of his memories only confirmed it. Hence, I was left with no choice, but to conclude that it was, in fact, a bona fide, newly marked death eater, and that the Dark Lord had actually risen again." He finished.

It was something of a calculated gamble to reveal the whole thing quite so casually, that much he would be the first to admit. As a matter of fact, his original plans had set the reveal date much further down the road, several months in the future at a minimum. But he had been actually surprised, when the rumors had started making the rounds by themselves, without his help, born out of the similarity of the occurrences to the last war. A string of articles about Voldemort had then appeared in the papers, detailing his rise and fall and several of his most formative years. Courtesy of Harry, of course.

Fudge and his ilk had tried to obfuscate and deny, but Harry had made it a choice between his peace of mind and his office, and the man, under intolerable pressure, had chosen the latter.

Another aspect of this gamble was that this would strengthen his enemies' hand, given that this news was certainly bound to result in additional resources being allocated to the DMLE, and therefore Bones. No matter. That had been accounted for with numerous backup plans.

The point was that this would allow Harry to get the ball rolling for a huge drive in the ministry and the wizengamot, to allow him to start steering things into the appropriate directions.

He allowed the whispers to continue for a bit more, reaching their peak, before continuing. "Now I know how bad this is, but there is no cause for panic. What there is a need for, however, is rapid action, and that being carried out effectively." He paused here again, as if goading the assembly into seeing if someone would challenge him. No one did, not even with a 'wait a minute, how can we believe you?' Of course, that was due to his enemies' vested self interest in the aforementioned increase to their personal power, as well as the vast effort he'd made to bully, cajole and trick the members to his way of thinking in the last month in preparation. Anyway, he continued, "Now there are a whole lot of steps that need to be taken in the days ahead, but the first one is to prevent a repeat of the danger to the Statute of Secrecy, which was a major problem in the last war. Wouldn't you agree, lords and warlocks?"

A ripple of yeses and 'hear hears' were heard around the room, subsiding in a few seconds after which Harry spoke again. "Now one thing I can say right now, so that you can all relax a bit, is that steps have already been taken in this matter. To explain, there have been quite a few rumors about the meetings of The Council of Fifteen going around. I must say at this juncture, that a lot of them are true."

In another time and circumstance, something like this would have incited outrage. The fantastic power that the Most Ancient and Noble houses, along with the First Families/Eldritch Houses (there were as many names as there had been poetically inclined people interested in them) could wield, should they choose, was a cause for some extreme envy and loathing among the lesser families, and could send more than one otherwise mild mannered lord into an incandescent rage at the merest mention. But right now everyone had other things to worry about, bigger things, what with the news about Voldemort and all.

"The council of Fifteen has, over the last month, met a full half dozen times. Over the span of these meetings several matters have been discussed, and one in particular has, as a matter of fact, been resolved fully." He took a few moments to throw a look at Morrigan, who looked like someone had just driven a heated spike up his rectum.

This time, however, Harry kept his pause very brief, not wanting the assembly to get distracted by showmanship. "As such, I am happy to announce to you the Muggle Solution Act, which, as I and my brethren on the Council believe, is the full and final solution to the biggest threat to the statute of secrecy."

He opened his folder at this, turning his gaze down to it. "As none of us likely have the time nor the patience to fully read this 78 page piece of legislation, and as there is no need to, I shall now summarize. The Muggle Solution Act is intended as the final step towards securing total separation between the muggle and magical worlds, not to mention the protection of our world from the muggles," he finished, very thankful to his occlumency for allowing him to not scoff at the last part.

"First of all, there is the matter of the muggles' advanced communication facilities. Primitive though they are in comparison to our own, especially what my company's been recently churning out, they allow for a lot of information to be shared very rapidly, a fact which could be a considerable threat to our secrecy in the future. As such, the act directs the Ministry of Magic to form within itself an office dedicated to that very matter, which shall maintain a permanent overview of all such communication systems. Furthermore, they shall be trained fully in all the skills that are needed in order to properly subvert the said systems, and destroy them if needed." He paused here, looking around at the din that was building up. With a pulse of magic and some words from the Chief Warlock, it was silenced, allowing him to speak again.

"After the matter of muggle communications is dealt with, the matter of the muggle-born students needs to be addressed. It has come to our attention that more than a few of them face treatment from their families and other muggles that is simply not acceptable towards a member of our noble people. There are reports of beatings, neglect and by all accounts, and of all things, persecution as the antichrist." Harry paused again, letting the murmurs that had exploded reach their swelling point.

Christianity had never quite grown the roots in the magical world that the squib Constantine had allowed to gain a foothold in the Muggle one, but there were actually about a dozen or so of them in this very chamber, representing the ten to twelve thousand or so Catholics in Britain, and all of them (the dozen lords, not the ten thousand) were currently making scandalized noises.

Harry continued unabated.

He spoke for nearly an hour, outlining all the major points of the law. He spoke of the clauses banning any and all muggles entry into purely magical locations, and he spoke of the ones allowing the harshest measures to be taken to enforce the previous clause.

He spoke of the dissolution of Ministry offices like the Improper Use of Muggle Artifacts (of which there were dozens, all now irrelevant) and of the repealing of the (Not at all) Reasonable Restriction of Underage Sorcery and the Muggle Protection Act.

He spoke of the formation of the Office for Magical Infant Rescue, and the manors donated to be converted into hostels for the muggleborn choosing to use them.

When he spoke, there were detractors, of course, but relatively few. Such was his conviction, his authority and the sheer terror taking root in several minds that hardly anyone tried to debate with him in earnest. Not that it would have mattered. This was an announcement, not a proposal.

In the end there was a vote, of course, but only from the council, and that only a formality.

In any case the eleven votes cast in favor made it a three-quarters Council decision, and thus irrevocable by the Wizengamot as a whole.

"The second and final order of business is the awarding of merits based on acts done within the last several days. I nominate Bartemius Crouch, Gilderoy Lockhart, Ralph Talbot and Anthony Proudfoot for Orders of Merlin, first class, each."

"A nomination for honors has been made. Anyone to second?" Dumbledore asked dutifully, even as the veritable forest of hands going up made the question unnecessary.

They spoke as one, making it necessary for order to be restored with a series of loud bangs.

It was Montague who managed it, and even was the first to vote.

"With two hundred and forty votes for, forty seven against, and thirteen abstaining, I announce these four people the newest recipients of the Order of Merlin, first class. With that, this session is closed."

"WIZENGAMOT IS DISMISSED!" the usher bellowed.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Harry was sitting alone in the semi-darkened room, looking at the screen in front of him as reports from the Serpent-Sworn operatives around the world appeared one after the other. Most matters were handled at ground level, but there were a few that needed his personal attention.

"And that concludes the current matters for Portugal. Next is the matter of the Spanish elections, and your decision for the party you will be backing." Selene's crisp voice cut through his thoughts, bringing his mind back to what he was doing.

"Yes. There are five parties involved, yes?"

"Yes, sir. Three are fronts for the Knights of Aragon, and out of the other two, one is deeply obliged to them, almost to the point of being a puppet."

"Hmm… and what about our place with them?"

"Two of the Aragon candidates and one of the independents are now deeply involved with our agents, sir. Malfoy's brothels and our own casinos have ensnared another dozen or so party members from each of them."

"Okay... what about the payments to their underlings?"

"Over fifty clerks, junior executives and grass-roots level leaders each of all five parties have sworn verbal agreements, in lieu of payments made from fifteen separate numbered accounts, three here in Britain and the rest scattered across Delhi, Paris, Cibola and New Hamunaptra; the Egyptian one, not the Indian."

"Okay…do one thing. Arrange a few donations. Two million each to the Aragon parties, and one million to the others, from Althric funds. Then donate another million each from all the other companies to the last, totally non Aragon guy."

"Acknowledged, sir. How do you wish for these payments to be handled?"

"For the Althric ones, use Sanchez, and while you're at it tell him to make appointments for me, promising eight digit donations if they'll throw in a few signed commitments."

Romero Sanchez was the Branch Head of Althric Realty, one of the least advertised, but most important branches of the company. He'd aced the 'Business Negotiation' courses while in training, and if reports were to be believed, had only become sharper with live experience.

In other words, perfect for the job.

"And for the donations from Blackfyre, Peverell, and the other smaller companies, sir?"

"No meetings, and make the payments from personal accounts."

"Understood."

This was another angle Harry was trying to work. He was the CEO of Althric, and that meant that the donations from Althric were his choice. It was his hope that the fifth candidate, one Paco Velasquez, whom he intended to quite purposefully slight, who was being supported by Damien, Erebus and Aries, would be seen as a difference of opinion between him and them.

"Oh, and run a feasibility check for Knightfall, will you?"

"Certainly, Harry. Processing…completed. Feasibility is… 87%."

"Come again? Eighty seven you said?"

"Repeating check…yes, Harry."

"Okay, do a day-by-day analysis since the last check" Harry ordered. This was, frankly speaking, quite a bit surprising to him. Knightfall had always been a minor side-project, something that was only contemplated as an extreme 'what if' scenario.

To understand just why that was, one would have to know a few things.

The balance of power in Spain was a rather strange thing. Officially, the land was the Republic of Spain, created from the amalgamation of The Kingdoms of Castile and Aragon, the two lands that had been carved out of the mess that Europe had been in the immediate aftermath of Arthur's death. The empire that Camelot's legions, led by Harry's own ancestors, had built had come crashing down with Arthur's death. In the chaos everyone had set out to gain control of their own piece of the crumbling empire. As it happened, five ancient and noble families, and about a dozen minor ones, had come together and created the two aforementioned nations.

Well, a couple of centuries and a Napoleonic takeover later, the noble families were out and the commoners were in and ruling uncontested. The usual bloody process followed , whittling the clans down from hundreds of members to barely a dozen each.

It was during this time that the few remaining survivors of the families banded together, hunted at every step, and chose to forgive all past arguments and grievances, some of which were blood feuds spanning centuries, all past transgressions paling in light of the direness of their situations. What good was vengeance against their long-time enemy if they were all wiped out by the commoners in the mean time? Borne of desperation, the remnants came together in a very tightly knit group, taking to extreme secrecy, and clandestine codes of contact, the typical needs of a people in a great deal of trouble and enemies baying for their blood on all sides. It took some time, but the eventual result was simple enough, the formation of a secret society in a continent already rife with them.

Not to dwell too much on ancient history, what happened a dozen decades or so later was the inevitable counter-coup, restoring the displaced noble families back to their lofty places of power, this time cloaked in secrecy as the undetectable and unidentifiable Knights of Aragon.

And the iron grip that they had maintained on power ever since had not slackened once ever since.

Till now.

Knightfall was created by a mind without the slightest hint of sympathy or emotion, which knew no limits, neither accepting nor acknowledging any societal, practical, or moral constraints on its actions. The plan was brilliant in its simplicity, and ruthless in its implications.

It was daring, certainly, aiming very, very high, probably too high actually. So high that Harry had practically discarded it as utterly unfeasible, mothballing or reallocating all the relevant resources to plans with a bit better than a snowball's chance in hell of actually succeeding. Especially given one of its vital components; that of the elections.

Putting it bluntly, Harry didn't like elections. The sheer ludicrousness of entrusting the entirety of a nation's power structure to a popularity contest…

Churchill was free to have his opinion, of course, even discounting the obvious fact that as a product of the damned system he was honor bound to support it, but that didn't change the fact that democracy was just plain stupid.

Still, stupidity aside, democracy was an integral component of Harry's plan. Because elections did something nothing else could quite manage. They introduced chaos into the system.

To put it simply, elections were a time when anything was possible. Sure, mostly it was a formality, and only one or two parties ever had a real chance to win; three as the case was here. But even then, it allowed for the fact that any party could win and be seen as legitimate. It did away with a whole lot of problems involved in creating false marriage records and line thefts that had previously been necessary to legitimately takeover a place of power.

So his plan was as simple as it was efficient. As long as the families were willing to take part in the whole charade of allowing non-member candidates to stand, Harry could, just maybe could, with extraordinarily strenuous effort, arrange for a candidate to win who wasn't just non-Aragon, but indeed, had reason to deeply, truly loathe them. If they didn't have cause, then, well, they could be given it.

Of course, it wasn't that simple. The Knights of Aragon were by no means weak, oh no, the five families, while having supposedly given away most of their political power to perpetuate the myth of democracy, still remained extraordinary powerhouses. Together they owned just over 70% of the total Spanish magical economy, this was partly legitimately (about 40%), and partly through a network of aliases (the remaining 30%). Then there was the organization that they led. The Knights of Aragon currently boasted most of the greatest parts of the very highest echelons of power in their membership, and that was just the government.

The Chairmanship of the Spanish Magical Election Commission, for one, was a post that had never, since its very creation, been in the hands of anyone not a devout Knight. It was similar for all the other important posts too, from the Minister (of course), to the senior Secretary positions throughout the civil service, all the way to the Commandant of the Home Defense Force.

Out of the dozen-odd secondary leylines that were clustered in the land, they had official control over one each, something that made them, together, just barely less powerful than the government, which in any case was already their puppet. Then there were their own 'Industrial Security Forces,' a nice name for the private armies at their beck and call.

And then there was the Fox, chief enforcer of the Knights.

Once, very briefly, there had been in the British Government a position called 'The first lord of the wand.' Pretext aside, it was basically a way to remove a Grand-class level magical from the realm of politics, by making them what amounted to be the chief attack dog of the government. Eventually the dearth of Grand Mages and the much larger numbers of Arch level ones had caused the position to evolve into its own office in the DMLE called the Hit Wizards, but that was a story for another time altogether.

The point was, that once, there had been a high powered Hidalgo in Madrid, going by the name; and yes, if you are an intelligent reader then you have already guessed it, Don Diego de la Vega.

He was a wealthy and powerful man, but the most important part about him was that he was also a quite monstrously powerful wind elemental, not to mention the finest swordsman in the world (a much tested claim, the latter. But well proven.)

Well, long story short, he became the masked bandit, El Zorro. Eventually he went after the Knights, was stopped, and then suborned using unknown ( and didn't it stick in Harry's craw, that word) means. Since then his title had been passed on to the most powerfully magical member of the Knights, the one who would serve as the one man special forces unit for the whole organization.

Currently it was Alejandro Esteban, a much celebrated champion of the European dueling circuits, a master of over half a dozen wanded subjects, and an Archmage four times over.

In other words, a bug that Harry could squash without even noticing it. (What, you honestly expected something else?)

But weak or strong, the man, and the position, was a key pillar of power for the secret society controlling the Magical Republic of Spain, along with the other, aforementioned ones.

But even for all of that in their favor, they weren't without chinks in their armor. The first and most obvious was the fact that as things were right now, all five of the founding families hated each others' guts with a burning all consuming passion. No, really. They made the Capulets and the Montagues (no relation to Alexandros) look like chums. Indeed, it was only because they were intelligent enough to realize the importance of maintaining at least the appearance of solidarity that Spain wasn't locked in a civil war right now.

But that was one weakness. There were others, such as the fact that the Knights were a rather small organization. Not militarily, no, as it had enough armed forces to maintain the equivalent of twelve Ouroboros Legions. No, their numbers were small in the government. The fact that most of the high and mighty belonged with them was as much a weakness as a strength, as it meant that their power, and thus all real power in Spain, was concentrated into very few hands.

By extension this meant that the people under them, their assistants and deputies, not being members, had very little in terms of actual power, and this necessarily meant that they got very little attention. This further translated into the fact that they had a rather pathetic selection where things like privileges, earnings and the other components of a successful and decadent lifestyle were concerned.

So, in other words… low-powered, second rung officials dissatisfied with their lot in life and desperate to improve it, while seething with envy over what they saw others around them constantly receiving, and ready to do just about anything to sate their long denied wishes… they were almost exactly the type of people that Harry's Serpent Sworn routinely sought out to suborn and control, with their huge funds and extreme power.

Indeed, enormous inroads had already been made in this regard, with the local operatives all having successfully placed dozens and dozens of mid-level officials and bureaucrats onto their payrolls.

Harry made a decision. "Download the full assessment of Knightfall directly into my mind. I need to look over this personally." He ordered Selene.

There was no verbal response, before Harry felt the package of mind-essence being pushed directly into him. He went through it at his usual lightning pace, analyzing it, weighing each option against every other, judging the different aspects, questioning his judgments, rethinking things over, extrapolating things, amending and modifying in light of new information, all for well over five minutes (over two hours inside his mind), before he nodded.

"Okay. Give the go ahead. Knightfall is to be activated as a Priority One project, effective immediately."

And it would be just in time, too. With the elections a mere seven months away, the preparations could be made without compromising the other plans he had going, something that wouldn't have been possible even a short time from now.

Before he moved on to the next matter requiring his attention, that of the MSA , Harry considered Knightfall one last time. He had to admit, expensive and delicate almost to the point of near infeasibility though it was, the plan was brilliant, one of his best yet in terms of the reward-risk ratio, which was always a vital consideration in his planning.

The key part from his end was the matter of his different identities, of course. By supporting the existing regime from his own position and their opponents from the aliases, there was literally no way for any real risks to arise. If the plan worked, well and good. The Knights would be in tatters, and Spain would be a piece of cake to grab. If it failed, well… there would be discreet contact made with him, by then a good friend or at least an associate of the alliance, in lieu of his donations. Then the perpetrators would perish, and he would be the favorite new friend of the Knights of Aragon.

Of course, that was assuming that they hadn't penetrated those aliases. But that was as close to impossible as it ever got, what with the nearly infinite number of countermeasures and protections that were in place to prevent such a thing (not to mention that more were put in every day). And if it did inexplicably happen, then he was finished anyway, internationally as well as domestically.

Barely had Harry overseen the relaying of the activation orders on the appropriate comm. channels, when the next report came up. The 'adventurous' Director of State of the MSA had just been fired, as a result of the files that Harry had received from Lucius and then leaked. A cell of half a dozen high level spies had just been arrested in Moscow two days ago while setting up shop, consisting of members from the MSA, the Catholic Church, France and China. They were already scheduled for execution, and anything and everything they knew had already been ripped out of their minds. It'd left them vegetables, but that was an irrelevant matter, as they had gotten a message out at the last moment that indicated their capture, thereby making the possibility of 'turning' them into double agents worthless.

Harry looked over the whole matter, found the actions that had been carried out acceptable, and more to the point, had found no new potential angles to exploit out of the matter, and so tagged the file as NFAN. (No Further Action Needed) The bodies, even as vegetables, however, were still useful in another way, and thus they were sent for use in his breeding program after a mock execution. Their genetic diversity would add to the crop of magical children produced.

It was like this for a rather long period of time, him reviewing all the reports, analyzing, making decisions as needed, and all in all keeping abreast of the latest developments in his burgeoning empire. Dull, absolutely, but necessary.

Well, the next thing wasn't dull at all, given that it dealt with the shadow war that was now in full swing. He looked over the reports on the half dozen assassination attempts on the lives of his alleys and subordinates that had been foiled by his agents, noting that mercenaries had been involved extensively. It wasn't a surprise, while the opposing families had some good men under their banner, the vast majority were all tied up in their civilian duties.

Of course, that couldn't be expected to last. Harry fully expected that with the Hit Wizards being reinstituted, they would soon be called up to fill the ranks, along with vassals from the Bones and the other neutral households.

But that had its own benefits, primarily in the form of breaking the back of his opponents' production capacities. Not to mention… well, perhaps that was better shown than told, whenever the showing might come about.

Meanwhile he took a look at his social appointments. Lawrence Talbot, the 211 year old father of Harry's solicitor (who was himself 99, looking like 45), was dead. His funeral was in five hours time, and two days later was Ralph's retirement party, as he left private enterprise and took up the family seat on the wizengamot. All well and good, but this left Harry needing an experienced legal mind to fill the chairmanship of Talbot, Smith and Boot (he'd promoted Talbot as soon as Althric Legal had acquired the firm).

Of course, there was an opportunity here as well, given that this made the option to get the man appointed a Judge a possibility, with the goal of eventually a different committee Chairmanship.

Harry closed the file, scrawling 'Asquith' across the top page, for Robert Asquith, one of the finest lawyers among his Slytherin vassals, before turning his attention to the next matter.

There were three raids coming up, one to take out Morrigan's primary warehouse (yeah. Political brilliance aside, the man was actually stupid enough in business matters to have one), one to assassinate six members of the Wizengamot council of elders, and the last to eliminate one Walter Cavendish, current Director of Magical Finance, a die-hard (rest assured he would do exactly that, in all interpretations of the term) neutral and a very close ally to his enemies.

Put simply, these sounded at first glance like simple enough things, no real need for a schedule or a plan. That was a common mistake. Truth was, the vital part of all of these…arrangements, just as all other things, had been in the preparation. Ever since it had been judged that the people involved could not be turned or suborned, the onus of responsibility had been on the planning offices, who had to lay out everything for the operators to carry out, right down to the hour of the strikes. Everything was cross-referenced, collated and tallied against each other, every action calculated for maximum benefit to Harry and the Ouroboros.

Quite naturally the official cover for the strikes would be death eater attacks, especially as it was that organization that was supplying the bulk of the resources, under the illusion of doing so at the command of their 'master.' Again, the inevitable panic had been calculated as best as something like that could (If anyone was stupid enough to believe that things like that could be precisely calculated then they didn't usually reach any worthwhile station under Harry). It would allow for him to act all the more freely, once the all-encompassing guise of 'Thwarting the Dark' could be used to justify anything and everything. He didn't like to brag, even to himself, but The Voldemort Deception, as he privately called it, was a rather special type of double whammy. In one stroke, the dark side was bound to his service. And second, just raising the specter of the 'Terrible Dark Lord and his Death Eaters' was all he needed to do to get the light families to throw all their weight behind him and 'Dumbledore.'

And of course, if the eventual result of things was something no one had ever imagined in their wildest dreams, or, for that matter, their worst nightmares…

Enough rambling. He had work to do.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Undisclosed Location
Three weeks later

The meeting was getting louder, and violence seemed more and more likely with every moment. But then, violence was an integral part of their lives. The top thirteen covens of Clan Nosferatu were assembled, and wondering just what to do in the future. It had not been an easy thing to get them here, and sitting around a negotiating table at that, but it had to be done, if the Clan and House Drakul were to endure.

Because what both groups were currently facing wasn't just an emergency, it was a full blown fucking catastrophe. To understand why, a little history lesson was required. For as long as anyone could remember, the leadership of the Vampire clan Nosferatu had vacillated between seven extraordinarily powerful, old bloodlines.

It had often been a bloody, crude succession of power, often haphazard, but it had worked decently enough.

That is, until thirteen hundred years ago. Then something new had happened.

What had happened was that a new vampire had just come of age. Moreover, he had done so rather spectacularly. See, the way it normally worked, was that a vampire was born/turned, spent a decade or two growing up (in the case of the True-bloods), or just getting the hang of things (for the ones converted from humans). Then, they entered politics, used their knowledge and skills, their aptitude to curry favor, acquire followers, carry out assassinations, survive assassinations, re-assassinate those who had survived assassinations, built up blood-reserves (the only currency other than gold they truly dealt in), and basically familiarized themselves with the real world. If they survived all of that to actually reach the age of two hundred, they were deemed a Master vampire, a title that came with numerous rights and privileges in their culture, one of the most important of those rights meaning that they could then start their own largely self-governing coven.

This was the normal way, the by-the-book way that had lasted for thousands of years. Naturally, there were exceptions. Those showing exceptional power and potential, or those whom someone highly enough placed vouched for, they could have all that far earlier. The ways to prove their mettle were numerous, but if one understands even the smallest truth about vampire society then one understands that ninety nine point nine percent of those ways involved large quantities of horrific violence. Well, something different happened this time, even from those loose standards.

A new Vampire had just become a master, and as stated above, the way had been unusually spectacular. The ruling vampire at the time had been one curmudgeonly old relic from the time of Ancient Greece, a vampire called Priam (yeah, might just have been that one from the city with big-ass walls. No one dared guess and he wasn't telling). The point was, he was, as stated, a thoroughly disgusting sort of tyrant, and ruled by fear and fear alone.

And as it happened, the new vampire Master lacked that fear. He made this clear, repeatedly, through his actions as well as his words.

To be fair, the tyrant did try to be reasonable. He sent a group of envoys to ask what the guy's problem was. Of course, given the fact that the envoys began their talks with killing half the livestock (humans) of the new coven leader, he really could have made more of an effort.

The young Coven lord responded in the way that would soon enough become the stuff of legend. He impaled them on top of nice long poles, stuck in the ground. And if it did resemble a certain…organ, making the gesture a very clear, very literal 'Fuck You,' well, that was an added bonus.

But in that day and age, that was pretty much a direct declaration of war, and Priam duly declared it.

Bad move. Really, really bad move.

Because it would be in the following years that he and all his sycophants would come to understand two things. One, that the newcomer, the guy called Vlad, was utterly and absolutely devoid of fear, sentiment, or indeed basic decency, and the second, that he was monstrously, truly devastatingly powerful. Maybe it was due to his mother, who had been a converted vampire with an ancestry that was wound up pretty tightly in a Sharr-Gryffindor-Romanov web (not that the bloodlines were called that back then), or maybe it was just sheer, dumb luck, but the one the world would eventually come to call 'The Impaler' was the single most powerful being in the last several millennia.

Well, the rest of the war followed along traditional lines. The old regime, with all its adherents, perished en masse, dying by the hundreds of thousands. It didn't matter how many fighters they had, or how powerful they believed themselves to be, they died. Going against the Coven Lord of Transylvania, they burned all the same. The Patrols of Blood, the Gasht-e-Sarallah, as the Persians would have put it, were brutal, ruthless, and all in all, utterly unstoppable. For three decades Eastern Europe was a slaughterhouse, till the inevitable was achieved. Vlad the Impaler was now Vlad III, Voivode of Romania.

But even more than the ousted (well, more like exterminated) regime, the consequences were felt by those who had supported them. The royal covens had all been behind Priam to the hilt, and had lost their best and brightest fighters to the war. As it happened, they were going to lose a whole lot more. He started with the women. Each and every female Vampire belonging to the royalty was dragged out of their palaces and towers and gang-raped repeatedly by almost a whole regiment apiece. This was followed by mental torture, then mutilations, and finally executions. All this set the tenor of things to come.

Before long the covens had all been destroyed, any powerful magic that they'd had to themselves was reworked into only accepting Vlad and his bloodline. This continued, till the very last survivors were hunted down and killed.

And then, the Drakul (his bloodline) had it all. They were the new royal coven, more importantly the only royal coven.

Time passed. It seemed like Dracula (as the world came to call him) would have an eternal reign, given that no signs of his destruction seemed forthcoming or any challenger arose capable of doling out that destruction.

Of course, that was then. Without going into too much detail, the long and short of it involved an Archangel that took human form to father a lasting bloodline, a demigod, tacit aid from the House of Corvinus, and a werewolf that was the brother of his latest bride, but it happened. Dracula was toppled and killed.

That was three centuries ago, and it had left a crisis of succession that was now on the verge of destroying the whole Clan.

For the intervening centuries it had been the brides who had ruled as regents, using the awesome army of bat-things that Dracula had left behind, not to mention the vast arsenal of weapons, to keep the Clan in order.

But lately it was becoming more and more evident that there was something wrong with them. Their decisions had become chaotic, haphazard, often unreasonable to the point of insanity. Random cruelty was becoming common, with open burnings, often for no reason other than some mild offence to one of them.

And not just that, but their decisions were becoming more and more unsound. Ridiculous demands followed by ultra-harsh punishments, disastrous foreign alliances, all were starting to become the norm rather than the exception.

There had been a time when no coven would have dared to say a word, no matter what was inflicted on them. But the days of Dracula were by now a bit too long gone, and therefore injustices rankled.

This meeting had been called in regards to the latest such injustice. What had happened was that a couple of months ago there had existed a long-standing treaty between the Clan and the Russian house of Alexandrovitch.

Things had been going well, but then Harry Potter had happened , and the whole of their army was cut down to barely more than a tenth of its original size.

Well, the chains were now gone, and this was the time for the obedient dogs to become wolves. Only…they couldn't.

One thing that was right now impossible was to topple the House of Drakul, or at least to do so in a way that let the Clan survive in the aftermath. Too many things were reliant on them, too few alternatives were present. In his time, Dracula had overcome these concerns with sheer, brutal force. Today there was no one powerful enough to utilize that method.

To compound the problem, the covens, not realizing this earlier and thus the danger of it, had been carrying out a campaign to 'end the tyranny of the Drakul' by killing off any promising new members, a campaign made all the more easier by the brides' growing incompetence. By the time they realized just how badly they were screwed, it was far too late. The last heirs of the House had perished in Russia at Harry Potter's hands, which left the whole thing in a giant, twisted knot, only made worse yet because the people supposed to untangle the knot were too busy trying to strangle each other with it (not that they breathed of course).

"I'm telling you, they can't be allowed to stay on! Far too much has been done by them!" the Vampire was bald, tall and immensely fat, the typical vampiric pallor making him look uncannily like a boiled egg wearing clothes.

"I concur, because there is no other option. Trying to turn them into figureheads won't work; they are insane." The second vampire looked a great deal like the stereotypical villain, thin and dressed in black.

"You don't seem to understand. They cannot be removed! Not unless you want us to be easy prey for any hunter who fancies an adventure and a reputation." This was the young-ish one, short and bulky.

They were debating the same thing they had debated in a dozen other meetings, specifically just what to do about the whole matter. Thankfully, there was something interesting planned for this one.

Speaking of, there it was. Mere moments after the third vampire had spoken, the first two had already died, crumbling to ashes as two lances of superheated plasma collided with them. This was followed by a series of full-fledged lightning bolts descending from the stone ceiling to decimate their bodyguards and champions where they were sitting. This was itself followed, not by something even louder and more extravagant, but rather the relatively quiet sound of two vast, ancient stone doors opening.

By now the whole hall was as silent as the grave, most of the vampires staring idly at the spots that their treasonous members had formerly occupied. It was this atmosphere that was disturbed by the heavy thud thud thud of boots, as one after the other grey uniformed soldiers jogged in, taking positions along the walls in what most people here recognized as redcoat firing positions, holding what the Elders realized with a jolt were 'war wands,' trained on each and every one of them.

Here a little break is warranted to explain exactly what war wands were. Simply put, there are pieces of magic within spell-craft that are much, much too destructive to be handled by normal wands, and in any case require things normal wands can't provide. An example would be the fiendfyre laser that had been so effectively demonstrated just moments ago, and would otherwise have burned out any normal wand.

For such powerfully destructive spells, war wands are used, and they did a pretty good job most of the time. And of course, once Harry Potter got his hands on them, they were yet another thing altogether, and by now the readers can pretty well guess just what they would have become.

Either way, they were trained on the hall full of vampires, who were still trying hard to come out of the shocked stupor of having two of their oldest and senior most members made extra crispy.

The first to react were the guards, the elite retinues of the remaining eleven Elders. They rose rapidly from their seats, pulling out weapons of all sorts. Rifles, automatic weapons (magically enhanced, of course), bows, maces, all were drawn and readied, before a series of shots rang out, killing some and knocking out the weapons of the rest.

Then reality dawned, and the Elders rose as one, bowing their heads in surrender.

"Oh sit back down, no need to be so formal." A voice, rich and smooth, came from the doors.

They turned and stared. The figure strolling in was just as distinctive as the events preceding him. Black hair, tall, dressed in robes of the deepest crimson, his skin pale and the eyes the color of the brightest emerald, dancing with a wild, insane ruthlessness that could (and had) sent grown men scurrying before him with a glance. He was a teenager, barely fifteen, but there was nothing young or immature or inexperienced in the way he held himself. Every step he took was that of a confident predator, secure in his domination of all before him, a sort of prowling, graceful gait that promised terrible retribution for the slightest of infractions.

Had they known, they might have been terrified or they might have laughed, for this was officially 'Conqueror Mode #8,' as Harry defined them.

Harry looked imperiously at the gathered vampires. They looked right back. He waited for it… smiling lightly when it came.

"You!" Not surprisingly it was a red-haired vampire, standing up from his position at the far end of the table, the vampire furthest from him.

"Yes, me."

"Murderer! Butcher! You destroyed our people!"

"Yes! I most certainly did!" He answered brightly.

He smiled wide, looking innocently at the seething ancient leeches. Letting his magic rise, he manipulated several minds, triggering the more volatile tempers in the room, those who he knew beforehand were opposed to the Drakul. On cue, they exploded from their positions, trying to rush him, taking strategic positions with what little sense their rage spared them.

He made a show out of raising his hand, before snapping his finger, slowly and dramatically.

When they all burst into flame, he even allowed a smirk to cross his face, more to see the reaction on the faces of the rest than for any other reason. The political and cultural framework of the Nosferatu was already shaken to its core, as with five of the thirteen Elders dead along with their primary heirs, there wasn't going to by any administrative council, nor any new bloodline enthroned (theirs were the eldest bloodlines).

He supposed it would take them a fair amount of time to realize the favor he'd just done them, but that was fine. He walked through the whole room, scanning the faces, making a detailed examination of everything and everyone. Eventually, someone did speak. It was a rather young vampire, not quite managing to suppress the tremor in his voice. "So, Lord Potter, what is it that you're here for, if one may ask?"

"Actually it's Duke, Peter. It is Peter, isn't it? Pyotr Filipovich Kaminsivich Suvorov (many times ancestor of the famous one), born 1101, acclaimed as a master vampire in 1312, ascended to Elder status in 1819 for achievements against the French. You killed him, didn't you? Napoleon's son?

"Yes, Duke, it was me. But that doesn't answer my question, and I do believe my fellows are becoming rather nervous."

"Oh yes, of course. Well, the answer to your question is that I'm here to help you all."

"Oh?"

"Yes, yes. See, for the last oh so many years you've struggled mightily to find proper leadership, and I thought it was just about time to take all those worries off your hands." Harry chirped with the same cheer that he knew was so disturbing in juxtaposition with his appearance and the way he had so casually executed several elder vampires just moments before.

He could see the composure returning to the young vampire, along with a touch of anger. "Would you be so kind as to explain, Duke?"

"Well…how to put it? A year ago I found out that I had a great grandfather. Know his name, do you?"

"Yes, yes, I do."

"And as you know, he had a consort. One of many, of course, but he had one, and she just so happened to birth him a son, who was my grandfather."

"Well, the consort had a name, you know. It was Marya."

The hall went silent. Harry figured that at least a few of these people must have already known, even attended the wedding, but just kept quiet. The reason for that? Well… this exact possibility, to put it simply.

"Recognize the name, do you ?" he asked, deliberately injecting some considerable arrogance into his tone.

"Yes, your grace."

"Yes, I thought as much. The daughter of Count Dracula, born of Anne Drakul, née Valerious, the rightful heiress of his power. It was those worms that I just killed that were responsible for what just happened to her and her mother, weren't they? Answer me!" He spoke the last part in that half-yelling, half-normal way that often characterized failing self control, aware of the trick's power to open mouths and obtain unguarded admissions.

No one responded. They were far too canny, and had recovered far too much for such tricks to work. Harry didn't need them to, however. The story of what had happened to Anne and Marya was typical of how stupidity was rewarded in the real world, and he didn't need anyone to educate him on this particular example. Marya was the daughter of Lord Dracula, centuries old, yet not really all that hardened. She had seen the young, dynamic Gellert/Darius and had fallen hard. The match was advantageous to all, so it went on with the brides' blessing.

Then a child was born, and that was Ambrosius. A good, happy baby, but nothing extraordinary. That was one matter.

Taking advantage of Dumbledore's rampage through Berlin to kill the baby's mother and grandmother was quite another, and that was exactly what the Elders that were now cooling piles of ash had done.

The result had been Ambrosius taking refuge with the Chandravanshis, and fathering a daughter with a Lamia, of all beings. Well, as far as the world knew he had fathered two, Liliana and Erebus .

But that too was another matter. The point was that Harry had the first part of what was needed for any claim to the vampire throne. His inheritance, that is, was perfectly credible and possessing a very valid claim.

In an ideal world that would have been enough.

Ideal worlds are just as boring as they are impossible .

What remained was for that claim to be proven. It would have been much harder for any non-related vamp, but what he was facing could not be called easy either.

Traditionally every bloodline put up a champion, and the claimant to the throne had to take down all of them. These matches were invariably to the death, and had done a very thorough job of reducing the Drakul line to its present condition.

Well, Harry was thankful.

"So, shall we get on with it, then?"

"Shall we get on with what, your grace? You just barge in here, and expect us to treat you as a legal-"

Whoosh

Harry turned his gaze away from his seventh vampire elder slaying today.

"As I was saying. Shall we get on with it?" He said as if nothing had happened as all, even as a dozen potent spells darted from his fingertips to rip apart the dead vampire's retinue.

"Y-Yes, your grace."

Harry was starting to enjoy this, despite his sociopathy. Such power… these very beings would have been serious, terrible threats to him just months ago, in all three fields, their canniness, their political and business acumen and their personal power. Now… they weren't even ants to be squashed beneath his heel.

He supposed one important bit of it was that Vlad had done an amazing job of culling away the really threatening ones, leaving the younger bloodlines only. But even they were formidable, by average standards at least.

And now there were only seven left.

"Well, people? I know we actually do have forever, but I have plans."

His answer was in the form of six gestures, resulting in the bloodline champions stepping forward, hulking and rippling, striding up from their former positions.

Till they stopped, freezing under the gaze of the visibly angry seventh Elder. Harry didn't need legilimency to know what message passed between them, before the champions backed up several steps, before coming to a dead stop

"With all due respect, Duke. You are not going to get a great deal accomplished if all you can do is threaten and destroy us. If that is your entire strategy then you might as well finish off all of us right now." Suvorov said, not arrogantly, but resolutely.

From that moment on his future as Harry's favorite vampire was assured . Harry responded, still in the same ridiculously saccharine tones. "But that is the last thing I want to do, Lord Suvorov. As I have already said, all I want to do is to press my perfectly legitimate claim and take what is mine."

"And you shall have it, sir, but not like this. I believe you know the procedure quite well, possibly better than us all. So show us that I'm right. You have taken the first step, you've made your claim. Now take the second. Prove it."

Harry could have been angry and insisted that that was exactly what he had done. But that would be a lie, and far more importantly, it was unnecessary.

He said instead, "If that is what you want, honored lords, then of course, I have no objections."

Then he revealed himself.

The gods, when Harry had first ascended, had said Harry had gone halfway through divinity, substituting 'a great deal' of his physical self with magic, but nowhere near all.

Harry had, over the last several weeks, come to understand just what that had meant. For one thing, his metamorph powers were now enhanced. It made sense, too. Metamorphism was the control of one's flesh using magic. Reducing the flesh and increasing the magic was a surefire way to improving it.

But that wasn't what Harry meant. What he meant was that when he turned, he truly turned. Mind, thoughts, mannerisms, all were perfect, almost to the point of copying the subject's soul itself.

The downside? The 'almost' was insurmountable. Well, near enough to it.

Harry could not steal the soul of any person just by taking their physical appearance. But that still left a great many benefits. Vlad, his three uncles, and all his alter identities were now impenetrable , with each having perfect magical signatures, cores, everything. That was an advantage.

The other was being revealed now, as Harry's skin turned chalk-white, teeth morphing into barely detectable fangs, his scent changing, all attributes turning into ones fit for, not a full vampire, but rather a Dhampir.

It was not just an appearance. That, any sufficiently skilled metamorph could do. No, in this case the beauty was not at all just skin deep. He became a half-vampire, right down to the last detail. That was the advantage. Obviously, the forms needed to be prepared in advance, with rather rigorous and time consuming effort at that, or he would have thousands of animagus forms by now, but there was no limitation whatsoever on what he could become.

And of course, he couldn't have a simple transformation. Harry let his power come fully to the fore, saturating every bit of his body thoroughly and completely, and then he let it wash out, ebbing and flowing in wave after wave of raw power, crashing against the minds and cores of everyone in a hundred mile radius. He activated spells and enchantments crafted lovingly, shaping that power into raw charisma, while at the same time the raw magic that went untouched by them worked its effects. The walls of the room rippled, trying simultaneously to shy away from him and to embrace him, while the air was filled with a dozen fragrances, prominent among them was venom and ozone. Those very fragrances rushed this way and that, following cuts that opened in the tapestries and on the pale skins of the vampires as the wind itself was sharpened. Shadows squirmed and moved, while a slight keening sound, like that from a hound chained too long filled the background.

These and a dozen other effects unfolded, while Harry went beyond even his core. Instead, he focused on the place. There was power here, a great deal of it. Slaughters had been carried out here, millions of times the magnitude of what he'd just done. The power of the unfulfilled dreams of hundreds of thousands of human victims, of the collected depravity of thousands of sinful immortals, they all lurked here, within the very bones of this place. Chaste virgins had been raped and mind-washed till they were the worst of harlots, savages had been worshipped, mass murderers treated as heroes. All of that had power, and all of that power was gathered unto himself.

Naturally, it had been used. Quite often, actually. But not in a way that reduced the quantity. Using power derived from past atrocities to commit fresh ones never did anything to heal the past, and that meant that the power, while tapped into, had never truly diminished.

What happened was that it was crushed. It was like taking a sugarcane and juicing it, and then jury-rigging a device so that that juice was used to carry out further juicing. In this case there was an endless supply of liquid in the cane, given as more was created with the very act of juicing, but that didn't stop it from becoming a pitiful pulp.

The power in this place was that pulp. Beaten and crushed, if it had a color it would have been a deep, ugly purple, the color of the very worst of bruises.

It would take a demented mind to even touch that power, one without even a trace of empathy to even begin using it.

So Harry opened the floodgates, and took it all in like Ronald Weasley did at a buffet. As the entire hall was swathed in the crushing, poisonous essence of the power of all that was negative, Harry spoke with a terrible power. "Is this proof enough?"

He didn't wait for an answer, before letting go of the power. Not back out, of course not. That would have been the sensible, proper way, given that this much exposure would leave permanent marks on the soul. But not on Harry's, his soul was untouched and would remain so, because the power all went into the void. The formless ether could take anything and everything without being affected in the least, and this was no exception.

But it served its purpose, and it does not require much effort to surmise what happened next.

Twenty Minutes Later

(A.N: Verona, Marishka, Aleera are from the movie Van Helsing. Mina is, well, the hottest one you can find. Oh, and tell me.)

Vlad IV , Voivode of Romania, Count of Transylvania, Chieftain of the Wallach, Prince of the Gypsies, Clan lord of the Nosferatu, Dracula the Second, Lord Drakul and holder of several other titles stood before the door to the suite of rooms that he had been informed was by far the grandest in the land. That was not what was on his mind. The occupants were.

By all accounts the four queens of Dracula, brides if you wanted to be particular, had been almost totally insane in recent years. That, in Harry's mind, was enough for an immediate death sentence. But there was something he hadn't told his new advisers. During his ascension, he had felt four strong bursts of mind magic rushing from himself to this very location.

Now there could be two reasons, one being that they were all now brain dead and therefore out of his way, the other being that Harry had just found and cured the cause of their insanity. Knowing his luck, he was betting on the second.

He was right.

As the door opened, Harry looked to see four of the finest examples of lethal sensuality to ever exist. He looked around, up and down, and confirmed detachedly that the suite really was as magnificent as it'd been boasted to be.

"So… I just became the new Voivode." He said, cursing his lips every other second, leaving the ones in between to curse his current instincts. The vampire was a deeply sexual being, and this form had been just the spark needed to reignite the previously dormant lusts of the werewolf, dragon, basilisk and kraken, not to mention the combined lusts of dozens of gods (the male ones, who had been, and still were, utter and absolute horn dogs of the highest order).

"Yes, you did." That one was Mina, he realized from the accent. Wilhelmina Harker, originally wife of a senior solicitor for a Goldia Alley firm, now a vampire seductress. The Victorianism had been charmed right out of her, Harry could see (and was very, very glad for it).

Crippled as it was, it took Harry's brain one whole second to realize that yes, the brides did intend to do exactly what he thought they would. It took a further centillionth of a second for it to work out the fact that Harry had no objection whatsoever.

Still, formalities were formalities. " You do realize that you are akin to my grandmothers ." He said in an attempt as much challenging as it was disparaging.

"I did not know you were the sort who cared for such trivialities, my Lord," a new voice responded to his left. Harry turned to see a black haired black eyed beauty of a woman who was very obviously one of the spoils from Dracula's Ottoman adventures, from what he could deduce from her facial features. Then there was a rustle of cloth.

As the belly dancing outfit pooled around her legs, Harry quietly sent all such formalities straight to hell. Then, as if to confirm the end of the very brief drama, a second sound of tearing cloth was followed by the feeling of claws digging deep into his chest. He could have removed them, of course, had he not felt the very distinctive, ahem, presence, on his back. Hypersensitive mini-scales told him all he needed to know even through the two layers of cloth, and his last thought, before deep, overpowering lust smashed all barriers aside, was something like 'Whoopee!'

The suite, alas, lost all of its former splendor. As did the whole floor. And the floor below, for that matter.

One has it on reliable testimony that somewhere, somehow, a vampire whose name the world was still terrified of, laughed very, very loudly.