Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter or the characters of his universe, I just play in that sandbox for fun and without pay or any form of remuneration other than reviews and private messages; which are fortunately non-taxable.
AN: You freaking kidding me? Over 510 reviews with only 3 chapters?! And the host of ideas, they've been great and some have inspired me to play out other options as your thoughts helped prompt my muse and add to the chaos in my mind. Thanks for the following and I hope you continue to enjoy the story. As for updates, sorry it took so long for this chapter to come out, I've traveled multiple time zones for business and the all-day meetings and lack of real sleep at night means that I've only had about a half an hour a day to type. That said, here's the next installment and keep those ideas coming. Cheers!
'Thoughts are in italics'
"Things Said, or Things Written"
Chapter 4: They Call It A Grind For A Reason
Harry had worked off the fear through the therapeutic practice known as "screaming his head off." Yes, Harry Potter had moved beyond the fear, passed go, did not collect 200 dollars, and went straight to angry. Angry at Mr. Tibbles, but also angry at himself. And nobody liked either one of them when they were angry. Why people didn't like Mr. Tibbles when the kneazle was angry was pretty self-explanatory, the little kneazle was downright frightening.
Why people didn't like Harry when he was angry, well, it was because he was a broody emo little bastard and was annoying to be around; just like the level 1 charisma warning stated.
Harry sat on the invisible floor, legs splayed out in front of him and hands resting behind him on the dark surface of the floating nothingness. He just sat there, in the dark, and stewed as he stared at the large screen floating in front of him asking if he wanted to reload from a saved game.
"I've been a bloody fucking idiot. More nutty than a Lovegood and more prideful than a Malfoy." Harry cursed at himself in a bout of self-loathing.
"Griffindor, griffindor, griffindor, bloody griffiindor has to go be the one always running forward and never looking back to see if he missed something or trod over something in our path. Bah!" Harry threw his arms up in the air from his seated position and slumped backwards, his head rebounding off the rather hard but invisible floor.
Harry welcomed the pain in the back of his head as it helped to focus his thoughts.
He mentally cursed his lack of foresight in not spending more time just grinding his strength and stamina skills up. He berated himself for not stopping to realize that he could have just reloaded from his last auto-save that happened before he was thrown out of the school and the library, and he doubly cursed himself for not taking better advantage of his saved spots. He had been acting exactly like the Harry that had gone off to let Voldemort kill him, and he didn't like that Harry.
Harry thought to himself, 'This is a game, yet it's not a game, it's my life and I can't lose focus of that for one moment. I need to save more often, grind everything, loot everything, and use that Slytherin cunning that saw me survive the Dursleys without dying of malnutrition by the age of 10. There is a way to win this game, whatever the ending, and I'm going to find it." After all, games were meant to be won by somebody, and it was his goal to be the winner this time.
A minute passed as he silently thought to himself as he lay on his back and stared into the darkness, the only light issuing off the floating screen.
Another minute passed, and Harry finally had enough of his own brooding.
"Bah! Enough of this." Harry pushed himself up with one swift motion and then bounced to his feet.
"Screw you programmer, I'm going to beat you." Harry growled, shaking his fist at the large glowing screen in front of him.
"I'm going to do every mission in this stupid tutorial level. I'm going to discover every hidden item, every golden snitch and every way that I can milk your bloody stupid program for all its worth. I'm going to cheat so badly that if people knew what I was doing they would think that I was pulling a Draco Malfoy taking a potions exam in Snape's class." Harry growled, and then glared at the screen as he continued to speak from between his teeth, "And I'm going to Kill Mr. Tibbles, mark my words."
Harry paused, his teeth grinding together in anger as he waited to see if he would get a response. Yet just like the last time, none was forthcoming. And yet, he had learned the grinder's motto: the level isn't done until every bit of experience is milked; every item, no matter how worthless, collected; and every defeatable enemy crushed.
"Would you like to reload from a saved game, yes or no?" Was the only response as it continued to shine from the screen in front of him.
"Reload last save." Harry growled, and the world around him flashed, depositing him in front of the two teenagers holding the kitten in the bag.
Harry pulled out the Surrey slugger and stepped forward towards the first of the two teens, who turned towards Harry once Harry stepped within the 5 foot range.
"Avast Matey!" Harry growled, his "Arr Yer a Pirate" perk affecting his words, as Harry put both hands on his cricket bat and pulled it back over his shoulder as he stepped forward while winding up his entire body.
"Wait, what?" The teen closest to Harry answered, totally confused as he turned around, just in time to get Harry's two handed swing of the Surrey Slugger right to the face.
"Face Shot, Critical hit! Knockdown! Groin Stomp activated!"
"Arrrrrr!" Harry cheered and hoisted the Surrey Slugger in the air in triumph as he took out his frustration by pulling his knee to his chest before depositing the heel of his combat boot firmly in the fallen teen's groin and giving it an extra twist; all while making eye contact with the other teenager.
"Oy, that's just not right—Run Away!" The second teenager paled as he saw Harry's brutality, dropped the bag with the cat and sprinted away before Harry could attack him.
"One Level 2 Weak Teenage Hooligan defeated, 0 experience, +1 Two-Handed skill. Loot body? Y or N?"
"Aye ya bloody bastard," Harry growled in reply, which the games programming translated to a "yes." Harry didn't even care that he was talking like a pirate at the moment, he was just frustrated.
"You found 1 Leather Jacket, 1 Switchblade and 15 pounds muggle."
"Grrrrr." Harry's growl was the only reply, as apparently the greyed out names meant he wouldn't get any more experience from defeating the teenagers, and apparently they had learned the same lesson as he had from Mr. Tibbles. Dangerous things came in little cute packages; though at least on Harry the leather jacket and barbwire wrapped cricket bat were a bit of a giveaway as to the dangerous part.
"Release kneazle and complete mission? Y, N?" Flashed above the bag that was moving on the ground as the cat inside struggled to get loose.
"I swear to god, if you're anything like Mr. Tibbles I'm going to skin you and wear you for a hat—ah, who am I kidding, I'd probably pee myself." Harry groused to himself as the pirate perk stopped forcing him to speak like a privateer and he reached down to the bag and pulled open the loose tie that was holding the bag shut.
"Saved the Kneazle! Mission success, +200 Experience and +5 to Care For Magical Creatures."
The bag flopped open and a flat faced ugly ball of mottled orange and brown fur tumbled out of the bag and then looked up at Harry.
Harry glared down at the kneazle kitten while clothed in all his hooligan glory: leather jacket, punk-rock t-shirt, jeans and combat boots, holding the Surrey Slugger as it rested on his shoulder.
In return, the kitten looked up at Harry, blinked incredibly cute eyes up at him, and then purred before rubbing up against Harry's leg.
Kneazles were magical felines and despite all Harry's anger and frustration he was still a trustworthy and good guy, and Kneazles could tell that type of thing.
"Yeah yeah fuzzball." Harry sighed, put his cricket bat away in his inventory, and leaned down to pet the little kitten and felt his earlier anger start to leave him.
The kneazle kitten pushed its head into Harry's hand and then moved its head until Harry's fingers found the spot just behind and under the kitten's ear, the kitten's purr becoming even louder when Harry's scratching fingers rubbed the right spot.
Harry couldn't help but smile, the kitten's actions helped relieve the last remnants of stress and frustration at getting his ass kicked by Mr. Tibbles.
Like most cats, the kitten only stayed still to get pet for a few moments before deciding that it wanted to be elsewhere and scampered off for Ms. Figg's cat door on the front of her house; not to be confused with the cat door on the side of Ms. Figg's house, the cat door on the other side of her house, or the cat door on the back of her house.
Harry just shook his head as he stood up, and smiled.
Looking around, Harry paused as his focus rested on the path around the side of Ms. Figg's house; towards where he knew the Herding Cat's and now infamous Nine Lives missions were.
Harry had a plan, or at least a small semblance of a plan in a very rough almost lack of a plan type of plan. Ok, so he knew he needed to get better and that was about it, he wasn't Hermione after all. Alright, so he was still going to fly by the seat of his pants, but he knew where he could start, just like he had at the beginning.
"It's time to finish exploring this place and hopefully gain some more strength and bonuses." Harry said with a big inhale of air which he held before letting it out along with the tension he had been holding.
"But first, we have to do something with this body, and what Aunt Petunia doesn't know will actually make her roses healthier." Harry smirked, pulled out his Hufflepuff Shovel and brought it down with a loud sloppy chopping sound as he disposed of the body in the tried and true Hufflepuff style; he was making fertilizer.
"+1 to Herbology!" The game cheerfully stated.
"Snape's Septic Scalp Wash! Does every one of these bloody golden snitches have to reside in the most awkward spot possible?!" Harry cursed as he pulled himself up to the apex of a neighbor's roof five blocks away from number 4 Privet Drive. Golden snitch number 5 for Harry was darting back and forth, dodging Harry's grasping right hand while his left hung on tightly to the horse shaped weathervane on the absolute summit of the roof. It had been a tough climb, a bounce onto a hedge, then pulled himself up onto a drain spout that barely held his four year old weight, then a scamper up the pipe while watching his stamina bar slowly decrease; hoping that he reached the roof before his stamina bar wore out and no doubt dropped him to the ground two stories below. The other snitches hadn't been any easier to catch being at the top of trees, dangling above the top of the monkey bars at the park, or this one here on the top of a two story house. The fact that the snitches were all hidden at high altitudes in tough to reach spots made sense in that weird dark humor "let's make Harry suffer" type of way, and Harry really was beginning to expect that type of thing from the bastard who was programming his life's game.
Harry swung his right hand at the rapidly dodging golden snitch which was so far keeping out of his grasp.
"Why!" Harry swung his hand to the right as the snitch dodged to the left and Harry growled at the snitch through his teeth.
"Won't!" Harry swung his hand to the left to try and catch it again but missed again as the snitch darted right above Harry's head.
"Stay!" Harry growled as he let go of the weathervane with his left hand and attempted to use both hands to clasp the snitch between both hands, but the snitch dodged downwards and hovered right in front of Harry's eyes.
"Still! Ah Ha! Got ya." Harry cheered as he darted forward with both hands and snagged the snitch.
"Congratulations, you caught a golden snitch! 5/200 caught. +500 Experience and unlock cheat code "Bobble-Head characters."
"What the hell, all of that for-" Harry's incredulous statement was cut off by the fact that he realized he was falling.
The snitch seemed to dissolve into whatever place captured snitches disappeared to, which didn't really help Harry one way or the other as he plummeted forward while flailing his arms like some demented penguin that forgot it was a flightless bird.
"Craaaaaapppp-iiiittt!" Harry shouted as he and his voice disappeared over the edge of the house as gravity took control; closing his eyes and covering his head right before he landed in the neighbor's bushy begonias and barely missed the large rose bush.
"Owww" Harry gasped as he flopped over, lying on his back once again and staring up at the sky as five of his precious hearts disappeared and became grey ghosts of what they once were.
"Ding! Congratulations, you've received the trophy "I can Fly!—Nope, I was wrong." Fall more than two stories and live to tell about it. We suggest using a broom next time."
"Har, Har, Har." Harry groused between gasping for the air that had been knocked out of his lungs; his mock laughter prefaced by two fingers being thrust once again into the air.
This was getting to be a reoccurring theme…
"Bobble-heads, all that bloody work for something that just makes everybody's heads extra-large and go all wibbly-wobbly. Bah!" Harry groused, going back into the menu commands and turning off the cheat code for Bobble-Heads.
"Maybe if I was trying to take pot shots at enemies from a distance that would be helpful, but otherwise that was a complete waste of time." He snarked to himself as he bounced down the road after fully discovering the rest of the Little Whinging neighborhood.
He'd gained more levels in stamina and another +3 to strength in the time he had been bouncing around, not to mention finding and capturing the other four golden snitches. The Little Whinging neighborhood was boring, other than the school and the park it was nothing but homes that he couldn't get into; some of the doors appeared to be just paintings and not even real doors.
"How the hell did I miss that last time." Harry groused to himself, realizing that the ill-fitting and nonprescription glasses Petunia had forced upon Harry in his last life really were that bad, or he had been an absolute idiot not to notice the problem with doors that weren't doors.
He needed a break from the monotony and then he was going to try and sneak into the Dursley's house and see if he couldn't steal some of his aunt's hair-pins so he could get back into the school. But for now he was ready for a bit of adventure.
Harry approached the mission called, "We're Making Whoopie" and couldn't help but think that he had heard that phrase somewhere before. The Polkis house, where the mission was located, was right down the street from the Dursleys' and looked remarkably similar to every other house on the block. The grass was mowed short and not a leaf or branch nor piece of garbage marred the pristine grassy yard. In fact, the only difference between the Polkis house and the other houses on the block was the milk truck parked in the driveway. Harry thought he remembered that Mr. Polkis worked at a bank during the day but that was so long ago considering it was from his early first life that he could have been wrong. Shrugging to himself, Harry bounced out of the backyard and towards the side of Piers Polkis's house where the silver exclamation point hovered.
"Dee-Do, We're Making Whoopie. The back window of the Polkis house is open, and you are hearing terrible screams and the sounds of shattering glass issue from the house. Best be quiet and sneak up to see what is happening. Mission reward 100 experience and +10 to sneak skill."
"Sounds easy enough, but how do I sneak?" Harry asked, and helpfully enough a tutorial popped up just as if it expected to receive that very question.
"Thieves do it from behind." The tutorial was titled before describing the game mechanics, "Queensbury rules to difficult for you? You'd rather be a dishonorable, unchivalrous, backstabbing, underhanded rogue would you? Well jolly good on you old chap! Sneaking allows you to not be heard and hopefully not be seen if you do it right and have the right level of skill. Become a master of the Sneak skill and enemies will lose sight of you when you drop into sneak while in combat, allowing you to break off attacks that relying on sight to target you and allowing you to deal devastating bonus damage and get a bonus to initiative and surprise attacks when you are sneaking and deliver a backstab. To sneak, all you need to do is crouch down and watch that you stay out of vision of the target or targets you are hiding from. The easiest way to do this is to stay quiet and stay behind your target, staying in their blind spots and hugging to the shadows where it is harder to see you; staying still in the shadows is particularly helpful. Your sneaking skill will increase as you stay hidden from your targets, neither making too much sound nor being seen. You can tell if you are seen by how open the eye in the middle of your screen is or how far you go into the red on the "sneaky sound meter" while you are in sneak mode. Try it out, but stay quiet. Be warned that you will cause a lot of noise when first learning to sneak."
The tutorial shut and the words "Sneak skill 0" popped up in his vision before fading away.
"This doesn't look so hard." Harry said to himself with a smirk as he looked across the soft grass and clear yard towards the window that was open about ten meters away.
Harry crouched down, and took one step forward.
"Crack!" A loud cracking sound quickly drew Harry's attention downwards to see a stick crunched under his foot.
"What the hell." Harry whispered in confusion, looking around to make sure the rest of his path towards the house was clear.
Harry took another step, only for his foot to get stuck in a bucket.
"Ack!" Harry tried to stay crouched yet hopped on one foot while trying to get his left foot out of the bucket- only to step on a garden rake that hadn't been there before.
"Thwack!" The rake shot up like something out of a slapstick comedy routine and smacked Harry right in the nose.
"Merwin's Bwuddy Buggers!" Harry clutched his crushed nose and cursed as his eyes leaked tears and a part of a heart disappeared; fortunately the bucket fell off his foot and he was able to stop hopping around long enough to make sure his nose wasn't bleeding.
Harry looked in front of him to double check that the path was clear, and sure enough, there wasn't a single twig, bucket, rake or other noise producing product situated in his path. He only had roughly 5 meters left to go to get to the window, and he needed to stay as quiet as possible.
If he hadn't been convinced before this, Harry's next 5 meters truly showed that the game programmers had it out for him.
First it was the pinecones crunching under his step.
Then a tin pail full of pence coins got stuck on his foot and rattled like crazy until he could get it off.
Then the game put a pile of fine china plates in his path that he knocked over with a crash.
Then a bike's horn which he stepped on and caused it to honk.
And finally there was the sleeping dog's tail he accidentally stepped on, causing the dog to howl and yip as it ran away scared.
Finally he reached the window, and it was a surprise he hadn't failed the mission for how loud he had been.
But apparently not as surprising as what he saw when he looked in the window.
Mrs. Polkis was a big lady, about 350 pounds, and the mustache wearing milk man thrusting between her naked thighs was definitely close to 400; and also not Mr. Polkis. Several milk bottles had fallen off the table causing a mix of glass and milk to cover the floor while Mrs. Polkis was sprawled out totally naked and covered in milk laying on the kitchen table while the two of them looked like a couple of mating walrus.
"AAAAAAAAAHHHHH My Eyes!" Harry screamed in anguish as he stumbled back from the window.
"Mission failed! You made too much noise." Popped up in the visuals of the screen, but Harry ignored it as he was pawing at his eyes.
"I can't get it out of my head! I can't get it out of my head!" Harry whimpered before turning to the bushes and throwing up the most recently eaten burnt bacon.
Harry closed his eyes, and a moment later when he opened them he was again standing in front of the mission for "We're Making Whoopie." Once again the path to the back window was free and clear of any obstructions and there were no signs of the items that would cause noise if Harry attempted to walk towards the window; not that he wanted to do so.
Harry paled further when he thought about attempting the mission again.
"Uh, there has got to be a better way to gain levels in sneak, Urp!" Harry almost puked again but covered his mouth and swallowed it again at the thought of having to see that horrible image again just to gain some experience.
Harry turned away from the mission and looked back towards the front of the house, hoping to see something that could distract his imagination from the horror that had been imprinted in his mind.
The mailman walking down the sidewalk waved at Harry as he passed, which was weird because Harry had already seen the man circle this block and deliver the mail here at least once if not twice today.
Harry waved back, only to stop mid-wave as a new idea came to his mind.
"Maybe—Nah, it can't be that easy." Harry said to himself, his arm stopped in the air as he thought, only to realize he was standing there looking like an idiot and dropped his hand.
Harry looked around as the mail man delivered mail to the next door neighbors and walked back towards the sidewalk. Harry realized this was the same mailman who had ignored the fact that Harry had killed and stripped two teenage hooligans right in the middle of the sidewalk and in bright daylight.
"Well, it wouldn't hurt to try." Harry said with a shrug before crouching down and activating sneak mode as he tailed the mailman.
"Squeek!"
"Crunch!"
"Honk!"
"Beep!"
"Yip!"
Every step made a new sound as Harry silently flipped the bird towards the sky; Harry's bird flipping being the only silent thing about him at the moment.
"+1 Sneak" Flashed in his vision as he smirked.
"It's worth the annoyance" Harry said with a smirk, his combat boots briefly turning into a pair of clown shoes that honked with each step before suddenly turning back to normal combat boots.
Harry would continue to follow the mail man, slowly but surely making less and less noise, becoming stealthier and stealthier as time went by and he continued to gain levels in sneak while the mailman in front of Harry never bothered to turn around.
Eighty nine points.
That was Harry had gained 89 points in sneak before he hit the wall and couldn't sneak any more. The day spent following the mailman had been very successful. More area traversed, another plus 3 to strength gained along with multiple levels in stamina, and like stated before 89 points towards his sneak skill.
Harry was the wind, he was as one with the silence of night even in the middle of the daytime, he was like an house elf playing the silence game, he was well on the path to being one sneaky son of a bitch; and even Lily Potter referred to herself as a bitch during a certain time of the month and she would have agreed that her son was now very sneaky.
Yes, all was smooth sailing for Harry Potter as he silently crept behind the ever whistling ever walking Little Whinging Mailman.
The hours had past for Harry in mindless sneaking, and long gone were the occasional bouts of honking clown shoes suddenly appearing on his feet. Long gone were the sudden buckets, twigs, pinecones or rakes appearing in his path and underfoot. He could have kept going, well if it was his choice he would have. But he really hit a wall.
And by hitting the wall, Harry literally went face first into a wall and wasn't able to sneak forward any more.
Come rain or shine or dark of night, nothing could stop the mailman—not even the invisible wall that separated Little Whinging and Big Whinging. The problem was Harry apparently didn't have the same powers of movement as the non-player character mailman.
Harry hit the wall with a crunch, which was his nose going crunch followed by his forehead ricocheting off the invisible surface spanning the sidewalk, followed then by his inertia causing his body to smash into the wall and sending him stumbling back as his arse hit the sidewalk.
"Morgana's Mouthful Mammaries that hurt!" Harry sat on the concrete cursing as he clutched his nose, his eyes watering from the sudden pain to his face.
"Did somebody forget to tell Hagrid not to stand on the street under an invisibility cloak?" Harry asked, not expecting an answer as he reached out with the hand that wasn't busy clutching his noggin and felt around until his hand came in contact with the solid invisible surface.
Harry's touch failed to feel anything but a smooth hard surface under his fingers. It wasn't hot, it wasn't cold, and there were no feelings of a tingling enchantment or a shimmering cloak of invisibility. It was just an invisible wall that was hard and as unmoving as solid steel yet strangely porous as the light and even the breeze filtered through it unhindered. In fact, the only thing it seemed to do was keep Harry locked into this little chunk of Surrey.
Harry shook his head and pushed his way to his feet.
Harry turned his head to the left and right, moving his head until the side of his cheek pressed against the hard invisible surface as he tried to see if he could figure out if there was any way to see how far the wall extended.
Harry couldn't remember heading into Big Whinging in his previous life; Petunia and Vernon considered Big Whinging the wrong side of town for such 'upstanding citizens' as themselves. Rather the Dursleys preferred to shop at the pricier stores in London even though it was more of a drive and cost more, but then again the Dursleys were the type of pretentious fobs who cared about their brand of toilet paper even though it was exactly the same as the cheaper brand and just had a different label slapped on it.
"It seems to span the entire street." Harry mumbled to himself, placing his hands against the invisible wall and moving laterally out into the street while lifting and then pressing each hand against the surface. Harry walked while moving his hands one next to the other against the wall and across the street onto the grass of the neighbor across the street from where he had started.
Out of the corner of his eye Harry could see a little picket fence that was easy to step over, and Harry picked his way through the many ornate stone lawn gnomes that spanned the neighbor's grass, focusing most of his attention as he tried to feel if there were any breaks in the invisible wall so he could explore the rest of the world.
"Get off me Damn lawn ya bloody Mime!" A voice from Harry's right startled him and caused him to quickly look at the front porch to where an old pensioner with a beard and crazy hairstyle walked out his door shaking an iron pipe in Harry's direction while clothed in cargo shorts and an open Hawaiian shirt. "I know ya bloody mimes are after me lawn gnomes and you won't get em without a fight!"
Harry was about to argue that he wasn't a mime, but then noticed two things.
First, Harry was in fact doing a fair imitation of a mime pretending to have an invisible wall in front of him.
Second, upon taking one look at the old pensioner Harry's blood went cold.
"Old Man Henderson" was the name hovering over the man's head; only rather than crimson red or any color Harry had seen before it was a light absorbing black and bore in italics the word "Invincible" next to his title.
It was at this point that Harry realized that the creators of his so called video game life were serious about keeping Harry from trying to get over, under or around this particular invisible wall. Because if Mr. Tibbles was crimson red, then Harry didn't want anything to do with a character as crazy and as high leveled as to have a level and title as black and promising death as Old Man Henderson's.
Harry turned around, knocked over a lawn gnome in the process, and sprinted like the very elder gods of hell were after him.
"Blasted gosh darn mimes, their always after me gnomes." The old man said to himself as he set his lawn gnome back up and went back into his house.
Harry in turn was long gone, out of sight, and promising never to try and seek a path into Big Whinging again.
"Ok, You can do this Harry, you can do this!" Harry pumped himself up for what he was about to do, bouncing on his toes and shaking his head back and forth to loosen up his neck as he prepared for what promised to be the biggest challenge to date.
"Every bit of experience gained, every item collected, every enemy crushed. Every bit of Experience gained, every item collected, every enemy crushed." Harry mumbled this statement to himself several times like a holy mantra that would hopefully protect him; praying to the patron saint of game grinders.
"You've upped your sneak, and there is nothing to stop you now, I can do this, I Can Do This." Harry finished with a growl, punched the mission exclamation point and quickly crept forward.
The sight of two walrus's mating in human form once again hit Harry in the gut like a sucker punch.
"Murphle!" Harry shoved his fist into his mouth to stifle the scream of anguish as he fell to his knees and dry heaved his empty stomach; the taste of bile in his mouth.
"Ding! Mission Complete! +100 experience and +10 to sneak." The screen cheerfully flashed before Harry's vision.
Harry didn't even notice, his glassy pale eyes stuck in a thousand yard stare as he mumbled to himself over and over again.
"The horror… The horror."
Harry walked past the three Dursley chore missions when he read in the mission details that completion of them would advance time and end the tutorial; Harry wasn't leaving this level without milking it for all the experience possible, getting back into the school, and most of all defeating Mr. Tibbles.
Harry walked up to the front of the Dursley house and crouched down before silently opening the front door, all 99 of his hard earned sneak points coming in handy.
"Did you hear about what happened to Helen Matherson from down the street?" One of the ladies in the neighborhood gossip/book club asked snidely before taking a sip of tea.
One or two women twittered, and Harry heard Petunia cut in, "About her husband being demoted at work and them having to move because they can't make the mortgage? My dear Dorthy, where have you been, that is practically last month's news."
Harry peaked around the corner of the foyer and into the living room where Petunia was smugly smiling at another lady who was frowning at Petunia's dig and undermining. Both women were hiding their respective looks politely behind tea cups and were staring at each other.
Harry took that opportunity to sneak up the stairs, hop silently over the squeaky board above Harry's cupboard that Dudley liked to jump on in the mornings, and pad up to the upstairs bedrooms.
The house's upstairs was a treasure trove of knick knacks to be collected.
"Gained one box of broken jagged jacks, Gained one box of matches, Gained one pack of cigarettes, Gained one can of dipping tobacco. Found one hundred pounds muggle."
"Merlin, apparently Dudley was an early bloomer on the controlled substances." Harry whispered wide eyed as he went through Dudley's second bedroom and found Dudley's secret stash; and quite a stash it was for a kindergartner. Harry had lived in the second bedroom for several years, so knew all the good hiding spots. Not to say that Dudley had used one of the good spots, rather the stash was merely hidden under a pile of worn out toy trucks and other broken toys.
Other than the secret stash and the broken jacks, the jacks being listed as a weapon in Harry's inventory, Harry only found one other item of note that was worthwhile. "Gained one dog squeaky toy." Harry recognized it as a chew toy that Marge Dursley had given her nephew Dudley so that Dudley and her bulldogs could play together; that is when Dudley and the dog's favorite game of choice wasn't 'fetch the freak' aka chase Harry up a tree.
"Ding!" A tutorial popped up in Harry's vision when he picked up the squeaky toy. "Be vewy vewy qwuiet, its hunt'n season." The tutorial was titled before diving into more in depth discussion on Harry's latest find.
"Congratulations, you've found bait. Bait can be used to draw animals or creatures to a specific location so they can be collected, corralled or even hunted. Some items have multiple use as both ingredients for food, craft items as well as being used for bait. Trust us, the bait works very well for its particular type of target creature."
"Trust you? Trust you to screw me over more like." Harry groused before the item disappeared into Harry's inventory. Then it was onto Dudley's bedroom.
Now most people would think that Dudley's bedroom would be a sloppy mess, and frankly you would be right if it was left up to Dudley. However Dudley Dursley's bedroom was almost always kept pristine.
Every day Dudley would get out of bed, leaving behind a wet spot because he hadn't learned not to soil his bedding at night, scratch his bum, and head to the shower. As soon as Dudley left the door Petunia would come in, straighten up the room, change out the sheets and padding for clean dry linens, and give the room a nice spritz of lemon air-freshener to hide the manly sweat smell of her darling pudgy boy.
Into this room crept one Harry Potter.
"Jackpot!" Harry quietly cheered, for on the shelves were several never opened books that glowed the hue of skill books.
"The Pugilist, Queensbury rules" gave Harry an additional +3 to Unarmed combat. The rest of the books made Harry laugh as well as gain levels, as the titles were perfect for Dudley even though none of the books had ever been opened.
"French language for dummies," +3 to French.
"Chemistry for Dummies," +3 to Muggle Subjects.
"History for Dummies," +3 to Muggle Subjects.
With a final "Math for Dummies," +3 to Muggle Subjects, Harry had opened the sum total of books in Dudley's collection that were worthwhile. To be fair to Dudley, even the books for dummies were at a higher reading level than a four year old should be able to read. However fortunately for Harry he wasn't your average 4 year old and could actually get a benefit besides just being able to read them. The other books on the shelves weren't so helpful seeing as how they were children's books of the variety of "See spot run", "The Happy Little Alphabet" and "Put your Poop in the Toilet, not in your Pants;" the helpful potty training book touted by Ms. Polkis for helping her little boy learn where and where not to go potty.
Harry didn't think spending the time needed to study those books would be that helpful so he skipped those. Still, Harry looted Dudley's dresser drawers, avoiding the underwear drawer after one look to make sure it didn't contain any loot, and from Dudley's bedside dresser found a box of donuts that was surprisingly fresh along with two bags of candy which he added to his inventory. And thus Harry was introduced to the tutorial on stealing.
"Actually, Crime does pay; it's the penalties that hurt." Was the title of the tutorial, and the explanation seemed to follow along with that theme. "Well boys and girls, its time you learned how to gain wealth and glory through the joys of theft. Theft is your friend, it helps feed you, clothe you in awesome gear, and make sure you are kitted out with the best weapons while dripping in jewels. That said, don't get caught. In the Muggle world, getting caught means you get beat by the police or store owners, you go to jail and lose all your stolen loot plus have to pay a fine or get locked up in prison with only one hairpin to attempt to pick the lock. In the Magical world, getting caught means you may be cursed by guards, aurors or store owners, and have to pay a fine or possibly spend time in Azkeban with no hope for a hairpin. Neither of these outcomes is good for you. Hence stealing in front of people is probably a bad idea unless you are looking to start a fight. To know if you are stealing, use common sense. If the item is in a store or somebody's personal belongings it's probably not yours for the taking without being called theft. What, you thought we would color something red and ask you if you wanted to steal the item every time you look to pick something up? Ha!"
Harry read the tutorial, and shrugged. "I'm still going to loot the Dursley's for everything I can take." He said to himself before creeping down the hall towards Vernon and Petunia's room, with a slight stop in the bathroom.
"You gain 25 hair pins." The screen stated while Harry smiled, having looted Petunia's complete supply of bobby pins.
"Mwa ha ha ha ha." Harry chuckled a bit unhinged as he crept into his aunt's and uncle's room and began to go through their things.
"You stole diamond earrings, you stole two gold rings, you stole 250 pounds muggle, you stole one silver money clip, you stole ornate broach, you stole pearl necklace." Harry cleaned out the jewelry container and Vernon's spare money clip and cackled with a smile.
The smile quickly fled Harry's face when he heard the front door slam beneath him and Vernon stomp in the front door of the house.
"Just home for a quick stop pet, good report at work, have to grab my money and spare money clip because we are going out to the pub after work." Vernon's voice echoed up the stairs along with the sound of Vernon's feet.
"Ding, random events," Popped into Harry's vision while he frantically looked for a place to hide. Harry flung aside the comforter on the bed only to see that the mattress rested on a box and there was no space where he could hide under the bed.
"In this tutorial we will learn about random events and enemy spawns. Throughout the world random events will take place that you can take advantage of or enemies can appear forcing you to fight them or run away. Some events are triggered by you stepping in a certain spot or triggering a set item, some are completely random. Just another way we keep your life exciting! Cheers!"
"Worse than walrus mating," Harry cursed, trying to keep as quiet as possible as he looked at the bedroom's closet and quickly rushed to it. Harry quickly pulled the sliding closet doors open and then closed behind him as he heard Vernon reach the top of the stairs and enter the hallway headed straight for the bedroom.
Harry finished quietly shutting the door just as he watched through the closing crack as Vernon made his way into the room and headed towards where the money clip had been before Harry's pilfering.
In the darkness of the now closed closet, Harry heard Vernon talking to himself in the bedroom.
"Now where did I put that money clip?" Vernon's statement was followed by the heavy breathing and creaking of furniture as if the large man was getting down onto his knees to look under the dresser while using the wooden cabinet to balance his prodigious weight.
"Damn, it's not there." Vernon's muffled voice cursed before being raised to the point it rattled the closet doors. "Petunia, where did I put my spare money clip, you know, the silver one your father gave me when we were married?" He shouted.
"Shite." Harry cursed, not realizing the importance of the money clip when he stole it along with the money it contained.
"Did you try the pants I hung for you in the closet?" Petunia's voice echoed up the stairs.
Harry's eyes went large, "Double Shite." He cursed.
Vernon pushed his way to his knees and then his feet, using the dresser again to help pull himself up and ignoring the creaking sound the wood made when it struggled to withstand his weight.
Vernon smiled down at the dresser and then patted his tummy. "Good solid English stock." He complimented himself, his mustache twitching before heading for the closet.
Vernon threw open the closet doors.
"It's not in these pants Pet!" Vernon's voice echoed through the wall and into the crawl space where Harry quietly scurried. A muffled reply was the only thing Harry could hear through the small painted plywood cover for the attic crawlspace's door as Petunia must have answered. Harry then heard Vernon curse under his breath, the sound of the closet slamming was then followed by the thuds of the overweight man disappearing out of the bedroom.
Harry didn't have a light spell, and barely any light trickled in from the few louvers that allowed the attic to vent moist air and reduce the possibility of mold during the damp English weather.
Still, Harry did have one possible light source.
"Inventory." Harry ordered, and then fished around in the dark until his hand closed around a box of matches rather than the assorted stacks of waffles and the one still living fish.
Harry struck a match, and as it flared he looked around in the dim light.
Yellowed wedding dress, assorted cardboard boxes, a few broken pieces of what would have been antique furniture, and one large Hogwarts student chest.
Harry's eyes went large.
"Woot!" Harry cried out, quickly followed by sputtering curses as the match burned down and burned his fingers causing him to quickly wave the match and extinguish it before sucking on his fingers.
Rather than light another match, Harry crawled forward in the dark feeling his way towards the chest and finally finding it by its leather wrapped wood edges; the hatch easily popping open without the need for a key.
"Ta-DA! Congratulations, you've found a secret chest! Lily's Hogwarts Chest Found! Secret chests are secreted throughout the game in secret areas and give special secret prizes. We used secret four times in the last sentence, that's what makes these chests so secret!" The words that popped up in Harry's vision were accompanied by a flash of golden light and glitter exploding out of the chest and all over Harry.
Unfortunately Harry's mouth was open in surprise, thus ensuring he got a mouth full of the glitter.
"Ptttbth, ptttt, ptuey." Harry spat, then spat again and finally wiped his tongue, not amused by the mouth full of glitter that accompanied the finding of some of his mother's possessions.
"You gained 1/2 of the Potter Gold Heart Locket! One half of set." Was accompanied by a sweetheart locket that had Lily's face smiling up at Harry from one side, the other side missing as if it had been given to another person. The picture in the locket was obviously magical and showed a smiling picture of his mother. The picture of Lily smiled and winked at Harry before moving a long red strand of hair out of her face and tucked it behind her ear.
Harry smiled back at the picture before taking the gold chain that accompanied the locket and putting it over his neck.
"+2 to Charisma, +5 to Charms skill while equipped," Immediately appeared to him when Harry seated the chain about his neck and the locket nestled against his skin and under his shirt, making Harry smile even larger.
"You gained "The Fire Lily's Potion Book," 1/2 of a set," The tutorial read when Harry pulled the next item out of the chest. Harry's eyes lit up and he cracked open the book, a potions book similar to what he remembered of the Half-Blood Prince's book, yet the writing in this book was neat and tidy with a bit of a cursive curl to the words that showed a feminine touch. "Plus +10 to Potioneering skill, +10 to Charms, you learned the potions recipe: "Revenge of the Red Head" "Have you been pranked? Don't just prank back, get revenge! Strike fear into your pranking enemies by reversing their genitals and imbuing a polyjuice like quality which makes them look like their mother; Warning potion only works on males." The potions description made Harry subconsciously cross his legs while turning the page from the potion section and into an area that was covered in Charms' notes. Still, Harry gained an evil smirk when he thought of the possibility of getting one over on the Weasley twins.
"You learned the spell "Homeworkicus Doneicus Alreadycus! If you know the answers, cast the spell at the parchment and it will write your homework for you. No reason to tire out your hand if you already know what you want to write."
"Woot! Thanks mom!" Harry cheered, only realizing he was being too loud and quickly looked back towards the crawl space's door to see if he had been heard.
Fortunately it didn't look like he'd been heard so he continued to look through the chest.
Unfortunately, it only had one other book in it, but then again, it was an ability book called, "The Charmed Theory." A magical theory book that gave Harry another +2 to Wisdom when combined with his first chosen perk.
"Best perk ever." Harry smirked as he pocketed the book in his inventory before quickly looking through the rest of the loot in the trunk.
Harry shoved the books and a few pictures of his mother and her friends into his inventory but left her school robes behind as they were the only thing left in the chest and Harry wasn't into cross-dressing. The golden light from the chest extinguished when Harry shut the lid.
Harry crawled through the dark until his fingers found the door to the crawl space.
Carefully opening, crawling into the closet, then carefully shutting the crawlspace door, Harry's mind was thinking about his parents and especially his mother.
At least that's the excuse he would use for how he missed Vernon standing looking into the now open closet and down at Harry.
"BOY…!?" Vernon's voice pitched up in a questioning rage filled yell, causing Harry to spin around and face Vernon.
"Are You Threatening Me?! Perk triggered, Incendio!
Harry's eyes went wide open.
Vernon glared down at Harry, only to get a face full of fire and scream in pain. Vernon's mustache and bushy eyebrows caught fire and his face was cooked to a nice lobster read as the flames licked at his hair, eyebrows and mustache.
"Enemy is weak to Magic! Critical Hit! 25 Points of Fire Damage!"
A green bar appeared over Vernon's head and the green bar dropped into the red until only 1 hit point was left but then stopped there even though Vernon's health bar now read 1/25. The damage should have killed Vernon in one hit, only for some reason it didn't.
Vernon reeled back screaming and slapping at his flaming eyebrows and mustache just as a tutorial popped up in Harry's vision.
"The Unkillable" the tutorial popped up in Harry's vision, an overlay of details in Harry's view as he sprinted past Vernon for freedom.
"Congratulations on fighting an enemy that currently can't be beaten." The tutorial began to explain, "Some characters like the Vernon Dursley can be attacked and even stunned, but they cannot be killed or defeated as they are integral for story progression. Other characters are just too uber to be fought until you find their weakness, best to find a way to defeat them without attempting stand up combat. Also of note, some enemies become more powerful when enraged; we thought you should know that Vernon Dursley is one of them. That said, good luck… you'll need it."
"Oh Shite, Oh Shite, Oh Shite, Oh Shite." Harry screamed as he sprinted down the upstairs hallway, jumped as he reached the top of the stairs and sailed downwards skipping the stairway and cushioning his landing by impacting the wall before spinning off said hard surface and heading for the door.
"RAAAAAAAGGGGH!" The sound of an enraged behemoth sounded from upstairs, causing the women in the living room to spill their tea just as a little boy bounced off the wall across from the living room and left black streak-marks on the wallpaper from his combat boots before sprinting out the front door of the house.
The entire house shook with the power of Vernon's footfalls as the heavy man picked up speed; like a dwarf, not very worrisome when it came to a marathon run, but very dangerous over short distances.
Harry slammed the door open so hard it ricochet off the wall and slammed shut behind him. With that Harry hit the front stoop of the house and started bunny jumping, only getting to the driveway before the front door exploded off of its hinges at the power of Vernon's enraged state.
"Shite, Shite, Shite, Shite!" Harrys cursing was prefaced by every jump he took as a still smoking Vernon saw Harry and came right for him; gaining on Harry despite Harry's speed, stamina, and strength grinding.
For you see Vernon Dursley was a min/max character, and all his stats were in Strength with a smattering in Charisma and only enough points in Intelligence to make sure he remembered to breathe and to which Grunnings' Executives he needed to brown nose.
"This isn't working!" Harry screamed to himself as he attempted to bounce a zig zag pattern, remembering something Hermione had once said in a rant about survival around alligators and other animals that didn't corner quickly.
Unfortunately for Harry an enraged Vernon did not appear to be one of those enemies and was undaunted by Harry's evasive maneuvers.
Vernon caught up to Harry and lunged for the little boy in an attempt to crush him.
"I didn't Save!" Harry screamed in fear and ducked into a crouch while covering his head and closing his eyes.
Only nothing happened.
There was no crushing blow, no fist to the face and no foot to the ribs.
Harry popped an eye open, only to see an enraged Vernon breathing deeply, purpled and burnt face and pulsing vein in the forehead, singed mustache and eyebrows and a distinct smell of burnt hair, standing right next to Harry but seemingly at a loss for a target.
"Where did that little freak go?" Vernon growled between deep heaves of breath. The large man looked right over Harry's head and then started to stalk back in the direction of Privet Drive as if looking for Harry.
Harry blinked, and then smiled, for apparently Vernon hadn't put any points into Dexterity and thus had lost sight of Harry upon Harry entering sneak mode.
Harry crept silently behind Vernon listening as the man continued to question where Harry had gone.
A good fifteen meters back towards the Dursleys' house, and Harry blinked.
When Harry again opened his eyes, well in sight of the Durlsey residence, Harry was silently startled to see that Vernon was once again fully healthy and back to normal and the front door of the house was fully repaired.
"Hmmm, I must have been mistaken. Now what was I doing?" Vernon asked himself before shrugging and heading to his car that was in the driveway. "Well then, back to work." Vernon finished aloud.
Harry smiled as he followed Vernon all the way to the door of Vernon's car, totally unseen and now safe from Vernon's anger.
"+1 to Sneak!" Popped up in Harry's vision, followed by a new title.
"TaDa! 100 Sneak skill completed! You've gained the title, "The Shadow!" Only the shadow knows what type of trouble you will get up to. Enemies will lose sight of you if you crouch down during combat, giving you the ability to break line of sight attacks, get a head start when running away, or quickly losing unwanted attention. +10 to pickpocket and lockpicking when attempted while sneaking and hidden in the shadows."
Harry smirked; even if he couldn't off the Dursleys, things weren't that bad after all.
The School library; a bastion of learning. That might have been how Hermione would have seen the building, but to Harry it was the solitary confinement wing in a prison for children; the chief tool in the formation of bricks for the wall. Staffed by murderous librarians and teachers of yet unknown powers Harry wasn't fooled for a moment by its cheery façade of finger-paintings strung on yarn through the halls, sunflowers and daisies planted in the windows, and the occasional alphabet poster showing A's shaped like Apples and B's shaped like Bumblebees.
No, in Harry's eyes, this place was evil, and Harry was here to conquer it. Nothing stood in the way of Harry and his quest for skill grinding advancement.
Harry had circled the building and once again found all of the doors locked. Still, his search hadn't been for loss as rather than the main door he had been tossed out of, he found a door that was labeled simply "Library." A door which must have been the public access to the Little Whinging community at large but was locked during public hours in violation of public code 34d.25.36; which also happened to be the dimensions for the January Playboy centerfold in the year the regulation was published.
Harry looked at the lock and a display popped up above it reading, "Simple," denoting the difficulty as being that which a simpleton could get on a first try.
Of course that means that Harry broke his first five Hairpins; he wouldn't be the programmer's spittoon if things had gone right the first time. Still, Harry was able to bump the lock's pins up and into the right locking position after twenty minutes of cursing and fiddling with the persnickety lock and flimsy little metal hairpins.
Harry crept into the library very very quietly, not letting the door slam shut or even click as it closed. As quietly as a Malfoy house elf that didn't want to have to iron its ears, Harry slipped through the bookshelves, sticking to the shadows as he hunted his prey.
Pulling out his Surrey Slugger, Harry slowly pulled it back over his head, bit his lip with concentration, and then whipped it down with all his strength.
"Head Shot! Critical Hit! Librarian Defeated, gain 50 Experience, Key to the Library, 50 pounds muggle, and Copy of Kama Sutra; the illustrated edition."
"Damn!" Harry briefly broke the quiet when he saw what he had gained in his loot. Startled by his own voice breaching the quiet Harry quickly looked around to see if he had been heard, but he figured he was safe when he wasn't immediately mobbed by Librarians like he had been the last time.
"Save game." Harry mumbled before looking at his loot again and shaking his head at the pictures in the illustrated Kama sutra; a seventies styled version with pictures of men with copious chest hair and mustaches and women with very all-natural growth down under.
"+1 to Flirting" Popped up into his vision when he opened the book. Apparently it was an item not unlike a skillbook that gave Harry skills. Still, Harry was now questioning what he didn't know about bibliophiles and trying to keep thoughts about Hogwart's Madame Prince out of his head.
'Still, this has possibilities with Hermione.' Harry thought to himself with a little smirk, for though he was in a 4 year old body, his mind still remembered what it was like to be a teenager.
"It's always the quiet ones." Harry shook his head as he pocketed the book in his inventory and swapped out his Surrey Slugger and armed his Hufflepuff Shovel.
The near silent "shlop!" sound was soon followed by a "+1 Herbology!" in Harry's vision as he got rid of the evidence of his crime and pocketed the fertilizer. Then Harry was back on the hunt.
Harry was out of Hairpins. In fact, he had wasted the last 20 Hairpins and still hadn't been able to pick the lock on the cases behind the Head Librarian's desk and which housed the six Stat bonus books. He had however gained an additional +5 to his lockpicking skill and another 4 piles of fertilizer from defeating the librarians; not to mention he was now the proud owner of two illustrated kama sutra, one book on Shibari bondage rope tying and two copies of the Story of O for a total of 4 more skill points to Flirting and some new 'reading' material for when he actually hit puberty.
Of course, it was upon thinking of saving the material for later that his brain got hooked up on the word 'saving.'
He started to curse a bloody streak, only to stop, and then smack himself in the forehead.
"Fool." Harry cursed at himself before continuing to speak, "Load last saved game."
The world around Harry blurred and he once again found himself crouched down behind the head librarian with his Surrey Slugger reared back and ready to strike.
"Critical Hit! Knockdown Damage! Groin Stomp Activated!"
"Bwa Ha ha ha!" Harry cheered as he ground the heel of his boot into the head librarian's crotch; it was an equal opportunity attack.
Once again Harry gained the Shibari book, 100 experience, 100 pounds muggle, and 1 library key.
"Kinky buggers." Harry quipped as he pulled the key out of the loot and prepared to drop it in his inventory after once again gaining that 5th point to Flirting.
However it was upon picking up the key that Harry again kicked himself. Well, he did the mental equivalent.
Harry closed his eyes and groaned as he ground his teeth together, opening them again to look at the key in his hands.
Turning to the locked cases Harry tried the key, and sure enough the cases opened up.
It was then that Harry also realized the cases were glass, so he could have just busted the glass and grabbed the books if he wanted versus waste the hairpins and all that time attempting to pick the locks.
"It's a learning experience, a learning experience." Harry growled a mantra to himself as he cracked the books.
"+2 Strength! +2 Dexterity! +2 Constitution! +2 Intelligence! +2 Wisdom! +2 Charisma!" Harry's first chosen perk helped boost the stats more than the +1 he would have normally received, and he thanked his lucky stars he had put enough points into intelligence in the beginning to realize that was the perk he wanted.
Harry set the ability books in his inventory rather than return them to the case, ignoring the part where he was probably stealing them.
Harry almost turned to go study, but then looked back at the cases and the key that was still available sitting there taunting him from his inventory.
Harry looked at the glass and wood book cases.
Then at the inventory.
Then back at the glass cases.
And then Harry smacked himself right between the eyes with the flat of his hand and groaned at his own stupidity.
"Save game." Harry said, locked the glass case with the key and then pulled out a hairpin.
"Hairpin broke! Lockpick failed." The game stated in Harry's vision.
Anybody walking by the library for the next couple hours would probably have been struck with a sense of deja vu as Harry picked the lock, failed, reset the game at his last save until he finally succeeded and was awarded a "+1 Lockpicking!" He'd then save the game and attempt to pick the lock after using the key to lock it back up again, repeating a reload until multiple levels in lockpicking were gained and the cases were easily unlocked. He'd gained an additional +25 to his lockpicking before similar to the problem with the two teenaged hooligans this level of lock wasn't giving him anymore skill points.
Harry put away his hairpins with a smile that he hadn't lost any of his remaining 20, cracked his knuckles before blinking his eyes vigorously to give them some moisture after staring at the lock for so long. He saved the game, and then stretched.
"Yawn! So bored." Harry groaned out a yawn of boredom and not due to a lack of rest. Rolling his neck he looked around the library and gave a half-hearted shrug and a smile, it was time to study the old fashioned way.
With a clap of his hands, Harry hit the books.
Harry exited the school at what would have been comparable to four and a half weeks later if time had actually moved; he was milking this tutorial level like Hagrid milked the famous Hogwarts twenty-teated magical cows. In short, he was making the tutorial program his bitch doing everything he could to milk the fixed time for all that it was worth.
After leveling up his lockpicking as high as he could with the locks available, Harry had hit the books for the equivalent of a week's time before boredom drove him to go sneaking through the school on a scavenger hunt.
He had first gone through the school and searched for items of use, which there were surprisingly few. Twelve boxes of chocolate milk from the cafeteria, one regular cricket bat from the athletic offices and three skill books was the extent of his loot: +3 to French language, +3 to Dancing, and +3 to Muggle Studies. Then he had gained Muggle Studies levels the hard way, by picking up books and reading until he couldn't read any more. The game mechanics of the tutorial level helped him, as it appeared that the programmers hadn't expected a four year old Harry Potter to make it to the school. Thus Harry was able to study continuously for just over four weeks non-stop; no need for bathroom breaks, no need for food, no need for sleep as time didn't move at all.
Reading for that long in the library left him feeling loopy, fruity, cakey, and not unlike one big nargle infested fruitcake, if that makes any sense.
Still, he was weary and while his stamina bar and hearts were full his eyes and throat felt dry and scratchy like he had used one of the Weasley Weeze products, "Guaranteed to get you out of Class, or our names aren't Gred and Forge." His back was sore from being hunched over the library's desk and the main piles of muggle books. And it was that after reading for approximately 4 weeks straight his brain felt as wooly as if Dumbledore had hidden his sock collection between Harry's ears. However there were benefits.
Harry stretched and felt his back pop as the last of the bonuses scrolled up his vision.
"Muggle Studies +1! Muggle Studies now at 100! +1 Intelligence. Ta-Da! Gained Title, "I am the Very Model of a Modern Major-General!" Congratulations, you've information vegetable, animal and mineral, you know the kings of England, and can quote the fights historical, your very well acquainted, too, with matters mathematical. Yes, that's right, you've become the ultimate know it all. If you are asked a mundane question of fact, or potentially even fiction, you will have an answer; even if you are pulling it out of your arse. Gain +5 to Charisma and open up the dialogue option of "Baffle Them With Bullshit!"
Harry wrenched his body to the right, and then to the left, twisting his arms around his body as his back made horrible crackling sounds as it popped into place and wasn't stiff anymore.
Bouncing on his feet a few times, Harry again pumped himself up as he had now completed all of his objectives other than finishing the remaining Dursley and Kneazle missions, and defeating Mr. Tibbles.
"Whelp, no time like the present. Pip pip tally-ho and all that wrot!" Harry smirked and bounced away down the street.
And then there were two, as in two kneazle missions with a total of three missions left. Well, to be fair Harry had finished the other two Dursley Chore missions and advanced the time to one oclock in the afternoon. The missions hadn't provided that much experience as Harry realized that they were built for him under the expectation that he wouldn't be sitting at Level 5 and almost Level 6 at the end of the tutorial. To top off the lack of real experience gained, the chore missions were bloody boring. But at this point Harry would do whatever it took to level up, because Mr. Tibbles was going to die before he left the level.
For his efforts, Harry had spent time weeding the yard for just a gain of experience, and then an hour spent shoveling fist sized rocks into his inventory rather than completing the other Dursley mission. That's not to say that he didn't eventually get to using the infinite pile of round river rocks associated with the Dursley's Chore mission titled a boring "Put in a stone path." Harry had just learned to collect everything he could that was worthwhile, especially after he learned that the rocks could be used for other things than just a winding garden path.
The mission itself was just as boring as its title sounded as Harry had started the mission only to grow bored halfway through it. Carrying loads of river rocks and laying them four inches deep was heavy backbreaking child labor, even for an abnormally strong 4 year old. Add to that the shear monotony of moving rocks and the fact that the Dursley's hadn't even given him a shovel, and you get the idea that they were trying to drive Harry mad; or at least more crazy than he seemed to becoming since his restart on life.
Thank Merlin Harry had already earned the Hufflepuff Shovel to make things easier. Still, even shoveling rocks was boring, but then Harry had learned the joys of throwing rocks. In a piqué of anger Harry had started throwing rocks at the dirt area the Dursley's wanted filled, only to see a message pop up into his vision.
"+1 Ranged" The message had said, and when Harry had gone to his Stats and looked at the skill, he learned that it allowed him to hit targets from a distance with a ranged weapon. The higher the skill, the better his accuracy and distance he could target… and the real kicker was, it worked for magic also.
"Dead Eye Dick" Was the title he had earned upon reaching 100 ranged skill after the equivalent of a day of doing nothing but throwing stones at the dirt target area where the Dursleys wanted their path.
The new title went on to explain just what the "Dead Eye Dick" title meant for Harry, or apparently for his future significant other.
"Dead Eye Dick. Your ability to hit targets at range makes you every lady's dream, a man who will never miss the toilet when he stands up to pee. That and you now gain the ability to briefly slow down time to aim your ranged attacks for body parts of your enemy; Headshots do 50% more damage and you now have the ability to disarm your opponents by either knocking weapons out of their hands or just disarming them literally by targeting their arms. You decide which bonus is more impressive, but the lady's love a man who doesn't leave the seat wet." The description was quite mocking, but still it did provide some benefits.
And now, Harry had a date with a kneazle, or at least a battle. Heck, Harry just wanted to live to see the day Mr. Tibbles bit the dust.
"Herding Cats." Harry's screen lit up with the word when he got within five feet of Ms. Figg.
"Oh Harry, there you are dear." Ms. Figg turned and smiled at Harry as he approached. It was weird, her smile and reaction looked extremely fake and 2 dimensional as if she was some sort of 2 dimensional painting of the lady he thought he knew.
"Hello Ms. Figg." Harry replied with a smile, he was about to keep talking when she interrupted him as if he hadn't greeted her at all.
"You simply must help me. I tried to change the catfood and now none of the kneazles will let me anywhere near them. If you could just get them into the house without hurting them, I'd be able to show them that I bought kitty treats to make it up to them. Will you help me?" Ms. Figg asked, looking down at Harry.
A floating Y and an N appeared in the air in between Ms. Figg and Harry and Ms. Figg smiled at Harry and gave him a big solid stare while she waited for his response.
Harry cringed as Ms. Figg just stared at him, totally unblinking and unmoving; not even seeming to breathe.
Harry shifted to the right, disquieted by the look he was getting from Ms. Figg as she just stared at him with that fixed look and smile.
Ms. Figg's body pivoted as if on an axel so her face was still pointed at Harry; she hadn't moved here legs or torso or even her head, she just stared right at him still smiling that same now quite creepy smile.
"Uh," Harry paused, while taking a step back.
Ms. Figg's body moved forward, keeping the same distance between them.
Harry darted to the left, Ms. Figg's body followed.
Harry tried to run a circle around her, only for Ms. Figg to spin around like a top.
"You're freaking me out lady!" Harry yelled running zig zag patterns and loops, yet continually followed by the woman who was seemingly frozen in the rigor mortis of a smile and question.
"Ah! Alright, alright yes I'll herd your cats! Just stop it already!" Harry finally screamed in a panic.
In a blink, Harry was standing back where he and Ms. Figg had started.
"Oh good, you're such a nice boy Harry." Ms. Figg smiled and moved to pat Harry on the head, only for Harry to dart away from her hand.
A set of numbers popped up in Harry's vision showing that he had wrangled zero out of nine cats into the house; a message popped up that stated that each cat could take no damage from Harry in the process.
"Right Ms. Figg, got to get working on those cats." Harry replied quickly as he turned and hopped over to the closest cat, a big black colored kneazle that looked to weight somewhere around 30 pounds.
Harry went to reach for the kneazle and was suddenly face to face with a hissing spitting hackle raised cat that was definitely showing its disinterest in Harry picking it up; claws extended, back up in an arch and mouth open as it let out a long threatening "rrrrRRRooooooW."
Harry put up his hands to show that he didn't mean any harm and slowly backed away, "Nice kitty, no pulling a Mr. Tibbles kitty, I'm not supposed to hurt you kitty so don't make me." He finished the last one with a growl of his own, which didn't help his situation.
Backing up a good five steps, the kneazle finally stopped hissing and clawing at the air in Harry's direction and then settled down with a silent glare at Harry.
"Fine, be that way. I'll save you for last." Harry groused, only his situation didn't get any better.
Eight different cats later, eight identical reactions and Harry had learned the lesson that you don't make cats do anything, you politely invite them into your life so that you may serve their whims and not the other way around.
Harry huffed and crossed his arms as he looked at all the kneazles who were now staring at him, and a part of him thought that perhaps they were smirking a bit.
"Wish I could get a hint here." Harry snipped, trying to figure out how to get the cats in the house without knocking them over the head and dragging them inside; which was he currently thinking of trying before restarting just so he could burn off some stress.
"Ding!" "A Square Peg In A Round Hole," A tutorial message popped into his vision, and Harry snarled at the not so positive description. However if the title made Harry snarl, the tutorial description itself frustrated him enough to cause him to break out into an immediate bought of childhood petulance; arms crossed and lip sticking out in a pout.
"So, insanity seems to be suiting you." The tutorial started to type across Harry's vision.
"Hey! I'm not insane!" Harry shouted at the tutorial screen.
"Trying the same thing over and over again and expecting a different outcome, the definition of insanity." The tutorial read, to which Harry had no response but to pout.
"In The Adventures of Harry Potter, the video game, you will receive items which can be used to help you get through missions, puzzles, seemingly unstoppable enemies, and other assorted problems. Some collected items are useless, others have very specific uses. It's up to you to figure out what the correct use for an item is. Good luck!" The tutorial finished and Harry just stayed with his arms crossed and glaring forward until the message finally disappeared.
"Fine, be that way bloody, annoying game system, Inventory." Harry mumbled before order his trunk to appear and began digging through his stuff.
"Hmmm, throwing stones at the cats won't work, though it may be therapeutic, hmmm," Harry spoke to himself, leaning into his inventory trunk and disappearing up to his waist as he hopped up so he could bend over the edge of the floating trunk and dig through the brick-a-brack that he had collected.
"Burnt bacon, nope. Rubber squeaky toy, that's for dogs not cats—Hey, maybe a bait of some sort." Harry shoved items out of his way until he dug his way down to where the single Koi fish was sitting in his trunk.
"Fish, hmm, cat's like fish, right?" Harry asked as he grabbed the squirming fish and wiggled his way backwards out of the trunk until his feet hit the ground.
Harry held the fish in his hands and looked around with an eyebrow raised as all the Kneazles were still ignoring him.
"Hmmm, how do you use the fish as bait?" Harry questioned, not expecting an answer.
Harry certainly didn't expect the game to answer him, or, at least take a literal approach to his words, namely the "use the fish as bait" part. However if the game was going to take his words literally, then of course it would do so to his detriment.
"Fish used as bait!"
The moment the screen stated that, all nine 30 pound kneazles turned as one to look at Harry with a frantic look and licked their chops.
And then they charged.
It's not hard to understand what happens when 270 pounds of Kneazle at a run, and claws first, hit a stationary 38 pound four year old whose hands are busy controlling a large squirming fish.
Harry disappeared under a pile of fur and claws that was attracted towards the bait in Harry's hands.
"Bugger Me!" Harry screamed as he became a pint-sized human scratching pole.
As last words go, it probably rated up there as one of the more ignoble things to put on ones tombstone.
Good thing Harry had saved his game.
AN: Well, on to the next chapter and Tibbles the Terrible round 2. Next level sees the end of the tutorial and time pick back up with regular time as Harry skips to the future and right before the Hogwarts letter. I need ideas for an open world Harry Potter video game. I have a bunch but I'm always looking for brain-fodder for my muse. For the sake of gaining ideas, give me mission ideas in both muggle London(the zoo, places throughout the city) as well as Magical (Diagon Alley, St. Mungos, Knockturn Alley, Kings Crossing and platform 9 and 3/4ths, Godrich's Hollow, number 12 (The-Black-ancestral-mansion-which-slips-my-mind-a nd-which-I-can't-look-up-because-I'm-flying-on-a-p lane). Hogwarts, Hogsmead, the Forbidden Forest and Shrieking Shack won't be available for missions until after Harry gets to Hogwarts, and even then he is going to have to sneak out of the castle and not get caught if he wants to go anywhere other than inside Hogwarts or on the approved grounds. So please give me some ideas based on Harry's life in the first book and, you know, missions for those types of places. The rules will be that Harry will have to deal with regular time constraints once again so some missions will have to be bypassed until he gets time to deal with them. Other than that, the world is an open world with limitations on what parts of jolly old England are unlocked. Time will move slower than it should, but he will still be limited in the number of things he can do during a day; that's what time-turners are for after all. Harry is not going to be going to the USA, he's not going on a world tour nor entering some other crossover universe so stick to the places that explicitely exist or are possible muggle locations in the potterverse, so help me out here people. Again, a special thanks goes out to the people who sent me the over 500 reviews, over 30 private messages, and ideas galore for the story. You people rock. Cheers!