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: So, nearly died, again, but I got better; so yeah that was a thing and I have some lovely scars on the side of my head as a memento. I won't go into all the other rigmarole of life, but I'm trying to get back into writing. Normally I'd put out a small chapter and try and split this up, but if I did that then you wouldn't get all of the added game mechanics nor out of the zoo and into the main story. I think we can all agree we want to get to the heart of the Harry Potter Adventure in the magical world, so you get to enjoy a longer than normal chapter (27 pages in the word doc). Anyway, you can thank several 9 hour-long flights and bottomless bailey's Irish creams for this chapter getting completed, I hope you enjoy it. (I literally drank out the plane's entire supply of bailey's irish cream on the flight across the Atlantic writing this. Mini-bottles for the win! I think it helped.) Cheers!
AN 2.0: Not beta read, and I didn't think you wanted to wait any longer for this to come out so I reviewed it as much as I could and then posted it. You have been warned!
'Thoughts are in italics'
"Things Said, or Things Written"
Chapter 10: Theft, Profit, and Game Mechanics
"2058 Alligator teeth, yes I want to sell, 2059 alligator teeth and sell, and finally 2060!" Harry slapped the last of his looted teeth on the Zoo's gift shop counter. The battle with the Boss Mama Alligator had been hellacious until he realized that he could tie himself to one of the vines hanging just out of the reach of the Mother Alligator and her rapidly spawning children that instantly grew to adult size upon birth. Sure the Hufflepuff Shovel didn't do much damage, and sure he got a bit motion sick seeing as every time he swung the shovel at an Alligator under him it sent Harry's body, and attached vine, spinning back and forth. Still, it had been worth the 500+ XP and revenge for the teeth he had to pry out of his buttocks after swimming out of the Alligator Lagoon. Besides, each tooth sold for one Pound Muggle money, plus his Barter percentage bonus, which was nothing to sneer at given how many teeth he had sold. This wasn't counting the other assorted fertilizer and miscellaneous items pilfered from the school and Little Whinging. So he sold all that, and then he worked on finishing selling the teeth. Each item and tooth sold one, by one, by tediously one which worked to slowly increase his Barter skill as the hours ticked by; and Harry was sure that the gift shop should have been closed by now. But still the "Buy or Sell" screen was in front of Harry and the world was frozen, so it was with the last tooth in his inventory that serendipitously gave Harry the real award he had been grinding for.
"Ding! +1 Pound and 80 Pence Muggle. +1 Barter!" "+1 Charisma from Barter increase." The screen announced his 16th increased Charisma point since starting selling stuff, then Harry's vision flashed and a trumpet sounded in his ears.
"Tada! 100 Barter skill completed! You gain the Perk, "Merchant of Surrey!" Named after Shakespeare's little known failed first try before later succeeding with "Merchant of Venice," the Merchant of Surrey was a boring and failed early work in three acts; the play was devoted to the story about a little boy from Surrey who grew up to sell meat pasties and pickled eggs next to the fishmongers' market but never amounted to much, the end. Now you know why the play failed, anyway, you're good at business and be thankful that we didn't decide to make you pay back taxes or VAT on your ill-gotten gains. You are now able to gain 80% more profit on sold items and substantial discounts from merchants when making purchases. By hitting Barter skill level 100, you may now buy businesses. Just touch the sign outside any business that is for sale and agree to pay the price (Muggle for muggle businesses, Galleons for wizard businesses) and enjoy the additional discounts, free items, and income or rent pouring into your pockets; please note that you will need to regularly stop by the business and pick up your income owed or have somebody in your party pick it up for you. The Merchant of Surrey! Perk also allows you to sell stolen goods at normal stores rather than always having to use a Fence."
"Heh, apparently the programmers are still steamed that I'm gaming their game. Well you can join Aberforth in blowing goats you bloody wankers!" Harry cupped his balls with one hand and raised a two fingered salute towards the air.
Harry took the time to finish reading the message and then closed it, along with the "Buy or Sell" menu that had been open while he spent the hours grinding his Barter skill and cleaning out his inventory of junk; he kept some spares of the hooligan leather jacket, pants, and boots in case he could share the benefits of armor with friends, and he didn't sell any of his books.
Upon closing the Buy/Sell screen the world around Harry seemed to blink, and he suddenly found himself in a dark, and closed for the night, Zoo Gift shop. Outside the windows the sun had gone down and the zoo was completely dark except for the scarce lamp light, but Harry's vision was flooded with messages that he had not received while he had been selling items and stuck in the buy/sell screen. A part of Harry realized that this could be a negative for not being aware of time passing, but in this case the back dated messages filled him with joy.
"T-minus 30 minutes until the Dursleys leave you behind."
"The zoo is closing soon. 20 minutes till you have to live your life on the streets, the Dursleys will leave soon."
"10 minutes and counting, do you know where your relatives are?"
"1 minute warning till Dursleys leave. Aren't you cutting things a bit close?"
"The Durlsey's left and have locked you out of the house. The zoo is now closed. Good luck living on the street."
Messages kept scrolling through Harry's vision, but he didn't pay them any heed; he was too busy dancing and singing his victory song.
"They're gone! They're Gone! Oh Yeah! They're Gone! Woo Hoo, They're Gone!" Harry's dance was a mix of several hip thrusts, vigorous shakes of his buttocks, and pointer fingers jabbing into the air like he had just been dubbed the number one contestant in the Firebolt Broom Company's first ever seeker contest. Actually, the dancing was pretty hideous.
Still, it's the effort that counts, and Harry received a message that he had gained "+1 to Dancing," for a miserable total skill of 4 points to Dancing; hence why he looked like an epileptic fish flopping about at an electronic dance festival.
"Ding dong the Dursleys left! Which old Dursleys? The bastard Dursleys! Ding dong the bastard Dursleys Leeeeeffffttt!" Harry skipped around the dark store singing to a tune from the Wizard of Oz that he had heard at primary school during his first life; so it was a good thing he was making up the lyrics.
Harry was happy in his circumstances. The Dursleys didn't want him, and Harry didn't want anything to do with the Dursleys.
"Yay! Nothing can go wrong now." Harry smirked to himself, ignoring the little feeling in the back of his head that suggested he really shouldn't tempt fate; or the programmers.
Just then, Harry felt a tingle in his scalp as if icy slush was poured on his head as the messages scrolled before his vision, the last one showing Harry that he was up over the 20 point threshold and all the way to 32 Charisma due to the Barter skill raising his overall Charisma; well 34 given the +2 charisma from wearing Lily's necklace.
"Congratulations! Bonus perk unlocked at Charisma 20! For reaching Charisma 20, you gained the specialty Perk, "Silky Slytherin Locks of Love." Yes, you have gained silky locks, effortlessly taming that mane you call hair and becoming the jealous aspiration of everybody whose last name ends with Malfoy. Yes, the joys of gaining Charisma. You look better, your hair will always smell like a summer breeze and fluff like the dandelions floating on an autumn evening. Well now, aren't you special. Women want you, they are jealous of your lovely hair, and so are many effeminate men; the men want your body Harry, not just your hair. But hey, good news, now the girls and boys will come to you for hair product tips rather than pointing in surprise that The-Boy-Who-Lived's hair looks like a duck's butt. You gain "Male Model" reputation with Teen Witch Weekly and all "Harry Potter Fan-Club" Members, and because you seem to bathe more regularly than the usual juvenile male, female characters are more likely to join your party! Congrats!"
"Bwuugh?" Harry blubbered, wide eyed, and quickly patted himself on the top of his head, only to feel silken clean hair that had grown a foot in a single instant. Harry pulled a coal black lock of beautiful hair around to where he could see it.
It smelled good.
It was shoulder length.
And it made Harry doubt his masculinity for all of 3 seconds.
This brief interlude with his feminine side was quickly interrupted by a stream of invectives and cursing that would prove that Harry could swear like a lumberjack; even if his hair made him look like he skipped and jumped, pressed wild flowers, and had buttered scones with tea.
Quickly looking around the closed gift shop, Harry noticed some ribbons that were there to help tie up gifts, and so he stole a black one to tie back his hair.
"Fiddle liddle, mumble, feel like a bloody pansy, mumble, Draco better not be interested in me, mumble." Harry grumbled to himself as he struggled to tie back his hair; something that had never happened before in this life or the previous and as a result ended with a disheveled look and multiple miscellaneous hairs hanging out of the ribbon at odd angles or getting in his eyes.
"Ribbon Stolen!" A red colored warning message popped up in his vision, which Harry totally ignored.
"Bloody hell, might as well cut off the blasted hair." Harry griped at himself while arming a switchblade and then reaching behind his head and sawing at his hair until he cut off his pony tail and held it in his hand looking for a place to ditch the cut hair.
"Whoop!" A tingle surged through Harry's head and there was even a sound, followed by another icy feeling on his scalp as his hair immediately grew out to its previous length, now spilling forward and covering his face and getting in his mouth.
"Ptewy! Poof, get away hair." Harry spat and blew at the hair in his face and pushed it back with his hand while a trumpet sounded.
"Tada! You've gained the Perk of "It's an Adventurer's Life!" Day 157+ since you left on this adventure, and you've not once needed to use the toilet, brush your teeth, or cut your hair! Yes, the joys of being an adventurer, your hair will always grow back to its proper length, your teeth will always stay in whatever form your Charisma allows (minus the negatives associated with being British), and you will never need to use the Loo; unless you need to use the Loo in order to: A. Fight a troll in the loo, B. make a batch of polyjuice potion in the loo, or C. enter a secret tunnel in the girl's loo leading to a founder's secret chambers. In short, you didn't think we would make it that easy to get rid of your girly hair, did you?"
Harry glared at nothing in particular, only to have the beam of light of a flashlight/electric torch shine through the window of the locked Gift Shop, and Harry noted out of the corner of his eye that his radar showed that a Guard figure had turned yellow, as if the guard was slightly alarmed.
"Bugger!" Harry gulped as he dived under a display of pink girls t-shirts and sweatshirts that had cuddly pictures of Koala bears and baby tigers on them.
The yellow cone of the guard's site panned back and forth on Harry's radar matching the view available in the torch's beam of light. From Harry's hidden view peeking through the girls pink shirts, he could see the Guard looking in the glass windows of the gift shop while the light from the torch made the shadows of the display cases seem to move as Harry plastered himself to the floor and deep in the shadows of the girl's clothing.
"Ninja Vanish activated" scrolled through Harry's vision, making him smirk as he watched the yellow cone of an alarmed guard turn white and then move off as the Zoo's night guard went back to patrolling the outside grounds of the zoo.
Harry slowly picked himself up and looked around.
"Well, looks like I should get out of…" Harry's statement to himself slowly petered out as a thought came to him.
And then an evil smirk grew across his face.
"Open inventory," Harry stated out loud while reaching towards the rack beside him.
It was girly, and it was pink. But it was all worth money.
"Girl's t-shirt stolen! Girl's t-shirt stolen! Girl's sweatshirt stolen!..." The messages flowed across Harry's screen, and it was only the beginning.
Harry had stolen everything in the gift shop that could be stolen.
The money in the cash register; pocketed.
The girly charm bracelets with different animal bangles; pilfered.
A baggie of Cocaine that must have been left by the gift shop owner; hesitantly added to his supplies that he would be pawning off or using to poison an enemy.
The bright yellow t-shirts with the googly-eyed giraffe; yeah, he took those too.
The plastic grasping alligator heads on sticks, stickers and coloring books, and photograph books of different animals; all put into his inventory.
The fake plastic snakes that young boys would buy to freak out their sisters; a good reminder of his horrible escort mission and now packed neatly into his inventory with the other rubber rats, snakes, and other assorted rubber spiders and insects.
Even the rainbow colored elephant plushy that no boy Harry's age would ever be caught with unless he wanted to be bullied to death; it went into his inventory because it had to be worth something.
In short, if it was for sale, Harry stole it, and his inventory was now sporting several large stacks of items whose index names were crimson red when Harry viewed them; showing that they had been gained illicitly.
Frankly, if he had been able to, Harry would have taken the display racks and the cash register itself with him, or maybe even the nails and screws that held together the front counter.
"Bwa ha ha ha ha." Harry cackled manically as he moved towards the front door. For some reason all of the alligator teeth he had sold weren't anywhere to be found in the store, but it wasn't like he would be hurting for loot to sell.
Turning the lock on the front door of the shop, Harry snuck out the doors and into the dark Zoo, thankful that the door hadn't been alarmed.
Quietly closing the door behind him and locking it via a hairpin used as a lock pick, Harry turned back around to face the cobblestoned plaza in front of the gift shop, only to see a wooden stand sitting on the stone paving stones. The sign had a large "For Sale!" written in red letters on top, a price tag of "10,000 Pounds" written in red beneath the for sale, and a blinking red button underneath all of the words that was labeled, "Push Me!"
Harry looked right, and then left to make sure the coast was clear, before tentatively reaching towards the button, only to stop suddenly and yank his hand backwards quickly before it could touch the button.
"Uh, better to be safe." Harry said, quickly arming his Pointy-Stick and then using said stick to jab the button.
A loud "Pop!" sound rang out through the night as the sign immediately disappeared in a poof of smoke, only to clear a few seconds later to show that a tweed-suit wearing goblin was instead standing in its place.
Harry blinked.
And the goblin sneered a sharp toothed snarl, "Well I haven't all day, are you going to buy the business or not? Stupid humans, waking me up in the middle of the night and then lollygagging about like I have all of the time in the world." The goblin grumbled and glared at Harry.
Harry blinked again before replying, "Uh, so I just give you the cash and I own the business? What do I get for buying the gift shop?" Harry tentatively replied; a part of him wanted to curse back at the goblin, but Harry didn't think that would be good for future relationships and business dealings with the Goblins and Gringotts. Apparently putting 24 points into Intelligence was good for something after all, even if only for making sure Harry didn't shoot himself in the foot with the goblins, or, you know, start the next major Goblin Rebellion; knowing Harry's normal luck.
"Here. Read this." The goblin grumbled, pulling out a single page of parchment and handing it to Harry.
Out of the corner of Harry's eye he noticed that a guard entered the range of his radar, and Harry began to see the gleam of light of a torch coming his way.
Quickly glancing over the parchment, Harry noted that it was quite simple.
"Small Gift Store at Non-Profit Zoo. Cost: 10,000.00 Pounds. Rent Earned: 500.00 Pounds every two weeks, and a free container of Zoo-Poo fertilizer once a month. It's a small store at the zoo that sells knick-knacks and helps fund the Zoo. What, did you really think you were going to get a department store's rent for such a small purchase price?" The piece of parchment read.
Harry glared at the paper and the fact that the programmers were still being rude to him every chance they got.
"Fine," Harry replied, handing back the parchment to the Goblin, "I'll buy the place, though heaven knows what I'll do with the Zoo-Poo." The beam of light was now getting closer through the hedges that bordered the plaza.
"Good, sign here, here, here, here, over here, initial here, here and here and then date there and there." The goblin unfurled a long roll that dropped down and rolled across the ground until it bumped up against Harry's feet; a malicious grin spreading across the pint sized financier's face as he pointed at all the different places Harry had to fill in information.
Harry's eyes bugged out as he quickly looked between the complicated legal purchase contract, the goblin, and the oncoming guard with the flashlight.
"Bugger!" Rapidly filling out the five signatures, three initials, and two date sections with a ballpoint pen with frogs on it, stolen from the gift shop of course, Harry ignored the part where it said he now owed the goblins a first born male and quickly handed back the completed contract.
The goblin's teeth gleamed in the light trickling through the bushes just as the Guard rounded the corner. "Nice doing business with you." The goblin smirked before disappearing in a poof, leaving Harry as the only person in the plaza besides the guard that was now pointing his flashlight directly at Harry as Harry's screen filled up with several messages."
"Wallet minus 10,000 Pounds Muggle. Congratulations, you've bought a business! First rent available in 2 weeks. Your total Business income is 1000 Pounds and 0 Galleons per month. You gain 1 Zoo-Poo: This Big Cat poop is guaranteed to keep away rodents from your lovely plants."
All interesting information, but Harry had a bigger concern at the moment.
"Um, Save Game!" Harry quickly yelled as the flashlight was shown right in his eyes.
"Sorry, unable to save at this time due to being pursued by guards. Please lose your pursuers and try to save again." The game ever so helpfully informed Harry.
"Intruder Alert! Intruder located at the Plaza! All Guards converge!" The Guard shouted into a radio clipped to his collar before charging at Harry.
"Bwaaaa! Run Away!" Harry bellowed in frustration at getting into another crappy situation and sprinted in the opposite direction while beginning his patented bounce-sprint. Harry traversed the cobbles of the plaza headed towards the displays from Africa, only to have two Guards round the corner in front of him and charge Harry straight on; the fact that they were wearing body armor and wielding truncheons didn't fill Harry with much hope that he could take all three of the guards.
Stopping and looking left and right, Harry did the only thing he could as the guards in front and behind dived for him.
"Yipe!" Harry shrieked before taking a hard left bounce over the railing of the display and once again plummeting towards a pool of water; the guard behind Harry just brushing the heel of Harry's boot with an outreached hand but failing to grab ahold of Harry.
Harry splashed into the water only to surface with the light of several flashlights shining on him. Well, shining on him and reflecting off of several sets of large eyes.
"Tada!" A trophy popped up in Harry's vision, "Congratulations! You've earned the trophy "Hungry Hungry Hippos!" Did you know that hippos kill more people in Africa than any other wild animal in that region of the world? And you've decided to go for a swim with them! Good luck!"
The deep bellows of several angry, and very territorial, hippos was perfectly counter pointed by the prepubescent scream of fear that left Harry's mouth as Hippo heads surfaced out of the water in bursts of bubbles and churning algae, and then charged right at Harry.
"Holy Mother of Dexterity and Dodging don't fail me now!" Harry yelled as he threw himself to the right and then dived under water, and fortunately under a snapping large toothed mouth, before popping up with all of his strength as he saw a hippo coming at him from under the water.
"Zoing!" "Run-Away! Activated." Never had the manufactured sound of Harry's perk sounded as good in his ears as the Perk launched Harry straight up into the air, out of the water, and just out of reach of a Hippo that seemed to have been watching too many reruns of the movie "JAWS."
The Hippo directly beneath Harry snapped its mouth shut on nothing but air and then gravity pulled it back towards the surface of the water.
Only for Harry to land directly on its head.
It is important at this point to note that Hippos apparently don't like people standing on their heads, especially not while wearing combat boots.
"Hippo takes 10 points of damage!" Flashed in front of Harry's eyes, but he was a bit too busy to pay attention to damage stats.
"Oh shit! Hop damn'it!" Harry hopped off of the head of the hippo towards the only other available surface, which just so happened to be another Hippo's head.
This hippo was equally unhappy with Harry using his head for a landing point.
"Ahhh! I thought you were vegetarians!" Harry picked up one foot quickly, almost doing an imitation of the Heisman American Football trophy as the hippo beneath Harry tried to twist underneath in an attempt to take off Harry's leg.
Harry's response was to frown and stomp on the hippo's head in retaliation.
"Bad hippo! No Harry for you!" Harry perforated his comments by stomping his heel twice on the back of the hippo, causing two sets of "Hippo takes 5 points of damage! Hippo takes 5 points of damage!" To pop up in Harry's vision.
The Hippo retaliated by diving under the water.
"Bwa! Abandon ship!" Harry's boots got wet but he was successful in jumping over the mouth of another hippo and onto the back of a third.
"Fawkes Flaming Feces! Feet don't fail me now!" Harry leapt and cavorted, sometimes spinning, all of the time flailing his arms to keep his balance, and desperately leapt from hippo to hippo until he made it to land.
"Ding! Title earned, "Hippo-Hopper!" We don't know why anybody would be crazy enough to try it, but you earned it. Did you know that Hippos are faster on land then in the water? Congrats!"
Harry charged out of the water, only to have the hippos charge right after him as he scrambled across their encampment and with a jump to help him gain more altitude, Harry barely made it up the opposite wall from where he had entered the hippo enclosure.
A few moments of climbing saw Harry reach the top of the fence and the safety of another of the zoo's paths.
At which point seven guards turned the corner to Harry's left and pointed their flashlights at the now dripping wet Harry.
Harry sprinted to the right, and the chase was on again.
It was at this point that the Video Game's programming decided to add a new mechanic to the video game that was The Adventures of Harry Potter, the video game.
"Benny Hill mode activated due to being chased by six or more enemies." Flashed in Harry's vision, accompanied by the comedic theme song to the "Benny-Hill Show" starting to play from speakers throughout the zoo.
"Oh now you're just fucking with me." Harry yelled at the game's programmers as he came to a four way intersection and took a fast right turn as there were guards coming from his left and directly in front of him. The seven original guards were now running in a line behind Harry, each of them waving their truncheons in the air and shaking fists at Harry who easily kept in front of the lengthening conga-line of guards chasing him. The circus like music kept playfully matching the cadence of the chase, as the ever growing line of guards started to look like a clown parade of guards waving truncheons with a white faced Harry zigzagging through the zoo while leading the crazy conga line.
Harry bunny-hopped down the path between the llamas, alpacas, emus and ostriches who were the only audience to the cavalcade of madness that trucked on by, the circus like music keeping pace with the fast paced chase scene in front of them as more and more guards joined the back of the group chasing Harry as he wound up and down the Zoo's paths.
Harry bounced to the right, and to the left, even doubled back along twisting routes as the path wound about in front of him through the bird sanctuary and then out the other side into a circular roundabout that went around a large fountain.
Around and around Harry led the guards in a circle around the fountain.
Harry ran around the circle with the guards all following him in a line, silly music still syncopated to the chase scene, and Harry continued to follow the loop around the fountain until he nearly ran into the back of the last guard in the line.
Around and around they went, four times, before Harry realized that he was really tempting fate so decided to be smart and dodged off the path towards the "Big Cat" house that was just off the fountain plaza.
Darting into the Big Cat house through the double glass doors, Harry ran into the dark twisting halls of the large building that housed the Zoo's assorted lions, tigers, leopards, and other large predatory cats.
The sound of the double doors slamming open behind Harry let him know that he was still being followed, but the darkness gave him a chance to get away.
"Ninja Vanish activated!" Flashed in Harry's vision as he crouched in a dark corner and stealthily, but quickly, made his way towards a side door that was marked as, "Private! Zoo Employees Only!"
By disappearing in the shadows and sneaking, the Benny Hill music stopped. However that didn't mean the chase was over as the guards on Harry's radar were still flashing red in warning that they were actively searching for him, and it in looking at his radar it appeared that more guards were entering the building through all the public entrances.
"Quick, somebody turn the lights on! The little bastard can't have gone far." A guard's voice echoed down the hall, making Harry quickly take out his lock picks and scramble to unlock the door with the privacy warning.
"Come on, please Merlin, Morgana, and baby Jesus don't be a difficult lock." Harry quietly prayed to any divine power that he could possibly think of to let him get out of this situation unscathed.
Fortunately, the door's lock only showed as "Minor Difficulty" in his vision, and with a few deft twists of the bobby pin, the lock snapped open.
Harry quietly opened the door and then shut it behind him as he entered some sort of cramped dark structure and nearly tripped over something lying on the floor.
He eased the door closed just in time, and heard it lock automatically behind him. The surface of the walls were rough and the cramped area reminded him of the broom cupboards in Hogwarts, or some sort of small stone structure as Harry used his hand as a guide on the wall to help him as again he tripped over what he thought was a thick broom handle and then stumbled to his knees and onto a flat but pitted stone area of the floor; just as the lights turned on flooding the room around him and blinding him for a moment.
Harry had to blink and used one of his hands to wipe his eyes as he knelt sprawled on all fours on what he could now see was an artificial stone floor.
Lifting his head, Harry came nose to snout with a large male lion that was only about two inches away and sniffing the air. It was at this point that Harry realized that it wasn't a broom he had tripped over, twice, but several female lions who had been peacefully lying in their artificially created cave in the back of the Lion Enclosure. And at this point the full pride of twelve or so fully grown lions, and several cubs, were all looking at Harry who was splayed out in the middle of their pride.
In such a situation as this, the only thing Harry could thing to do was wish he had saved more often, and to smile nicely at the large predator in front of him and utter, "Um, uh, nice kitty?"
As last words go, not particularly brave or courageous. Still.
The large lion's nose edged closer to Harry, nostrils flaring as the large beast took big sniffs of air, before opening his mouth.
Harry saw a mouth full of teeth, full of very sharp teeth at that, before a large rough tongue licked him across the face.
At which point the other lions in the pride jumped up and all swarmed Harry.
Meanwhile, the guards were busy searching the halls for the intruder.
The large cats were originally nocturnal, but the zoo liked to change the lighting and feeding options so that the animals were more active during the day when visitors could enjoy them.
As the guards walked the halls they didn't see anything out of the ordinary in the tiger cage.
"All Clear!" The guard yelled while another checked near the leopard enclosure.
"Nothing over here." Another shouted back, noting how the cheetahs were lounging around their opening, the same as with the puma, lynx, and mountain lion displays which were all showing normal levels of night time activity.
"The Lions are a bit frisky tonight, but nothing out of the normal. Maybe some of the females are going into heat or something." One guard scratched his head as he looked into the enclosure where a large dog pile, or rather kitty pile, of frolicking lions were seen rolling around together and playfully pawing at something under the pile as if they were high on catnip.
"No way you idiot. Don't you ever listen to the zoo keeper's explanations? The females are still nursing their cubs, so it's not season for them to be going into heat." Another guard walked up and cuffed the younger guard upside the head.
"Hey! I just guard em, I don't care to learn about em. Damn things are scary as hell. Could you imagine not having glass between them and you?" The guard questioned with a shiver.
Then, as if the world blinked, all of the guards seemed to shake a bit, and blink before pulling out their flashlights.
"Guess there is nobody there." The first guard stated.
"Must have been my imagination." A second responded.
"Stupid wind always making noises." The third replied before all three turned on their flashlights and walked out of the building, shutting off the lights behind them as all of the guards went back about their routine patrol.
As the lights went out, dimming the room to only the light that you would get from a full moon, Harry stopped stifling his voice.
"Ha ha Ha! Stop! That tickles, Ow! Hey, don't nibble there, I still want that Ah! Claws in the butt! Stop it you… STOP!" Harry put all 27 points of strength to use and was able to barely roll himself over so that he was no longer pinned by several playful cuddling and licking lions.
Very thankful the previously earned title of "Cat Whisperer," Harry pried the two cub's claws out of his leather jacket and carefully set the playful lion kittens down.
Standing up, face shining with slobber and red from being rubbed nearly raw by multiple sandpaper like tongues, Harry stood only to feel a breeze on his neck.
Patting his neck Harry realized his long hair wasn't tickling the back of his neck at the moment, and looking through the dim light at the glass on the other side of the enclosure showed him why.
Harry's Silky Slythern Locks were moussed straight up and sticking out in every which direction as if he had used an entire bottle of hair gel only to then stick his head through the blow driers at the end of a car wash. Either that, or that he had been shocked by one point twenty-one gigawatts and survived with only a new hairdo.
Harry's inspection was interrupted by a hip check as one of the female lions rubbed up against his legs like a giant house cat, only to send Harry stumbling and quick stepping not to land on one of the little cubs cavorting at his feet and playing with the laces of his combat boots.
"Hey, that's enough of that." Harry smiled and reached down and scratched the lion behind its ear and down its cheek, the lion in turn purring and pushing into Harry's scratching fingers.
Harry patted the lion on the head, only to have another lioness push under his other hand for attention and Harry just laughed and smiled as he looked around the enclosure. A glint of gold caught his attention from right in the middle of the lion enclosure.
Quickly dodging around several lions, "Hey, no biting my bum!" Harry quick stepped away from an overly amorous lioness and then stiff armed the male lion who almost nuzzled too hard into Harry and nearly pushed the young boy over, but fortunately in the direction of the snitch.
A quick catch, and the screen lit up with another message in Harry's vision.
"Congratulations, you caught a golden snitch! 7/200 caught"
Harry was nudged again and he giggled and laughed as he enjoyed petting the very friendly lions, very very thankful for the Cat Whisperer bonuses as he made his way towards a clearly marked "Handler's entrance" door labeled and which Harry's vision told him a lock that was marked as an "Easy."
Still, having multiple large cats continue to try for his attention while trying to unlock the door was difficult, and he lost two lock picks to distraction before finally getting the door open, barely keeping the lions from following him into the hall, and then securely locking the door behind him.
Leaning against the door, the sound of lions scratching pleadingly at the other side of the metal door, Harry smiled to himself and patted down his hair as it once again magically flowed back into its long Slytherin Locks configuration. The ribbon must have been left behind in the lion enclosure, but that didn't mean he didn't have other stolen ribbons he could use.
Smiling, Harry turned around to discover a well lit zoo keepers' locker room with several lockers and one large wooden and leather wrapped chest in the corner.
"WooT! Wonderful Loot!" Harry cheered and jumped over the wood bench in his way, ignored the lockers, and threw open the chest.
Only to get a face full of glitter.
"Ta-DA! Congratulations, you've found a secret chest! You found Hagrid's Secret Chest of Cuddly Kitty Supplies!"
This time Harry's mouth was closed, but he still got a face full of glitter that clung to his still wet face and hair.
The chest didn't contain a lot of items, but what it had was Amazing, with a capital A.
"You gained one vial of Re'em Blood: a permanent one time use tincture of +5 to strength; please note that Re'em Blood does not stack with other vials of Re'em blood." Harry didn't even bother to continue looking through the chest for other items before snatching the vial out of the chest, popping the cork, and draining the blood into his mouth and swallowing.
Harry swallowed, waited a second, and then the blood hit him as hard as if Hagrid had elbowed him in the chest as Harry felt like he had been punched in the gut and let out an explosive breathe as his body immediately felt flushed, then numb, and finally tingly and hot as his shirt first felt tight before automatically adjusting to his new muscles and strength of 32.
"Whew," Harry patted himself on the chest until a belch came out, a puff of smoke issuing from his mouth and his ears ringing as he blinked and looked back into the chest. "What else do you have in your little hideaway Hagrid." Harry said to himself as he leaned over the large chest and looked inside.
There was a big burlap sack that was empty and wasn't going to be worth anything, but the pair of dragon hide creature keeper gloves at the bottom of the chest absolutely made up for it.
Grabbing the black and blood red gloves, which looked to have been made from the juvenile hide of a female Chinese Fireball dragon, Harry went to his armor tab and equipped the gloves to see what they did.
"You gained The Fire Catcher's Gloves, made from Dragon hide with an armor rating of +20 these gloves are puncture resistant and fully immune to fire. Sure, you can juggle lit torches or play with fireballs and not worry about burning your hands and forearms, it's the rest of your body you need to worry about."
The game's description of the gloves and their magical capabilities was as glib and taunting as usual, but still, the gloves practically doubled Harry's overall armor rating and fireproof gloves were nothing to scoff at. Besides, it was his first piece of magical armor, and it belonged to a man who in a previous life had been a dear friend.
"Heh heh, loot. Bloody nice is what it is." Harry said as he admired his gloves and turned them back and forth before turning to look at the four lockers that were in the room.
Only one of the lockers didn't have a padlock on it, so Harry figured he would start with that.
"And, let's see what we have behind door number one!" Harry cheered and threw open the unopened locker.
Only to stare stunned for a second, and then quickly slam the locker closed and throw himself against the door; as if holding it closed would fight off the images that would be forever haunting his dreams.
"Pin ups of naughty naked Brazilian Grannies… the Horror…" Harry's statement faded off as his eyes stared unseeing at the wall opposite him.
A green color slowly spread across his face, and he thought he was going to vomit for a moment as images of tiny string bikinis hidden in folds of wrinkles upon wrinkles where wrinkles shouldn't be floated through his mind.
"Constitution check! 8 of 5 needed: Passed!" Flashed in Harry's vision and the urge to vomit slowly left him.
Shaking a bit, Harry reached for the lock on the next closest locker.
A bit of twiddling with wire, and the lock popped.
Only to show an empty locker.
Grumbling to himself, Harry went to the next locker to see if there was any loot to purloin.
Opening the locker gained him a whole lot of diddly, and a few squat. Translated: Harry found diddly-squat in the empty locker, and thus teaching Harry that just because something is locked, doesn't mean it has any loot you want.
"Still, better to search then miss out on any great loot." Harry told himself, only to have a brief flashback of saggy breasts and buttocks being held up by a white string bikini, causing Harry to shiver before he darted for the fourth and final locker in an attempt to distract himself from the evil thoughts.
"That way lies madness." Harry mumbled to himself as he spun the lock and popped it off the door.
"+1 Lock-picking," the screen told him, but Harry was more worried about what he would see in the locker.
Hesitating before opening the locker, Harry chanted to himself, "No whammy's no whammy's no whammies, Harry needs a new set of duds!" Harry threw the door open to discover the brown long shorts and khaki t-shirt of a zoo keeper.
"Hmm," Harry reached into the locker and grabbed the uniform out of the closet.
Harry's grasping of the uniform caused a message and tutorial to pop up in front of his eyes.
"You've gained "Zoo Keeper's Uniform."
"Ding!" Sounded in Harry's ear as the tutorial message typed across his vision, "Congratulations, you've found your first Disguise! Disguises make people think that you belong where you aren't supposed to be. Want to make people believe you belong in the kitchen at a high priced restaurant when you don't even know a steak knife from a cleaver? Steal a chef's outfit. Want to enter some mansion? Steal a servant or delivery man's uniform. Uniforms are great for making blatantly obvious intruders fit in, you could be a bald headed man in his thirties, clearly caring pistols, and if you had the right disguise then McGonagall would set you on the seat with the other firsties to be sorted. This uniform will allow you to move through controlled areas of the zoo, but please understand that if you perform a crime while being viewed, or by leaving bodies lying around, your disguise will probably not protect you."
"Mwa ha ha ha ha ha." Harry cackled evilly while going to his armor tab and quickly swapping out his current punk hoodlum gear for the zoo keepers outfit.
Smiling to himself, Harry commanded out loud. "Save game."
The Zoo Keeper's Uniform made life so much easier for Harry as he wandered the zoo at night.
Harry's first test was walking past a guard with a jaunty confident wave.
The guard didn't even give Harry a moment's hesitation, the guard just turned to Harry and greeted him.
"I used to be a zoo keeper like you, but then I took a Kangaroo kick to the knee." The guard said nonchalantly, as if it was the most normal statement in the world.
Harry just raised an eyebrow at the guard, like the guy was crazy, and kept walking.
Harry followed his map, now with clearly visible items marked on it, and easily passed the second guard who merely mentioned, "Aren't you kind of short for a Zoo Keeper?"
Harry just smiled and made his way to the bird sanctuary, where he climbed a tree and grabbed his 8th golden snitch. The guard who patrolled through the sanctuary just smiled and waved at Harry with a comment of, "Wow, you look strong for a zoo keeper your size, but kind of sneaky."
Apparently it was appropriate for zoo keepers to keep the birds company in the trees, or at least not illegal so as to negate Harry's disguise.
Two more missions were accomplished, both which called for Harry to run back and forth from one side of the Zoo from where he got the mission to where he had to deliver a package of vitamins to a Koala with herpes without getting bit, thank Merlin for the Fire Catcher's Gloves, and then pick up 25 items of litter and drop them in trash cans to collect a reward. All together Harry gained another 400 XP and a lifelong pass for admission to the zoo.
Climbing the fountain in the plaza Harry had run circles around gained him snitch number 9, and he found snitch number 10 floating over a large dumpster full of manure and a machine that dispensed empty containers with the label "Zoo-Poo!" on them.
Harry looked at the snitch, floating above the stinking rotting pile of feces left by all sorts of animals.
He looked at the machine that dispatched the buckets; also noted the lack of a shovel, ladder or any sort of way to get the floating snitch other than climbing the pile of crap.
And then Harry looked towards the sky.
"I am so going to find this world's version of your mothers, and then I'm going to give each and every one of them a righteous rodgering." Harry paused and then thought a bit more before adding,
"Just as soon as I hit puberty and it's not going to get anybody arrested due to age concerns." Harry yelled to the air, only to stop and think about the problems with his threat and peter off in his last part of the statement.
With a sigh, Harry equipped his Hufflepuff Shovel, grabbed a bucket, and started shoveling.
Six hours later saw the day shift arrive with the dawn, and it wasn't long until a cute twenty something zoo keeper walked out the back, saw Harry hard at work with several hundred buckets of full Zoo-Poo stacked a good 20 feet away, and Harry still near the open front of the container shoveling Zoo-Poo.
Harry wasn't even paying attention he was so bored shoving shit. Not to say it didn't have benefits though.
"+1 to Herbology!"
And then a few minutes later.
"+1 to Herbology!" the screen told him.
By this point Harry was at total of 74 skill points to Herbology, had somewhere in the night earned a new title of "Shite Shoveler," but it now took more than one or two full buckets shoveled full of poo before he gained another point.
"What doesn't kill you makes you stronger." Harry chanted to himself, the sort of mantra that had helped tide him over all night long. The shoveling barely taxed his stamina, and he found that he didn't really need to sleep while his stamina bar wasn't empty. Thus a few seconds pause after working for a bit saw the stamina bar back to full whenever he needed a break. Thus he had been shoveling nonstop for the last six hours of the night and through the wee hours of the morning.
"Wow, you must have been working all night." The smiling zoo keeper came up to Harry and admired his stinky yet well packaged mountain of zoo-poo packages.
"Ugh, tell me about it." Harry moaned back in reply, not stopping his shoveling as he still had about two feet to go in emptying the container before he could safely find a ladder and get to the snitch without having to wade through crap for it.
"Well yeah, it's really nice of you to empty that out. Especially since the next load from the remote dumping areas are due to be dumped here any moment." The girl informed Harry, still smiling at his hard work.
Harry stopped mid shovel, and slowly turned his head to face the girl who smiled brightly at him.
"Wait, what next shipment?" Harry slowly asked.
The sound of metal sliding on metal behind and above Harry sounded, followed by the whir of a motor followed by what sounded like a snow blower churning through icy slush, and that's when a fresh wave of smell hit Harry's nose.
Turning around, a chute had opened in the wall and was spewing a new load of shit onto the pile, erasing all of the work Harry had spent all night performing.
Harry lost it.
"Shite! Fuck! Bloody Blokes Buggering Bulstrode on a Bike! Come ON!" Harry threw down his shovel on the concrete and jumped up and down in an absolute fit. Spit flying from his mouth in fury.
"Severus Snape's gangrenous ass you bum fuckers!" Harry cursed at the sky.
"Woah, woah, hold on. What's wrong?" The female zoo keeper at first looked taken aback at the vitriol, some of it not making a whole lot of sense to her, before stepping forward and placing a hand on Harry to calm him down.
Harry tried to calm down, but between his blood pressure and the veins in his forehead making him look like a miniature angry Vernon Dursley, his response only came out in a series of grunts.
"Grrrrr!" Harry pointed at the buckets.
"Gah!" Then at the shovel.
"Murphl!" Then pointed the full zoo-poo buckets while biting his knuckles so as not to start cursing again.
"Mhhhnn." Harry's shoulders collapsed in defeat, finally looking at his boots.
"Awe, don't be frustrated. You want to move the whole container?" She stated as she rested her hand on his shoulder briefly and gave him a smile and a squeeze.
Harry could only silently nod in frustration.
"Then no worries." She walked around Harry and leaned to the left side of the open face of the large metal container, and pulled a door around from the side until it slammed and bolted in place taking up half of the opening of the large waste container. She then walked to the other side and pulled the shipping container's other door closed before turning to Harry with a smile.
"There you go. Now we just call the waste removal company and they will send a semi-truck to remove this container tomorrow." She finished happily.
Harry looked at her, then at the container with a frown.
"But I want to move it today." He whined, his literal age showing through despite his original maturity of thought from his first life.
"Well I'm sorry, we just don't have anything strong enough to pick up this container." She stated, turning and giving a yank on the waste container to show that even though it had wheels underneath it, it was just too heavy to lift without heavy equipment or magic.
Harry looked at the girl playfully tugging on the container in an attempt to make Harry smile, and a thought came to him.
"Intelligence check Passed!" Flashed in Harry's mind as an idea came to him.
"No heavy equipment, but let me try something. Hold onto that container and whatever happens, don't let go." He said with a smile as he walked towards her and then surprised her by picking the girl up off the ground.
"Wait! What are you doing?!" The girl questioned, startled by Harry picking her up, especially with the fact that he was so much shorter than her but clearly strong enough to lift her up.
"What is a hero without an ability to sweep the damsel off her feet." He said with a smile, and effortlessly started walking backwards.
"Me Tarzan You Jane Perk activated!"
And thus Harry easily pulled the girl, and her cargo container, out of the position where it was under the now shut waste shoot and cleared a path for him to set up a ladder underneath the snitch.
Setting down the girl, Harry smiled and bowed to her over her hand while giving the back of it a kiss, "Thank you for your help m'lady. I would have been lost without you." He said with an over exaggerated wink.
The zoo keeper blushed and smiled at Harry.
"+1 to Flirting!" Flashed in Harry's vision.
"My pleasure." She replied with a smile.
With a twirl in his step, Harry turned and quickly walked over to where a pile of ladders had been hidden behind the shipping container he just moved. A quick return and the ladder was up, Harry climbed it, and snitch number 10 was his.
"Congratulations, you caught a golden snitch! 10/200 caught! +500 Experience and unlock cheat code "Dramatic Moments!"
"Hmm, I wonder what this cheat does?" Harry mumbled to himself before going into the menu and activating the cheat code "Dramatic Moments!"
Exiting the menu, Harry looked around but didn't see anything out of the ordinary.
So with a shrug, Harry headed back towards the opening to the zoo; he'd completed all the missions and explored the whole place.
As he walked past the Zoo Gift Shop he saw the clerk flip the sign from Closed to Open, and Harry paused mid step.
"Wait a minute." Harry tilted his head to the side and walked to look into the shop to see that it was still empty of product to sell at the moment.
"It can't be this easy." He said out loud with a shake of his head, before pushing through the door and heading up to the counter where the clerk was cheerfully smiling at him.
"Welcome to the gift shop. Would you like to take a look at our wares?" The clerk cheerfully asked, and again the world froze as a query popped up asking if he would like to "Buy" or "Sell?"
"Uh, sell." Harry answered and a list of his inventory appeared, most of it full of items labeled in Red and previously stolen from the store the night before.
Tapping a stack of pink koala t-shirts, Harry was surprised when the option to sell all or sell individually was offered.
"Then again, it did tell me that Merchant of Surrey allows me to sell illicit items at regular stores." Harry commented as his smile started to grow.
With a tap of his finger on the button in the air, Harry hit sell all and was rewarded with 200 Pounds muggle in return.
"Mwa ha ha ha ha." Harry started cackling, only for his laugh to grow into a maniacal laugh that would have done Voldemort proud. "BWA HA HA HA HA!" Harry tilted his head back to the side, clawed hands at his side and a gleam in his eyes Harry as he laughed at the possibilities of gaming the system.
Just then, lightning flashed in the clear blue sky outside gift shop and thunder crashed, matching the tone of Harry's crazed laughter.
Harry went from crazy laughteer to stone sober in an instance and looked over his shoulder at the rapidly clearing sky; the clouds melting away just as quickly as they had been created.
"Mwa ha ha ha ha?" Harry test laughed, only for the clouds to build again rapidly, and then fade when he stopped laughing.
Tilting his head to the side, Harry paused, and then a look flashed across his face as he understood.
"Ah, I get it now. Dramatic moments. Got it." Harry said with a shrug. "Eh, good for a laugh." He finished blasé before going back to selling all of his stolen loot, back to the very store he stole it from. The irony that he owned the store was not lost on him either.
Five minutes later Harry walked out of the store 5,000 pounds richer, and half way back to recouping the expense of buying the store. As usual, he kept the books, but everything else he had stolen was sold back to the store.
Walking past the attendant at the gate who was still stuck on the repeat of "Ticket Please…" Harry walked out to the parking lot to try and figure out where he wanted to go.
"No wand, so Knight bus is right out. Don't want to lose anything important, so not going to try and apparate. Hmm." Harry said to himself, while noting that it was a bad habit continually talk to himself, and that he was going to have to stop once he finally got friends or people to talk to again.
As his vision panned the London Zoo's parking lot, a cabbie pulled up and dropped off a couple.
At which point a dastardly plan to game the system popped up in Harry's mind.
"Mwa ha ha ha," The thunder clash halted Harry's laughter before it could really get started, so instead he quickly made his way over to the taxi before it could drive off.
"Are you open for a fare?" Harry asked through the taxi's front window to the Cabbie who looked back at him quizzically.
"Where to lad?" The older cabbie asked.
"I want you to drive around London until this runs out, I want to see everything without ever repeating the same street, and then I want to go to Charing Cross Road." Harry replied smugly, handing over a bundle of 5000 pounds in advance.
The cabbie blinked at the boy, and then at the money before smiling large.
"Right O then goven'r. I know this town like the back of my hand and I'll show you every bit from the docks to the dry, from the good to the bad. Hop in." The taxi driver said with a big smile as Harry got in.
As they drove off through the town Harry pulled up his map and watched more and more of it become visible.
"Discovered new area, 10 experience gained." "Discovered new area, 10 experience gained."…
Harry kicked back in the rear of the cab and let the world come to him as the city map was unveiled and the experience rolled in.
Harry gained another level halfway through the drive, prefaced by just happening to pass a marching band whose trumpet blasts happened at the exact same moment as the "Level Up!" message popped into his screen.
After that, Harry turned off the "Dramatic Moments!" Cheat because it was just getting silly.
'I'm much too mature to keep the Dramatic Moments going.' Harry thought to himself, before pausing. 'Unless I need to show up Snape and his fluttering cape, or Dumbledore and his twinkling eyes.' Harry thought smugly before realizing that the world was still frozen around him and he wasn't gaining any new experience until he dealt with the new level stats.
Level 9:
CURRENT EXP: 18000 TOTAL. EXP NEEDED FOR NEXT LEVEL: 25000
Health: 23/23
Magic: 430/430
Stamina: 100/100
ABILITIES: Ability points to be allocated: 4
Strength: 32
Dexterity: 17
Constitution: 8
Intelligence: 24
Wisdom: 10
Charisma: 32 +(2)
SKILLS: Skill Points to Allocate: 87
Armor Wearing: 12
Barter: 100
Bulgarian Language: 25
Care of Magical Creatures: 20
Charms: 12 +(5)
Criminal Contacts: 1
Dancing: 4
Dual-Wielding: 25
French language: 34
Flirting: 56
German Language: 25
Herbology: 74
Lock-Picking: 32
Magical Transportation: 6
Muggle Subjects: 100
Parseltongue Language: 100
Pick-pocket: 26
Potioneering: 10
Ranged: 100
Russian Language: 25
Silent Takedown: 100
Sneak: 100
Two-Handed: 7
Unarmed: 6
PERKS:
Comprehending The Incomprehensible.
Arrr, Yer a Pirate!
Accidental Magic
I Have The Power
It's an Adventurer's Life
Are You Threatening Me?!
Ninja Vanish!
The Call of Cthu-Tibbles
Run-Away!
Me Tarzan, You Jane
Silver Tongued Devil
Studiously Studying Student
Wiser is the Miser
The Cunning Linguist
The Merchant of Surrey
Multi-Classing (Thief)
Silky Slytherin Locks of Love
It's an Adventurers Life
AVAILABLE PERKS: Perk Points Available: 1
"Hair Like Snape"
"Lemon-Drop Addiction"
"A Black Gene"
"A Summer Job"
"Creature Comfort"
"There Are Some Who Call Me—Tim"
"It Was An Accident!"
"Dog-gone'it, People Like Me."
"He's Got That Kung-Fu Grip"
"You're a Dark Son of a Bitch"
As usual, first came the analysis of what points he wanted to put into his abilities.
"Hmm, so of course Intelligence is always a good place to put in order to level skill points up as quickly as possible, and it stacks at level. Then again, I am on my way to Diagon Alley and the wizarding world. No telling how much magic I'll need to use when I start out or whether my constitution should be leveled so I can try to avoid poisoning or even Legilmency attacks." Harry pondered his possibilities while tapping his lips with one finger while he rested his hand on his chin in thought.
Harry almost entered his points in a mix of Intelligence and Constitution, but then stopped and really looked at what he had in light of his past experiences.
"How many times did I really get hit with a spell versus dodging or shielding against it?" Harry asked himself, and then cringed when he thought about the Avada Kedavra that he took to the face, and then all of the times that Voldemort had nailed him with a Crucio.
"Yeah, that wasn't fun. And if I put three points into Dexterity it would help me dodge better and get me a free perk. Damn I wish this wasn't my life and just a stupid simple game I was playing." Frustrated with himself, Harry plugged 3 points into Dexterity and then one into Wisdom.
"Dodge it or shield it. I sure hope this works to keep me alive and in one piece better than the last time." Harry cringed as his stats changed.
Level 9:
CURRENT EXP: 18000 TOTAL EXP NEEDED FOR NEXT LEVEL: 25000
Health: 23/23
Magic: 450/450
Stamina: 100/100
ABILITIES: Ability points to be allocated: 0
Strength: 32
Dexterity: 20
Constitution: 8
Intelligence: 24
Wisdom: 11
Charisma: 32 +(2)
"Ding" A message popped up in the corner of the floating stats menu screen. "Congratulations! By reaching 20 Dexterity you've gained the "Dodge This!" Perk. You gain a preternatural sense of your surroundings, almost as if you were a spider or something, and gain a brief moment in time to try and dodge incoming ranged attacks; this includes spells. Be thankful we didn't force you got get bit by a radioactive owl, rabid hippogriff, or a doxy with gout in order to get this perk. Still, with Dodge This! you're now able to pull off some wicked stunts that enable you to dodge bullets and perform other Matrix wibbly wobbly; "Matrix wibbly wobbly" being the technical magical term for being able to move fast enough to dodge bullets or spells. Congrats!"
Harry smiled. "Well worth the extra points into Dexterity." And as Harry looked over his new stats, he thought that the extra 20 magic points weren't to be scoffed at either.
Harry looked over the skills but just like the times before, he wanted to wait until he got a wand or at least into the magical world before using his skill points to help him. So it was on to the perks, and only one perk was new.
Harry read the new perk, and started shaking his while muttering "Hell No" all the while.
""You're a Dark Son of a Bitch" Your background is just like another famous orphan, only now you too have the urge to inflict pain on others and stake furry little woodland creatures out in the sun or feed them to assorted snakes. Yes, you're well on the social path (read as sociopath) towards ruin, despair, and cutting yourself like a little emo bitch. Still, darkness has its perks, with the "You're a Dark Son of a Bitch" perk, you gain +25 reputation with Dark Creatures like Dementors and non-sparkling Vampires and -50 reputation with all Light sided individuals and groups. You gain x2 experience when learning Dark Magic skills and spells and unlock the Dark Rituals skill. So come on, be a Dark Son of a Bitch, because really, sometimes it's fun to help make the world burn."
"Yeah, not happening." Harry shook his head vigorously. "I'm not going to be anything like Voldemort, psychotic bastard that he is." Harry finished before scrolling through the perks some more. Some of them were more horrifying than others, while some were benign but not really that helpful for what he wanted to do.
Harry read through the perks several times before it dawned on him that he didn't know if he was going to be able to buy a wand just yet, so that left wandless magic or magical devices as his only present hope of using magic on a more regular basis.
"Besides, how many times did losing my wand come back to bite me in the ass?" Harry paused and thought to himself, counting some of the times he could remember from his first life on his fingers as he spoke, "There was the time with the Dementors, while tied up in the grave yard, oh and can't forget the Quidditch World Cup, priori incantatem can't catch what you don't use a wand for, hmmm, eh, that's enough reasons anyway."
With a cringe, Harry chose "It Was An Accident!" while rereading the perk one more time to make sure he understood what it did.
"Is accidental magic really accidental if you control the outcome? This perk increases your chance of having boughts of accidental magic by 50%. Additionally, 25% of the time your magic does act 'accidentally' something positive for you will happen. Of course you don't have full control over your wandless magic yet so 25% of the time something negative will happen; the other 50% is a crapshoot. Still, this is the first step to controlling your magic without needing a wand, so who wants to plan some accidents?" Harry read again, and then nodded and slotted his only available perk point.
Harry smiled and reviewed his stats as the game asked him if he was done with the level up screen.
Level 9:
CURRENT EXP: 18000 TOTAL EXP NEEDED FOR NEXT LEVEL: 25000
Health: 23/23
Magic: 450/450
Stamina: 100/100
ABILITIES: Ability points to be allocated: 0
Strength: 32
Dexterity: 20
Constitution: 8
Intelligence: 24
Wisdom: 11
Charisma: 32 +(2)
SKILLS: Skill Points to Allocate: 87
Armor Wearing: 12
Barter: 100
Bulgarian Language: 25
Care of Magical Creatures: 20
Charms: 12 +(5)
Criminal Contacts: 1
Dancing: 4
Dual-Wielding: 25
French language: 34
Flirting: 56
German Language: 25
Herbology: 74
Lock-Picking: 32
Magical Transportation: 6
Muggle Subjects: 100
Parseltongue Language: 100
Pick-pocket: 26
Potioneering: 10
Ranged: 100
Russian Language: 25
Silent Takedown: 100
Sneak: 100
Two-Handed: 7
Unarmed: 6
PERKS:
Comprehending The Incomprehensible.
Arrr, Yer a Pirate!
Accidental Magic
I Have The Power
It's an Adventurer's Life
Are You Threatening Me?!
Ninja Vanish!
The Call of Cthu-Tibbles
Run-Away!
Me Tarzan, You Jane
Silver Tongued Devil
Studiously Studying Student
Wiser is the Miser
The Cunning Linguist
The Merchant of Surrey
Multi-Classing (Thief)
Silky Slytherin Locks of Love
"Dodge This!"
"It Was An Accident!"
"Close screen, and save game." Harry ordered with a smile as the world outside the taxi started to slide by again as the taxi was again driving.
"Hey cabbie, how much more of London do we have to explore?" Harry asked as he kicked back into his seat and then turned sideways so his legs rested on the back bench seat of the taxi.
"5 Magic Spent!" appeared before Harry's eyes before the cabdriver could respond.
"In this morning traffic, about an hour and a half." The cab driver stated while looking at the meter and then into the rearview mirror at Harry.
Harry saw the cabdriver's eyebrows furl together in a bit of confusion via the reflection in the rearview mirror.
"Hey, wasn't you're hair black before? I could have sworn your hair wasn't blue when you got in the cab." The cabbie asked confused.
Harry grabbed a lock of his hair and pulled it around to where he could see it, and sure enough it was a now colored a deep incandescent royal blue.
"Grrr, just drive." Harry griped with a huff while throwing the hair back over his shoulder and then crossing his arms in a pout and slouched on the back seat.
In the corner of Harry's vision, the magic meter appeared and showed that it started to creep back from 445 towards 450 as it slowly refilled.
And thus Harry experienced his first, but not last, introduction to the joys that was the "It Was An Accident!" perk.
Two thousand and sixty experience points later, and Harry's map showed all but the suburbs of London discovered as he pulled up to the curb at Charing Cross Road; he would have to go back and hit the high points to show all of the missions and items, but that wasn't his focus at the moment.
"You sure you want me to drop you off here lad? It's only an empty parking garage, and not a good looking one at that." The cab driver stated, point to where Harry clearly saw the sign for the Leaky Caldron, but where the cabbie saw several grimy businesses and a ramp into a parking garage that appeared to be covered with graffiti.
"Sure thing, thanks for the ride." Harry stated with a smirk while moving his hand towards the handle of the cab, only for the door to unlatch and open itself before Harry could reach it.
"5 Magic Spent!" Flashed in his screen.
Blinking quickly, at the nearly empty street, then back at the cabbie to make sure that nobody had watched the cab door open itself, Harry quickly slid out of the cab and then slammed the cab door and waved the driver off.
The taxi driver pulled away from the curb and Harry turned to face the Leaky Caldron as several muggle pedestrians walked by without glancing up at all.
"Ok, here we go, into the magical world, but first things first. Save game." Harry ordered and waited till the little save icon of a rapidly flapping snitch was done before walking forward and pushing the door open to the Caldron.
Harry pushed the door open with a smile, only to see a little girl in a pretty cream homespun dress with long wispy blonde hair, a bottle cap necklace, and wide eyes, glaring at Harry with hands on her hips.
Harry's vision flashed red at the edges and the words "DANGER!" flashed before his eyes, only confusing him as several thoughts went through his head.
Those thoughts were, 'Wait. She looks familiar.' Followed a second later by, 'I wonder if this red light and Danger warning is the Dodge This Perk?'
To which the world answered back with a resounding "YES!"
Harry saw a flash and found himself spun in a circle from the force of the slap to his face.
"Luna Lovegood attacks with Bitchslap!"
AN: There you have it, sorry for the cliffy but this is where it needed to end. Sorry for the wait, but here is much longer chapter to make up for having to wait so long for an update. Expect shorter chapters more frequently, hopefully, going forward. Of note from the story: First, yes I unfortunately experienced opening up an employee's locker only to find naughty Brazilian grannies inside, now you get to picture it also. Second, for those of you complaining about Harry not being in the wizarding world, Ta Da! He's there. Basically we get to see what a video game version of Diagon Alley would be if you could go into a lot of the stores, do mini missions throughout the alley, Gringotts, and Knockturn. Much shenanigans will be had. So, I hope you enjoyed the chapter, let me know your thoughts of things you'd like to see in a video game version of Diagon and knockturn alley, or even the ministry of magic and Gringotts. Cheers!