It took me a few hours to convince Madam Pomfrey that I was fine and she finally let me leave the infirmary.

So now I was sitting at the lunch table, a little annoyed that I'd missed an opportunity to make a clown of that 'defense against the dark arts professor.'

I ignored it though and sighed into the bowl of soup in front of me. Apparently, that nurse ordered my food for me for the day too because I was 'still recovering'. This meant I was only allowed to have this soup. At least it tasted good, but after missing breakfast, I was hoping for something a bit more hearty.

"What's wrong? Isn't the soup good? There isn't much to complain about getting good food." Ginny seemed to have been following us around quite a bit as of late, and while it was nice, sometimes she seemed to be just a bit too folksy. No respect for the culinary arts.

"I think Rimuru's mad she can't have the other stuff with the soup."

"And whose fault is that? I wouldn't be in this situation if you had just kept your blabber-mouth shut." I still wasn't too happy with the boy after he pulled that stunt back in the infirmary.

"Well. Sure." Sebastian grumbled and went quiet. "Who makes all this food anyway? I've never seen a chef come up here."

"Hm. I think it's mostly the house elves, but some of the Hufflepuff students help too, sometimes. They have been at the school for a long time."

"House… elves?"

"Yeah, they've been serving wizard-kind for a very long time, but usually it's only the richest ones that own them."

"Wait, are we talking about slaves?"

"Slaves? Uh… I don't think so. The house elves want to serve wizards and witches, I think."

Sebastian looked startled for a moment. "Yeah, I think that might be a bit far, Rimuru, at least if Ginny's right. Plus… Going on a big fuss about it might make it worse for them… We're just kids, we can't change anything…" I'd have to deal with his self-worth later, slavery was the current topic of discussion.

Ginny took back over the conversation. "Talking about a big fuss, one of my brother's friends has been making one, I think. It even caused some of the house elves to stop working for a few days… Dunno what happened, though."

"Hm, really? Who might that friend be?"

"I think her name is Herminone?"

"You mean Hermione?" I suggested.

"Yeah, that was her name."

"Isn't that the girl that everyone calls an annoying know-it-all?"

"Yes, but that isn't what I'm worried about. Might as well visit her." I stood up, taking my tray with me. "You two play nice while I'm gone, 'kay?"

"What do you mean 'play nice,' you're the one that causes problems! I'm the most esteemed person we know."

"Sebastian has a point… for once." Ginny said, although I think she was only referring to the first part. She still didn't like Sebastian enough to describe the boy as 'esteemed.'

"Whatever you say."

I stood up and started walking away from the two kids.

"Hey! Want to try and steal Professor Flitwick's stepstool?"

"I'll pass. I think I'll go hang out with my Gryffindor friends now."

It seemed like Sebastian was about to get himself into trouble, but I didn't care.

I found Hermione seated at the Gryffindor table with two boys, one with a hair color that near-perfectly matched Ginny's, and the other with jet-black.

I approached the small group and asked, "Is this seat taken?" pointing at the open spot next to Hermione.

"Uh… Someone might sit there." It was the boy with almost the same hair as Ginny, just shorter.

Since he didn't give me a solid answer and seemed to just be discouraging me from sitting, I just sat down, ignoring him.

I then took a closer look at the two children I didn't know. Well, more specifically, one of the boys, who was a bit more special than the other in my eyes.

The darker-haired boy was wearing a set of round glasses and seemed quite scrawny and pathetic, but there was one mildly interesting part about him. The scar on his forehead. Not the scar itself, but what was right behind it. It seemed like a fragment of soul was just stuck in there, not matching the look of the boy's own.

I suspected this was the 'legendary' Harry Potter, since the redhead seemed like he was that brother named Ron that Ginny mentioned. Maybe that gnarly scar came from the supposed 'battle' he had with Voldemort as an infant.

Well, whatever the cause, the stuff inside it looked pretty nasty. I might have to take care of that if it started causing problems.

I only gave Harry a passing glance before immediately turning toward Hermione, putting on a friendly smile. "Long time, no see, Hermione."

"You know this creepy girl, Hermione!?" Ron, or at least the boy I thought was named Ron, rudely shouted.

"Don't be rude, Ron. Her eyes aren't that weird. I actually think they're quite pretty."

"Pretty weird, yeah."

"Ron!" Hermione scolded.

"They are pretty weird… I've never seen someone with golden eyes before. Kinda strange if you ask me."

"Haha. Maybe you're right? They might look a bit more normal to a dragon." After that, I giggled.

"Wha–?"

"Sooo… I wanted to ask you about house elves, Hermione. I've heard you know a lot about them."

The girl's eyes lit up with a fire of excitement the moment I stroked her ego. She had always seemed like the type to sink her self-worth into her know-how, based on our previous interaction.

"What are they exactly? I'm not really familiar with these western wizards' customs. I do feel a little bad for them, though." I had to make sure to clue her in, otherwise she might get defensive. This was the most neutral, while sympathetic, way I could word it.

"Finally… someone with some sense in them…" she muttered quietly, a smile spreading across her lips. "Follow me to the library and I'll tell you everything!"

I immediately downed the remainder of my soup, drinking from the bowl as if it was a cup. That wasn't the best manners (I could almost feel Shuna's scolding from here), but finishing my meal quickly was more important right now. It may have just been a lame, unsatisfying soup, but it was still food, and I never waste decent food.

"I knew you were the curious, intelligent sort. I'm glad you came to me rather than most of the others here. None of them seem to understand that there's a serious problem here, and none of them will listen to me! I seriously don't know what's off about their minds, but something is clearly wrong with them."

The girl seemed incredibly frustrated for whatever reason, perhaps very passionate about this subject. Maybe I was in for more of a lecture than I expected…

"I mean, how could everyone be perfectly fine with keeping a whole encampment of slaves in a school of all places?! They don't even allow house elves clothes, Rimuru, it's atrocious!"

Wait, these elves go around naked!? No wonder they keep them out of sight!

Now my imagination was running a bit wild… a bit too wild, maybe. If I didn't stop myself, I'd get Ciel angry with me again.

"No clothes? That sounds pretty inhumane to me."

"Exactly! And this mistreatment has been going on for generations, apparently. It's disgusting. Maybe together we can do something about it!"

"Well, I'd like to learn a bit more about the situation first. You know, before deciding to take action or anything."

"Of course, of course. Yes, knowledge is power. That's why I'm taking you to the library, Rimuru. There are some books about house elves there, it should be enough to convince you, I believe." I wasn't being dragged per se, but I had the feeling that I wouldn't be able to bail at this point.

"Lead the way." I decided to give off a contented tone, otherwise I'd probably get in trouble.

From there, I was led the long path to a big dusty library, with a few iron grate doorways with big chained locks dotted across the perimeter. It did make me wonder why they needed those, one of those doors even had a clear magical lock on it too.

"What's with all the security? Isn't this a library?"

"Most of it is only accessible to upper-classmen. The restricted section isn't allowed to be entered without the direct permission of the headmaster, though."

Breaking or bypassing that lock should be no problem for me, but I decided to leave that little side-quest for another time. I could delve into the forbidden knowledge stored in there later when nobody else is around. I doubted it would have anything useful to me, but the fact that it was being kept a secret from most people made those books too tempting for me to resist.

The frizzy-haired Gryffindor girl talked and talked and talked about house elves, using examples in many books she had pulled off the library shelves to help her arguments. It helped me gather some of the information that I needed, but Hermione is incredibly long-winded. I ended up very bored by the time she finished, but I guess that's what I get for going to a girl I knew didn't know when to shut up.

At least her heart was in the right place, though. Her passion about freeing house elves from their metaphorical (and sometimes literal, it seemed) shackles was the real deal. I could admire that, at least.

Still, her way of going about it was very flawed, obviously. That was part of why nobody else listened to her. Being only 12 years old, though, I was hoping she would just grow out of that with time.

"So then, Rimuru. Will you help me?"

I giggled softly, "Maybe." The giggle instead of chuckle was even surprising to me, but I ignored it. Then I got up and left.

"What do mean, 'maybe'!? After all that, you leave me with a 'maybe'!?" I swear her hair was puffed up like the fur of an angry cat, but that might've just been my imagination.

I didn't feel like answering her further, so I left the yelling little girl behind, probably to face the consequences of screaming her head off in the library. I didn't think librarians tended to take that sort of thing lightly, so Hermione would probably end up in some trouble. That wasn't my fault, though.

From her I'd learned house elves had been known to serve wizards for around two thousand years, however the circumstances under which they'd become servants were unclear. From there, house elf contracts were pretty strict, they'd even engage in self-harm if they believed they had wronged their master.

They also had to serve their master, regardless of their own will, even when they wanted to be free. However, most of them were found to be happier within their contracts. That made some sense to me, but at the same time was disturbing. It was not exactly natural for any creature to want to serve another. The connection through naming with monsters in my world was one thing, but this situation felt entirely different.

I'd never intended for that to be the case when naming them. If anything, I'd attempted to give them as much free will as possible… Partially in hoping they'd leave (yet that never seemed to happen). However, this contract thing seemed a lot more devious. I didn't know everything yet though, so I had to learn more.

"Master, I would like to go into the Forbidden Forest to seek out Riddle's other victims." Hebi spoke up out of nowhere, peering at me with her orichalcum eyes as she slightly untwined herself from around my finger.

"Oh, yeah… that. Yes, I can take you there tonight, how does that sound?"

I hadn't exactly forgotten about that goal, but it had slightly slipped my mind when I got fixated on this whole house elf thing. I decided that the house elves could wait another day or so to be freed and I should focus on my first goal which was helping the others that were in a similar state to what Myrtle was. I was certain they were suffering if they were still lingering in this world in some form.

Considering how young they were, and how traumatizing the experience was, even to Myrtle, I had to guess they were extra-here. Probably pretty mad too. "Alright, yeah. We should definitely deal with that."

"You already said that, Master."

Hebi seemed eager enough, which was good. I wanted her to do a good job finding those poor child souls out in that forest. Plus, if it was just meant to be sass, it wasn't like she was exactly setting a new standard for the women I normally hung out with. That had sounded like a line straight from Raphael, so it was definitely nothing I wasn't used to.

Nothing else of note really happened for the rest of the day luckily.

…

So getting into this 'forbidden' forest was a lot easier than you'd think. A kid could pretty much just wander in if they wanted. That seemed a bit problematic to me, but it sure made this job a lot easier.

Maybe it was this way to make 'em stronger. I mean, I'd put my students in a deadly forest too, as a test, but I'd watch 'em at least. Kids need supervision when being intentionally thrown into dangerous situations, otherwise that's just carelessness on the part of the adults around them.

Anyway, I waited for it to get dark and snuck out of the school, stealthily making my way through the winding hallways and staircases before escaping out onto the school grounds. The nighttime air smelled nice and refreshing; I thought the quiet of it was nice too, since Hogwarts was usually plagued with the sounds of students milling about, both inside and out.

The entrance to the forest, as I already knew, was completely unguarded. So I just waltzed on past it and into the place. It was pretty homey too, a nice forest.

It seemed peaceful for something deemed 'forbidden' and stuff, which made this little jaunt into it all the more relaxing. I'd always enjoyed forests ever since my reincarnation, I 'grew up' in Jura, after all. And still to this day, a large portion of the Great Jura Forest remains undeveloped and natural, and I would like to keep it that way.

"Okay Hebi, here should be fine," I said as we neared a decent-sized clearing. I wanted to see Hebi's full size now that she'd evolved, but it wasn't like I could have her do that in the middle of the school. That would grab too much attention and maybe even cause a panic.

The small basilisk unraveled from her place on my finger and slithered to the ground and away from me. Then, I watched as she grew exponentially in size, filling the space I picked for this.

Ultimately she was larger than she used to be, though she was a bit thinner. She became more snake-like in body proportions. Relatively thin, but incredibly long. I had to guess she was at least twenty meters.

"Pretty impressive, Hebi. I like your cute full size almost as much as your extra-cute tiny one!"

Hebi slithered closer and leaned forward so her golden eyes matched the level of mine.

"I do not believe the other students would agree that I am 'cute.'" she said with complete seriousness.

"And I don't believe their opinions on you matter." I gave her nose a gentle pat before she backed away.

"Shall I go now, Master?"

"Sure. Have fun. Don't eat anything intelligent out here, alright? Just animals and stuff if you feel need to have a little snack. You can contact me with telepathy once you're done with your job."

I was planning on turning back after that, but halfway along my turn, I saw the silhouette of a giant man carrying some animal on a path parallel to my own.

I recognized him; I mean, who else is shaped like that around here? Nobody I'd encountered. This had to be that Hagrid fellow, and with a little more focus with my limited magic sense confirmed that assumption.

It also confirmed he was carrying… A cow? A whole-ass dead cow, draped over his shoulder in a similar way to how he'd carried me before.

Hagrid was merrily humming to himself as he walked further into the forest, not struggling with the massive animal carcass at all.

Wondering why this man was taking a corpse deep into a forest during the dead of night, I decided to follow him.

Secretly, of course. I was certain the man would drag me back to the school if I was found out here.

This place is called the 'Forbidden Forest', after all, and I knew it was against the rules for me to be in this place as a student. I wasn't even supposed to be outside at all, actually, not that I cared one bit.

He didn't seem to notice me at all as I followed quietly behind, keeping out of range of his little lantern he was carrying. The thing really didn't seem to help much with the visibility, since the forest was draped in a bit of a fog, which just made the light scatter uselessly rather than stretching out as far as it should.

As I skulked along, I started noticing something strange; there was an unusual amount of spiders skittering across the ground at my feet, and the number of them just seemed to keep growing by the minute. This didn't bother me (I wasn't nearly as freaked out by those eight-legged arachnids as I was in my human years, and early slime ones), but it was odd enough to grab my attention.

When the concentration of spiders started reaching the point of ridiculousness, I knew something else was up. With a closer look at them, I also noticed that they all were the same type, and had some form of magical connections, a web of them, connecting every single individual to each other. They were all related, intertwined, acting as one; it reminded me of how some pack-based monsters operated back in my world.

After having a bit of fun seeing the rudimentary little details of one of the magical monsters of this world, I went faster along my way following the giant man.

It was a little while before he stopped, and the area we were in seemed to be absolutely covered in spider webs. I hid in a bush somewhere behind Hagrid, deciding to just listen and watch from here.

"Ello, Aragog! Got this here cow fer yas," Hagrid boomed as he tossed the cow carcass at his own feet.

A surprisingly dainty voice popped up in a thought communication band. It seemed almost like it was just a ranged version of the skill, or a magic that was close enough I could just recognize it. "It helps."

"Good to hear, ol' friend!" It seemed the man was feeding the spider, and what I suspected were its children. "Any 'truders as o' late?"

"There is one watching us right now."

"Haha, Aragog! Yer finally developin' a sense o' humor!"

"It was… Literal." The spider paused and pointed one of its front-most legs right in my direct, "There. It is hiding just out of sight, but my children noticed it."

I realized I'd been spotted at that, so I slowly stepped from the bush. "I guess I've been caught."

Hagrid seemed startled as I stepped out into the light of his lantern, spitting out a hushed "Merlin's beard…" under his breath.

"Be careful, Hagrid. This one is more than it seems." the spider said cautiously. Somehow, the creature had seen through my pseudo-human disguise in one way or another.

"O' 'ell if ya mean the girl ain'ta normal witch, that much aye know."

"Mhm."

"Sorry ta cut our visit short, Aragog, but I gotta take this 'ere lil one back'ta tha school before anyone else notice's she's gone."

The spider seemed to nod, and Hagrid turned to leave, motioning with his arm for me to follow. I just decided to go along without argument since my business out here was done for now.

"Walk with caution, my old friend," one more mental message from the spider was directed at Hagrid before the arachnid seemed to go silent.

Hagrid didn't seem to take much from it, because the only way he reacted was with an acknowledging nod.

We didn't walk far before the large man spoke up again, though.

"Now, young miss. Tell me what'cha doin' out'ere. Not safe fer students in this forest."

"Just curious. Wanted to check out this forest."

"Now that ain't a good s'cuse there. Ya can see a map o' the forest in his'try class." It seemed he'd been here long enough to have a go to response to most excuses.

"Well… I guess I just wanted to follow you. I saw you carrying that cow." So I fielded something a bit better, since I wasn't exactly lying.

"You've been followin' me fer that long?" Hagrid shook his head at me.

"Is there anything wrong with that? So long as you're nearby, I'm not in that much danger, right?"

"Well, I may be strong, but I ain't allowed a single bit o' spell-craftin', so I ain't the best guardian."

"Not allowed?"

"Tha's a long story." Hagrid drooped sadly as he said that. Obviously, it was a painful memory for him.

"Is it because you're mixed?"

"Nah, not quite. Was 'ccused of somethin' I didn't do. Lucky I didn't end up in Azkaban, ta be 'onest. Prob'ly because I was just a young'un then. I can't talk'a bout it with ya." He sighed a big breath, "Dumbledore told me, ya'know. 'Bout your hist'ry. What 'e knows, at least."

"Ah, did he? Well, I'm curious what he told you then."

"That yer mixed, like me. Not with giant, tha's obvious, but somethin' else. He didn't tell me what. Do ya mind sharin'? Me mother was'a giant, but me father was'a wizard."

"Dunno how long ago it was that one was in my family, but I am part dragon." It really didn't seem like that big of a deal to me, so I didn't mind telling him that.

"Dragon!?" Hagrid sounded surprised and… excited. Very excited, actually, but he reeled that excitement in quickly.

"Hey! Don't go shouting about it!"

"Sorry. Ay'm just surprised. How did tha' even 'appen?"

"Well, the dragon in my lineage took human form and lived as a very powerful wizard, I think. Then, well… they had children with a human. Pretty self explanatory, if you ask me."

"Didn't know dragons could do that…"

"I don't think most can. But, maybe ancient dragons were a little smarter, and eastern dragons in general."

"I s'pose that makes sense. Well'hen, can ya fly? Or transform? Or can ya grow scales? How sharp are yer teeth… Can ye breath fire!?" He seemed a bit too excited again.

"Uh… none of that, at least as far as I'm aware. My eyes are a little special, though, but you probably already noticed that."

"Yeah, they're a'glowin' in the darkness some. Quite interestin' to see." The man stared at my eyes for a long moment before saying anything else. "Well… How strong are yas? Ya must be strong."

"Stronger than I look. I cracked some of the stone in the floor back at the castle, I was kinda mad… So I stomped on the ground."

"Blimey, I'll 'ave to see them. Might need'ta replace 'em me'self."

"Oh, sorry about that… I'll help if you need it." I felt a little bad that someone so nice would have to deal with that damage, even if it was accidental. But, Hagrid just shook his head at my offer.

I might as well give him one more detail to chew on. "I guess one more difference is that I'm more magically strong than a normal wizard or witch, but I'm not sure by how much. I fried my first wand on accident when I tried it out."

"Froy a wand, innit?" Hagrid went pretty quiet after that. "Aye only ever 'ad the one… Canny imagine froying one."

We got to the edge of the forest after a moment of silence. "I guess that's tha end. If ya wanna talk another time, ya can come to me hut. Not during yer classes, though! I don't want'ta get ya in any trouble!"

"Sure, I might stop by later."

"An' no more sneakin' into the ferbidden forest! It's called that fer good reason! Next time I won't have any choice but'ta tell Dumbledore."

"I understand." I'll just have to be more careful when I go there to fetch Hebi. Can't let myself get snitched on by a swarm of spiders again.

Leaving behind the forest and the half-giant man, I snuck back into the school and made it to the dorms without getting caught. I did have one close call with a scraggly old man and his equally raggedy-looking cat who were patrolling the halls together, but I managed to avoid their sight and get back to my bed safely.

I knew Hebi might take a while to find a thousand years of child statues, so I had a few days to work with. Knowing that much, I took a small rest on one of the couches in the common room that morning, it was nice to rest with my eyes closed, even if I couldn't fall asleep again.

I was there first, so as all the students filtered into the room, or at least the ones that liked using the common rooms, I was eventually very annoyed.

"Hey, you! Brat, that's my seat you're in."

"I don't see what makes it yours. This is called a common room for a reason, that means everything here is shared." I cracked one eye open to stare at him lazily.

"Y-you!" His lip quivered in disgust for a moment as he seemed to recognize me. "How did you… You cannot be a Slytherin!"

"Well, I am one, so… Suck it up, buttercup." I felt like being a bit obnoxious since I knew this boy gave some pretty amusing reactions.

"Don't you speak to me in that way! Get out of that chair now!"

"Nah, I'm too comfy." I nestled into my spot and closed my eyes again. Still watching with my magic sense, of course, but to the outside observer I was sure it looked like I was ignoring Draco.

"Crabbe, Goyle. Move her for me!"

His two goons waddled up and grabbed one of my arms each. But, when they tried to lift me, they couldn't. I made myself immovable with my skills, so they stood no chance.

The two boys grunted as they yanked on me, but I continued to rest on the chair, smiling lightly to myself. Draco's face was turning progressively more red by the second; I could almost see steam coming out of his ears by the time his cronies gave up the struggle of attempting to move me.

"My father will hear about this!"

"And why do you think he'd care?"

He had no answer to that and just continued his storming-off act. Huffing and stomping out of the room, chock full of drama and attitude. I had no clue why he thought acting so childish was effective, even as a child. His parents must've not been raising him correctly.

Around me, I heard some mumbling from the other kids in the common room, but I didn't bother listening to what they were saying and just resumed my relaxation.