"Back off big boy, before I kick your newly descended balls back up," he said making everybody around question their eyes and ears.

While everyone was expecting a beatdown to come over the pretentious first year, they heard a scream that they will never ever forget for the rest of their lives.

The lofty Bully screamed as if he had seen a Quintaped and collapsed backwards on the ground. He then proceeded to point at the first year and fled the place horrified, dropping everything, including his wand as he ran for his life.

'[Fear] is more potent than I anticipated.'

Ben looked back at the stunned and bewildered faces of his fellow first-years with a nonchalant expression on his face. Just as he was about to start his posturing, he heard a voice that made his blood run cold.

"Mr Brown, that is no way a gentleman should talk," the crowd of students quickly parted away as a tall witch made her way through them. The look on McGonagall's face shifted from shock and disappointment to anger.

'Give me a Break!' Ben screamed in his heart.

After an hour-long etiquette lesson with the furry witch, Ben was exhausted beyond belief. It seemed that McGonagall had quite high expectations of him and was disappointed to see him use such crass language with his fellow students.

"It is commendable that you stood up for your friend, but that is no way to talk to your fellow students," McGonagall had said admonishingly, Ben wanted to ask who he could use such language against but even he knew that it would be pushing it too far.

At least Doug got harsher punishment, he got taken straight to professor Flitwick's office and the half-goblin can get very nasty when it comes to punishing bullies.

"Not only do I not get to posture but I also lose house points and get detention? I hate this day."

Ben entered the common room and was immediately surrounded by his friends.

"You really saved my skin there mate, thanks," Michael said.

"That was so wicked bruv, " said Terry Boot.

"Did you see him running? That's the funniest thing I've ever seen," Entwhistle was grinning ear from ear.

"How'd you do it mate? You have to teach me that." Corner seemed truly impressed.

While the first-year boys were impressed and intrigued with the stunt that Ben had pulled, there were also some ravens who were not happy with his losing house points. Ben didn't give a rat's ass about their disappointment.

Ben looked around the room but didn't find Doug anywhere which was a disappointment. He wanted to make sure that he didn't come looking for trouble again. Ben decided to look for him later to ensure he didn't disturb his peace in the Ravenclaw tower.

---

Time passed swiftly and days turned to weeks and months as Ben spent his days in a slice-of-life fantasy. Having let go of fear and paranoia, Ben was able to enjoy his time at Hogwarts. He was still practising his skills and spells every single day and making significant progress but he was also creating a lot more ruckus in the castle. Ben had reigned in Michael and the group's crazy antics after getting an earful from McGonagall.

While he didn't want to get involved in playground squabbles between twelve-year-olds, he did spend a lot more time playing pranks in the playgrounds and around the castle.

With the Marauder's Map, Inventory space and the ability to become invisible, there was little that could stop Ben at this point. He had taken upon himself the task of trying out every Zonko product and had even started writing a review sheet.

Potter had made the record for the fastest-ever capture of the Snitch and Ben had made a fortune betting on it. With his newfound wealth and the title 'Seer of Ravenclaw', Ben was living life at large.

Ben's favourite prank was dropping Swelling Solution on top of unsuspecting students. The disproportionately large heads on top of tiny bodies were inherently funny and reminded Ben of the Bobblehead toys that he used to have on his desk. Despite the increasing cases of Bobbling heads in the castle, no one knew of the perpetrator.

Invisibility had its perks and Ben was careful not to expose his invisibility. He used not-so-creative ways like delivering the potion with a paper aeroplane, sticking it onto the ceiling and the good old door trap.

Ben controlled his invisibility use strictly to stop himself from becoming a peeping tom. Till now, he had been successful in avoiding any such situations. Ben was mostly worried about what troubles puberty might bring with him being able to go invisible. Hopefully, none.

Although his process had been slow in the last two months, Ben had managed to level his Alteration to Apprentice and had learned two new spells, [Magelight] and [Stoneflesh]. Magelight was the upgraded form of [Candlelight] and was even more useful than Lumos. It produces a ball of light that sticks to the surface where it strikes. It basically produces a light bulb.

[Stoneflesh] made Ben's flesh as hard as stone but also made him brittle, Ben was starting to feel like a certain Osmosian from a popular show. Ben did not dare to test the limits of this spell as he didn't want to shatter his arm like a statue. He decided to experiment with it further after getting better healing spells.

His Conjuration, Destruction and Restoration were yet to level up because Ben was also working on Transfiguration and Potion making while also having to write a number of assignments daily, but they were very close to levelling up.

"Psst, Ben! I heard you're going home for the Easter holidays," whispered a voice from across the table, pulling his attention from his transfiguration book.

Ben was surprised to see the little Gryffindor girl with large front teeth, Hermione Granger staring at him with disbelief in her eyes.

He gave her a confused look as she usually didn't talk to him. Ben ran into the Griffindor know-it-all quite often in the library but he had made it a point to not interact with her too much.

She was simply too annoying in his eyes as she had a habit of talking too fast and too much and Ben did not appreciate her poking her nose into whatever he was reading.

After getting the cold shoulder for a while, she understood that Ben did not like to be disturbed in the library.

"Yes, I am. That's what holidays are for, aren't they?"

"But what about the exams? There's only so much time left, I thought you'd be more serious about them."

"I've already planned my whole schedule for the holidays, Transfiguration on Monday morning....." and yada-yada-yada she went on reciting her whole study schedule.

One could see a vein starting to bulge on Ben's forehead as he listened to her rambling about how close the exams were.

--Dreamscape--

MC is a nerd that hates other nerds, what a prick. Read more and explore the limits to his hypocrisy on Patre@n/DreamyApe.

Special thanks to TheRipper89 for the support.