~15th of July, 1988.~

~ Dumbledore Family Home, Godric’s Hollow, West Country, England, Great Britain.~

It was your typical summer afternoon at Godric’s Hollow – characterized by clear skies, a blazing hot sun, and relatively humid air. The only sounds audible were those of the rustling trees, chirping birds, and chatter of No-maj children as they played and ran around the main street of the village.

Unlike the street, the cottages of the house were silent and tranquil, seemingly detached from the exuberant atmosphere generated by the children as they innocently frolicked around, insouciant of worldly matters. 

 

Within an archaic looking study of one of such houses, two boys were seated opposite each other on a table. They were each reading books with absolute focus, unfazed by the floating vases moving about above their heads.

It was quite a peculiar sight.

One of the boys – the one with iridescent blue eyes and dark brown hair– suddenly put down his book, looked at the other boy, who had blonde hair and freckles, and smirked,

“I’ve got to say, Aurelius, I’m impressed. This is probably your record time isn’t it?” 

The blonde boy, now identified as none other than Aurelius, dropped his book and chuckled, “Indeed it is, Adrien. Though, I would watch out if I were you, I’m gonna give you a run for your money this time.”

“Right,” Adrien chuckled as well, “Well, we’ll be seeing the winner in a few moments now, won’t we?” he teased, smirking.

“Yeah we will.” Aurelius smiled, “Just don’t forget the wager, you dodgy prick.”

Adrien raised his eyebrows in amusement, “What wager?”

Aurelius stopped smiling, “I swear…”

“Relax,” Adrien laughed, seeing Aurelius’s change in expression, “There’s no need to be so gruff about it.” he said, chuckling.

Aurelius scoffed, “You wouldn’t be saying that if you were the one on the losing end.”

“You’re right.” Adrien laughed even more. “That’s why I’m not. Winners get all the rights…it feels great mate. You would absolutely love it…if you could actually win for once.” he bantered, smirking at Aurelius.

“Prick…” Aurelius chuckled, picking up his book and resuming his reading.

Adrien just smiled at that. Aurelius was quite the sore loser. Especially whenever he lost to him whenever they played mini games. It was why he liked proposing wagers before each one – they were always aimed at getting back at Adrien for his smugness and taunts.

This mini game was about who could make their vases levitate the longest and the loser had to clean up after Aberforth’s goats – an abysmal task, simply speaking.

‘Should be getting the Hogwarts Admission Letter soon…Can’t believe it's already been 11 years since I reincarnated into this world.’

Adrien thought, resuming his reading.

2 years had passed since the demise of his parents and his subsequent relocation to Godric’s Hollow and a lot of things had happened during this time interval – the first to be discussed being Adrien’s relationship with Aurelius.

Initially, Adrien was shocked and perturbed about Aurelius’s existence. He had expected for the wizarding world to be different solely due to his existence but he never thought about the possibility of there being yet another Dumbledore to exist.

After all, Dumbledore was gay and Aberforth was old so the thought of either of them having a child never once crossed his mind. It was largely the reason he was perturbed – if something as unlikely as Aurelius’s existence had come to be, what other unexpected change had occurred? The thought was rather disturbing.

The boy in question’s background was a bit uncanny. Apparently, he was the son of Aberforth Dumbledore and an unknown witch. Adrien had tried investigating who this woman was but to no avail – Aberforth refused to tell him, and there were no leads whatsoever on who she could be.

The only thing Adrien could deduce so far was that the woman was blonde –since Aurelius did not inherit Aberforth’s hair color – and that she was Aberforth’s second lover according to Dumbledore. Even he did not know much about the woman and all he knew was that Aberfroth’s first lover was dead so it couldn’t be her.

Adrien had also found out that Aurelius was named after his elder half-brother: Aurelius Dumbledore I who was colloquially known in the Fantastic Beasts series as Credence Barebone. 

Adrien mused that Aberforth probably gave him that name as a way to heal from his grief of not being involved in his first son’s life – Credence was an obscurial and had thus died young.

Aurelius, like nearly all Dumbledores, was exceptionally talented at magic. Additionally, unlike his father, he was exceedingly intelligent, more so than anyone his age. This made him more mature than normal, much to Adrien’s liking. 

The two boys easily clicked with one another shortly after meeting each other and Adrien was starting to see him like a brother. He loved hanging out with him…it was always a good time.

Though, there was one thing he didn’t like about Aurelius. Unfortunately, like James, Aurelius was an early riser and liked opening the curtains or turning on the lights the moment he woke up. Since they lived in the room, this irritated Adrien and he felt like cursing fate every time it happened.

Seriously, what were the odds of facing the same problem even after reincarnation?

Adrien found living with the Dumbledores similar to how he lived with his parents – quiet, simple and uneventful. Both Aberforth and Albus didn’t spend a lot of time with him or Aurelius. Dumbledore was always busy…even more so nowadays, and Aberforth had to run the Hog’s Head Inn in Hogsmeade.

Adrien didn’t mind it, he was a grown man mentally and didn’t need any attention. Aurelius paid no attention to it as well, probably because he was already used to it. Whenever they did spend time together though, it was oddly fun…at least, in Adrien’s eyes.

Aberforth would always bicker with Dumbledore about the smallest of things, which caused the latter to always have an exasperated expression on his face. The two could simply not see eye to eye on most things. Though, when it came to the two of them, they always settled their differences and co-operated.

In terms of parenting, they were complete opposites of each other. Dumbledore was more of a wise, and warm father figure while Aberforth was more of a joker and was often laid back. Dumbledore taught with words and experience while Aberforth was sort of a disciplinarian when he got serious.

All in all, it had been a unique experience for Adrien.

Besides family matters, Adrien had made significant progress with the first part of The Magic Series Codex – the magical energy metric system and wizard power level system.

He had worked relentlessly hard within the last 2 years developing it and was now just a few steps away from completing his first magical milestone.

His magic had stagnated due to him pouring all his time into research for The Magic Series Codex, and this was something he didn’t mind. There was plenty of time to improve in his magic but the same could not be said about his research…especially with the current situation in France.

The state of Magical France had spiraled out of control within the last 2 years...way earlier than both him and Dumbledore had estimated. Antoine Lestrange was certainly wasting no time in trying to achieve his goals.

According to the news, half-breeds had started killing non half-breed wizardkind indiscriminately out of the blue, raided wizard stores, and started committing all sorts of crimes. Naturally, in response to this, wizardkind retaliated and fought back, causing conflicts all over France.

Prejudice against non-human and part human beings had reached its highest point ever in the history of Magical France according to the latest poll conducted by the French Ministry for Magic. 

Additionally, a militant reformist group had risen seemingly out of nowhere and started rallying wizards and witches to fight back the half-breeds and protest against the government for allowing them to run amok, saying the government was too ‘soft’ and demanding the abolishment of half-breed rights. 

Furthermore, they had slowly started to propagate the blood supremacy ideology, though currently, it was largely centered around marginalizing half-breeds and not half-bloods.  

Because of them, riots raged all across magical France, with wizards indiscriminately killing anyone who had so much as an ounce of non-human blood within them. Civil unrest was at an all time high.

In fact, just last week, there was a riot on the main floor of the French ministry. Wizardkind, led by the reformist group, vandalized, and looted government property, killed ministry workers  

The French ministry and the ICW had tried to control the situation and get to the bottom of it but they weren’t making any headway and all attempts at dealing with the civil unrest had failed miserably. 

The French minister for magic, Thomas Dupont was facing immense pressure from all sides – especially from the ICW and his own cabinet. Adrien wouldn’t even be surprised if the man was forced to resign or worse….assassinated.

He had no doubt in his mind that Antoine Lestrange was the orchestrator of the entire thing and probably aimed to get rid of the minister without doing it himself. 

Honestly, Adrien could not fathom how France had deteriorated to such a state so quickly and how foreign countries had not yet intervened in the situation. 

Magical France’s economy was on the verge of collapse and should that happen, they would be severely affected as well. It was simply in their best interest to do so. The fact that they hadn’t meant that something was definitely going on behind the scenes.

Adrien, of course, could not watch this unfold before his eyes and do nothing about it. Not when his best friend – who was a half-breed – lived there. He knew that there was pretty much nothing he could do to alleviate France’s current civil unrest. Too many lives had been lost.

His plan, for now, was centered around taking control of Magical France’s economy and his metric system was crucial for that, which was why he had invested so much time into it.

This brings us back to the present.

Adrien and Aurelius continued to read in silence and occasionally glanced at each from time to time, only stopping when they heard knocking sounds from the direction of the window.

In sync, the two boys gently dropped their vases, frowned and turned to face the window, intending to decipher the source of the noise. Once they did, Adrien smiled seeing what lay behind the window – It was a large brown screech owl hovering with what looked like letters within its claws.

Aurelius turned to face Adrien, “Is that what I think it is?” he asked, with a slight smile on his face.

“Dunno, why don’t we have a look?” Adrien smirked, standing up and walking towards the window.

Aurelius just hummed and followed suit. Once there, Adrien opened the window and the owl flew in towards the table they were sitting at, dropped two letters and perched on Adrien’s chair.

Aurelius’s eyes lit up as soon as he saw the Hogwarts stamp on the letter, “We’ve actually got the letter!” he said, rushing towards the table and sitting down.

“Indeed.” Adrien smiled and joined him.

As they opened the letter, Aurelius tittered, “You would think that as the godson and nephew of the headmaster, we would have our letters delivered in a special fashion.”

“Well, evidently not…” Adrien chuckled as he unfurled the envelope and pulled out the piece of parchment that signified his ticket to the mystical school that was Hogwarts.

‘Can’t believe I’m holding an actual Hogwarts Admissions Letter…Who would’ve thought?’ Adrien laughed inwardly as he held the parchment.

Then, he grinned and eagerly read its content.

HOGWARTS SCHOOL OF WITCHCRAFT AND WIZARDRY

Headmaster: ALBUS DUMBLEDORE

(Order of Merlin. First Class, Grand Sorc., Chf. Warlock, Supreme

Mugwump, International Confed. Of Wizards)

Dear Mr. Flamel,

We are pleased to inform you that you have been accepted at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. 

Please find enclosed a list of all necessary books and equipment.

Term begins on September 1. We await your owl by no later than July 31.

Yours sincerely,

Minerva McGonagall,

Deputy Headmistress.

 *Pheew* Aurelius whistled as soon as Adrien finished reading, “Exciting isn’t it? We’re going to Hogwarts, just like dad and uncle.” he looked at Adrien and grinned.

Adrien grinned as well, “Yeah, it certainly is.” he then glanced outside for a moment, “Do you wanna buy your stuff today?”

Aurelius thought for a moment, rolling his tongue on the side of his cheeks, “Yeah, I don’t see why not...Dad’s home anyways so it’s convenient.”

“Right.” Adrien smiled and stood up, “Shall we?”

Aurelius smiled as well, “Absolutely…”