The Black Bloodline of Hogwarts

"Julien! Do you know what we've discovered!"

Kayson Moretti's voice came from the end of the corridor, carrying the excitement of discovering a new toy.

Julien looked up from "The Geography of Magic: The Humanistic Epic of the Wizarding World" and saw his roommate tugging at Edgar's arm, both of them wearing expressions that were a mixture of curiosity and a successful prank.

"What trouble have you gotten into this time?" Julien sighed and closed the book.

"What do you mean by causing trouble? Oh, Julien," Kayson said, feigning sadness. "Hearing you say that really disappoints your only two male friends."

Julien shrugged indifferently.

"It's not trouble, it's discovery!" Edgar couldn't help but lower his voice, his eyes shining.

"There really is a ghost in the women's restroom on the second floor! A real, talking ghost that lives in the toilet!"

"Myrtle?" Julien frowned.

Of course he knew Myrtle, the ghost who cried all day long, the Muggle-born girl who was killed by the Basilisk.

"What! You knew all along?" Kayson deflated like a punctured balloon. "How boring, it's like you know everything better than we do."

"Kayson lost the bet," Edgar grinned. "He had to spend a full ten minutes in that restroom. And guess what?"

"And then it turned out that Myrtle suddenly popped her head out of the toilet, which startled me," Kayson continued.

"Her background is quite pitiful," Julien said casually. "Don't mess with her."

"We wouldn't dare mess with her," Kayson complained. "She came right up to us and started yelling at us, saying we threw things at her. She was really fierce."

"Exactly, she's practically a ghost now, we can't hit her with it," Edgar chimed in. "Oh, right, she said someone hit her with this this morning."

As he spoke, he pulled something out from inside his robe.

A pure black cover. Undecorated. The edges have a dark, light-absorbing sheen.

Julien's blood froze instantly.

"We found this next to the toilet," Kayson leaned closer. "We looked inside, and it was all blank pages, nothing at all—"

"This notebook looks very old-fashioned, may I have it?" Julien's voice changed, becoming low and urgent.

"I know you like studying these things," Edgar said without hesitation, handing over the notebook in his hand. "It was originally brought for you."

"Thank you." Julien practically snatched it from him. He resisted the urge to open the notebook immediately and stuffed it into the inside of his robe—in a hidden pocket enchanted with a seamless stretching spell.

"Tch, you really care about this stuff?" Kayson said dismissively. "We think it's dirty."

"By the way, you didn't write anything on it, did you?"

Seeing Julien's serious expression, Kayson stopped joking. "No, we just put it away because it was blank. There shouldn't be any problem, right?"

"That's good." Julien took a deep breath. "I can't say for sure right now. Let's look into it further. Don't tell anyone yet, okay?"

Edgar advised, "If you feel there's anything wrong with it, let's just throw it away." He and Kayson both came from the wizarding world, so they naturally knew that there were some items in the wizarding world that couldn't be touched.

"I know what's important. If there's a problem, I'll give it to the Dean or Dumbledore. This notebook just looks old; there might not be anything wrong with it."

Kaysen wanted to say something more, but Julien's serious expression made him swallow his words.

"Alright," Kayson finally shrugged, "but you have to buy us butterbeers."

"make a deal."

"Really?" Kayson came over and put his arm around Julien's shoulder. "Did you discover some secret passage leading out of the school?"

The laughter sounded again.

---

At night, lying in bed, listening to Kayson's snoring and Edgar's murmurs, the image of that notebook kept replaying in his mind. Pure black. Blank. Silence.

He knew that Voldemort's soul was hidden inside.

"Murphy," he called out in his mind, "can you sense that thing?"

In the library, a black cat was dozing off on some book, its tail swishing impatiently: "What is that?"

"The notebook my roommate found. The one with the black cover."

Murphy's ears perked up instantly, his heterochromatic amber and silver-gray eyes glowing in the darkness: "If I were you, I'd throw it away right now."

"Do you know what it is?"

"No, I don't know what it is." Murphy jumped off the pile of books, walked to the edge of the bookshelf, and spoke with an unusually serious tone.

"But it's not a notebook, not a book. It's a madness that cuts itself into pieces while pretending to be whole."

"Julien," Murphy's tail bristled like a brush, "I can feel it, it's choosing, it's waiting..."

"What are you waiting for?"

"Someone like you," Murphy stared into his eyes. "Intelligent, lonely, burdened with secrets, yearning for answers. You think you're protecting your roommate? No. You're protecting it. You're giving it time, giving yourself excuses, to..."

"Where to?"

"Go open it, won't you?"

Julien fell silent. He recalled how he had snatched the notebook, the guilt he felt when he said, "Give it to the Dean or Dumbledore," and the fact that he was still awake at three in the morning, and why he was still thinking about it.

"I won't," he said.

"You will," Murphy said, leaning back onto the book, her voice languid and tinged with a hint of pity. "You all will. At least keep an eye on it, and don't let anyone else see it."

At four in the morning, Julien found himself sitting at his desk. He didn't remember when he got out of bed or when he picked up the notebook.

Moonlight streamed in through the window, flowing like mercury across the cover.

"I'm just checking," he told himself, "to make sure it's safe."

He turned to the first page.

blank.

Page 2.

blank.

Page 3 —

"You've finally arrived."

The handwriting emerged, elegant cursive script, as if it had been waiting there all along.

Julien slammed his notebook shut, wanting to scream and throw it out the window.

He remembered that in the original story, Harry Potter wrote down "Who are you?" first, and then the notebook gave an answer. Why was it answering him on its own now?

But his fingers wouldn't obey him, and the quill pen was already in his hand without him even realizing it.

"I'm not here to communicate with you," he wrote, his fingers trembling slightly. "I'm here to ascertain if you're harmful. I will hand you over to—"

"To whom? Dumbledore? That old fool who let Harry Potter grow up in the cupboard? Or Professor McGonagall, that rule-bound slave who even has to register his Animagus form?"

The handwriting carried a hint of laughter, the ink slightly spreading:

"Blake, I know who you are. I've been listening when your roommates talk about you. Kayson says you 'always know too much,' Edgar says you 'are never really happy.' They don't know you, but I do. We're the same kind of people."

"We are not the same kind of people."

"Isn't that right? I can tell you're looking for answers too."

Julien's quill pierced the paper.

"What do you know?"

"I know a lot of things. Don't you want to know who opened the secret room fifty years ago?"

"Don't try to fool me, I know it was you who opened the secret room. It was you last time, and it's you again this time!"

The laptop seemed to be silent for a moment before the text reappeared.