At Hogwarts, the story begins with deconstructing Avada Kedavra.

For Harry Potter, these past few weeks have felt like a dream. He's no longer the nobody living in the stairwell; he's the boy who survived the ordeal, the youngest Seeker in Gryffindor's history. He has friends, endless roast beef and Yorkshire pudding, and even the chalk-throwing from Peeves is far more fun than being used as a punching bag by Dudley at the Dursleys' house.

Except for two things.

The first thing was Potions class. Snape's undisguised hatred for him baffled Harry.

The second thing puzzled him even more and made him feel uneasy.

About Lucian Ashford.

On Friday evening, the fireplace was blazing in the Gryffindor common room. Hermione was huddled in an armchair, trying to whack Ron on the head with a book on magical theory to make him understand the basic principles of gender reassignment.

Harry sat on the carpet, fiddling with his holly wand, but his thoughts drifted elsewhere.

"Hey Harry, are you listening?" Ron complained, rubbing his sore arm. "Hermione's gone mad. She actually thinks Ashford's performance in Charms class was 'not just skill, but art.'"

Art? I think it's bizarre!

Upon hearing the name, Harry froze, and a puff of smoke rose from the tip of his wand.

"I don't understand why you're prejudiced against him." Hermione closed the book. "Although he's aloof, he got us out of trouble, taught Malfoy a lesson on the train, and even in flying class... although he ultimately couldn't help, he at least tried to save Neville. Objectively speaking, he's a genius."

"A genius?" Ron scoffed. "Fred and George said he was a genius too, and that he fixed that automatic quill pen. But I just feel... something's off about him."

Ron lowered his voice and leaned closer to Harry: "I don't like the look in his eyes."

"That's your inferiority complex at work, Ron," Hermione pointed out mercilessly.

"No."

Harry, who had been silent all along, suddenly spoke up.

He sensed something else.

"It wasn't just his eyes." Harry struggled to find the words to describe the feeling. "Every time I got close to him, I felt... afraid."

"Scared?" Hermione frowned. "You mean he's ugly? Although he always has that poker face, objectively speaking, he's not—"

“No, it’s not that kind of fear.” Harry shook his head, his face pale. “It’s a churning feeling in my stomach. It’s like…like you’ve put your hand into a cold pool and touched a slippery, dead fish; or smelling some kind of faint but definitely poisonous chemical.”

Harry recalled the moments he had brushed past Lucian several times in the corridor.

The black-haired boy always walked by with a notebook in his hand, never glancing to the side.

But whenever the two got close enough, Harry would feel a sense of repulsion deep inside him.

The feeling made Harry want to run away, to vomit, and even to pull out his wand and cast a curse on that figure. The thought terrified him; he wasn't a malicious person at all.

"Maybe it's because he's too perfect?" Hermione tried to explain logically. "Psychology says that overly perfect people can cause the 'uncanny valley' effect."

"Come on, Hermione." Ron shuddered. "I think it's dark magic. My dad said some dark wizards carry a cursed aura that small animals and children can sense. We're not kids anymore, but Harry is the boy who survived, his intuition is probably right."

Harry didn't speak. He stared at the flickering flames, the unease lingering like a shadow.

That Ashford... is there something in his soul?

The clock on the wall struck eleven times with a dull thud.

Harry stood up abruptly, as if the sharp intuition and deep fear he had just felt had been forcibly erased by an invisible hand.

Instead, a sudden, illogical surge of passion and anger arose.

That feeling of anger... he was very familiar with it.

It was on the Hogwarts Express that Malfoy insulted the Ron family, and it was during flying class that Malfoy stole Neville's Memory Orb, that he felt the same anger.

This time, however, the anger came without any reason.

"The time has come," Harry said, his eyes becoming somewhat vacant and fanatical. "Malfoy has challenged us to a duel in the Trophy Room. If you're too scared to go, Ron..."

As soon as he said it, Harry was stunned for a moment.

A faint question flickered in his mind: Wait, why do I absolutely have to go? It's just a verbal argument, and Hermione's right, this will cost the House points...

But this doubt was fleeting.

If I don't go, Malfoy will laugh at me. I'm a Gryffindor. I have to go.

The logic was so crude it couldn't stand up to scrutiny, but Harry's body had already involuntarily stood up.

A voice deep inside his head screamed: Wait, this isn't right!

The fear and aversion I felt towards Lucien hadn't even dissipated when, why... why was I suddenly ignited by another small thing?

But the anger directed at Malfoy, amplified tenfold, had completely overwhelmed his ability to think.

"I am Gryffindor, I cannot be a coward!"

This idea was imprinted in his mind.

"Who says I wouldn't dare!" Ron jumped up immediately, his face flushed red, as if he were a pre-programmed actor. "I'm going to kick that weasel's ass!"

"Are you all crazy!" Hermione exclaimed, jumping off her chair in a fit of rage. "If you get caught, Gryffindor will lose points! I only went with you to stop you!"

They crawled out of the portrait hole of the fat lady and disappeared into the dark corridor.

Like three marionettes, they are walking step by step toward a trap that has already been set up in the center of the stage.

At the last moment before stepping into darkness, Harry instinctively glanced back.

Behind them, the fireplace in the common room continued to crackle, as if mocking some inescapable fate.