It had been a few months since the duelling club had been established and Darius' reputation as an expert duellist had already spread throughout the school. The classes were held in batches with the 2nd and 3rd years, 4th and 5th years and 6th and 7th years placed together. Though he only had classes with his own batch, he had been challenged to a few informal duels by seniors and he had beat-down all of them. He was also able to chain-cast easily now and the professors were very impressed by him.

His classes had also been going swell. He was acing all his classes and even Snape couldn't find anything to fault him. Though, he supposed it helped that he didn't act too close to Harry Potter. If he did, he bet Snape would make his life miserable no matter his grades. The rest of the teachers were very pleased and were pleased to help him with any doubts he came across in higher grade textbooks.

The twins and him had worked out the majority of products they would be selling via Owl Order Service and had even dragged Lee into their plans. Lee was to be the coordinator, he would take the finished goods from the twins and me and deal with all the selling and delivering business. The twins did most of the manufacturing while I helped out occasionally and I was the financial support. We had been stockpiling goods for a couple of months and would be ready to sell by summer. I had even invited the twins to stay for the summer with me. It would be convenient to get to Diagon Alley and we could fool around a bit.

My runes were coming along nicely as well. I had managed to create spell-imbued runestones, which were essentially one-time use spells. I had a few powerful healing ones stashed in my robes which would automatically activate when I received any significant injuries. I was halfway there to making cell phones. I currently had something like walkie-talkies which only functioned between paired devices. I wanted them to be able to connect to any device like cell phones. It was only a matter of time before I was successful. The other thing I was concentrating on making was a spatial bag. While extension charms were enough for storing lots of material, they were still able to be scanned using powerful detectors. A spatial bag would twist space itself in a localized area into a sub-dimension, thus preventing any sort of scan. If I ever had to hide away something well, this would come in very useful.

My occlumency had also reached very high levels. I only wondered about if the room of requirement could help me train it in anyway. It's very hard to train the skill if you don’t have a partner to help you. The room of requirement came up with a cubicle like device which increased mental pressure the longer you sat inside it. While it didn't help you learn the intricacies of occlumency, it was very helpful in increasing the sheer mental strength of a person. I was very confident that even the likes of Snape would have a tough time even getting into my mind, let alone doing it without my knowledge.

Christmas rolled around and I sent presents to my mom and all my friends. I sent her a necklace with a rune inlaid pendant. The rune would heal her using her own magic automatically if she was injured. I sent the twins andLee some of the best goods money could buy at Zonko's. I sent Harry the potion's textbook of Lily, that I had found in my childhood and Hermione a set of useful books for Defence against the Dark arts. God knows she would need it the next year. I got Hagrid a cookery book. He really needs to learn what normal people eat.

Hagrid was good company when I visited him sometimes. He was exceptionally knowledgeable regarding magical creatures and always had something new to tell me. He even took me to see the thestral herd at my request. He was surprised I even knew about it and had said that the majority of students finished their student life at Hogwarts without ever seeing them. They were in a slightly deeper part of the forest and Hagrid took along pheasants to feed them. The thestrals had a sort of regal air to them and I couldn't help but be drawn to them. Maybe it had something to do with my wand or my essence as Ollivander had put it. They too, were very comfortable around me and I even rode them a few times.

I figured, if the death essence led to my affinity with the thestrals, there ought to be creatures for the life essence too. Off the top of my head I could only think of Unicorns and Hagrid easily obliged to show them to me. They were magnificent creatures. It was like all sorts of positive feelings were simply radiating from their bodies and spreading around. They too, were very friendly with me. Hagrid was very surprised and told me that the unicorns generally preferred females over males and it was rare they got close to one.

It was fun to see all these magical creatures but the one I wanted to really see should be arriving any day now. The Norwegian ridgeback egg that Hagrid wins from the disguised Quirrell. He should be getting it soon and I really wanted to have a look at it. Of course, I wasn't going to bumble around till it was too late like the trio in the canon storyline, and let Charlie know asap, so that he could have it taken over to Romania.

Finally, when I went to Hagrid's hut one evening, it was stifling hot inside. Even though it was such a warm day, there was a blazing fire in the grate. I immediately looked closer and saw the black egg laying in the fire. It was the dragon egg. Hagrid caught me staring and gave a resigned sigh.

'I s'pose you a'ready figur'd it out, didn't ya? Shouldn't be too har' wit' brains like yours. I won this dragon egg off a cloaked fella over at the Hog's head in Hogsmeade. It a beau, ain't it?

'Yes hagrid, I figured it out. It wasn't too hard. But don't you feel it's too suspicious that the one thing you want most, just happens to be with a guy drinking in Hogsmeade and you manage to win it off him.'

'O' course not! There's lots of shady folk who go to the Hog's head. Cloaks are quite common there, ter be hones'.'

'Well, can't be helped if you don't see it. The main point is you can't have a dragon in your hut and not just because it is illegal. I know what you'll say, that you will be able to control it and that it'll be fine. But you can only do that while it is still young. So, I suggest you write a letter to Charlie when it is hatched and have him take it over to the wild in Romania. You can spend the interim period with the dragon and then see it off.'

'I know what you sai' makes sense, but I really don' wanna do it. I wan' to raise all by meself. But.... I guess it is better to write to Charlie. He'll treat it alrigh'.'

'Excellent. And don't forget to send an owl to me when its hatching. See ya, Hagrid!'

'Thanks Darius, fer helpin' me out. Goodbye.'

I occasionally popped over to have a look at the egg after that but it was always just the same. It was also swelteringly hot in the hut and I left quickly. But a couple of weeks later, I received a letter that made me grin. He had written only two words: It's hatching.

I bolted over after lessons and found that the trio were already there. They seemed a bit surprised to see me there but they calmed down soon after. They knew I was on good terms with Hagrid. We had even met each other a couple of times when we were visiting the hut. From what I knew, Harry was on good terms with both of them while Ron and Hermione were just on speaking terms.

Anyway, the egg emitted a scraping noise and it split open. The baby dragon flopped onto the table. Its spiny wings were huge compared to its skinny jet body, it had a long snout with wide nostrils, the stubs of horns and bulging, orange eyes. Hagrid started crooning to it, when he suddenly leapt up and rushed to the window. It was Malfoy. I had completely forgotten about this in my eagerness to see a dragon. He must be rushing back to the castle so it would be hard to 'obliviate' him unseen. But wait, this plays out in my favour. I need to let the timeline take its own course. My meddling could have changed too many things. I had already gotten a look at the dragon, now it was time to bow out and let the trio handle the situation. I just reminded Hagrid about Charlie before leaving.

I kept an ear out and realised that events had taken their course when Gryffindor lost 150 points all of a sudden. It was a bit disheartening to see that but I knew that Gryffindor should make it up soon.

The next part was regarding my plans for the philosopher's stone. I had the option of stealing it beforehand or letting the trio handle it as per canon. I was confident I could get through all the rest of the traps but not so sure about the Mirror of Erised. If I did get the stone, I definitely had plans to research it and I wondered if that counted as using it. According to Dumbledore's explanation to Harry, only one who wanted to find the Stone - find it, but not use it - would be able to get it, otherwise they'd just see themselves making gold or drinking Elixir of Life. I didn't really need to use it. I had more than enough gold and wasn't really interested in immortality gained from being dependant on exterior help. If I did desire immortality, I would work towards finding my own method to do it. So, technically, I wasn't going to be using the stone. Now, the only part left was to try and steal it. I had to prepare myself well. There was still about three week's time left before Quirrell made his attempt. I would go in two, once the exams were over.