“Hey…uh, Cormac?”

“Yeah?” without looking away from the cauldron, he responded to Sol. Sol was sneaking glances at some of the Slytherin and Gryffindor students that were in the Potions Class with them.

“Were these two…-” he nudged Cormac’s shoulders and subtly gestured at two Slytherin students he did not recognize. Cormac followed his gaze as Sol’s remaining words fell to his ears, “-in our year?”

“Yeah…you’ve never seen them?” Cormac looked at him in mild surprise. However, the sizzling sound immediately made him look back at his cauldron. The potion inside had overheated causing it to spill over and touch the flames underneath.

“Crap!” he exclaimed loudly as his potion had essentially been ruined.

“Five points from Gryffindor,” Snape’s nasally voice rang unpleasantly over his head, “for not focusing in the class.” He then turned around and dashed in front of Sol. Leaning towards him, he glared with his black irises, “Just because you’re finished doesn’t mean you can distract others from doing so, Mr. Balor.” Snape spat his name out through gritted teeth.

“I’m sorry, professor.” Sol apologized.

“Make sure not to do it again,” Snape flicked his robes and went away to check on the progress of the other children.

Cormac and Sol looked at each other before the former sighed and started redoing his potion. Sol sat down on the stool in front of his desk and rested his chin on his hand.

“Are they placed here just to obstruct me?” Seemingly spacing out, he was acutely aware of the gazes of the new students that periodically fell on him. They were sneakily keeping tabs on him.

He pinched the bridge of his nose in frustration. “Is this related to the Vaults? Are they part of ‘R’ or something? I am absolutely going to get attacked the next time I go tomb-raidi…vault raiding.”

“You seem to be bloody busy this year,” Katie nudged him and broke him out of his thoughts. “What are you even doing?”

“I either study, hang out with you guys, or sleep,” he rolled his eyes. “What else do I need to do?”

Katie looked visibly taken aback. “If you put it like that…” she mumbled to herself. Despite finding no flaws in his words, she still couldn’t shake off the feeling that he was busier than he was in the previous years. But since she had no evidence, she decided to put it down for the time being.

“Well, never mind that,” she waved her dismissively, “The break’s at the end of this month, what are you going to do?”

“Just relax at home with the folks, I suppose.” Sol never put any thought or effort into doing something else during the vacations unless it was his family who was taking him. He was content with staying home.

“Really?” Snape was still in the room, so her shout was lowered to quiet hisses. “That feels a bit bland, doesn’t it?”

Sol smiled but said nothing. That particular comment didn’t mesh quite well with him. But he decided to leave it be. Despite being a kid physically and feeling like turning into one mentally, he still had some rationality from his older mind to realize that it was just the remarks of a child and wasn’t necessarily meant with malicious intentions.

“We made plans to go to a theme park last time, remember?” Katie spoke in hushed tones but with an excited gaze. “Last time, the school shut down. But we can go this time. Come on, Sol. It’ll be fun.”

“Sure,” he pursed his lips. “But first,-” his gaze shifted to her cauldron and slyly, “-you should focus on your potion first.”

“Wha-?” her question was drowned by a small explosion and a plume of green smoke. Katie waved her hands frantically and let out violent coughs. Her hands kept trying to disperse the smoke in front of her face.

Sol took out his wand and cast a Hot-Air Charm from it. The wind swept away the smoke in front, revealing Katie’s face which looked like it was coated with a thick layer of green soot. Some of her hair was also covered with soot. She opened her eyes, revealing her ruby-red irises. Sol reached into the small bag she carried with her and brought out a small hand mirror, raising it to her face. His other hand was used to hide the fact that he was laughing.

Seeing her miserable look, Katie’s chest rose quickly. As she was about to scream, Sol reached out and clamped her mouth shut.

“Don’t scream, go to the washroom and clean yourself up.” Sol pacified her and let one of her girlfriends take her to the nearest girl’s washroom. Of course, after everything was done, Snape took 5 points off from Gryffindor once again.

Sol picked up a nearby hand towel and wiped off the sweat from his face and neck. Letting out a turbid breath of air, he poured the orange-colored potion into six separate vials.

He was in the Room of Requirement once again, preparing to tackle the Vault in the Forbidden Forest. Since the Vault of Ice had an Ice Knight in it, which was not recorded in any book whatsoever, the Forest Vault might have something like a Wood Knight or a Wood Serpent.

Of course, that didn’t mean he was going to the Forest Vault next. He was going to raid the Vault of Fear by the end of this week since it was the closer of the two.

Sol sat down on a nearby stool and leaned back his head on the wall. “At least the Forest Vault gave me some idea of what to expect but what the fuck do I even do for the Vault of Fear? It’s too vague to make out anything. The only thing I can associate with ‘fear’ is darkness and Boggarts. So, all of my preparations are spell-based…”

Indeed, that was the case. Boggarts are easily dealt with thanks to the Riddikulus spell; darkness has about four different spells to dispel it. The mastery of the spells was not something to be worried about since even if he had never used Riddikulus at an actual Boggart, he would still do just fine. He can cast the spell and can aim it well. So, he could do nothing but prepare for the next, next vault.

After he was done cleaning up, he left the room. The potion vials and other herbs were stored in his satchel that was charmed with Capacious Extremis. The extra space meant he could store a lot more than his satchel’s space.

He left the Room of Requirement after making sure no one saw him and went back to the common room. Hiding his satchel inside his robes, he walked up to the Fat Lady.

He seemed to be inspecting her nails. Sol quickly said the password and the Fat Lady stopped what she was doing and looked at him, “Not so much as a greeting, Mr. Balor?”

Sol inwardly sighed. He looked up at her and laughed slightly, “Haha…how are you doing?”

“Just fine, Mr. Balor!” she seemed to have been electrified and began talking animatedly. “That day, I was having tea with Hilda and the girls on the fifth floor and…” She kept on talking and talking about her day while Sol stood and listened to it all. It was fine. He didn’t need to be anywhere else anyway.

The Fat Lady talked and he would occasionally reply or nod his head. He had learned long ago that having someone to talk to about seemingly useless things was rare. Very few people would want to listen to your ramblings and even fewer would not get sick of it, And at that point, if you meet someone you can talk to about useless things from dawn to dusk, you might just wish to spend the rest of your life with them.

After twenty or so minutes of talking the Fat Lady finally stopped and looked at Sol who hadn’t yet moved from his spot. She smiled and looked apologetic, “I kept you waiting for too long, haven’t I?”

Sol smiled slightly and waved his hand dismissively, “That’s fine. You kept me entertained.”

“Haha, you’re making me blush!” she beamed. “I shouldn’t make you wait-” she raised her arm and the door swung open, “-go ahead.”

“See you later,” he bade her goodbye and headed inside. As always, Gryffindor students were lounging inside the common room and his entry hadn’t stopped them from doing that. They briefly looked up to see who entered and then went back to whatever they were doing.

He sat down on one of the sofas and leaned back. He rested his head on the sofa back and closed his eyes.

“Where have you been?” a shadow fell over his eyes and he opened them to see Katie looming over him. Her face still had a tinge of green from earlier today but it had mostly faded.

“Just here and there,” not wanting to delve too deep into it, Sol answered briefly.

“So, about before…?” she sat down next to him and looked at him expectantly.

“Yeah?” he replied absentmindedly.

“Really?” she looked at him with sparkling eyes and got on talking about what they were going to do but Sol wasn’t really paying attention to her.

Those piercing gazes were starting to get on his nerves.