On the morning of September 1st, sunlight spilled through the window onto the living room sofa where Hermione, Alice, and Cho Chang sat. Their trunks were neatly placed beside them—today was the day they would take the hogwarts express to school.
For these young Wizards, it was a momentous occasion. However, Adelaide, a late-stage procrastinator, had yet to finish packing and come downstairs.
Hermione paced back and forth in the living room, looking upstairs from time to time, appearing quite anxious.
After a while, she couldn't help but shout upstairs, "Adelaide, aren't you finished yet? Don't forget what Dumbledore said: Hogwarts forbids keeping Flobberworms. You have to leave them all at the old house and let the House-elf take care of them!"
Cho Chang comforted Hermione from the side, saying, "Hermione, don't worry. Our scheduled departure time is ten in the morning, and it's only nine-twenty now. There's still plenty of time."
But Hermione couldn't listen at all. She continued to mutter irritably to herself, "This is my first time going to Hogwarts; I absolutely cannot be late!"
The more she thought about it, the more urgent the time felt, as if being a second later would mean being late.
Alice rolled her eyes helplessly and said with a slightly impatient tone, "Please, the Hogwarts Express is scheduled to depart at eleven noon. Even if you arrive at the station early, the train definitely won't leave early!"
A flurry of hurried footsteps came from upstairs, and then Adelaide came running down the stairs in a rush, dragging her trunk.
While panting heavily, she shouted, "Coming! Coming! Let's go quickly!"
With Adelaide's appearance, the originally tense atmosphere instantly eased.
The House-elf Blue respectfully stepped forward and handed a large food box to Adelaide. This box contained the lunch and afternoon tea that Blue had specially prepared for the four of them.
Since the tool-man Edward had been temporarily recalled by the Ministry of Magic for overtime, Adelaide couldn't take a car to King's Cross Station as usual. Instead, she needed to travel via floo powder.
The specific route was to first teleport to a public fireplace near the station and then walk to Platform Nine and Three-Quarters.
For Hermione, this was her first time using floo powder, so she was exceptionally nervous. Fortunately, with Cho Chang and Adelaide constantly comforting and encouraging her, she eventually completed the teleportation successfully.
Hermione was the first to enter the fireplace, followed by Alice, then Cho Chang. Adelaide deliberately placed herself last.
Once Cho Chang disappeared into the flames, Adelaide immediately turned back and asked the House-elf Blue for an Owl, quickly writing a letter.
The recipient of this letter was Edward—Adelaide knew well that Blue would report her actions to Dumbledore, but she didn't care at all.
This year's situation was very special: The Chosen One was enrolling this year, and there was also a Professor Quirrell in the school who shared a body with Lord Voldemort.
Dumbledore needed to protect the Philosopher's Stone, which was being used as bait, while working with Snape to pressure Quirrell. At the same time, he had to find time to guide The Chosen One according to his plan—Adelaide estimated that Dumbledore would have no time to worry about her little schemes this year.
There was still no news of that Protagonist Cockroach, and Merlin hadn't given her any dream revelations either. For Adelaide, this was an excellent opportunity to improve her strength. She set a goal for herself to use this year to balance the various forces in her hands.
Currently, her primary goal was to cultivate a British pure-blood force absolutely loyal to her to counter Armandina, the actual controller of the Acolytes in Britain.
This elder sister had been getting more and more out of hand lately. A few days ago, she even deliberately stayed overnight at Dumbledores Old House and showered in Adelaide's room. Adelaide felt that if she weren't still so young, Armandina would probably have made a move on her already.
Armandina was extremely talented, proficient in Alchemy, and had inherited the political legacy left by Vinda Rosier within the Acolytes. For the current Adelaide, her role was irreplaceable.
To balance this power, Adelaide could only accelerate the siege on the Borgin family, striving to let the head of the Borgin family, who had completely defected to Lord Voldemort, die in an "accident" within a month.
Although Edward's older brother had entered the hall of marriage, he and his wife had yet to welcome the fruit of their love.
According to the traditional rules of the British pure-blood world, this meant Edward possessed a special right—after his elder brother's passing, he had the right to challenge his sister-in-law.
Once the challenge was successful, Edward would be able to seize back the actual control of the Borgin family from his brother's branch and become the new head of the Borgin Family.
At that time, Edward would not only inherit the Borgin Family's ancestral home, the underground vault at Gringotts, and the Borgin and Burkes shop, but also take over the various connections and channels the Borgin Family had accumulated over many years.
This was undoubtedly great news for Adelaide because it would become exceptionally convenient for her to purchase things in the future.
Of course, Adelaide's ambition went far beyond this.
She planned to build a powerful British pure-blood alliance centered around the Borgin Family after Edward had established a firm footing.
Since Dumbledore kept a close eye on the Malfoy Family and the Longbottom family, Adelaide wasn't sure if she could successfully win them over, so she temporarily excluded them.
After careful consideration, the forces she currently had her eye on included the MacFusty Family, the Parkinson Family, and the Greengrass family.
With the strength of these four families, Adelaide believed Edward should be sufficient to contend with Armandina.
After the letter was sent, Adelaide didn't dare delay any longer and immediately stepped into the fireplace. With a burst of green flames, she was teleported to King's Cross Station.
Perhaps because they arrived too early, when the four of them passed through Platform Nine and Three-Quarters, they found that there weren't many students near the train.
Adelaide led her friends onto the train and walked straight to a compartment further forward—on the night of the party, she had learned from Pansy Parkinson that there were several luxury compartments at the front of the train secretly prepared for pure-blood Wizards. The decoration inside was more luxurious, the seats more comfortable, and the soundproofing better.
Although such compartments were generally occupied by powerful or upper-year Slytherins, Adelaide didn't care about those rules—she was with Alice, after all. No blind Slytherin would come looking for trouble, right?
---------------------------------
I hope you enjoy this fanfiction! If you're having fun and want to read 30 chapters in advance, feel free to check out my Patreon: patreon.com/TLScarlet
Your support means a lot so if you like the story, don't forget to drop a Power Stone.