Chapter 288: Trouble child
(Dumbledore POV)
I had hoped that over time Nick would slowly mellow out and not cause so many problems but that simply hadn't happened. Not exactly how I had hoped anyways as he did indeed become less reserved and now spent a great deal of time amongst those he calls friends but he was arrogant in how he seemed to view the world now. The sort of prideful and vengeful attitude I would expect from a phoenix or ho-ho in fact. He isn't unkind or anything like that but he simply ignores anyone outside his circle.-
Add on his rapidly improving prowess in magic and the boy is rapidly shaping up in a VERY familiar manner to myself when I was younger. Thankfully unlike my younger self he has a fairly clear moral code and refuses to cross some lines. The imprint on the schools ward stone was proof enough of this. If he dabbled in dark magic in the pursuit of power like I did when I was younger the dark would taint his imprint to some degree and yet there was nothing , not a single drop. I was both eager and worried about what the future under him will look like as a result.-
Everything that made Gellert and I great was found in the boy but there was also negative points as well. He was charismatic , powerful , attractive and skilled in magic but he was also proud , ambitious and burdensomely gifted with many magical abilities. The last one doesn't seem like a negative point but people grow the most under pressure and with so many abilities at his beck and call the boy can casually coast his way to glory. He simply can't find the pressure needed to grow as an individual.-
This was why I was surprised to learn that he was teaching his friends his knowledge , it was out of character. The boy was many things but charitable was definitely not one of them and yet I can't figure out why he was suddenly deciding to do this. It was almost as if he was suddenly subjected to an extremely heavy pressure and was trying his hardest to adapt. The thought that he may have figured out what Gellerts sacrifices were for crossed my mind but I had only barely discovered their purpose myself after much effort.-
In the end I decided to just accept this good news and focus on the newest headache Nick had given me. Just this morning I had received a letter from Gringotts telling me that one Harold Rich had donated a staggering two hundred thousand galleons to Hogwarts for "class expenses and wages". This act had Nico's fingerprints all over it and I quickly pieced together why he had done this as well. It's not a common thing to have someone come into my office and have Fawkes personally deliver a letter to Nico after all. Yes the boy hadn't even tried to hide what he was doing from me but was completely obvious about it.-
I could only sigh and accept this donation since as much as I am loathe to admit it the funds were desperately needed. The only other person aware of exactly how close to bankruptcy Hogwarts was is Minerva. She had long been helping me manage the various legal aspects of the school and thus knew just how badly the DADA curse had sapped away the schools funds. It was for this reason that I had to reject Filius's proposal for crafting classes beyond the rare alchemy class I teach if demand is high enough.-
Now though the school is totally recovered thanks to the sudden injection of funds that brought us back to full capacity. I owe it all to that stubborn child who refused to accept lack of funds as an excuse. It was an odd feeling for me to be grateful for one of my own students being a troublesome individual but here I am. My current greatest concern is not with Nick but rather Gellert and the repercussions of what he intends to do. It was unpleasant but I had warned the various ministries of the world what he sought to accomplish not long ago.-
Few have noticed it but each ministry is slowly bracing itself for the massive war that the whole world will soon be embroiled in. I used arithmancy to determine the amount of time we have left to stop Gellert and came to the answer of two almost three years. If we fail to stop him in that time span the entire world will be flooded with magic ruining centuries of the muggles hard work and ousting wizarding kind from hiding by force. The predicted death toll was a staggering three and half billion lives as the muggles society collapses and wizards are forced out into the open.
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