Chương 78: A Gift.

The heavy marble doors swung open soundlessly and a lady dressed in a dark hospital gown stepped out.

"Professor Snape!" The woman greeted as her eyes settled on the potions hovering behind him. "Oh! You've finished this batch of the potions, thank you!"

Snape flicked his wand and caused all the potion crates to softly land in front of her.

With a slight nod, Snape started to walk back toward his office wordlessly.

Loki turned around in a hurry to follow Snape but when he was leaving, he caught the gaze of the matron who had been standing at the door, she was giving him a weird look, like she was pitying him for some reason.

'I know mam! I know! Although my detention is with Professor Snape it's not that bad that you have to pity me!'

Following Snape through the dark corridors that Loki had now memorised Loki found himself back in Snape's office playing with the flask of his failed potion which he was carrying.

"What else is there to do professor?" Loki asked Snape and only got a stink eye in return so he just sat down in one of the potion-making stations and began to read the book about Ancient Runes he had borrowed from the library.

Just when he was about to flip a page, Loki suddenly ducked low since his intuition warned him of a projectile flying at him.

*FLAP* *THUD*

Something flew past him and landed on the table behind him, prompting him to look at Snape who was acting as if nothing happened.

"What the heck!?" Loki mumbled and looked behind himself and spotted an old potions book.

The title was 'Magical Draft and Potions' something that Loki recognised since it was the same title as their Potions textbook, except the book seemed positively ancient.

Loki carefully picked up the book and turned over its first page.

'This book belongs to the Half-Blood Prince.'

Loki read in his mind.

'Half-Blood Prince? Someone's emo.'

Flipping the page Loki came across the first potion in the book, 'Cure for Boils.'

The original recipe of the book was the same as Loki had learnt from his own book, but what was interesting was not that but the scratches and annotations made throughout the page.

And reading a few it was clear to Loki that the author of these changes was nothing less than a genius. If the book was to be believed, the end result was a potion three times stronger with four times fewer materials.

'Did Professor Snape write this?' Loki wondered but didn't dare ask lest he be beaten by newspapers again.

So instead of reading the Ancient Runes book, Loki began to read the potions textbook which was a hidden trove of knowledge about potion making.

But a simple question lingered inside Loki's mind, 'This book, why did Professor Snape give it to me?'

'Did he give me this book because he acknowledges me?'

'But why do I have a nagging feeling that there is something more to this?'

*SNAP*

Snape interrupted Loki's thoughts with a snap of his book, causing Loki to look at him.

"Can I leave professor?" Loki asked.

"Yes.", Snape replied simply and Loki stuffed all the books he had into his satchel bag.

"Goodnight Professor!" Loki said and closed the door behind him as he left, going to the nearest washroom.

Along the way he debated, 'Should I take it to the Sefirah castle?'

'No, if Professor Snape tries to divine about it and finds out that he can't notice anything then I won't be able to create a cover story.'

'It is better I bring the ring out, and since it has been in the Sefirah castle for so long, it should have been tainted by the grey fog enough that Mr. A shouldn't be able to divine anything about it.'

Setting up a bestowment ritual targeted to himself and taking four steps counter-clockwise, Loki entered the realm above the grey fog to respond to his ritual.

But before he responded to the ritual he picked up the ruby ring that had been lying in the Sefirah castle and threatened it using the Grey Fog.

'I will give you food soon until then help me out!'

The ring vibrated non cooperatively but Loki knew just what it needed.

'Do it or else forget about ever seeing a living thing again! I will drop you into the black lake and you'll remain stuck there for an eternity! Possibly even becoming Kraken Poop if your luck is terrible.'

*whine* *whine* *whine*

"Good boy. Don't worry, I promise you that you will get your food soon."

*whine* *whine*

Loki then threw the ruby ring on the star pulsating with crimson light, his own bestowment prayer.

Leaving the Sefirah Castle Loki put on the ring immediately to use the soul of the Mystery Pryer who was trapped inside it and entered Cogitation to perform a dream divination.

"Why did Professor Snape give me this book?"

Loki closed his eyes and relaxed as he let his astral body come in contact with the spirit world so that he could gain information.

His vision shifted from darkness to black and slowly stabilised as he noticed he was looking at Professor Snape sitting on a desk in the dungeons.

Professor Snape was holding the book and ruminating about something.

It was the Half-Blood Prince book.

Loki tried to find anything in the vision that would lead him to understand why Snape decided to entrust this to him but nothing seemed to particularly stand out as the reason for the gift.

'He gave it to me because I'm his favourite student?'

It was only after a whole minute ticked by that Loki found Snape opening the book and taking out a piece of paper.

Loki quickly scanned through what was written on the paper and immediately fell into a shocked silence.

The vision was disrupted and before he could do anything, he found himself back in the cubicle in the washroom.

"He was intending to turn me into a Beyonder? Of the Moon pathway?"

"That explains a lot. He could be a Sequence 6: Potions master."

"So he's actually a vampire!?"

"But he's still dangerous! He's of the Moon pathway! I can't under any circumstance go into the Moon pathway!"

'Although I don't know if it is corrupted by 'Her' in this world, it's better I don't take the risk.'

Loki flipped through the book just to be sure, but once he didn't find the paper that Snape was holding he felt a little relaxed.

'At least he's not in a hurry to convert me yet.'

Loki set up a quick sacrificial ritual for himself and quickly stored away the discount bin version of Creeping Hunger and cleared everything up so that there wouldn't be any traces of the ritual he'd just done.

He walked the rest of the way to his dorm in silence, pondering about the things that were happening around him.

'The Beyonder world…I still haven't really come in contact with it.'

'How do I naturally come in contact with it?'

'Will some professor tell me about it when they think I will do good in it?'

'Didn't Aunt Cassandra say something about students going on missions in the fourth year? So that's when it's revealed to them?'

'Confusing…'