Harry Potter, the savior of Night City

Harry returned to the Great Hall and sat in his usual spot, right next to Draco. Draco was almost numb to it, nearly desensitized by Harry's antics.

At the Gryffindor table, Ron was bombarding Hermione with questions. Hermione had been patiently answering Ron's questions, but she eventually got annoyed by his rapid-fire questions. She reached out and pinched Ron's arm, successfully interrupting his endless curiosity. She now finally realized how annoying her former self, with her chatterbox, had been.

The Great Hall was noisy, with first-year students standing uneasily in the center, because according to Hogwarts tradition, they were likely to learn something like fighting dragons or kissing trolls.

It was that tattered hat again. Professor McGonagall picked it up and placed it on the chair. The hat started to sing a tuneless song, and Harry skillfully plugged his ears.

One by one, the new students went up to be sorted into their houses. A little girl with white hair, who looked very tired, caught Hermione and Harry's attention.

"Holy crap...it's so dark..." Harry rolled his eyes as he looked at the black mist gushing from the little girl's forehead. This thing had the exact same magic as Voldemort's, and it didn't hide it at all. Was it afraid that no one would notice?

Hermione naturally noticed the situation as well. Her eyes glowed with a faint blue light. She had made significant progress in her soul alchemy during the summer vacation, and could now at least see the general state of a person's soul. Now, looking at the little girl's soul, she felt a wave of nausea and dry heaving.

"Damn Voldemort..." she muttered. In her eyes, the little girl's pure white soul was tightly bound by a disgusting, snake-like monster. The black, slimy soul snake opened its mouth and began to devour the little girl's soul bit by bit. Each time the little girl's soul was bitten, it would try its best to recover, but each time it recovered, it would be bitten off again by the disgusting snake. The black snake's venom was also constantly seeping into this pure soul, and now wisps of black thread-like objects could be seen on the white soul.

"Serena Grace!"

Professor McGonagall's voice rang out, and Serena's white hair trembled, as if she had just woken up and hadn't realized what was going on. Professor McGonagall had to call her again, and this time she finally reacted. She hurriedly ran to the Sorting Hat and asked Professor McGonagall to put the hat on her head.

Harry could only see a thick plume of black smoke enveloping the Sorting Hat. Then, a burst of intense golden-red light violently repelled the smoke. The black shadow tried to resist, but it was struck hard by a combination of brown, green, and blue light, along with the golden-red light. The smoke seemed to have suffered a severe blow and immediately shrank back.

Hermione, however, saw a different story. The monstrous snake with three eyes, a mouth split into four pieces, and dripping slime slowly crawled toward the Sorting Hat. Just as it opened its mouth, ready to bite the Sorting Hat, a griffin leaped out of the Sorting Hat, glowing with a golden-red light, and rammed into the monstrous snake, knocking it to the ground.

The strange snake tried to resist, but then a blue-glowing eagle, a brown-glowing honey badger, and a green-glowing snake sprang out from the hat. The four animals glared fiercely at the strange snake, then rushed forward and viciously bit and rammed into it. The strange snake's body shrank considerably in an instant as it was torn apart. It dared not linger and slithered back into the girl's body at an extremely fast speed.

Fearing they might harm the girl's soul, the four animals had no choice but to give up. The griffin took a deep breath and sucked the soul poison out of the girl's soul. The snake coiled around the girl's body, adding a layer of soul protection for her. The honey badger rubbed against the girl's soul, repairing the holes in it. The eagle landed on the girl's soul, bestowing wisdom upon her, hoping she would soon discover the anomaly.

"Are those... the will of the House? Or the will of the House's founders?" Hermione and Harry pondered together, while on the stage, the girl had been sitting there for ten minutes.

"Um... Mr. Sorting Hat," the girl's timid voice rang out. "Um, my sorting..."

"Hmm? Oh, right, right, child, you possess the characteristics of four academies. For a moment, I'm a little unsure myself. So, which one do you want to go?"

"I, I..." The girl thought for a long time, then blushed and muttered softly, "I want to go to Hufflepuff..."

"Okay! Hufflepuff!!" the Sorting Hat suddenly shouted, startling the blushing girl.

Serena jogged off the chair and ran back ten seconds later—she was wearing a hat, just like Neville in first grade.

Harry and Hermione both turned their gazes to Serena, whose face was flushed. She was somewhat overwhelmed by the enthusiasm of the badgers. It was clear that Voldemort's tricks on her had been mostly destroyed by the four house representatives, and her mental state was now much better. Only a tiny bit of thick black smoke remained on her forehead.

"Is Voldemort insane?" Harry thought to himself. This madman is even using children, just to take over a school? No, that can't be right. He must have something else planned. What could it be...?

The Sorting Ceremony ended quickly, and the Weasley girls were sorted into Gryffindor—well, it was pretty obvious, actually.

Dumbledore stood up and introduced the new professor, Gilderoy Lockhart, to the students present.

Lockhart wore a large pink robe, with pink smoke billowing behind him. Severus kept his distance from him as much as possible.

The students present erupted in excitement upon seeing Lockhart. Almost everyone, regardless of gender, had a hint of pink in their eyes. Only Harry, Hermione, the Weasley twins, and Ron, who was engrossed in eating a chicken leg, remained unaffected.

Lockhart gave an extremely cheesy self-introduction and even winked at random people in the room, especially Harry a few times. Harry could feel the Psychopaths gagging because the Psychopaths had started flashing their screens.

Lockhart sat back down, turned and tapped Snape on the shoulder. Snape turned his head and met Lockhart's flirtatious wink.

Snape: ...Help...

Harry clearly saw Professor Snape's body tremble violently, and his face turned ashen. But Lockhart wasn't satisfied and turned to throw a kiss at Professor McGonagall. Professor McGonagall immediately bristled, but Dumbledore, Flitwick, and Sprout pulled her back down.

After the dinner, Harry returned to his dark and damp underground dormitory. The only acceptable thing was that at least the bed was dry and had been warmed up beforehand.

Lying in bed, thinking about what had happened that day, I fell silent.

Is my mouth blessed? I just said I wanted a peaceful year and this happens... Does God dislike me that much?