Harry Potter and the glory of Merlin(On temporary hold)

Chapter 1: And so it begins

Chapter 1: And so it begins

The hot afternoon sun glared down on Harry Potter as he sat in the dappled shade of the trees in a small park. His hair was matted with sweat and his oversized t-shirt clung to his thin frame like glue. It had been less than two weeks since had returned to the Dursleys for the summer after an agonizing year at Hogwarts and it had been unbearable so far. Every time he shut his eyes or even when he was awake his mind tormented him and transported him back to the horrifying events that took place in the graveyard only a few weeks ago.

He had tried multiple times to reach out to his two friends only to receive hurriedly written, short and curt responses back that revealed nothing and didn't do any good at taking his mind away from dark topics that it tended to return to. Of course his godfather, Sirius, would always readily respond to his letters but always seemed cautious on what information he was revealing and how much he was giving out. Dumbledore it seemed was trying to ignore his letters altogether and had not responded to a single one he sent asking for information or even craving for some form of contact. Harry, however was sure Dumbledore had sent someone out to watch him and keep an eye on him, seeing as that he always had the feeling he was being followed.

His relatives had been tolerable this summer, choosing to cave in after constant threats from Sirius and fear of magic. When he said tolerable, he meant they ignored him completely acting like he was an unseen ghost rather than a human being as long as he had his long list of chores done and didn't attract any of the neighbours attention. Since sleep brought nightmares and sitting idly brought flashbacks, chores were a way for him to take his mind of the depressing thoughts. He had almost started looking forward to the daily list he was given. 

It was sad really.

Harry knew he should have snapped out of his thoughts and start being proactive. But how could he bring himself to be? Voldemort had returned and his fellow death eaters were probably spending their time carefully planning and plotting how to take over the Wizarding World. Ron, Hermione and the rest of his friends and allies refused to give him any information leaving him to rot in hell without the slightest updates. To top it of he was stuck in an abusive household with relatives who hated his guts. What was an almost 14 year old boy to do? What was he to hope to do in this circumstances? 

Beyond completing his schoolwork, he had managed to steal some of Dudley's school books and had spent the rest of the time flicking through them and studying. Something he kept different was that he had kept up with his muggle studies.

 After he had gone of to Hogwarts he had secretly registered himself as home-schooled and every summer managed to sneak away to complete the progress tests needed to asses how well they were doing and whether he needed to go to normal school instead. Thankfully, he had always managed to pass with flying colours. 

Something he kept a secret from everyone. His relatives would probably accuse him of cheating and demand he withdraw the scores. Hermione would first applaud him for taking some form of studies seriously before opting to do it herself and spend her time studying and taking every years tests and trying to upstage him. He loved his friend but sometimes she could get overly jealous. Ron would probably say how he was trying to hard and moan about schoolwork and demand why Harry was choosing to do anything related to school in his free time. Once again Harry loved his friend but he really was lazy. Other adults would either disapprove saying he was overworking himself or ask why he needed to learn muggle subjects. To be honest, this was something he preferred to keep secret.

To his dismay Harry had found everything was far too easy for him and picked up everything quite easily leaving him with extra free time on his hands. Once the summerly progress tests were done since they happened at the start of every summer, Harry had no idea what to do. He had tried to review his magical school curriculum but it didn't help. To be honest, Harry was much better at the practical part rather than the theory. It was why he excelled at DADA. However, he wasn't allowed to use magic outside of school and didn't dare try and brew a potion in case he blew up his room. He figured his relatives wouldn't be very fond of that.