In the past month when he lived in Leaky Cauldron, he had practiced innumerable spells with his wand and came to a realize a few things.

Spells chanted in Parseltongue are two or even three times more powerful than spells chanted in Latin. Just like how spells chanted in Latin are more powerful than spells chanted in English or some other language.

He has still not been able to figure out why that was but he was glad that he at least knew the strongest language out there.

Well, not technically the strongest language. It was rumored that Merlin could talk with Dragons and if there was a Dragon language, then Harry had no doubt that that particular language would be even more powerful than Parseltongue. But so far, Parseltongue was the strongest language that he could find that was spoken by humans.

There was also the various discoveries he made about his wand in the last month.

The main one being the one which taught him the importance of a wand.

In simple and short terms, wand was a tool that the wizards created in order to amplify their magic as well as act as a focus so that they would be able to perform delicate spells much more easily.

And even though he had a bad opinion about wizards and thought that they were overly reliant on those sticks, he was not blind enough to not see it's benefits.

So he kept his pride down and started using his wand to perform spells when necessary.

Still, he was not going to let his only power amplifier become a crutch for himself and had tried to put several charms on it to make it indestructible so that he would not lose it in the heat of a battle.

Unfortunately, for some reason, most of his attempts to use magic on his wand failed and in the few times that he succeeded, he realized that his wand's power had diluted a bit so he had to remove those charms as well.

So essentially, his strongest weapon right now was also his most venerable one which was why he had bought his standard handgun along with him on his way.

Just in case.

Electronics didn't work in Hogwarts and other highly saturated magical areas which meant that even if someone tried to blow that place up with rockets, they would fail. But handguns didn't rely on any form of electricity so he was sure that he would face no problem in using a handgun at Hogwarts.

His musings were cut off when he felt another person sit in front of himself. He opened one eye and was surprised to find that instead of leaving like how she did in the movie, Hermione choose to sit in front of him and was looking at him intently right now.

"What was that spell you just used to summon Neville's toad?" she asked and he held back a sigh.

Of course, Hermione Fucking Granger would want to know about the spell. Especially one this is not taught until the third year in their curriculum.

"It's a summoning spell. Known as Accio spell. You'll learn about it at Hogwarts in the future." He said in a dismissive tone, hoping she would leave him and closed his eyes.

She was one of those girls that would become rather beautiful in the future but right now, she was too annoying. Not to mention young.

"Can you… can you teach me as well?" she asked hopefully and he opened his eyes once more in irritation, intent on telling the girl to sod off when he saw her nervous gaze as she bit her lip as she looked at him demurely.

Hah…. Of course. This was not the confident and older Hermione he saw in the later movies but just a little kid who had been bullied for being too smart most of her life and had no friends except her books.

Still, he had a reputation to maintain. The reputation of a person who you don't fuck with. And you don't get to create that kind of reputation by giving in to every little girl that gives you puppy eyes.

"You'll have teachers in Hogwarts who'll teach you those spells." He said dismissively even though he highly doubted his own words. Those so called teachers might have a good heart but they never really taught Harry and his friends anything truly important during their time at Hogwarts.

To this day, he felt disbelief that Harry Potter was able to beat Voldemort considering how much more powerful Voldemort was than Harry himself.

The force of plot armour was strong in him.

You don't become the worst Dark Lord of the century and then get beaten by a 16-17 year old boy who had not even completed his Hogwarts education nor been taught any dueling tactics by anyone.

Hell, Flitwick was an International Dueling champion and Voldemort would have destroyed him in a minute.

Even when Minerva, Kingsley and Slughorn banded together, they were barely able to hold him back in the battle of Hogwarts.

There was no way Harry Potter, a 17 years old emotional teenager was able to fight back The Voldemort on so many occasions without Plot Armor.

He really really doubted that he had the Plot Armour given to the original Harry by J.K Rowling or the protection of the prophesy considering how he was not essentially Harry Potter but someone else who had taken over his body.

So when he faced Voldemort in the future, it would be imperative for him to be strong enough to hold his own against the no nose bastard.

"That language you spoke in…" Hermione said slowly "I've never seen anyone use that language. Was that even a language because all I heard was hisses when you chanted the spell."

Harry opened his eyes and realized that the other three classmates-to-be sitting beside him had gone tense.

He once again held the urge to scoff at wizards and their superstitions.

"It's a language called Parseltongue and can only be spoken by very few people who are gifted with it from birth (Nope. Not gonna admit that he got it from the scar). Normal wizards and witches cannot speak this language and those who can are called Parselmouth." He said and looked at her to confirm if that was the end of her questions but of course it wasn't. She was Hermione Granger after all.

For the next half and hour, she continued to ask him various questions and he continued to answer her. By the end of her questions, even the other three classmates looked relieved and comfortable.

Yes he had a reputation to maintain but a little help every now and then to other kids would definitely keep Dumbledore off his back.

What's the saying.

Helping a kid a day helps keep Dumbledore away.

And things went well, until one foolish Draco Malfoy strutted into the room along with his two goons like he was the father of Merlin.

—————

Hermione looked at the Harry Potter in fear, then at the boy who had just introduced himself as Draco Malfoy and was now serving as a carpet for Harry.

She didn't even know what happened.

One moment, the door opened and Draco along with two other mean looking boys walked in and said something derogatory about her and the others sitting in the compartment and the next second, the two big boys following him were sent flying and Draco himself snapped in attention like the soldiers and fell on the floor like a stiff board.

After that Harry closed the door and said a few words in that scary parseltongue language and no one has come to their compartment since then.

And to think that they were having a civil conversation just a few moments ago too.

Of course, Harry had seemed very intimidating and scary at the first glance and his parseltongue ability was terrifying in and of itself but when she asked him questions to satisfy her curiosity, he had answered with patience that few kids of their age held.

And when he did not show any annoyance like how most other children did when she asked them something, she started getting excited and continued to satisfy her curiosity from this well of knowledge, forgetting why she felt so threatened by him on the first place.

And now as he sat nonchalantly with a peaceful expression on his face, an open book on his hand and a foot on Draco Malfoy's petrified form, she wondered what she should do.

Should she tell him that it's against the rules to bind another student like this and then use him like a carpet?

Should she go and ask others for help?

But then again, Draco had called her a mudblood (whatever that meant) with disdain while Harry had patiently answered all her questions for the past hour and helped Neville with his toad.

And aside from this one single action of his, he did not seemed like a bad guys. Perhaps… he could be her friend. Her first friend aside from the books that she loved so much.

She glanced at her three other companions and realized from their expression, that they were too terrified to do something themselves.

Well, she was not feeling very brave either, but still, it's just not right to break rules and treat your fellow students like this.

She looked at the blonde boy who seemed to be frozen in time and wondered if she should tell Harry to let the boy go. To tell him that it's against the rules to treat others like this. Would he even listen. Would he resent her for that. He probably would.

So, in order to not be resented by the person would might become her first friend, she reluctantly chose to not mention Draco's predicament and the rest of the train ride went by with them simply talking with each other about random things.