Chapter 8 - Family Ritual - I

Days passed with me doing my various physical, mental and magical exercises and also reading various books. My Occlumency was coming along very nicely. I could even do legilimency now. I practised it on my roommates and caretakers at the orphanage and I could browse through their memories. The speed was a little slow and it was increasing with practise. At first it caused them headaches but as I become better at Legilimency, the headaches disappeared. My magical reserves were also slowly increasing. It was still not quite possible for me to do spells which required more reserves and I was waiting for my magic to stabilise. I expected my magic core to stabilise on my 7th birthday according to my observations and research. On the seventh birthday every child would get a boost in their magic core and hence it was the age when the less talented children showed accidental magic.

My school life was also progressing as expected. The teachers had taken notice of my genius and made me take the tests for high school early. I was set to start my high school from the next school year in August. It was 4 years earlier than normal and gave me enough time to finish the 7 years of high school before joining Hogwarts. My performance also gave the school publicity and they were happy to give me scholarships.

My performance at school also gained me a single room at the orphanage. The matron was happy to have a genius in her orphanage. There were some jealous children but I showed them not to mess with me on the first instance of bullying. My martial arts classes were also coming along very well. I was learning very quickly. Reading dojo master's mind while he explained various moves made it very easy to understand.

Today was 3rd June 1984. I was making final preparations before the ritual. I was in my house and not at the orphanage. I had informed the matron that I was going out for 2 days. She asked me some questions and I made an excuse that I was going to attend some lecture. She did not try to stop me as she knew that I was a good boy and could take care of myself. There was no school as the summer vacation had just started.

I emptied an unused bedroom and decided to do the ritual there. I did not understand much of the runes needed to be inscribed in the ritual circle and how to inscribe them. Thank god Sherry knew how to. I had already informed her about the ritual and told her to study up on it and acquire the needed ingredients. Sherry could still access my mother's vault that she had opened in Gringotts France. She opened this to use while hiding and the vault could still be used by Sherry. Sherry was using this vault for her needs and when I asked her to buy different things. The British Gringotts vaults were frozen by my parents before they went in to hiding. So money was not a problem.

I made sure that everything was ready before going to sleep. After waking up I had a shower and checked to see if there any changes due to me reaching the age of 7. I checked my magic core and found that I was right and my magic core had stabilised. Now I could start practising magic. My core size had also increased by a large amount. It was more than double the magic reserves I had yesterday. Now I had a ritual to perform and i knew it would give me another magical boost.

I made sure that I was in perfect condition for the ritual and went to the ritual room without wearing any clothes as it was specified in the ritual and sat in the centre of the ritual circle. Sherry place the various magical ingredients required in the appropriate place on the ritual circle and then left the room.

now it was time to perform the ritual. I supplied my magic to the runes placed in front of me to activate the ritual circle and then started chanting. Magic flowed through the runes and completely activated all the runes in the ritual circle. Then there was a bright light as the whole circle glowed with a bright light enclosing me in the light. I was in a meditative position with my eyes closed but I could feel what was going on. After the light enclosed my whole body, suddenly without any warning I felt an unbearable pain coursing through my body. It was as if my blood was burning and wherever the blood, it hurt like hell. I had to bear the pain until I felt that all parts of my body was hurting with even pain without any exceptions. This was to make sure that every cell in my body had activated and it gave a higher chance for the ritual to be successful. Due to my stronger soul I was able to bear the pain until required. I tried to bear the pain for some more time but even with all my will power I could hold on for only a minute and then lost consciousness.