“So let me get this straight. You want us to go kill demons at some boarding school in England?”

Yusuke Urameshi leaned against a heavily carved pillar framing a massive doorway, raising an eyebrow in confusion. If one ignored the green clad teen’s surroundings, one would be tempted to think that Yusuke was an average teenager holding a conversation with a rational, presumably human adult. That person would be a fool.

Yusuke Urameshi was one of the most powerful agents of the world of the dead, spirit world, had ever seen. He had slain so many demons and stopped so many plots for world spanning domination that he had become legendary in two of the three worlds. Assassination attempts were attempted daily.

The person he was talking to, Lord Koenma, was neither human or an adult. Koenma was the child of a god, Lord Enma, or Koenma for short. Some would say he wasn’t rational at times either, but that is neither here nor there. To prepare him for the awesome responsibility of full god-hood, the infant deity conducted spirit world’s affairs in his father’s absence, generally in the form of paperwork.

At the moment, Yusuke was highly confused and irritated. He had been called down, without the support of his three fellow detectives, to hear the details of this new bizarre mission. Koenma’s excuse for being called here by himself was that Kurama and Hiei were getting supplies that he’d need for the mission, and Kuwabara wasn’t strictly necessary for the mission.

Koenma rubbed his temples wearily with his pudgy fingertips as if trying to soothe away the question. “No. Listen closely, Yusuke! There has been strong demon activity in the United Kingdom recently that is synchronous with attacks by the bad sort of reiki wielders on innocent humans. Or their fellow reiki users, depending on the situation.”

Yusuke’s head tilted to the side, birdlike, in confusion. “Fellow Reiki users? I thought the ability to use reiki isn’t too common. And why would they want to attack each other in the first place?”

Koenma had the grace to look slightly embarrassed. “They’re called wizards, Yusuke. They-”

The teen snorted in amusement, leaning back against the wall. “Wizards? You’ve got to be kidding. Like in bedtime stories?” Like demons, I guess. “I thought this was serious.”

“It is. You’re supposed to think they don’t exist, Yusuke.” His tone indicated that he might as well have added, ‘you idiot’. “Wizards have to great lengths to keep themselves separate from typical human society, or “muggles” as they call it. And shut up. This is too important for you to interrupt. These wizards,” Here he rolled his eyes skyward in exasperation, “are humans who have a slightly higher amount of spirit energy than normally occurs, or what they call ‘magic’. They directly force the ‘magic’ out of their bodies in the form of whatever form they need through wands, or not, depending on how powerful they are. Generally this is in a reduced form, so it is more easily controlled, so the average witch or wizard is simply not capable of the power you can manipulate.”

“Anyway,” the infant god added quickly as Yusuke’s attention started to waver, “these wizards are known as being extremely biased against pretty much everything. This includes normal humans, other wizards, demons, and half breeds. They most especially dislike any blending of the groups.”

“One of these wizards, a shady character named Voldemort, was especially powerful and massacred hundreds of both normal humans and his fellow wizards in a reign of terror that lasted more than a decade before he was killed twelve years ago.”

The spirit detective cocked his head in curiosity. “By who? You said he was powerful, right? So who did it?”

Despite himself, Koenma smirked. “A one year old boy named Potter, Harry.”

The spirit detective’s eyes widened. “He was one year old?”

A worried frown spread over Koenma’s face again. “Yes, Yusuke, but now he is sixteen, and has been the subject of a prophecy foretelling voldemort’s second death. He also needs spirit detectives’ help. Voldemort escaped the grasp of our ferry girls somehow at his death sixteen years ago, and has annually been trying to assassinate Potter, with increasing success.”

“This year will be even more dangerous for Potter, Yusuke. I’ve received word that the demon attacks are coming to close to the demon attacks. It isn’t a coincidence- they are working as distractions for Voldemort’s attacks. That means he has demons helping him.”

When comprehension of the disaster Koenma foresaw failed to cross the teen’s face, Koenma slammed a pudgy hand on his desk, causing thick piles of paper to slide to the floor. “These aren’t normal demons, Yusuke! Most, if not all of them, are extremely powerful youkai! If any of them kill Potter or anyone at his magical school, who knows what will happen! It’s never good to mess with prophecies,” Koenma muttered.

“So Yusuke, I’m sending you, Kurama, and Hiei there to pose as exchange students. Or, to be more specific, a student teacher in Kurama’s case. Even in the smartest house his intelligence would stick out. We’ll just increase his age by a year or two so he looks of age, and decrease yours so you appear to be thirteen. Hiei’s fine, he looks thirteen anyway.”

“What about Kuwabara?”

Koenma snorted dismissively. “What about him? This mission calls for stealth, and that Kuwabara doesn’t have. Hiei will probably barely fit in at the school as it is.”

Yusuke looked disgusted at the idea of school. “School? Again? I thought I’d get out of that on this mission.”

The demigod grinned over at Yusuke. “Don’t forget, it’s a magical school that trains users of reiki. It’s definitely not the typical boarding school.”

P)P)P)P)P)

A shock of monochromatic hair peeked above a pile of bulky purchases precariously piled in a tower. A smooth, bass voice edged crept through the pile, tinged with a hint of a growl. “What’s next, fox.”

A feminine red head consulted a long list of supplies. “Next we need books and cauldrons.”

The two demons were standing in the middlea vast shopping area that was packed with humans bustling around doing their shopping. The wizards knew it as Fairl Plaza, the largest wizard shopping area near Tokyo.

It appeared to be a normal shopping center. But Kurama knew from long experience to look past appearances.

Almost all of the chattering shoppers wore strange, multicolored cloaks and hats, and calmly discussed things like dragons and flying broomsticks like they were everyday occurrences. Since the fox-demon personally knew someone who rode a flying oar, he was willing to bet that these actually were normal occurrences.

Not only that, but anyone who possessed normal levels of spirit energy wandered right past the line of shops without seeing a thing out of the ordinary. Actually the wizarding stores occupied one entire side of the street they were on- the other half was occupied by “muggle” shops and pubs.

Kurama figured it was a spell designed to redirect unwanted guests, since he had felt a vague pulling at his mind all afternoon, urging him to cross the street. Hiei had too, probably, but was far too proud to say anything about it, merely making gruff observations more often. It was probably a good thing, Kurama added mentally, that these wards had been designed more to repel intruding humans rather than demons.

The two demons had been wandering the maze of streets that made up Fairl Plaza for hours, ever since the disguised kitsune had received a message from Koenma (and large piles of gold) to pick up supplies for the mission in England. Eagerly seizing the opportunity to learn about the elusive human sect, Kurama had contacted Hiei and bounded off.

Kurama was not disappointed, fingers fairly itching with the urge to examine some of the more expensive examples. All of the items in the plaza were infused with trace amounts of spirit energy, and some were quite valuable but poorly guarded. Absently, the former thief came up with dozens of way to steal every valuable without being seen.

Shaking off the urge, Kurama turned himself back to the bookstore they stood before. Glancing over at Hiei to get the small demon’s attention, Kurama almost froze when he saw where the ruby eyed gaze of his associate was directed. Another demon. Here.

P)P)P)P)

Yes, this IS updating before September. That timetable was based on the fact that I wanted to rewrite Flowers Wilt in Shade first, but I have a severe case of Writer’s Boulder in that regard, so VI comes first.

If you’ve noticed, not much changed in this chapter. I’m actually fairly satisfied with the first two, mainly adding details here and there and cutting a few paragraphs. Around the second half of chapter three I grow disgusted with myself.)

Why yes, observant reader! This is indeed set in third year instead of sixth! One of things you may ask is, “What about the thestrals?” Well, observant reader, I must apologize. The thestrals had no real point in the first draft other than to introduce Loony Luna. Unfortunately I found out over several drafts of later chapters that I had no real grasp on Luna’s character. And, seeing as I prefer to be in character in most, if not all, times, that simply wouldn’t do. Instead I moved the whole story to third year. Not only do I know the most about third year, Lupin will have a much larger role, which is always a good thing. Lupin will still be spotted in Fairl Plaza, but he’ll teach as well. (He’ll also –eventually- explain why he was there in the first place.) This will also help introduce another plot point, but you’ll have to figure that one out on your own.

Glossary of YYH terms used during the fic:

Makai/Demon World

Ningen: human. Generally used by Hiei in a disdainful tone

Ningenkai/Human World

Reikai/Spirit World

Reiki: Spirit energy/ki/chi

:Youkai: demon

Youki: Demon energy/chi/ki

Youko: Youko Kurama, Kurama’s full demon form. Pointy ears and all

Glossary of HP terms I expect to use (will be updated based on need):

Lycanthrope/lycan: Referring to the disease of were-ism in general, the specific person who is infected with lycanthrope, or the state of being. When not used by the lycans themselves this is generally a discriminating term