The cellar was a place of damp and shadow, its stone walls slick with moss. From a gap in the ceiling, heavy iron chains dangled, suspending Anton's small, ten-year-old frame in mid-air.
He breathed in ragged, wheezing gasps, his gaze fixed on a rusted ventilation grille. Sunlight pierced through it, and in that single beam, tiny sprites danced obliviously, unaware of the agony below.
"Crucio!"
Red light seared the gloom.
"Urrghh!" Anton ground his teeth until they squealed, clamping his jaw shut to stifle any sound. Tears blurred his vision, the world fading at the edges.
How many times had he endured this? He had lost count. But he knew, with terrifying certainty, that this time might be the end.
'I don't know if this is the world of Harry Potter,' he thought grimly, 'but 'I'm certainly not waiting for an Hogwarts letter.'
The hooded figure turned and melted back into the darkness, leaving him alone with the pain.
Anton exhaled slowly, his eyelids heavy as lead, until his head finally slumped forward.
...
When he came to, he had no idea how much time had passed. The first thing he felt was the agony in his shoulders, where the chains had bitten deep. It felt as though his bones were being slowly pried apart.
"Hahaha…" A weak laugh burst from his lips. "I'm still alive!"
Once again, he had survived the old wizard's cruelty.
It had been two months since he'd woken in this alien land, only to fall straight into darkness. "Apprentice" was a cruel joke. He was nothing more than a test subject, a living shield, a slave, and bait. He was the sole survivor of the wizard's experiments.
He had tried to run once, slipping away into the night while the man lay drunk. But the memory of the curse still made his bones ache. He hadn't gotten far before he collapsed, a trembling, whimpering wreck, begging for mercy.
In a twisted act of "generosity," the man had released him into the Black Forest—offering him up as a feast for the werewolves.
The outcome had been... satisfactory, from the wizard's point of view. The beast had been tamed, and Anton had earned his keep. But it came at a price: he was kept alive, only to be tortured for the slightest mistake.
Creaaaaak…
The heavy door groaned, rusted and warped by time. A blinding torrent of light flooded the cellar, forcing Anton to screw his eyes shut against it.
The wizard's tattered black robes drifted closer, the deep hood shadowing his features, leaving only a sharp, hooked nose visible. Pale, gnarled hands reached out, clutching a wand of ten inches—maroon wood, its core pulsing faintly like the dark eye of a dragon.
With a sharp flick of the wrist, the chains snapped open. Anton crashed onto the cold stones.
The wizard chuckled, a dry, rasping sound like parchment burning. "Magic, when it surges unchecked… it leads only to destruction, my boy."
He loomed over him. "You aren't even eleven, yet the power inside you already threatens to tear you apart."
Anton said nothing, rubbing the raw bruises on his wrists. He might not have finished the books or seen the movies, but he knew the tropes well enough. Being a transmigrator didn't make him invincible—that was just fantasy. In reality, pain was very real.
"Yet, you are my most gifted apprentice," the old man rasped. "Obey me, and I will teach you to master it."
Anton's heart hammered. He scrambled up, putting every ounce of desperation into his act. "Master… I was wrong! I'm sorry!"
Satisfied, the wizard nodded slightly. "Go. Prepare food. And be careful with those… bright mushrooms this time."
"There won't be a next time, Master," Anton murmured, his voice thick with feigned remorse.
"Hmph."
With a sharp crack, the wizard Disapparated.
Alone at last, Anton narrowed his eyes, a cold smile touching his lips. He didn't know who this man was in the grand scheme of the wizarding world, but he knew one thing: he was desperate. His resources were clearly being drained for dangerous experiments.
'Only one wand?' Anton thought, a thrill running through him. 'If I could just snap it during a lesson…' The image of the powerful wizard helpless and weak was intoxicating. But caution held him back. The attempt with the poisoned stew had clearly been noticed. He needed to wait.
Patience. He had plenty of that.
He hauled himself up the stone steps and out into the forest. Sunlight pierced the mist, casting everything in an eerie, pale glow.
He crept toward the kitchen—a ramshackle hut tucked against the wall. Inside, it was pitiful. A shrunken sack lay empty by the stove, a clay pot held barely a scrap of animal fat, and there was barely a pinch of salt left.
"This cheap old bastard!" he growled under his breath.
He remembered the last time. The wizard had grown sick of bread and water and thrown a fit. That was when Anton had been sent into the woods to gather mushrooms to fill the pot.
He had gathered a cluster of striking fungi—Fly Agaric, their caps vivid red like tiny umbrellas dotted in white. He knew them well from documentaries: they caused sickness first, then a deep, dreamless sleep from which one never woke. A grim rhyme echoed in his mind: "Red cap, white spots, a deadly embrace, a final long nap in a forgotten place."
He was already imagining digging the grave with his own hands.
Unfortunately, the old man had a nose for treachery. That attempt, and others like it, had earned him hours of agony under the Cruciatus Curse.
"I didn't know! I'm just a child!" he had screamed. But mercy was a word that did not exist in this house. The pain only grew worse.
Why the sudden interest in teaching him? he didn't care, but he knew his role. He would smile, he would learn, and at the first chance, he would drive the knife in.
He cooked a thick, hearty stew, setting aside a small portion for himself first—he knew better than to expect the old man to save him any later.
"Master, stew is ready."
The old man looked up from a mountain of parchments. Without his hood, his appearance was striking: wild white hair and a beard that flowed like snow, framing a face carved by time. But it was his pale blue eyes that were most unsettling—deep, intense, and piercing right through him.
He stared at Anton's grime-streaked face in silence for a long moment.
"Wash yourself. We are going to Knockturn Alley."
'Knockturn Alley?!' Anton's eyes went wide.
He knew now, without a doubt, exactly what world he was in. He just didn't know when. For two months, they had lived in the forgotten corners of Britain, hiding from the world.
'Please, let it be the 90s!' he prayed silently.
He hadn't been an obsessive fan, but he knew the timeline. If it was now, Gellert was gone, Voldemort was defeated, and Hogwarts… Hogwarts was a sanctuary. A place of relative safety.
He was sick and tired of living on the edge of a knife.