Harry Potter: The Beast Wizard

"AAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!"

The scream tore through the quiet morning air like a spell gone wrong. It ricocheted off the walls of the Gryffindor dormitory, startling every sleeping occupant out of their dreams.

Ron Weasley sprang upright, red hair in full haystack mode. "Harry?! What happened?! Are we under attack?! Did the ceiling fall?! Did Fred and George prank us again?!"

Neville Longbottom flailed beneath his sheets, tangling himself in his blanket like a cocooned caterpillar. "Is it the giant squid?! Did it get in?! I KNEW it would come for us eventually!"

Dean Thomas fell out of his bed entirely, landing with a muffled "Ow!" and a flurry of Quidditch posters fluttering to the floor around him.

Seamus Finnigan's pillow exploded in a small puff of smoke—not from fear, but because, for reasons unknown, he had enchanted it the night before "to hum Irish lullabies with fireworks."

And at the epicenter of it all, Harry Potter sat up in bed, heart pounding, eyes wide as saucers, gasping for breath.

"WHAT IN THE—"

Hovering directly above him, clinging upside down to the ceiling beams like a human tarantula, was Inosuke Hashibira.

Wearing his boar mask.

Grinning through it.

Upside down.

"KAKAKAKAKAKA!" he cackled. "I AM IMPRESSED, FOUR-EYES! YOU SENSED MY KILLER AURA IN YOUR SLEEP! A TRUE WARRIOR INSTINCT!"

Harry's jaw flapped, but no words came out. He could barely process what was happening. Boar mask. Ceiling. Muscles. Steam? Why was there steam?

Inosuke released his grip and dropped like a sack of wild meat, landing squarely on Harry's bed with an oomph that sent the frame creaking.

Dean screamed. Neville yelped. Seamus's blanket caught fire.

"INOSUKE!!" came the unified shriek of the dormitory.

Inosuke bounced on his heels, crouched over Harry like a lion over prey.

"I HEARD YOU WERE THE BOY WHO LIVED!" he roared, slamming a fist into his palm. "THE ONE WHO DEFEATED THE DARK LORD WIZARD!"

"…You mean You-Know-Who?" Harry choked out.

"YES! THE DARK LORD DEMON! I DEMAND YOU DUEL ME!"

Inosuke's boar nostrils flared. Steam puffed from the snout like a dragon about to launch a fireball.

"I'VE BEEN TRAINING SINCE MIDNIGHT, RUNNING ON THE WALLS! I MADE TEN LAPS AROUND THE COMMON ROOM CEILING!"

Ron stared at him, groggy and traumatized. "Mate… why?"

"TO SHARPEN MY SENSES! THE MOUNTAIN NEVER SLEEPS! NEITHER DO I!"

Seamus squinted through the smoke rising from his singed sheets. "Do ye sleep hangin' like a bat every night?"

"YES. FOR SPINAL DISCIPLINE."

Harry was still catching his breath, pressed against the wall, blanket bunched under his chin like a terrified grandmother. "You—you can't just… drop in like that!"

"HAH!" Inosuke stood on the bed like it was a mountaintop. "EVERY DAY IS A NEW BATTLEFIELD! I AWAKEN READY FOR WAR!"

Dean blinked. "Mate… it's literally the first day of school. Breakfast isn't even ready yet."

"THEN I SHALL FEAST ON GLORY INSTEAD!"

With a dramatic leap, Inosuke jumped from Harry's bed to the floor, rolled, and sprang into a fighting stance—arms wide, legs tense, boar head gleaming in the sunrise filtering through the windows.

"COME, FOUR-EYES!" he bellowed. "SHOW ME THE POWER THAT MADE THE DARK LORD PEE HIMSELF!"

Harry stared blankly. "I was a baby…"

"THEN YOU HAVE ONLY GROWN STRONGER! FIGHT MEEEEEEE!"

Inosuke charged—but was immediately intercepted by Ron and Dean, who tackled him sideways onto the rug with a thump.

"NOPE. We are not doing this at seven in the morning!"

Inosuke flailed under both Dean and Ron's grip. "LET ME GO, FRECKLE-WARRIOR!"

"You're gonna wake up the whole tower!"

"I ALREADY DID!"

Neville finally spoke up, still half-bundled in his blanket. "Can he… do this every morning?"

"IF YOU'RE STRONG ENOUGH TO COMPLAIN, YOU'RE STRONG ENOUGH TO FIGHT!" Inosuke shouted from the floor.

 "He's gonna be the reason I fail Transfiguration, I just know it." Dean said. While gripping Inosuke.

"I'LL TRANSFIGURE YOUR SOUL WITH BATTLE HONOR!" Inosuke declared proudly.

"Alright!" Ron grunted, rolling off of him. "Breakfast. Let's go. Before he tries to do something that will scare us again."

"TO BREAKFAST!" Inosuke howled, bolting upright and launching himself at the wardrobe.

"Wait—what are you—"

He wrenched the wardrobe open and grabbed someone's robe—it might've been Neville's, no one could be sure—and tied it around his waist like a gladiator's sash.

"I AM READY FOR THE HALL OF FOOD!"

"Mate," Seamus said weakly, "you're still shirtless."

Inosuke flexed. "SO IS THE SKY."

"What does that even mean?!" Ron groaned.

Harry was slowly getting up, running a hand through his already-wild hair. "This… is going to be a long year."

As the group staggered downstairs—Ron dragging a skipping Inosuke by the wrist—Hermione met them at the common room, fully dressed, bag packed, hair in full lion's mane mode.

"Oh no," she said at once. "What did he do?"

"Spider mode," Ron said, rubbing his face.

"Ceiling ambush," Harry added.

"Tried to duel me," Harry added again.

Hermione's expression flattened. "It's not even eight o'clock."

"I HAVE CONQUERED THE MORNING!" Inosuke declared proudly. "NOW SHOW ME THE KITCHEN!"

"Kitchen?" Hermione blinked. "We don't go to the kitchen, breakfast is in the—"

But Inosuke had already sprinted toward the portrait hole, yelling, "BOAR FLIGHT!"

The Fat Lady shrieked as he barreled through the frame.

"WHERE IS THE GIANT TOAST MONSTER?!"

The rest of the boys groaned and followed.

"Did he just say toast monster?" Hermione whispered.

Harry nodded. "He's not… all there."

"I'm beginning to think he left his common sense in the Forbidden Forest," Ron mumbled.

Neville sighed. "I just wanted toast…"

And with that, the Gryffindor first-years began their first proper morning at Hogwarts—chasing a shirtless, masked lunatic who thought every hallway was a battlefield, every portrait was a potential enemy, and every breakfast pastry was a glorious conquest waiting to be devoured.

_____________________________

The Great Hall was still bustling with chatter when the Gryffindor first-years finally sat down for breakfast. Most students were digging into sausages and toast, sipping pumpkin juice, or yawning into their porridge.

Not Inosuke.

He was crouched atop the Gryffindor table, balancing on one leg like a bird of prey, scarfing down sausages with both hands like he was in a contest with an invisible rival.

"MEAT!!" he roared triumphantly, cheeks stuffed. "GLORIOUS, JUICY VICTORY MEAT!"

"Get down from the table!" Hermione hissed at him, yanking at his ankle like she was trying to bring down a rampaging chandelier.

"YOU DARE TRY TO CUT DOWN THE MOUNTAIN'S PEAK?!"

"You're getting gravy on the pumpkins!"

By the time Percy Weasley marched over with prefect authority and forcibly removed Inosuke from the table ("This is not the boar's den, Hashibira!"), breakfast was over, and schedules had been passed out.

"First class is Transfiguration," Hermione said brightly, checking her parchment. "We're with the Hufflepuff."

"Transfigu-whatsit?" Ron asked, glancing at Harry.

"It's the class where you turn one thing into another," Hermione explained.

Inosuke's head tilted. "Like turning an enemy into a footstool?"

Hermione blinked. "No, that's highly illegal!"

"Then what's the point?"

Transfiguration Classroom – Five Minutes Later

The Gryffindor and Hufflepuff first-years filed into the Transfiguration classroom—Harry beside Ron, Hermione leading them like an academic general, and Inosuke trailing behind, still chewing loudly on a stolen muffin.

The room was formal and neat, with rows of desks and a large desk at the front with a fat tabby cat sitting atop it. The moment they walked in, Inosuke stopped.

He sniffed.

His eyes narrowed behind the boar mask.

"That's not a normal cat…"

Hermione turned to him, voice low. "It's just a cat. Sit down."

"WRONG."

Inosuke crouched like he was preparing to pounce.

"That's a war cat. Look at the stare. The posture. That's a combat animal if I ever saw one."

Ron raised an eyebrow. "Mate, it's licking its paw."

"It's taunting us," Inosuke growled.

Harry sat down quickly before Inosuke could escalate anything.

Then the cat leapt from the desk and mid-air, twisted into Professor McGonagall.

Several students gasped.

Inosuke shrieked.

"I KNEW IT! SHE IS THE BEAST WITCH!"

He leapt over his desk in a dive roll and crouched, pointing one metal rod at her dramatically. "YOU WON'T CATCH ME OFF GUARD AGAIN, SHAPESHIFTER!"

Professor McGonagall arched an unimpressed brow.

"Mr. Hashibira, if you leap over a desk in my classroom again, I'll have you transfigured into a filing cabinet and left in the broom cupboard for a week."

Inosuke paused.

Then slowly nodded. "...Respect."

Hermione buried her face in her hands.

Ten Minutes Later

"Transfiguration," McGonagall said as she paced the front of the classroom, "is some of the most complex and dangerous magic you will learn at Hogwarts. Anyone messing around in my class will leave and not come back."

She leveled a pointed look at Inosuke, who had somehow wedged himself horizontally across two chairs like a human plank.

"Is that clear?"

"YES, CAT-GENERAL," Inosuke boomed, saluting with his metal rods.

McGonagall blinked slowly.

"I… suppose that will do."

On each desk sat a small wooden matchstick. Hermione was already primed and focused, wand out like a conductor before a grand symphony.

"Now. You will try to turn these matchsticks into needles."

She demonstrated with a casual flick—the matchstick on her desk gleamed and turned silver.

"Your turn."

Wands were raised.

Muttered spells filled the room.

Sparks flew.

Neville accidentally set his desk on fire.

Seamus's matchstick exploded into glitter, and then the glitter exploded.

Inosuke squinted at his wand like it was a wild animal. He gave it a test swing. Then another. Then struck a heroic pose and screamed—

"BEAST BREATHING, FORM ONE: NEEDLE DOMINATION!"

He stabbed his wand into the matchstick like it owed him money.

A faint poof happened.

The matchstick remained unchanged.

He snarled and headbutted the desk.

"Why isn't it transforming?! I screamed the technique name!"

"You're not supposed to scream anything!" Hermione whispered. "You have to focus your intent—like this!"

She flicked her wand. Her matchstick gleamed and curved slightly—halfway there.

Inosuke growled. "I'm gonna dominate this matchstick if it's the last thing I do."

"You can't brute force magic!" Hermione insisted.

"I CAN BRUTE FORCE ANYTHING IF I FLEX HARD ENOUGH."

A loud crack came from the back of the room.

Everyone turned.

Inosuke stood, shirtless as ever, muscles flexed, wand now held in his teeth like a dagger.

"I AM THE LORD OF STICKS!" he shouted triumphantly.

Ron whispered to Harry, "He's absolutely mental."

Harry nodded. 

McGonagall swept over to Inosuke's desk.

She looked down.

The matchstick had been snapped in half.

"Mr. Hashibira," she said calmly, "this is not a duel. You're not attacking the magic into submission."

"BUT I CHANTED MY SECRET TECHNIQUE!"

"It doesn't have a chant. This is transfiguration magic, not kabuki theater."

Inosuke blinked.

"...What's kabuki?"

McGonagall pressed her lips into a flat line. "You are to practice until you can make that matchstick look at least slightly silvery. If I see bite marks in your wand again, I'm confiscating it."

"Yes, General Cat!"

She turned to walk away, muttering, "Merlin give me strength."

End of Class

By the time the bell rang, most of the students had managed some level of partial transformation.

Hermione's was nearly perfect.

Harry's matchstick glowed faintly.

Ron's had turned into something that looked like a melted spoon.

Inosuke's matchstick was still broken in half—but now arranged into the letter "X" and wrapped in his bandages like it had survived a war.

"I HAVE CLAIMED VICTORY OVER THE TINY TREE DEMON!" he proclaimed, raising the X like a trophy.

McGonagall sighed deeply.

"Next class," she muttered to herself, "I'm teaching him how to sit in a chair."

A/N

[Power Stone Please]