Hogwarts: I, Tom, am really not Voldemort!

After uttering that name, Cassandra could no longer support herself.

Seeing that she was about to collapse, Tom quickly steadied her, whispering in her ear:

"Hush!"

After gleefully teasing Cassandra, Tom put the incident aside.

He knew that after entering Hogwarts with this wretched name and appearance, sooner or later someone would associate him with that noseless freak; after all, there were too many ghosts, portraits, and teachers on campus who knew Voldemort's secrets.

Right now, Tom was more concerned about Snape's detention tomorrow night; he had prepared a rare gift for Snape.

Saturday evening, seven o'clock sharp, Tom arrived punctually at Snape's office.

“You're late, Riddle; detention extended by half an hour.” Snape, who was grading homework, said to Tom without looking up.

Tom raised his eyes incredulously to look at the clock in the office; it was still a minute before seven.

‘Fine, fine, so that's how we're playing it.’ Tom glared at Snape through gritted teeth.

Perhaps noticing Tom's gaze, Snape looked up and pointed to two large buckets in the corner of the office, saying coldly to Tom, who was standing at the door: “What are you waiting for? Go; your detention tonight is to deal with these two buckets of slugs.”

Tom glanced at the large mass of moving soft bodies in the bucket and felt a wave of nausea for no reason.

For Tom, who was slightly fastidious, it was too much of a challenge to his psychological endurance to put on gloves and use scissors and pliers to deal with two large buckets of this stuff.

Seeing that Tom still hadn't moved, Snape began to get impatient: “What, Riddle, are you still standing here? Could it be that you're expressing dissatisfaction with me? Does it have to be Dumbledore to give you detention?”

Listening to Snape's sarcastic words, Tom decided to bring out the ultimate weapon against Snape.

“Professor Snape, can I not do this?”

“Oh? What gives you the audacity to think you can bargain, Riddle?” Snape looked at Tom coldly.

“Then how about this?” Tom took out a Voldemort brand voice recorder from his pocket and displayed it in front of Snape.

“A Muggle trinket; you think you can use this to negotiate? I don't know if your brain has been replaced by a troll.” Snape was quickly losing patience with Tom.

Just as Snape was about to continue berating Tom, Harry's voice came from the voice recorder:

“I, Harry Potter, change my surname to Snape; I am called Harry Snape.”

Hearing this sentence, Snape was struck as if by lightning, his whole body stunned.

“I, Harry Potter, change my surname to Snape; I am called Harry Snape.” This sentence played repeatedly in Snape's ear like a brainwashing mantra.

At this time, Tom's seductive voice sounded in his ear at the right time: “Professor, do you want it? Think about it, Harry is Lily's only child, and now he's changing his surname to Snape, doesn't that mean you and Lily are together?”

‘That's right, Harry is changing his surname to Snape, so I can be Harry's father; Harry is Lily's only child, so rounding it up, I'm Lily's husband!’ Snape, immersed in his own thoughts, suddenly straightened out his logic, and an indecent smile unconsciously appeared on his face.

Seeing Snape, who had always been impassive, reveal such a perverted smile, Tom couldn't help but sigh that a love brain really made people stupid; the wise Snape really couldn't escape Lily Evans.

“Give it to me.” Snape said to Tom in a pleading tone, having broken free from his own fantasies.

“Professor, this is what I managed to get with great difficulty; even alchemy emphasizes equivalent exchange; you can't just take it away with empty words.” Tom shook the voice recorder in his hand, responding to Snape.

“Riddle, detention is canceled from today.”

“No, no, no!” Tom shook his index finger when he heard Professor Snape's exchange condition, saying “no” three times in a row.

“Then what do you want?” Snape looked at Tom with a frown.

“Professor, if you do something wrong, you should be punished; how can you cancel detention so easily? How about turning the weekly detention into your private tutoring time?”

Hearing Tom's request, Snape's brow relaxed: “Okay, give me the thing.” As he spoke, he reached for the voice recorder in Tom's hand.

“Wait.” Tom moved slightly to dodge Snape.

“What else do you want?” Snape said to Tom with dissatisfaction.

“How about adding a pass to the restricted section?” Tom added the request with a smile.

“Impossible, Riddle, don't try to bite off more than you can chew.” Snape, who was already wary of Tom, would never agree to this request.

Tom was not surprised to hear this reply, but he had more bargaining chips against Snape: “Then, a free message, a message that will give you a chance to see Lily one more time?”

“What?” Snape's pupils constricted, and he exclaimed in a trembling voice.

Tom then unhurriedly took out a piece of parchment, on which he had already drafted a magical contract, and handed it to Snape: “Want to know? If you want to know, sign it.”

Snape took the contract blankly and carefully read the clauses on it.

The clauses were simple and clear, just like what Tom had just proposed, and seemed extremely fair.

For Snape, even if there was a one in ten thousand chance of seeing Lily again, let alone this kind of contract, he would dare to sign even a devil's contract a hundred times more harsh.

Then Snape signed his name without hesitation and threw the contract back to Tom, along with a freshly baked pass to the restricted section.

The contract that returned to Tom's hand burned spontaneously without fire.

“The contract is complete, Professor, here, the voice recorder.” Tom handed the voice recorder to Snape.

But compared to the voice recorder, Snape was now more concerned about what message Tom had brought.

He took the voice recorder and put it in the desk drawer casually, staring at Tom with burning eyes: “Speak, what is that message?”

Tom cleared his throat and began to tell the story: “A long, long time ago, at dusk, three brothers were traveling on a narrow path.

As they walked, they came to a large river.

The river was very deep, and they could not cross it.

At this time, a bridge suddenly appeared on the water, and there was a hooded man on the bridge…”

Just as Tom was getting excited, he was rudely interrupted by Snape: “Get to the point; I don't have time to listen to you tell a story from *The Tales of Beedle the Bard*.”

“You really have no patience, Professor; okay, okay, then I'll skip this part and get to the point.

Then have you heard of this thing?” Tom still patiently told Snape, without feeling unhappy about being interrupted.

“What thing?” Snape asked.

Tom slowly uttered a name:

“The Deathly Hallows!”