HP: The Arcane Thief

Chapter 10: Savage Sorting Hat

As they were talking, Axel was a bit surprised to see a group of pearly white apparitions float out of the wall, scaring many muggle-borns.

But since he had the general knowledge from the system, he knew that ghosts exist in the Wizarding world. Heck, he could have sworn he had seen one sometime in the past.

Soon Mcgonagall came back and ushered them through a pair of large doors into the Great Hall.

It turned out to be the biggest hall he'd ever seen. The four long tables seemed to stretch for miles. The upper area of the hall was filled with thousands of floating candles.

In the last decade, Magical Britain had adapted the magical equivalent of a bulb and tube light from other magical countries since those Purebloods having the monopoly over enchanted candles could no longer suppress them. So, he had seen crystal balls everywhere instead of candles and torches. But, the Great Hall was still lit only with candles and nothing else.

And Axel could understand why. The huge number of candles are able to provide more than enough lumination and the scenery looks simply marvelous.

Professor McGonagall placed a four-legged stool in front of the first years. On top of the stool, she put a pointed wizard's hat. This hat was patched and frayed and extremely dirty.

And for some reason, the hat began singing.

"It's horrendous," muttered Axel.

Even though he had the general knowledge of the system and understood that sorting would be done through the hat, he still found all this stuff quite absurd.

Why was that hat allowed into students' minds? Why was it so dirty? He'd prefer any hat over this one. And most importantly, why the fuck was it singing so badly?

While the hat was singing, Susan was trying to comfort a nervous Hannah.

"Don't worry, it's just a sorting," she was saying.

"But… but what if I get sorted into Slytherin?" She asked back in worry.

Rose shook her head, "Sirius said you can choose whichever house you want. The sorting hat listens," she said confidently.

Axel had also gotten the same information from the system's basic knowledge. That's why he was quite relaxed as he looked around the hall in curiosity while trying to ignore the song.

After the hat was done, Mcgonagall announced the start of sorting.

"When I call your name, you will put on the hat and sit on the stool to be sorted," she said. "Finnigan Seamus!"

A Sandy-haired guy walked out, looking excited, and put on the Hat.

"GRYFFINDOR!" Came the hat's voice moments later, causing the Gryffindor table to burst into cheers.

"Axel, when is your birthday?" Rose asked Axel out of the blue as Mcgonagall continued to call out names.

"... Why do you ask?" He asked back in bewilderment.

"The sorting is done either alphabetically or Chronologically. This time, it looks like it'll be done Chronologically. So if your birthday comes early, you'll be sorted first."

"Oh," Axel nodded in understanding. But… he really had no idea when his birthday was and neither did he ever felt the need to know.

Thankfully, Neville's name was called at that moment, causing the subject to be dropped.

Axel watched as the students got sorted one after another. Rose, Neville, Susan, Hannah, and Daphne all got sorted into the Houses they wanted.

And soon, it was his turn.

"HUNT, AXEL!"

Axel paused. He came to know two things today. His birthday comes quite late in the year, and his surname is Hunt.

'Axel Hunt. Well, it's at least better than Longbottom,' he thought dryly as he made his way to the stool.

As he sat, Mcgonagall put the hideous hat on top of his head. The system had assured him that the Hat can't reveal his memories to anyone.

As for hiding his memories, it could at least hide the murder, torture, and system's existence. Anything more would be suspicious. But Axel was not worried. The rest was stealing from assholes and defending himself in fights. There shouldn't be any trouble.

He heard the Hat's voice in his head.

'Hm… so what do we have here?'

'Put me in Ravenclaw,' he thought.

The hat ignored his words as it looked through his recent memories.

The sorting hat works on a clear-cut algorithm. It usually doesn't spend much time looking through a student's head. Especially if the student has no potential and no background.

Here's what it saw as it took a cursory look in Axel's mind.

'Hm… you're already stealing and injuring people at such a young age. No family background. Oh? And you can't even move properly and do magic? WHAT?! My singing and my song were 'Horrendous'?! I spent a whole year preparing for that! Hmm...I know where you belong…'

'Wait—'

But the Hat had already made its decision.

"SLYTHERIN!" Came his loud voice.

Axel was stunned. Did he just get sorted into Slytherin?

'My background—' he tried protesting.

'Yes, I usually do not put orphans with no family background in Slytherin. But perhaps, staying there would help you learn to appreciate my songs better. I hope you have a pleasant stay at Slytherin. Now move along, little fella. My time is only for polite or talented wizards.' "Next."

And Professor Mcgonagall lifted the hat from his head at that moment, revealing his baffled face.

Axel numbly got down from the stool and started to walk towards the Slytherin table. As he walked, a green snake insignia appeared on his cloak and his tie changed to green color, marking him forever a Slytherin.

He turned back to look towards the Ravenclaw table, where he was supposed to get sorted, and saw Daphne. She was sitting with the bushy-haired girl and the purple-haired statuesque girl he had seen on the train.

Then he looked at the Hufflepuff table, where Susan and Hannah were sitting together.

Finally, he looked towards Rose, who was sitting with Neville. She was looking at him with a questioning look while Neville was looking at him like he had caught the plague.

The Sorting Hat had fucked him over.

He looked towards the hateful hat and saw an imaginary pair of Black Sunglasses on its eyes and a cigarette in its mouth. It was certainly living the thug life.

He went to the table and sat with the rest of the first-year Slytherins.

'What the fuck system?! The basic information in my head said I had a choice!'

[People usually do have a choice, Axel. But it's not absolute. The basic information didn't contain the fact that the hat has an ego of its own and has authority over the final decision. Though things would have still worked out how you wanted, but you were just too unlucky that the Sorting Hat saw the worst combination of memories it could have in the basic sweep of your mind.]

Axel sighed, 'Bad luck, huh? Why am I not surprised?' he thought bitterly. If the goddess of luck existed, he might be her husband's bastard child.

'What memories did it see?' he asked the system, though he already had an idea.

[It saw you not able to cast the basic magic after many tries, the fact that you are a cripple now, and you having no family background. This caused its interest to lessen since you would be a bottom dreg in any house and won't have any major impact on the world. Therefore, it didn't dig too deeply and only saw a few glimpses.]

[In one memory, you were beating up people but it didn't see that they were the primary offenders and deserved the beatings.]

[In one memory, you were stealing something though it didn't see that the person you were stealing from was a rich asshole.]

[In one memory, it saw you getting annoyed by its song but it doesn't know that you have a condition called Misophonia, which is a mental disorder triggered by certain annoying sounds. It's usually caused by trauma.]

[In one memory—]

'Woah, woah, back the fuck up...' he thought, interrupting the system.

'I have something like that? So other people were actually enjoying that thing?!'

[No, not everyone. But no one was as annoyed as you and many also enjoyed it.] Replied System.

While he was conversing with the system, someone called out to him from the side.

"Your name is Axel, right?

Axel turned to see that it was one of the girls who were sorted into Slytherin.

The girl smiled at him.

"Hi! My name is Pansy Parkinson. I'm a pureblood. Nice to meet you."

"Likewise," he replied shortly.

He could tell that he was supposed to tell his blood status as well but he didn't know it either.

Thankfully, the blond kid from earlier had attracted the attention of the girl, making Axel grateful.

At this moment, the last of the students had been sorted and an old man at the high table had stood up. Axel guessed he must be the famous Albus Dumbledore.

He was beaming at the students, his arms opened wide as if nothing could have pleased him more than to see them all there.

"Welcome!" he said. "Welcome to a new year at Hogwarts! Before we begin our banquet, I would like to say a few words. And here they are: Nitwit! Blubber! Oddment! Tweak!

"Thank you!"

To Axel's delight, the plates and goblets in front of him were now filled with huge amounts of food.

'Putting aside magic, I'd have come just for the food,' he thought as he took his hands out of his robe pockets. Hiding them would be impossible anyways if he's going to attend classes and eat here daily.

"Why are your hands shaking and twitching like that?" And sure enough, someone asked him the expected question soon. He found that it was another girl. She was sorted right after him so he remembered her name. Tracy Davis.

Axel shrugged. "It's an injury. It'll be healed soon," He said evasively. But Tracy's words had attracted others' attention.

"What kind of injury was it?" Asked another boy in curiosity. Axel didn't know his name but he was tall for his age with a thin frame.

Draco Malfoy, who was sitting on the other side of the Pansy girl and had been hogging most of the limelight, was annoyed by this. Though he did find the idea of gaining attention by pretending to be injured somewhat appealing. He'll try it in the future.

He sneered, "Why are you getting fooled, Nott? He's obviously lying. What kind of injury makes your hands like that?"

Axel mentally sighed. How can he explain to these kids that when Cruciatus is cast on the body, as the region with most nerves on his body and the area which his magic didn't seem necessary enough to protect, the nerves of his hands and fingertips were the most badly damaged?

His shin, knee, and elbow being the other unimportant regions with a high number of nerves, were also constantly hurting. It was a miracle he was behaving normally right now and not crying and moaning like other people in his position would. And then someone has the audacity to say that he's faking his injuries to get attention?

Axel gave this blondy a deep look. This guy is going to pay someday. Axel has always had a nasty vindictive streak.

But for now, he just focused on eating. Anyone with half a brain can tell he's not pretending. Only an idiot would think he's pretending. And he does not view these idiots as significant enough to explain himself.

Pansy Parkinson turned to the blondy, "Draco, why did you have to say that? He can't be pretending, can he? Look how difficult it is to eat food."

This made blondy idiot even more annoyed but Axel had already reached his quota of social interactions for today. He ignored everyone for the rest of the meal.

The Purebloods were still talking.

"So, are the rumors true? The famous Mafia Princess is studying here?"

"Yeah, I heard she's a genius,"

"Is that her?"

"Yeah, I think that's her. No one has the same appearance."

"The Mafia Prodigy. I heard she could already cast wandlessly when she was 5."

"Rumor has it that the products the Valentino Family is selling were invented by her."

"But why would she come to Hogwarts? I don't think she needs classes."

Hearing their conversation got even Axel curious. He followed their gazes to see who they were talking about. It was the same purple-haired girl he'd seen talking with Hermione and Daphne.

From what he gathered from their conversation, her name is Martina Valentino and she's from the most powerful magical family of Italy and also a genius.

'Oi system, why didn't you choose her?' Asked Axel curiously.

[Axel, there's no information on her in the Records of this world. Further information on her is locked.]

'... The heck?'

****

A.N.: Sorting to Slytherin isn't a big deal. He's not be making enemies left and right. He'll deal with everything smartly. There is no one dangerous out to get him. And, he is not as weak as you are thinking. You'll see. In short, there's no bullying or suffering, you traumatized people who have read far too many bad novels. Those days are already over for our MC.

Also, don't forget that new features unlock when the approval rate reaches a threshold. So our MC is going to start gaining strength very soon. And whoever that girl is, OUR MC WILL BE SUPERIOR!!!

Though she'll and MC won't need to fight since there're on the same side.

Need I repeat my previous words? Your fears are redundant.