Adrian led Harry and Luna along the, barely visible paths that twisted through the heart of the Forbidden Forest. The snow in the Forbidden Forest showed no signs of melting despite the weak February sun. Everything remained transformed into a vast space of white that stretched as far as the eye could see.
Under these altered conditions, even Adrian, who had spent countless hours exploring the Forbidden Forest and knew its routes like the back of his own hand, found himself struggling to recognize familiar landmarks.
The snow had transformed the landscape so totally that some trails had vanished, rock formations were buried beneath white drifts, and even the most recognizable clearings had become anonymous spaces in an endless winter wonderland.
Fortunately, Ray circled high over their heads serving as their guardian and guide from above.
During their journey deeper into the forest's heart, Harry and Luna walked side by side, their heads turning constantly as they looked around with the curiosity of children experiencing something completely new and wondrous.
Actually, Harry's presence on this expedition had been completely unexpected—Adrian had originally planned to bring only Luna on this venture into the forest.
Of course, having an additional companion didn't matter in the slightest. Adrian was genuinely fond of both children, and their happiness and wonder at experiencing something new brought him considerable satisfaction. As long as the children were enjoying themselves and learning something from the experience, he was content.
Besides, with his protection, neither child would face any real danger during their forest expedition anyway.
As they ventured ever deeper into the forest's mysterious depths, following paths that seemed to exist more in Adrian's memory than in any visible reality, Harry's curiosity finally overcame his initial awe and caution.
Unable to contain his growing questions any longer, he asked, "Professor, where exactly are we going? We've been walking for quite a while now, and everything looks the same to me."
"We're going to visit an old friend of mine," Adrian replied with deliberate ambiguity, a mysterious smile appearing at the corners of his mouth as he preserved some of the surprise that awaited them. "Someone quite special who I think you'll both find fascinating. We'll be there very soon now."
Before long, as if Adrian's words had summoned it from the winter landscape, a towering beech tree appeared before them through the swirling snow.
Yes, their destination was indeed Bart.
At this moment, Bart appeared to be sleeping deeply. To any casual observer, he looked completely indistinguishable from any other ancient tree in the forest.
"This is our destination?" Harry asked, looking up at the towering tree with confusion creasing his face. Though the ancient beech was certainly impressive in its sheer size, they had gone to considerable trouble and risk to journey deep into the dangerous Forbidden Forest just to visit what appeared to be, despite its magnificence, simply a tree.
He glanced sideways at Luna, who was standing beside him, and found her behaving in a peculiar manner. Instead of sharing his focus on the massive tree before them, she was looking around restlessly in all directions, her silvery eyes darting from shadow to shadow as if searching for something invisible to everyone else.
Her entire posture reminded him of an alert deer that had caught the scent of something on the wind.
At that moment, Adrian stepped forward and knocked firmly on Bart's trunk with his knuckles.
Bart immediately responded, shaking a few times and dropping large patches of snow.
"Mmm..." A deep, resonant hum emerged from somewhere within the tree's core.
Slowly, Bart's wrinkled face began to appear on the trunk.
"Good morning, Bart," Adrian said warmly, brushing accumulated snow off his shoulders. "I hope you've been resting well. You certainly look peaceful."
Bart blinked several times in confusion, his mind taking a moment to fully emerge from the depths of his winter sleep.
Then, the moment his focusing gaze recognized Adrian standing in front of him, his entire demeanor transformed completely. His massive branches immediately began to stretch and sway joyfully, creating a rustling symphony that filled the air with the music of his happiness.
"Master!" Bart exclaimed with unrestrained delight, his voice booming through the forest. "You've finally come to visit Bart! I have been waiting for such a very long time, wondering when you would return to see me."
Harry and Luna couldn't help but be startled by Bart's tremendously loud and enthusiastic greeting, both immediately covering their ears with their hands as the thunderous voice echoed through the surrounding forest.
Adrian reached out and patted Bart's trunk.
"Please keep your voice down, Bart," He said with patient amusement. "You're frightening the children I've brought to meet you. They're not used to talking trees quite yet."
"Oh, I'm so sorry," Bart replied immediately, his voice dropping to a much more reasonable volume. He sounded exactly like a remorseful child who had just been gently scolded for making too much noise.
His branches drooped slightly with embarrassment as he quieted down, then turned his gaze toward Harry and Luna with obvious curiosity, studying these new visitors with intense interest.
Harry looked back at it with equal curiosity. The moment he first saw Bart's face appear on the trunk, the tree had given him an immediate impression of honest simplicity and goodness.
If he had to describe the feeling in familiar terms, Harry thought, Bart was perhaps similar to Hagrid's.
Adrian turned his attention toward Luna, his expression becoming more serious. "Do you remember this place, Luna?"
Luna nodded gently, her dreamy expression becoming more focused.
Adrian had indeed brought her to this exact location once before, during a time when Bart had still been nothing more than an ordinary tree. Back then, Bart had possessed no consciousness, no ability to speak or interact.
Now, after months of magical transformation, Bart had undergone a complete metamorphosis that had awakened him to full sentient life.
Adrian had specifically brought Luna on this return visit hoping that her unique abilities would allow her to perceive what changes had occurred since their last visit.
"Have you made any special discoveries since we arrived?" Adrian inquired carefully.
Luna didn't answer immediately, instead continued to look around the clearing with that same searching expression she had since their arrival. She moved her head slowly from side to side, as if trying to catch some invisible phenomenon drifting on the winter breeze.
Her silvery eyes seemed to track movement that no one else could detect, finally settling their focus on what appeared to everyone else to be completely empty air.
"What exactly do you see, Luna?" Adrian asked gently, knowing that her answer would be crucial to understanding what was happening in this place.
"Little spirits," Luna replied with absolute certainty, her voice carrying the confidence of someone stating an obvious fact. "Bart is completely surrounded by those little spirits, just like you are, Professor Westeros. They're exactly the same kind that always drift around you. I can see them flowing outward from Bart in all directions."
Adrian's eyebrows rose sharply in genuine surprise. He understood immediately what Luna meant by her description of "little spirits"—she was seeing the Mutation Factor, the mysterious magical essence contained within his own magic that served as the key to promoting accelerated plant evolution and magical transformation.
Could it possibly be that Bart had somehow developed the same extraordinary ability to cause plant "Mutation" that Adrian himself possessed?
"Can you see where those little spirits are traveling?" Adrian asked urgently. "Are they moving in any particular direction?"
Luna squinted her eyes and looked around the clearing for several moments, her head turning slowly as she tracked invisible currents that only she could perceive.
Finally, she raised her arm and pointed toward a specific tree that stood nearest to Bart among all the surrounding forest giants.
"Most of them are flowing that way," She said with confidence. "They're concentrating around that tree over there."
Adrian immediately walked quickly toward the location Luna had indicated, his feet crunching through the deep snow as he approached what appeared to be a completely unremarkable rowan tree.
"Eldra, I need you to help me examine this tree carefully," Adrian said quietly in his mind.
[Certainly, sir, as you wish.]
[Species: Rowan Tree]
[Level: 2]
[Trait: Guardian]
[Status: Growing (1%)]
The results left Adrian genuinely astonished.
This apparently ordinary tree had already developed its first magical trait: Guardian.
Bart's defining trait was "Great Leader," and now here was a nearby tree that had manifested as a "Guardian."
Leader and Guardian—Adrian felt absolutely certain this couldn't be simple coincidence. The complementary nature of these traits suggested some kind of magical relationship.
Excitement and curiosity driving him, Adrian quickly returned to Bart and pointed at the rowan tree that had caught Luna's attention. "That tree over there—tell me about it, Bart."
"Oh, that's Wica!" Bart introduced with obvious happiness and affection, his branches swaying gently with pleasure at the opportunity to talk about his friend. "That's a name I gave it myself. Wica is such a nice tree, really wonderful company. It tells the most amazing jokes through the root network!"
"I thought it might be something like that," Adrian sighed. "You really should have mentioned this development to me much sooner."
"Mentioned what?" Bart asked, his face showing genuine puzzlement and confusion at Adrian's words.
Looking at Bart's completely innocent expression, Adrian could only shake his head. It was clear that despite his magical transformation and consciousness, Bart still understood very little about his own abilities and the changes occurring around him.
Meanwhile, Harry stood watching this entire exchange with an expression of complete bewilderment, feeling utterly lost in this conversation. He couldn't begin to understand what Adrian, Luna, and Bart were discussing.
Little spirits... Wica...
These unfamiliar terms and concepts left him feeling completely bewildered and somewhat excluded from something clearly significant.
The only things he could understand with certainty were that there was a talking magical tree here that seemed to be quite familiar with Professor Westeros.
"Can Wica speak human language the way you do, Bart?" Adrian asked.
"Oh no, Wica can't speak in human words at all," Bart explained. "We plants have our own completely different way of communicating with each other—we talk through our root systems and soil. It's much more efficient than human speech."
Adrian stroked his chin thoughtfully, processing this information. He naturally had no understanding of plant communication methods—after all, he wasn't a plant himself, had no root system, and certainly couldn't plant himself in soil to join their underground conversations.
However, Bart's explanation confirmed what Adrian had suspected: Wica now possessed the same capacity for independent thought and communication as Bart, even if that communication remained limited to other plants rather than extending to human speech.
Driven by scientific carefulness, Adrian spent the next several minutes observing and analyzing other nearby trees throughout the area.
[Growing (66%)]
[Growing (25%)]
[Growing (89%)]
The results were exactly what he had begun to suspect.
Under the ongoing influence of Bart's newly developed Mutation Factor, every single tree in the surrounding area showed different stages of growth progress toward magical transformation.
Some were well advanced in their development, while others had only just begun the process, but all were changing.
Perhaps before very long, they would all be like Wica, possessing their own unique magical traits and the capacity for plant consciousness and communication.
Bart was quietly but steadily transforming the entire forest around him, creating what might eventually become a community of mutated trees.
In the time that followed Adrian's investigation, he took the opportunity to properly introduce Harry and Luna to Bart.
Naturally, Bart was absolutely overjoyed by the prospect of meeting new friends—as he had mentioned many times before, he genuinely loved making friends and cherished every opportunity for social interaction. His enthusiasm was infectious and immediately apparent to both children.
Though Harry initially found the experience of having a conversation with a tree absolutely strange and somewhat surreal, he quickly discovered that Bart was far more interesting, intelligent, and entertaining than he could possibly have imagined.
Luna, as Adrian had expected, showed no resistance at all to befriending a talking tree. She seemed to have some kind of natural magical affinity that made her particularly well-liked by small animals and growing plants throughout the Hogwarts grounds, and Bart was no exception to this pattern.
When conversing with Luna, Bart kept grinning with obvious pleasure.
Before any of them fully realized how much time had passed, the weak winter sun had traveled across the sky until it gradually approached its noon position.
The shadows had shortened considerably, and Adrian realized they needed to begin their journey back to ensure they returned to the castle before their absence was noticed or before the afternoon weather potentially worsened.
Adrian led Harry and Luna back along the forest paths toward Hogwarts.
On the way back to the castle, Harry was still somewhat amazed by everything he had experienced during their forest expedition.
Indeed, anything could reasonably appear in the magical world. Today he had encountered and befriended a talking tree—what completely new wonders would be waiting to surprise him tomorrow?
Perhaps humans who could photosynthesize?
In the magical world, Harry was learning, the impossible was merely another word for "not yet discovered."
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