Hermione never imagined she would become involved in her own family drama. The tense relationship between Fred, George, and Mrs. Weasley seemed to be somehow related to Tom.
What if Tom didn't buy Sortilegios Weasley products in large quantities? If Fred and George didn't have enough income, they might abandon the idea of producing fun toys and focus on serious studies.
In other words, Tom was possibly the "culprit" of the argument in the garden. Thinking about this made Hermione nervous. She couldn't accept the fact that the boy she liked was tearing a family apart.
The Weasley family was so kind and welcoming. Although she had only been there for a few minutes, Hermione could feel the warmth of the home. Anyone who disrupted that family harmony should be punished, shouldn't they?
"Tom, is this true?" Hermione's voice trembled slightly.
Faced with Hermione's interrogation, Tom calmly admitted that it was all true. He had purchased many products from Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes and was a loyal customer of the business. He always bought the new products as soon as they were released. Furthermore, he was a beta user who participated in testing the latest product lines alongside the Weasley brothers.
Hermione: ...
She shuddered: Tom wasn't just a "buyer," he was even a "seller," and he was more involved than she had thought!
A sense of helplessness washed over Hermione.
The reactions from the Weasley family members were varied.
Ron opened his eyes in surprise and exclaimed, "By Merlin! Tom, are you inventing things with them too? Ginny said she always heard explosions from their room; I thought they just liked making noise, but it turns out they're really creating things. That's incredible!"
As the youngest brother, Ron had no idea about his brothers' inventions. Ron couldn't be blamed; at first, Fred and George simply mimicked the magical toys available in the market, creating some silly pranks. It was only recently that they started working on original projects. Currently, they still operated as a small workshop in their rooms, producing and selling their products through owl orders. It wasn't a very big business, so they were able to keep it a secret from both Ron and the rest of the Weasley family until Mrs. Weasley decided to clean their rooms...
Ginny timidly hid behind the others, secretly observing that wonderful older student.
For her, Tom had a prominent presence. According to rumors circulating among the older students, he had helped defeat Voldemort with Harry Potter in his first year at Hogwarts, and in his second year, he survived attacks from a magical creature in the castle without falling behind in his studies. It was said that Tom only needed a week to catch up with the entire academic year and became the top student in his class. In the third year, he achieved an unprecedented feat: taking all the subjects at Hogwarts, something that hadn't been done in nearly a hundred years. It was said that this was because his girlfriend, Hermione, had also taken all the subjects, and that's why he decided to follow her, although there were also those who said he did it to fully explore the secrets of magic... Ginny preferred to believe the first version. When both of them arrived at the Burrow today, Ginny felt like she had stumbled upon some juicy gossip: Were Granger and Yodel just friends? The ghosts of Hogwarts wouldn't believe such a thing! Ginny had stopped believing in those rumors since they both summoned their strange Patronuses together; they had only fooled the first-year kids.
Now, that incredible boy was mixed up with her mischievous brothers. It was truly hard to believe. But did that mean her brothers were doing something truly amazing? Ginny didn't have a clear idea about Fred and George's career, as that mischievous pair didn't like showing off their prank products in front of their younger sister. Some things just weren't suitable to show to such young children.
Even Tom himself didn't know how famous he was among first and second-year students. His preferences could even influence how these students viewed things.
Initially, due to Mrs. Weasley's influence, Ginny had a negative attitude towards Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes products. However, after discovering Tom's interest in these prank items, Ginny's opinion about the products changed slightly from negative to curious.
Bill leaned against the wall, silently observing everything that was happening in front of him. To him, all of this seemed like child's play, and privately, without confronting his mother, he fully supported Fred and George. He thought that instead of spending a mediocre life at the Ministry of Magic, why not go out and venture?
That's exactly what he did. When he graduated, if he had wanted to join the Ministry of Magic, he could have secured an excellent position, but in the end, he chose to work at Gringotts as a Curse Breaker, which was much less prestigious than being a Ministry official. Perhaps in the eyes of others, he was also considered a slacker.
Bill felt that he could understand Fred and George better than anyone else. In the two brothers, he saw his own shadow. Yes, a toned-down version of himself.
After the initial moment of surprise, Hermione reacted.
"You should apologize to them!" She gently tugged at Tom's clothes, angry. "They should be focused on their O.W.L. exams instead of getting involved in magical pranks. You should reflect..."
"Reflect on what?" Tom's attitude was resolute. "Reflect on how I've corrupted them? Reflect on how I've tempted them to set aside their responsibilities?"
Hermione fell silent for a moment. That was indeed her intention, but Tom's words were too harsh, and she couldn't bear to see him burdened with guilt.
"Many people are considered lazy before they achieve something in their lives," Tom said, starting to sound like a self-help guru. "Have you heard of Bill Gates? He's about to become the richest person in the world. He was a Harvard student."
Hermione asked, "So?"
"Do you think, following his life path, he should have worked hard in school and then started his own business after graduating?"
"Isn't that how it should be?"
In the 90s, Bill Gates' story wasn't as well-known, and Hermione wasn't so familiar with that person's experience, so she fell into Tom's trap.
"He dropped out of college. He used to skip classes a lot at Harvard and didn't like to shower. He finally dropped out of Harvard University in 1977 and got a job in New Mexico programming code for $10 an hour. By that time, his company Microsoft had already been in operation for two years."
Hermione: ???
"I mentioned it to tell you, Hermione, that some seemingly lazy people can achieve great things in the end. Albus Dumbledore once said that a person's origin doesn't matter; what matters is what kind of person they become. Let me tweak that a bit: it doesn't matter if a person conforms to conventional values; what matters is what they are doing."