Chapter 4: The Shadows of Caution
Severus knew one thing for certain—Hogwarts was Dumbledore's domain.
The old man had eyes everywhere. He saw too much and let too little slip past him. If Severus—George—suddenly started behaving differently, showing talents that the previous Snape had kept hidden, or distancing himself from known figures, it would raise suspicion.
That was something he could not afford.
At least, not yet.
So, for the time being, he would lay low.
Avoidance as a Strategy
The first step was avoiding the Marauders and Lily Evans. That meant cutting down any and all interactions that could lead to unnecessary confrontation.
He started leaving class early—before the Marauders could corner him. As soon as a lesson ended, he packed his things quickly and slipped out of the room before they even had time to get up from their seats.
He stayed within the Slytherin group—Lucius Malfoy and his crowd provided an excellent deterrent against Gryffindor aggression. While they were arrogant and bigoted, they were useful as a shield.
He took different corridors to avoid running into James Potter and Sirius Black. Luckily, Hogwarts had enough twists and turns for a determined person to disappear when necessary.
Lily, too, was kept at a distance.
Severus knew she would not likely talk to him after their last fight, but he never gave her the chance. Whenever they shared a class, he remained silent, never looking her way, slipping out before she could catch him alone.
By the end of the week, it was working.
The Marauders had barely interacted with him. James and Sirius had lost interest in tormenting him—at least, for now.
Midnight Plans
But avoidance wasn't enough.
Severus needed information.
He had spent the past week mapping out all the known corridors of Hogwarts, but that wasn't nearly enough. Hogwarts was an ancient castle, full of secrets even Dumbledore likely didn't know.
And he knew exactly where to go to find them.
The Room of Requirement.
It was past midnight when Severus made his move. The Slytherin dormitory was silent, the only sounds the soft crackling of the dying fireplace. Carefully, he slipped out of bed, grabbed his wand, and cast a Disillusionment charm on himself, a and a silent Muffliato charm over his footsteps, before stepping out of the common room.
The dungeons were eerily quiet.
Severus navigated the empty halls carefully, his breath slow and measured. He avoided the main staircases, sticking to lesser-used passageways to avoid running into any of the teachers.
Filch, the castle's ever-irritable caretaker, was known to prowl the hallways at night. But Severus had spent enough time in detention cleaning the trophy room to know Filch's usual routes.
It took him twenty minutes, but he finally arrived at the seventh floor.
Standing before the blank stretch of wall, he closed his eyes, focusing.
"I need a place that holds everything lost in Hogwarts—hidden artifacts, forgotten knowledge, and a comprehensive map of the entire castle."
He walked back and forth three times.
And then, the wall shifted.
An ancient wooden door appeared, seamlessly blending into the stone.
Severus exhaled and stepped inside.
The Come and Go Room
The moment he entered, his breath caught.
This wasn't just a storage room.
This was a graveyard of lost knowledge.
Towering shelves lined the walls, filled with ancient books, discarded robes, and forgotten magical artifacts. Chests of gold lay abandoned, broken brooms leaned against stone pillars, and stacks of parchment covered in dust sat untouched for centuries.
Severus' eyes flickered around, scanning the room for what he came for.
"A map," he reminded himself. "A complete map of Hogwarts."
Almost immediately, a small pedestal appeared in the center of the room. Upon it lay a large, black leather-bound book, its edges gilded in silver, the Hogwarts crest engraved onto the cover.
Severus stepped forward, cautiously reaching out and flipping open the first page.
Hogwarts: The Complete Layout
By Phineas Nigellus Black
His heart pounded.
Phineas Nigellus Black—the ex-Headmaster of Hogwarts, ancestor of Sirius Black, and one of the most cunning Slytherins to ever exist.
He turned the pages, and his breath hitched.
This was not just a map.
It was a comprehensive tracking system.
Every hidden passage—both known and unknown—was carefully drawn out.
The moving staircases' unpredictable patterns were documented.
The restricted sections of the castle, including rooms that even Dumbledore likely never stepped into, were marked.
A live tracking feature—tiny ink dots moved across the map, displaying the names of students and teachers, showing their locations in real-time.
"This… this is what I needed."
And then, as he flipped to the final pages, he saw something surprising.
A smaller, incomplete version of this map was documented in a footnote.
"Deputy Headmaster Everett Greymoor assisted in maintaining a secondary version of this map for practical use. Upon his retirement, this map was lost to the castle's archives. However, it was later retrieved and repurposed for unknown purposes."
Severus' eyes narrowed.
So that's where the Marauders' Map came from.
They had not made it themselves.
They had found it, stolen from Filch's office, and modified it with their own magic.
Severus clenched his fists. Fitting. They were never as clever as they thought.
He snapped the book shut.
"Now, for the rest."
Sorting the Hoard
Severus turned back to the mountain of items strewn across the room. He had no idea how many centuries worth of Hogwarts' forgotten treasures lay hidden here, but there was far too much chaos.
"Room, sort yourself."
Immediately, the air shimmered, and the clutter began to shift.
Gold, galleons, and treasures stacked themselves neatly to the left.
Books, scrolls, and manuscripts sorted themselves into rows, categorized by subject—Potions, Charms, Runes, Transfiguration, and even Dark Arts.
Clothing and robes folded themselves into neat piles.
Wands, brooms, and enchanted trunks/suitcases were aligned in another corner.
Magical artifacts—rings, amulets, and other unknown trinkets—placed themselves on display tables.
Severus took a step back, stunned at the sheer scale of what he had just uncovered.
This wasn't just a treasure room.
This was power.
This was knowledge.
And no one knew about it but him.
A slow smirk curled at the edges of his lips.
"This is only the beginning."
The system chimed softly in his mind.
[Mission Update]
[Main Mission: Rewrite the Fate of Severus Snape—Progress: 7%]
[New Side Mission: Study and Utilize the Secrets of Hogwarts]
[Bonus Mission: Decode Phineas Nigellus Black's Lost Notes]
Severus exhaled.
The night had only begun.
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