Chapter 1 The Neighboring Girl Named Hermione.
Lynn was watering his garden when the little girl next door, skipping and hopping, walked past his door with her schoolbag on her back.
"Oye."
Lynn looked up and saw the girl calling to him through the fence, so he put down the watering can and went over.
"That's not very polite. If you don't know my name, you can say 'excuse me,' not 'Oye.'"
The girl pouted, seemingly unconvinced by Lynn's words, since he looked about her age.
But she didn't well on it. Instead, she peeked into her yard and carefully took a bag of dried fish from her schoolbag.
She pressed her lips together, then carefully extended the bag of dried fish toward Lynn.
Lynn didn't immediately reach out to take it, but instead raised an eyebrow at her and said,
"What, are you trying to bribe me with this bag of dried fish to play with you? If so, you've given me the wrong thing. I like sweets, like candy, not salted fish."
The girl tapped Lynn's fence with her foot, scowling at him.
"I don't want you to play with me. This bag of dried fish isn't for you, it's for the stray cats that roam around here every day. Mom won't let me feed them, saying they're full of viruses and bacteria.
But actually, I really want to have a cat. Dad said if I can keep up my grades, he'll buy me a clean cat when I'm a little older.
But those stray cats are so pitiful. They're all cats, yet they have to run around hungry every day. It's not fair.
Yesterday I saw you feeding them some crumbs of biscuits, so today I used my allowance to buy some dried fish, hoping you'd take care of them for me."
This kind of insight is overwhelming…
Lynn muttered to himself in thought.
It's clear that the girl is actually quite talkative; once she starts talking, she can't stop, but she had acted a little arrogant before.
Lynn, who had misjudged the girl's intentions, wasn't embarrassed at all; he was thick-skinned enough.
He took the bag of dried fish from her hand. "Okay, I happen to have nothing to do every day, so I can help you take care of them."
Then, he casually picked a lily from his yard and handed it to the girl.
"Consider this a thank-you gift on their behalf."
The girl didn't flinch, gracefully accepting the lily from Lynn's hand with a smile.
"I'm Hermione Granger. What's your name?"
"Lynn Bellok, I just moved here not long ago, nice to meet you."
Lynn felt the girl's name sounded familiar, but he didn't think about it too much.
After introducing themselves, their relationship naturally warmed up considerably. Hermione leaned over Lynn's fence, tiptoeing, and peered into his house.
"Are you living alone?"
Lynn took off his gloves, quite interested in chatting with Hermione. He had only recently moved to London, and with summer vacation approaching, he wasn't going to school and was quite free.
Yeah, it's just me here at the moment."
Hermione's eyes widened. "Where are your parents? Are they comfortable with you living here alone?"
"They passed away when I was very young. I live with my adoptive father now, but he doesn't come home often." Lynn's expression was calm.
But Hermione apologized with a sad look on her face. "I'm sorry, I didn't know about your situation."
Lynn waved his hand dismissively. "It's okay, that happened when I was very young, and I'm actually doing quite well now."
"And you?" Lynn changed the subject, subtly probing about his neighbor's family situation. "What do your family do?"
Hermione grinned, showing off her bright teeth
"My parents are both dentists. You can go to them if you ever have a toothache."
A dentist, huh? That's a high-paying job in England, a true middle-class profession.
Moreover, the British take oral health very seriously, and highly skilled dentists generally have extensive networks.
This neighbor seems like someone worth getting to know.
While she's still young, I can still be a little cheeky and charming; building a good relationship will definitely be helpful later.
So, Lynn flashed a bright smile and extended an invitation.
"Would you like to come over for a bit? I made some mung bean soup for lunch; it's great for cooling down and quenching your thirst in the summer."
Hermione seemed tempted, but then she glanced at her own house and shook her head.
"Thank you, but I've already been here a long time; my mom will worry if I don't go home soon."
"Then maybe next time." Lynn didn't try to persuade her to stay any longer. "I'll help take care of those stray cats."
Hermione thought her new neighbor was a wonderful person; she'd have a new friend.
"See you later, Lynn!"
She waved happily to Lynn, her long, fluffy hair like a cotton candy, and skipped and hopped back home.
"For Lynn, Hermione's visit was nothing more than a small event."
He put his gloves back on, humming a little tune, and continued tending to the blooming flowers in the garden.
Lynn was a transmigrator.
In his past life, he was a teacher who had been working for less than two years. On his way to work, he accidentally fell into a river while riding his electric scooter and drowned because he couldn't swim.
When he regained consciousness, he was an orphan in an orphanage called Starting Point in England, having just lost both his parents.
"It was hard to say if this was a blessing or a curse."
The good news was that his parents, whom he had never met, had left him a large inheritance, which he could inherit when he came of age, find a wife, and live a carefree life.
However, capitalist welfare institutions aren't truly charitable; there's a fair share of sordid dealings, and the group of troubled children, though pitiful, were also quite difficult to manage.
So, when Lynn was eleven, he secretly used some means to find himself a foster father, moved out of the orphanage, and returned to the house his parents had lived in.
Life was temporarily stable, but Lynn hadn't thought about his future plans, nor did he intend to.
Plans can never keep pace with how things change
There's plenty of time ahead, and the more plans he makes now, the more he'll regret wasting his time in the future.
Since fate has arranged for him to be reborn in the latter half of the 20th century in England, he might as well settle down and establish himself in this country first.
So, now, 11-year-old Lynn lives with the soul of a 25-year-old, but lives the life of a 70-year-old.
He's quite helpless, but entertainment is so scarce in this era. Besides gardening, weeding, and feeding the cat, he really doesn't know what else to do.
After tidying up the garden, Lynn puts down his tools, takes off his gloves, and stretches in front of the setting sun.
The air in London is terrible; although efforts to improve it have been intensified, the sky is still sometimes hazy.
Lynn squints, and he vaguely sees a small black dot flying towards him on the horizon.
When the dot draws near, he identifies it as an owl.
These birds aren't uncommon in England, so Lynn didn't pay them much attention. Instead, he picked up the dried fish the little girl named Hermione had brought, locked the gate, and prepared to go out to feed the cats.
However, he didn't notice that the owl that flew overhead had dropped a thick letter where he had been standing. The owl, then standing on his roof watching his departing figure, tilted its head in confusion.
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(End of Chapter)