I may have gone a tad too far in the whole 'golden child' scale of popularity.
In the sense that I might've just literally hit it by accident.
I hadn't expected my blunt approach to work as well as it did in a wizarding society where invisibility was a popular, if somewhat tricky, concept to pull off without help, but here we are.
I had to tail it down a notch- On the plus side, it made the next stage of my plan somewhat faster to put into play. Provided I notched my current popularity down that is.
My gambit with the headmaster had failed in making him publicly call me out for being too insane, even for a seer, given the man had elected to keep that meeting to himself.
Pity.
He was even more... Naive than I'd figured.
I idly took a bite of the spaghetti-filled plate in front of me, if only to keep up app-
"Sirius?" James called out beside me, whilst still chewing his food.
"Busy. Thinking. Talk later." I immediately responded, earning a blank stare from the boy before he elected to shake his head and focus back on his food.
"Why do you even have that paper on..." Lily remarked from the other side of the table with a frown.
I shrugged in response, focusing back on the matter at hand.
I needed to do something about... Well, the seeming perfect reputation I'd accidentally stumbled into.
It'd make the next stage easier.
With that thought in mind, I idly reached into my pocket and pulled out a blank piece of paper, and started writing on it.
"...Yeah, that's not worrying at all." James deadpanned beside me. "You were right Lil's. He is better when he's rambling his thoughts out."
I didn't look up to see the girl's expression, but even I felt the glare she was sending the boy next to me.
Ah, young non-existant love. There's hope for you yet Harry.
It didn't take long before the seal was ready. Slapping it onto the table, I watched as a field of light sprawled out of it to cover the entirety of the great hall before disappearing, the action startling and almost freezing most of the students as they started gawking at me, while a few seemed to sift through their pockets for, presumably, a wand.
After a moment of nothing, for them, popping up, most of them seemed to relax.
I scoured through the hall, taking in the information that propped up from every student around me.
By information, I was of course referri-
"Oi, what was-"
I clamped a hand onto James' face.
"Busy, give me a second," I remarked quickly.
The information that popped up? Everyone's current 'view' of me. Put down to numbers.
Hint: Green was good, red was bad.
Of course, given the sheer... Nature of the seal, I only allowed those that had my blood the ability to see it- Which was why a gawking Narcissa had gotten the same hand-over-mouth treatment I'd given James, courtesy of a very worried Andy.
It didn't take long before I found the target I was looking for.
A fifth-year Gryffindor who for some reason seemed to dislike me a great deal- Which given he was reckless/brave by default of being a lion made him perfect to use.
He wasn't the only red of course, he was just at the right level that he wasn't overtly afraid of me to act out against me.
Malfoy's number was a stark negative clasped in dark red. The boy hated me for taking away his blonde 'prize.' Or for the public beatdown. Or for a number of reasons really- Point is, he was too far gone to use.
He was also somewhat biased... So even if he did grow a pair, no one would really take his side.
Focusing on the fifth-year Gryff, I idly started editing up the seal to focus on him, my own gaze set up ahead of me at a wary Lily- Which might've been due to the small smile on my face now that I thought about it.
I idly got rid of the smile.
It didn't help Lily's expression.
With the seal fully focused on the fifth-year Gryffindor, I non-chalantally looked down and started reading the list that qualified as the boy's 'traits' so to speak.
See, magic was very aware of its users, aware enough to accommodate most of their needs- Which on the other hand also made it a gateway into their person.
And I happened to know the key to it.
The fact the information came up so easily, to begin with- The seal wasn't new per se, given I'd created it a few years ago, but the magic it was using wasn't original. It was actually one that already existed. It just wasn't particularly well known to the world- On account of it being one of the few hidden by a Fidelius charm.
I'd found it was one of those on account of another seal that checked for that sort of thing.
It didn't give me a list of what was forbidden, of course, only the confirmation that certain pieces of magic were.
Funny thing was that, as long as I didn't go about it the way the original form of magic was supposed to work, Ie ritual, spell, etc, then the Fidelius didn't necessarily stop it.
And seals? Well, they were practically a skeleton key for the Fidelius charm.
There was a reason I was wearing a seal that inhibited my thoughts right now.
Having gotten the information I needed, I calmly relaxed myself and subtly started gathering magic around me as I pulled out the last seal I needed.
With enough information regarding a specific object/target/what-have-you one could essentially predict its future in a way.
Of course, given how changing people tended to be, the information wouldn't stay very relevant for long- Luckily I didn't need to look into his future for very long.
Only a few minutes.
Slapping the last seal onto my head, I calmly activated the greatest seal I'd created so far in this life.
It was the seal that helped me convince my father that I wasn't in fact insane. That I was someone he should take seriously.
That despite my age, I was the greatest strength the Black Family currently had.
It was a seal that wouldn't work on anyone else on account of them not having had a certain... Blight of a curse attached to their soul.
A different universe it might've been, it was still there all the same- It just needed a jump start.
I calmly waited as the information was scoured through- As the seal took in all that it needed to achieve what I wanted.
I needed that particular fifth year to call me out for something. To set in stone the foundation of stage four of the Black Family's current plan.
Defamation.
Because haters are always going to exist.
It was good to know who they were, it was great to prove them wrong, but it was even better to control them from the start.
There was no point in a newspaper running an agenda against me if the children of every family that mattered didn't believe in it.
It was particularly wasteful if that newspaper was one secretly funded by my family as well.
Still, when all is said done- When the voices against me decided to rally up behind it because they believed in it, or because they thought it might help them gain something... When all of those future enemies put themselves behind a singular point-
It was going to be glorious to watch them scatter around like helpless chickens when that point was cut off at the head.
I quickly stiffened as I felt the seal's effect take hold, my mind turning numb for a moment as my vision darkened.
When time seemed to start flying by, the memories of what was currently happening in the present filtering into my head after they'd occurred, I knew it meant that it was successfully working.
Knew that the seal had taken hold.
Knew that my Path-To-Victory was in motion.