Edward apparated inside of the Magicis Domum Regis and was pleasantly surprised by how grand it was. Generous amounts of gold covered doorways and drew beautiful patterns of mythical beasts on the walls.
As Edward admired, a man was sneaking behind him; he quietly picked up a bludger bat that was on the table and stepped closer and closer to Edward. When he was only centimetres away, he closed his eyes and slammed the bat as hard as he could.
BANG!
However, when he opened his eyes, Edward's face was directly opposite his.
"Aaaaaah!" the man screamed and leapt back in shock.
Panicked, Edward tried to hush him, but he heard footsteps coming towards them.
A flying kick came out of nowhere and slammed the man into a wall, knocking him unconscious as Edward threw an invisibility cloak from the system over him. Then, he used his bloodline power of being a Metamorphmagus (Chapter 5) to copy the man's look.
Guards wearing a maroon uniform came rushing in.
"Sir, are you alright?" one of the guards asked worriedly.
"Yes. Yes. I'm fine," replied Edward, disguised as the TMA.
At that moment, a groaning noise came from the corner of the room.
"What was that?"
"Nothing!" Edward shouted, before his tone started to lower. "Nothing. Just my stomach. I'm not feeling very well, you see."
He patted his stomach.
"It might be Ague from your trip to Cattack. My cousin had it a couple months back; it's a nasty disease," one of the guards suggested.
"I'm fine. It's probably something I ate."
The groaning came again.
"Are you sure? We've got some Ashwin eggs in the Alchemy-"
"I'm fine! Please just let me rest."
"Ok, sir. Sorry to disturb you."
The guards started to leave, but one popped his head around the doorway.
"If you've got any problems when you go to the toilet-"
"Go!"
After he had finally got all of the guards to leave, he grabbed the unconscious HTMA (Head of Turkish Magical Association) and apparated to the bedroom. Once he locked the door, he began to slap the poor man awake.
"Urgh. Ow, ow! What's going on?"
Terrified, the HTMA looked around the room; he was relieved to find that he was still in the safety of his own home, but then he saw Edward.
"Who are you? What do you want?"
Edward frowned as he looked the HTMA up and down.
"I wanted to meet you, but it seems the trip has been a waste," Edward complained.
"What? What's wrong with me?"
The man was shocked. Somebody had just broken into his home and knocked him out, just to complain that he'd wasted his time.
"I thought you'd be some powerful Wizard like the guy that founded this place, but you're just a coward."
Edward drew his wand to apparate, however the HTMA instead believed it was to kill him.
"Hey! What did you expect? I'm a politician not a God!"
"No, I suppose I shouldn't blame you. The Minister of Magic in Britain is just as incompetent," Edward sighed.
Ignoring the insult, the HTMA continued to speak anxiously.
"You're British, aren't you? Tell you what, I've got something that you'll love."
"It's not tea is it?"
"What? No, no, it's not tea."
Edward's interest was piqued.
"Alright then what is it?"
"P-please follow me."
The HTMA beckoned for Edward to follow and lead him across the palace.
"What's your name?" Edward queried as he followed behind him.
"Asil."
"So, what did you do before you became the Turkish President or whatever you call it?"
"I've always worked in the Magic Association, I just worked my way up to the job I have today," Asil answered cautiously, but his nerves settling slightly.
Eventually, they arrived at a statue of a wolf.
"Is this it? You wanted me to look at a statue?"
"N-no, of course not," he stuttered as he kept looking back and forth between Edward and the statue nervously.
Then he looked straight into the wolf's stone eyes.
"Theodosius, Theodosius, I have come to explore."
As he said this, part of the ground beneath the wolf started to lower, and then it stopped while the rest continued to lower. And then another part stopped until eventually, a whole descending staircase was formed.
"Do you think all British people have secret passages?" Edward asked, confused.
"N-no, it's what's inside."
"Ah. Lead the way then."
The two continued down the staircase until the staircase didn't go down any further. Looking around, everything was pitch black.
Asil clapped twice and a row of torches with a blue flame lit up a dark corridor.
"Well this isnt creepy at all."
Casually, Edward strolled down the corridor behind Asil, arriving at a large, brightly lit room. Inside were many artifacts, books, paintings, wands, etc. It looked like a museum.
"What is all this?" Edward asked, as he admired everything.
"Theodosius, the first Head of the Magical Association, was obsessed with exploring anything to do with magic. Many Heads after him continued his exploration and these are all the spoils of war."
Edward looked around asking what everything was, like a schoolchild at the zoo, while Asil answered all of his questions.
"What's this?"
"The first golden snitch, created by Bowman Wright, 1523."
"This?"
"The first wand the original Ollivander sold in 382 BC to a Celt named Cunobeline."
"The slingshot that David used to kill Goliath."
"One of Zou Yan's greatest potions."
"Herpo the Foul's Basilisk's skin."
"Vincent Lyore's handwritten spell book."
And so on and so forth.
At some point, Edward stopped getting distracted and remembered why he was brought there in the first place.
"So what's the thing you think I'd like?"
Asil chuckled lightly.
"This right here."
He pulled off a red cloth that was hiding a beautifully carved sarcophagus. It had carvings of church windows across one side and scenes of battle on the other, and right on the ends was a coat of arms. A stone person lay on top with both dragons and angels weeping over him as he held a sword in hand.
That was when Edward realised.
'This is my tomb!'
"What do you think?" Asil asked in anticipation.
"Y-yes, yes, it's beautiful," Edward replied, snapping out of his daze.
"Right? It took a legendary group of tomb robbers to get it here. It barely fit in their bottomless briefcase," Asil laughed.
At that moment, his laughter died down and he looked more solemn.
'Yes. He must be feeling guilty for taking a national icon's tomb!' Edward thought arrogantly.
"It's just a shame we couldn't get his painting too," Asil sighed.
Edward nearly fell over.
"Yeah. It's a world treasure and if we stole it, the magical community could be compromised," he spoke regretfully.
Edward resisted the urge to strangle him and instead picked up a book to ignore him. Upon opening it, he realised it was a diary of all the escapades of Theodosius.
Diligently reading, he eventually saw something interesting.
"Hey Asil! What's Antioch's treasure?"
"Ahh, you have good eyes sir. Antioch's treasure is the only thing we could never find, even after a millennium and a half."
"What is it?"
Asil began to explain the tale.
Antioch I Theos was King of Commagene, a small kingdom in the Balkans, between the Roman Empire and Armenia. His family, the Orontid Dynasty, were the first (and last) monarchs in history to have magic. They changed magic from Egyptian tomb curses, snake charming and other random spells to the early forms of charms, curses, hexes, jinxes etc.
Antioch was one of the greatest wizards ever, but both of his sons, Mithridates and Antiochus were squibs, and he refused to pass the Orontid legacy to his 3 daughters. So, he buried all of his stuff in his tomb on Mount Nemrut and, when he died in 31 BC, he sealed himself inside with all of his treasures.
"Although people know Mount Nemrut is his resting place, nobody knows how to get into the tomb. It's a 2000 year old mystery," Asil explained disappointedly.
"Well then, I'll just visit him and ask!"