Opposed to the orderly chaos that was the imperial palace the forbidden palace was pure chaos of crowds of witches and wizards with their young children weaving through each other. For over three thousand years Beijing had been the beating heart of the Asian wizarding world, while Rome, Alexandria, and Constantinople had been beacons and eras in their regions with many thousands of wizards, Beijing, however, had been the center for many eras with many tens of thousands of wizards.

 

Surrounded by a dozen guards with more on top of roofs and among the crowd swerving around the protective circle, Alexander had been exploring the magical district entering a few stores and looking around. Eventually, the sun reached the zenith in the sky and yet more guardsmen appeared around the store that Alexander was currently in even later Guo had appeared into vision.

 

“Having fun?” He inquired walking up to Alex.

 

“Yes, this is an interesting place” Alex smiled “Filled with history and life”.

 

“Well, I'm glad you are enjoying the hard work of our ancestors” Guo replied slightly smiling “However, it's time to go and get your wand, are you ready?”.

 

‘Finally, I'm getting tired of being unable to at least practice magic’ Alex thought while falling back into faking his emotions to make them more pronounced “Of course, I'm ready Grandfather”.

 

“Perfect” Guo replied before grabbing the boy’s shoulder yet again for apparition. Reapperating on top of a three-story pagoda they overlooked hundreds upon hundreds of students shuffling across the street or into the building they stood on, all eager to find themselves a wand or to finish their trip in the magical shopping district hidden in the forbidden city.

 

Walking off the platform another group of people apperated before a few guardsmen stopped them from getting closer to the emperor and his grandson. They both had unique hair colors with the older one having a dark blue wavy haircut while his son had a reddish hue on his natural black hair.

 

“Those people are from the Huǒshān family, every single one of them are natural conjurers specifically of fire,” Guo said while pushing Alex along and staring at the older of the pair “that boy is probably going to Fenghuang, if he, no, when he challenges you do not allow him to cast magic, you will lose” he warned while disappearing into the pagoda with his grandson.

 

“Yes, grandfather” He acknowledged while looking at the boy with reddish hair who was grinning at him.

 

The interior of the pagoda as Alex was already used to, was magically made bigger with ‘spatial charms and wards’ as Guo explained when he had asked about it. Made of a similar wood to cherry not only was the wood smell heavenly it was also a good-looking wood, soiled by the hundreds if not thousands of people dragging their feet across the floor.

 

Moving to the side the hoard of people was split up by the guards and made way for the pair, of course, this was a minor inconvenience to the people while few found problem with it, while fewer yet wanted to do anything about it. Off to the side were counters, staffed by many gentlemen wearing an ugly pink skin color set of robes they were flanked by stacks among stacks of boxes holding wands.

 

Behind the counters were metal shelving units each holding hundreds of boxes with more shelving units stacked above them, it reminded Alex of a warehouse.

 

Seeing there were too many people Guo started down the hall to a staircase leading to a floor halfway up, where very few people were. reaching the staircase just before the pair from the Huǒshān family were once again stopped by the guards making the child's mocking smile from earlier diminish slightly. Looking back at the pair Alex could see the father leaning over and whispering something into the boy’s ear who was now smirking wider than ever.

 

Reaching the top of the stairs only three pairs of parents and children stood at one of four booths, which they soon took the last open one. Once the fiery pair reached the top as well the Huǒshān boy’s face once again soured making Alex give an amused smile at the speed that boy could change mood further angering him.

 

“Your majesty, I wondered when you would wander up here” the man laughed “A wand for the little one I suppose”.

 

“Yes, Mr. Zhao”.

 

“Dragon Heartstring, 12 inches, Yew a beautiful wand indeed,” he said handing a long black wand to the boy “give it a wave!”.

 

Nothing happened.

 

“Well its rarely the first wand that chooses them,” Mr. Zhao said “Wampus Cat hair core, 9 1/2 inches, Beechwood”.

 

Again nothing happened, in fact so many wands showed no reaction that the Huǒshān pair had long left while Mr. Zhao had started to believe that this kid was not magical in the first place. As the man was leaning over his desk thinking of some combination of core, length, and wood that he had not tried previously a few clacks sounded out similar to a piece of wood falling over on tiled flooring.

 

“It is the wand that chooses the wizard, this just may be your wand,” Mr. Zhao said while handing the staff of similar height to a human to Alex, without even doing anything a pressure wave sent all of the wand boxes on the whole floor flying while even Guo was on his knees facing away with his hair flailing about, wave after wave of air forced back everyone inch by inch while Alex himself was slightly floating.

 

After a few seconds, the aura stopped, the descending light disappeared, and Alex fell down on his butt while looking at the staff with incredulity in his eyes “uh, sorry” he apologized.

 

With a flick of Zhao's wand all of the wands and boxes that went flying flew back into their place “It was made by my ancestor 1500 years ago, took him 80 years to make with 30 of them being indentured to the goblins” Mr. Zhao explained “72 inches. Yew, Walnut, and Willow. the cores are Dragon Heartstring, hair from a Zouwu, and a bone from a Nundu, the silver metal bracings are from the goblins 1500 years ago”.

 

“I and certainly not my ancestor believed it was a possible wand, nothing more than a trophy, an achievement that he could craft a tri-wood and tri-core staff blessed by the goblins its usage in magic was understandably expected to be non-existent.” Mr. Zhao explained further.

 

“Is he forced to keep such an unstable wand?” Guo winced a little.

 

“The wand chooses the wizard, no wand here would choose a wizard with a perfectly functioning wand”.

 

Looking back at the staff Alex began to look at it in more detail, it was mostly black with streaks of dark brown and pure white. around the top middle and bottom was a pure silver band wrapped around the whole staff, at the top of the staff the woods opened like a flower to a pure black stone that seemed to devour all light.

 

“Cast Lumos,” Guo said hesitantly while also preparing to eject the staff out of Alex’s hand the second he sensed the staff was about to implode due to its unstable nature.

 

“Lumos,” He said confidently to which the black stone spit out light endlessly for a few seconds before it stopped as quickly as it came. Seeing that the staff didn’t collapse and explode Guo relaxed slightly while also putting to memory a supervisor when Alex performs magic in the weeks before school.

 

Standing in a field a day after getting his staff he was currently learning from a more specialized instructor for magic with a staff while another woman stood a few feet to the right of the group supervising.

 

“Magic with a staff is different than with a wand, similar to wandless magic it is more reliant on intent than movement” He started “Which is why staff users are also very good at wandless magic”.

 

“However, this is a generalization, thus grip and movement can help depending on the witch or wizard and his or her style which you will create on your own when your repertoire of magical spells increases. Movement can also be an extension of your intent” he finished before grabbing his staff and like a shovel, he pushed a massive amount of dirt into a two-story-high mound which flowed back into flat ground.

 

Concentrating on the teacher Alex noticed an object similar to a twinkling star in his prereferral vision, except more and more of them were appearing, fastly they grew and grew until massive balls of fire shot across the sky impacting a blue dome sending ripples across it and shaking the whole palace. Popping into existence a few dozen people wearing pure black robes shot green spells at both the instructor and supervisor who were still getting up. 

 

after the spells hit they ran to grab Alex who still was on the ground shocked at what was occurring but before they could get close multiple spikes shot from the ground and pierced their hands, chests, and heads killing them instantly while the rest were being annihilated by guardsmen apperating in left and right. Behind Alex was an extremely furious Guo who was the one who used the spikes to protect him.

 

“Are you ok? Did they hit you with any spells?” Augustus yelled while running up to him but while Augustus, Xie, and Guo were panicking over his safety he silently observed the leader whose hair turned from black to red “His hair it turned to black from red”.

 

Flicking his wand the head covering flung off to the back showing lush black hair turning into a firey red “Huǒshān scum” Guo spat before flicking off the coverings of the others revealing their faces “Well they aren’t Chinese”.

 

“They are African” one of the men wearing different robes spoke “Uagadou? maybe students from one of the lesser schools?”.

 

“Where they come from doesn’t matter” Guo harshly declared “Send another detachment of Aurors and hit wizards to Africa and prepare for pushback, I will not lose those legally bought mines because their feelings got hurt”.

 

Standing up he walked to the instructor and felt for a pulse of which he found nothing on either the instructor or the supervisor “the spell was green right? Don’t bother then, it was the killing curse only one lived through that” the same man as before spoke.

 

“Alright inside Alex,” Xie said while practically dragging the boy.

 

“Reinforce the wards, triple the night watch,” Guo said before joining Xie, Augustus, And Alex in going outside.

 

Across the world, dozens of different newspaper organizations practically sold out in minutes for their news on a land obscured in mystery.

 

The Chinese Emperor’s Personal Palace Attacked!

While declined an interview with any of the witnesses in the palace proper, dozens of people came forward describing a few fireballs smashing against a blue barrier- Most likely a version of the Protego Maxima spell- before cracking under the pressure. One would think a place of such importance would hold stronger wards.

The Chinese Buckling down on the purchase of Ivory and Gold mines in Africa!

Hundreds of Chinese wizards were seen exiting from the Chinese Embassy in Ethiopia, While the Ambassador buckled down on the purchases being totally legal and any attempt of force to remove them from their majesties hands would be an act of war and will be appropriately taken care of. Could it be Possible the attack on his palace and this response have some correlation?

 

These threats stopped the planned legislation from numerous magical governments across the world to send both manpower and support in the forms of potion materials and galleons none were willing to truly test the military might of china which had thousands of years to build up.