We spent most of the next day hanging out and having fun, it was only after dinner that I went back to Xeno's place to prepare for the break-in.
I found Xeno reading a book about my world's magic in the living room.
"Enjoying the gift?" I asked, sitting down on the couch.
"Immensely," he said, marking the page and closing the book. "But the rest of your gifts… They were a bit much."
"How so?" I questioned. "I know you like the weird and unusual, so I figured the books would be a hit."
Xeno sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose before giving me a deadpan stare.
"It was the gold, wasn't it?" I said in amusement.
"Of course it was the gold!" He exclaimed, getting up and moving to the other side of the room, where he took a small coin pouch off a table and inserted his entire arm inside, taking out with it a gold bar and waving it in my direction. "You gave me my literal weight in gold! What do I even do with that!? Where did you even get that much gold!?"
I snorted at his exasperated tone, getting up and taking the bar from his hand.
"Put it in the bank, buy a summer house in the Mediterranean or Caribbean, build a life-size statue of your wife, and coat it in gold," I shrugged, "it's your money, I'm sure you'll think of something eventually."
"And about where you got it?" He asked, having calmed down.
"I'm a Campione," I rolled my eyes, "all I had to say is that I owed you for your hospitality and my people were scrambling for ideas on how to pay you back." Although the idea of 'give him his weight in gold' was meant as a joke, I thought it would be funnier actually to go through with it.
"Fine," Xeno sighed, dropping the bag back on the table. "I gather from the bag that you also mastered the Undetectable Extension charm."
"Hell yeah, I did! And I made sure that every piece of clothing with pockets I own has one pocket with it." I waved at my pants, which had the spell on its front-left pocket. "I just have to figure out how to modify the Protean so they all share an inventory. Because right now, it's not worth using it to its full potential since I'd have to take everything out every time I change pants."
"Why not just use a bag?" He asked in confusion.
"Too external. I like to keep my things close to me, and a bag can be lost, so that's a no-go for me." I had that idea after I learned it, but the thought of losing whatever I put in there was too uncomfortable for me to go through with it. And it wasn't like I had enough things that I needed with me at all times to make proper use of it, as only the locket that I shared with Luna and my wand fell into that category, and both of those would be pointless if I didn't have quick access to them.
"Fair enough," Xeno nodded. "So, ready for the break-in?"
"Sure! How are we doing this?" I asked, feeling excitement for the night's activities start to build up.
Xeno gave me a grin. "Well, first…"
The cool night air blew as we walked past the government buildings on Parliament Street.
It was luck that I had taken a tour of the area before becoming a Campine. And that the door to a specific bathroom stall in Westminster station had been engraved in my mind after a particularly bad case of food poisoning. That way, we didn't need to apparate so the risk of being spotted by someone was greatly reduced.
Shaking the thoughts of that day out of my mind, I turned to Xeno in his somewhat inconspicuous clothing. Because while it was sparse, the street still had some movement even late at night.
"So, where's the visitor's entrance?" I asked as we passed Downing Street.
"Just up ahead, at the corner of Great Scotland Yard just past Whitehall," he said.
It didn't take long for us to reach it, and Xeno casually entered a red telephone box before waving me to get in as well.
"This is the entrance?" I skeptically asked.
"Yes," he snorted, taking the phone a dialing 62442, and said, "Magizoologists, Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures," before hanging up.
The booth suddenly lurched and started descending, replacing my question on why he had gone with the Magizoologist excuse instead of the much simpler 'came to report a robbery' with wondering why magicals pretend to not be heavily influenced by non-magical culture.
It was pointless anyway, as Xeno motioned me to cast the Disillusionment charm as soon as we started moving. I cast it wandlessly to avoid anything that could disrupt it. Thankfully, I could still somewhat see him, although I doubted that'd be the case if another Campione or God had cast it.
A few moments later, we arrived at the atrium that served as the reception area for the Ministry. There was a half-asleep guard by the entrance who woke up by the sound of the elevator arriving, so I took hold of Xeno's shoulder as we quietly moved past her and into the Atrium proper.
It was a very long hall with a highly polished dark wood floor. The ceiling was peacock blue, filled with golden symbols that kept moving like a notice board, and the walls on each side were covered in gilded fireplaces that were obviously used as Floo connections.
There was a fountain up ahead, with golden statues in the middle of the pool, a tall wizard, and a witch with their wands pointing straight into the air. Around them were statues of a centaur, a goblin, and a house-elf, all smaller than and looking up adoringly at the magicals.
With a quiet snort of disgust at the sheer ego of these people, I let Xeno guide me to the end of the hall, where, behind a pair of golden gates, was a smaller hall with what looked like twenty old-timey elevators.
Opening the wrought golden grille of the closest elevator, we quickly got in and were on our way.
Getting out of the elevator, I swore to never use another method of magical transportation these people invented in my life.
The chaotic mess went up, down, to the sides, and even diagonally at points before calmly leaving us in the Department of Mysteries, a dark corridor with black-tiled walls with a black door at the end.
The worst part was that I had seen the place we left in the hall pass by twice.
Taking a deep breath to let go of my annoyance, I took hold of Xeno's shoulder once more and moved with him to the end of the hallway.
Inside was a large, circular room where everything was black. It had a highly polished black floor that looked almost like standing water. And there were twelve identical, unmarked, black doors without handles set at intervals around the walls. Between each door were blue-flamed branches of candles hung on the walls, leaving the room dimly lit in its eerie blue light.
Once the door to the elevator closed, the room started spinning, but that was meaningless. Because I could feel it, I could ever since we Door'd to that bathroom in Westminster station.
It didn't feel like much at the start, just a vague feeling that a Gateway was nearby. But as we got closer, the sheer weirdness of its existence started pressing on me. And now, with it right behind a door to our left, I could finally understand why control over it wasn't coming to me the way every other one would have.
'This is not mine' The thought came unbidden. And as I pushed past the last obstacle between us, that truth rang stronger than ever.
The tall stone archway stood in the middle of the large, dimly lit room, in the center of a stone dais raised some twenty feet. It looked so ancient, cracked, and crumbling that if I didn't know of its divine origins, I'd expect it to fall apart at any second.
But my focus was on its center, in what appeared to be a tattered black curtain, gently fluttering and swaying very slightly.
That was the product of an Authority. And not one related to mine in any way that mattered. The fact that it worked as a Gateway was inconsequential to its purpose.
Focusing on its center, I concluded that 'Veil of Death' was an apt name for it, not for superstitions or its effects on the mortals, but because I could feel one of my Runes respond to it, to the point where I could almost see it in the fluttering Veil.
I pulled on my Authority passively, and clarity came to me, the Rune for 'Death' clear as day, etched permanently in the fabric of reality itself, superimposed over the faint outline of 'Division. '
And I finally understood why even though my Authority counted it as a Divine Gateway, I had no power over it.
It was a border, a point of separation between two realms, and while a gateway could be used to divide, its main purpose was always to connect.
I pulled my attention from the Veil to notice Xeno a few steps behind me, entrancedly looking at it and slowly approaching.
I quickly canceled our disillusionment and started snapping my fingers in his face,
"Xeno, knock it off!"
He turned to me, a dazed look on his face.
"Alex?" He asked, quickly shaking his head to dispel the trance he had fallen for.
"Sorry, but I thought I heard Pandora…" He said, longingly looking at the Veil.
"You probably did," I said, also looking at it. "But I'd bet she'd rather you stay alive with Luna than go there to be with her."
At hearing his daughter's name, he let out a sigh and turned back to me. "You're right. I'll see her again, someday," he said, giving the Veil one last glance before moving down the stairs on the side of the dais.
With a last look of my own at the Veil, I followed him. I'd need a much greater mastery in Runes to understand the Veil, but until then, I could look into who did it and where they are now.
As the door closed behind us, the circular room started spinning again.
Without paying attention to it, Xeno put his hand on my shoulder.
"Mission accomplished, time to go home," he said in a tired tone.
"Well, not yet," I said sheepishly.
"What do you mean, not yet?" he took his hand from my shoulder and crossed his arms.
"Severus kinda gave me a secondary objective since we'd already be here and all," I explained.
"Oh? And what objective would that be?" He asked, lifting a questioning eyebrow.
I put my arm in my front-left pocket, pulling out a crystal orb.
"He asked me to go into the Hall of Prophecies and make an exchange," I said.
With a groan, Xeno waved at the rest of the room.
"Do you know where it is at least?" He asked, defeated.
"He said it's an offshoot of the Time Room and that we'd know when we saw it." I shrugged and started walking to the nearest door.
"Great…" Xeno muttered, moving towards another door.
The first door I checked led to a dark room with a perfect rendition of our solar system floating in mid-air. I barely paid any attention to it before I turned back towards Xeno, who was closing the door to a brightly lit room.
As soon as his door closed, the room started spinning again. We looked at each other in resignation at the fact we wouldn't be able to find the room any faster than that.
Once the room stopped spinning, I took the door that ended up in the same position where the previous one was when I stopped.
My hand was just an inch away from the door, but my instincts were screaming at me to not go further.
Ever so slowly, I rested a finger from my right at the door, then another, and another, until all of them were pressing against it. And then I let them slowly spread apart, resting the rest on my hand on the door's surface.
It was then that I noticed. The feeling that I took as natural ever since I touched that door for the first time. The feeling wasn't coming from behind the door nor the door itself; it was coming from my chest. Or rather, it was coming from the thing resting on my chest.
With some trepidation, I raised my left hand and grabbed my locket.
And there it was. The slow, rhythmic beating of a sleeping heart, held on the palm of my hand.
The realization of what I was holding, of what it was, of what it meant, almost made me forego the mission and apparate directly to her.
But I didn't.
I slowly let my hand fall off the door, and I carefully opened my hand to see the locket.
From its previous pure golden color, now it was a softer rose gold. And at the front of the book-shaped locket, now a detailed engraved letter L proudly stood.
I lost track of time staring at it in wonder, feeling her heartbeat coming from it when I heard Xeno's voice from behind me.
"Alex?" He cautiously asked from behind me.
Suddenly conscious of where we were, I slipped the locket back into my shirt and turned to him.
"Sorry, what were you saying?" I asked.
Upon seeing my face, Xeno flinched before looking worriedly at me.
"Alex, your eye, it's glowing!" He said, pointing at my left eye.
I put my hand in front of it, seeing the reflection from the golden glow in it.
"Huh," I said, wondering if the warning about the room came from that Authority.
Leaving that thought for a time when I wasn't pressed for time, I looked at Xeno and said, "Never mind that, let's finish this and go home."
With a quick nod, he went back to close his door and let the room spin again.
It took another two tries before we found the Time Room.
The room was filled with beautiful, dancing, diamond-sparkling light with clocks of different types and sizes on every surface. The ticking noise filled the room incessantly, making every moment feel like time was running out.
The source of the sparkling light was a huge crystal bell jar at the far end of the room. It stood on a desk and appeared to be full of a billowing, glittering wind.
Inside the jar, a small hummingbird was rising and falling on the glittering current, going from an egg to mature and back to an egg again after it completed its circuit, constantly repeating.
There was a large case with a glass front by one of the walls, and inside were several small, golden hourglasses on necklaces.
At the end of the room was a door that could only lead to the Hall of Prophecies.
As I opened the door and looked back, I saw Xeno quietly removing a handful of the hourglasses from the case. It was only after he had made sure that they were secured in his robe's pocket that he noticed me staring at him.
"Decided that since you were already doing a B&E, you might as well add theft to the list?" I asked in amusement.
"These are time-turners, Alex! They would be invaluable in any matter where time is of the essence!" He whispered excitedly.
I looked at where he had hidden his loot. With a name like 'time-turner' it was easy to see why he was so excited to get his hands on some of them.
With an understanding nod, I turned back to the Hall of Prophecies and promptly groaned at the rows and rows of crystal balls we'd have to search through.
The Hall was gigantic, with dozens of towering shelves filled with hundreds of crystal balls per shelf.
Thankfully, Severus had given me the location of the prophecy I was there to change. Unfortunately, that still left a lot of ground to cover, as the closest shelf to the door was number 55.
With a sigh, I told Xeno the location, and we went to work.
Even with the location, it still took us the better part of an hour to find it.
According to Severus, to anyone else doing this exchange would have been extremely dangerous, thanks to the protections on the prophecies leading anyone not part of that particular prophecy into instant madness.
As a Campione, the exchange was anticlimactic; just a quick change, and it was done.
From the look on Xeno's face, he was also done with the whole adventure, so with a hold of his arm and a swift step later, we were back at my room on The Rook.
Xeno tiredly waved me good night and went up the stairs to his room, while I quickly changed clothes and laid down on the bed.
I pulled the locket out of my shirt and held it close, letting Luna's calm heartbeat lull me to sleep.
A/N: And that was that for our Ministry B adventures!
Weird things are happening at the DoM. Alex gets one more clue and one more mystery, or are they both clues? Who knows? Not Alex, that's for sure!
Like my writing? Want to be able to read a full four chapters ahead? Then check me out on P a treon . com (slash) NickKane.
As always, thank you all for your support, and I'll see ya'll next week!