Magic | Magnificent Century

prologue

My Roman Empire was the Ottoman Empire, as rare as that sounds.

Ever since a series about this realm showed up on my feed, I have been obsessed, perhaps to an unhealthy amount. The intricate palaces, dazzling mosaics, the swirl of power, betrayal, and forbidden love all pulled me in like a storybook I couldn't put down. But my fascination went deeper than the glittering harems and the whispers of intrigue. I saw the humanity behind the grandeur—the faces of forgotten women. The lives of rulers, celebrated and scorned, weighed down by the crushing weight of an empire that demanded everything from them and gave little in return.

I started reading books, watching documentaries, and even learning the language. I spent every moment I could spare from my routine in 16th and 17th-century Istanbul—or what was once called Constantinople. I wasn't just learning history; I was living it in my mind, imagining the silk and the gold, the politics and poetry, the suffocating rules of an empire that thrived on its contradictions.

But it wasn't just the glittering harems or the towering domes of Topkapı that fascinated me. It was the stories. The lives of those forgotten, confined, or erased in the shadows of history. People like Sultan Hasan I, the Kalpsiz Sultan.

Hasan the Heartless.

I had read everything I could find about him—what little there was. His reign was a footnote, sandwiched between greater rulers. Most historians dismissed him as a tyrant, a paranoid man who caged his nieces and sisters in the kafes, shut away his half-brothers, and reduced the palace to a silent mausoleum of whispers.

I couldn't stop wondering: why? What had shaped this man into such a merciless ruler? I hated what he did, hated the suffering he caused, but part of me couldn't help but feel a flicker of curiosity—almost pity. No one starts out heartless. Something—or someone—made him that way.

One afternoon, I wandered into a little bookshop on a quiet street near my university. It was the kind of place that felt out of time, with dust motes floating in the sunlight and shelves crammed with spines of all colours and sizes. My fingers trailed over the books, not really looking for anything. Then I saw it.

A worn, leather-bound volume, its cover embossed with an ornate tulip design. The title was faded, but the swirling Ottoman calligraphy on the spine caught my eye. It was simply called Hasan.

"Curious choice," a voice said behind me.

I turned to see the shopkeeper, a woman with striking grey eyes and a sharp, knowing smile. She wore a scarf that shimmered like silver in the dim light. "Most people don't linger on that one."

I glanced down at the book. "Why not?"

"It's not a happy story," she said. "But it's a powerful one." Her gaze seemed to cut right through me. "You care for his kind, don't you? The ones history left behind."

I laughed nervously. "I just... find him interesting. I guess I want to understand why he was the way he was."

"Do you?" she asked, her voice softening. She reached out, her hand brushing the book. "Understanding is a dangerous thing. It can blur lines you thought were clear."

I hesitated. "What do you mean?"

She stepped back, her smile widening. "Read it, and you'll find out." I wanted to ask more, but before I could, she turned and disappeared into the shadowy stacks. Confused but intrigued, I took the book to the counter.

The shopkeeper wasn't there.

No one was.

The shop had fallen eerily silent, the kind of silence that presses against your ears. Uneasy, I set the book down and flipped it open. The pages were thin and rough, covered in intricate Ottoman script I couldn't read—but as I turned them, the letters seemed to shift, rearranging themselves into words I could understand.

"Strange..." I whispered. The air around me grew thick, and a faint scent of lavender filled the room. Suddenly, the letters on the page began to glow, faint at first, then brighter, until the light filled my vision. "Wait—what's happening?"

The glowing letters began to swirl, lifting off the page in shimmering threads of violet.

"You asked why," a voice whispered, low and melodic, as if carried on the wind. It wasn't the shopkeeper's voice. It was deeper, older, more commanding.

"I... I don't understand," I stammered.

"To understand, you must see. To see, you must be." The room dissolved around me, the walls melting into a violet haze. Like a tide dragging me under, I felt a pull, and the voice whispered one final word: "Hasan."

And then I was falling—not in a dream, but through time itself, into a world of silk and smoke, intrigue and shadows.

The Ottoman Empire wasn't just my Roman Empire anymore.

It was my reality.