Throne of Magical Arcana

In a magic tower in Salyvaor, the capital of the Kingdom of Brianne.

The ending song of Allyn’s Past Week was still lingering in the room, however, it was suddenly cut off by a hand that turned off the radio. The slender-figured archmage Lauren had a sneering look on his face, and even his little mustache was showing his scorn. “What a good student of Neeshka. Lark doesn’t even want to hide her inclination.”

For a sorcerer like him, knowing who was hiding behind ‘Lark’ was just a piece of cake.

Lauren was standing in his study, which was decorated with dark red curtains and soft crystal lights, and looking at his students in front of the desk.

A senior whose hair had all turned grey said bitterly, “Arcana Voice, Truth of the World… Lucien is the one who is hiding behind. No matter how hard they try to cover it, they are always sitting on the chair engraved with the words ‘the Particle Theory’. Shame on them! A programme at least should be bias-free! How could they let Lark intentively shake the wave theory supporters confidence!”

He looked much older than Lauren.

“Christal, it doesn’t matter,” said Lauren calmly. “The world of arcana only respects truth, which makes here the justest place to live in. No matter how tricky they are, in the end, the experiment results will speak for us.”

Although he just mocked Lark, Lauren didn’t really hold anything against her. As an archmage whose great honors had been piling up, he did have the confidence and tolerance to only attack Lucien in a dignified manner with the experiment results and images.

Sitting beside Christal was a young man with light brown hair, yet his yellowish-brown eyes belonged to that of an aged man. He said to his teacher hesitantly, “Sir… About the result…”

“Yes, Manuel?” Lauren looked at him, frowning slightly.

The student’s lips pressed against each other into a thin line, and finally, he became determined to speak it out, “Sir… I think we should be prepared for the fact that the experiment result might not be able to overthrow the light quantum hypothesis.”

The middle-aged woman who had beautiful light purple hair also seized the chance and agreed. “It’s True, Sir. The several experiments in the past a few years have shown that the light quantum hypothesis can perfectly explain the photoelectric effect.”

“You…!” Lauren stared at his students angrily. He did not want to believe that what Lark said in the programme had indeed shattered his students’ confidence.

“If that was true, I’d rather prefer there is no explanation for the photoelectric effect at all!” Lauren reproached his students and then walked out of the study in a rage.

Outside of the window in the darkness, the fine spring raindrops were thrumming the field, indicating the upcoming harvest of a season.

……

In the Atom Institution, Lucien was still working on observing the tiny flashing light spots, trying to find what he wanted from their messy traces he took down. Meanwhile, the improved magic circles were now buzzing as the powerful electric currents passing through, slightly twisting the surrounding magnetic field.

Thanks to the Lord of Storm’s experiment of using helium atoms to bombard a piece of metal foil, Lucien now had the perfect reasons for applying to Magic Research Board for introducing the lately improved magic circles and alchemical facilities to meet all the requirements for conducting the experiment — the Atom Institution specialized in studying the microworld and the inner structure of the atom. Since the Lord of Storm had proved the existence of the atomic nucleus and described the atom’s inner structure by colliding particles, the Atom Institution had the very reason to conduct further studies based on the Lord of Storm’s achievement, and the institution’s request should be fulfilled without a doubt.

Finally, Lucien had identified the trace he had been seeking for!

Charge-to-mass ratio, charge quantity, mass… all the data flashed through Lucien’s brain. In the next second, he sprang up from the chair and started measuring the particle that made the trace!

Time flew, and Lucien’s work was almost done.

Charge-to-mass ratio, the same!

Charge quantity, the same!

Mass, the same!

The numbers had overlapped with each other!

Suddenly, Lucien’s cognitive world embraced him again, and the elements in the sky and the environment started changing in front of his eyes: the central core surrounded by the electrons had turned into the combination of two particles! The only difference between all the elements such as hydrogen, oxygen, and carbon was the different numbers of particles they had!

This was the nucleus of hydrogen! This was proton! This was the nature of the elements!

The great shift in Lucien’s cognitive world was done within seconds. Lucien could sense the fundamental changes it brought, as he could now feel the connection with all the elements much more sharply. Seizing the chance, Lucien quickly entered his meditation world and now his spiritual power possessed both the properties of particle and wave. This was not a simple combination of wave and particle, as now even a single spiritual quantum of his showed the nature of wave!

……

In his Kingdom of Electromagnetism, Brook stepped into his lab.

His lab looked like a fantasy: Cold metals, weird patterns and shapes, jumping and flashing electric arcs, black twisted magnetic fields, as well as the vast starry sky…

He stopped in front of a complex alchemical operation table, placed on his right-hand side were all the experiment notes and records.

Brook took a glance at the records he made, and a strange look stopped for a second on his face where his years had begun to show. Then he put aside all the thoughts and started focusing on the experiment.

……

By the time he walked to the door of the lab, Lauren had calmed down. He turned around and said to his students following him, “Manuel, Diana, you two can leave now. I will start my experiment.”

Manuel tried to say something, but Lauren had disappeared behind the door.

The door charged with flashing electric currents cut the students off from their teacher.

“It’s gonna be alright, isn’t it?” Manuel murmured subconsciously.

Christal had a cold look on his face. “Of course. The light quantum hypothesis can not explain everything, say, the diffraction image.”

“That’s true.” Agreed Diana.

She was not feeling too nervous, since she believed that the experiment result would not be too surprising. She was confident that the worst scenario would just be that her teacher suffered some damage to his cognitive world, which would only take a few years for Mr. Lauren to fix. In the past three years, she had gradually shifted her cognitive world to a more balanced position, if it was not more on the particle theory’s side, thus she was prepared for both outcomes.

If she could do so, it should not be a problem for her teacher.

Lauren put on his magic robe, and a layer of grey covered him from head to toe. After carefully checking all the magic circles and alchemical facilities, he started the experiment conscientiously, just like every time in the past.

……

In Lucien’s cognitive world which was basically substantialized, his spiritual power had filled in every corner of this space. The joining spiritual quanta together formed mysterious and dreamlike cloud clusters, but when Lucien approached them, they scattered and became particles and waves.

When everything calmed down, the image of Lucien’s cognitive world also disappeared. Lucien opened his eyes, knowing that he finally made the last step for finishing his own meditation method, called the Evans’s Duality Meditation. The meditation method was still in its first stage though, and Lucien could still make further improvements on it.

With this meditation method, the cost that Lucien paid for forcing his way into senior-rank could be compensated. Lucien tried with his new meditation method and drew the conclusion that his meditation worked at least three times better than the best existing senior-rank meditation method, and it would take him just another one or two years to reach the seventh circle.

In the past three years, due to the damage done to his soul previously, Lucien did not make any remarkable progress in increasing his spiritual power. Therefore, he had spent most of his time studying sixth-circle magic incantations and creating new spells. By now, Lucien had constructed twenty-one sixth-circle magic spells within his soul. Among them, there were three newly-created spells: a curse spell Professor’s Solicitude , an electromagnetic spell, and an astrology spell.

Taking a deep breath, Lucien repeated the experiment he just did. Then he took out the special parchment for writing arcana papers and a quill-pen and started writing his paper right on the operation desk:

“… The experiment showed that when using helium atomic beams to bombard nitrogen, positively-charged hydrogen atoms were produced. Therefore, a conclusion could be made here — Hydrogen nucleus could be extracted from the nuclei of nitrogen, thus a hydrogen nucleus is also an inner part of an atom. Because a hydrogen atom only contains one such particle, in the past, it was only thought of as the hydrogen atom…”

“… I’ll name this fundamental particle ‘proton’. The positive charge it carries is equal to the negative charge an electron carries. Considering its mass and its electric neutrality, it is reasonable to say that a hydrogen atom consists of a proton and an electron…”

“… To push the conclusion further, it is found that the listing of the elements in the periodic table of the elements also follows the number of protons. Based on the nuclear charge and the electromagnetic theory, it can be predicted that besides proton, there is another kind of particle which has the same mass but is not charged within the atom nucleus. The number of this neutral particle decides the variants of a particular chemical element…”

Lucien did not restrain himself within the experiment result, instead, he extended his conclusion to establish a theoretical system. His theories and predictions went beyond the evidence provided by the current experiments, as usual.

“… Starting from the conception of Mr. Fernando that the atom structure resembles the celestial body motion system, and by introducing the quantum theory, the structure of electrons orbiting around the nucleus could be quantized… That is to say, we no longer see electrons as particles orbiting around, but rather of different energy levels. When absorbing and emitting energy, they do transitional movements, and skipping levels is possible…”

“… This is proved by the discontinuity of the emission spectrum of atomic hydrogen…”

This time, Lucien did not choose to wait for more theories supporting him to come up, instead, he directly introduced the quantum theory into describing the atom structure by skipping many studies as prerequisite conditions and making predictions boldly.

There was roaring thunder coming remotely in Lucien’s cognitive world when the electrons orbiting around the nucleus all stopped. The electrons were on different energy level tracks – Some of them were absorbing spiritual quanta and making phase transitions, and some were losing spiritual quanta when dropping to lower energy levels. There were these continuous ups and downs as well as the constant reciprocal transformations in the flow of Lucien’s spiritual power.

Not distracted by what was happening in his cognitive world, Lucien kept writing very fast,

“… The number of electrons in the outside shell decides the alchemical property of an element; all alchemical reactions can be described and explained by the concept of gaining and losing electrons, including ionization and the valence state. As for the reason behind the configuration, I currently assume that each shell has a certain number of electrons, but this still requires further study…”

“… In this way, the School of Alchemy has been fully included in the School of Element!”

In his cognitive world, the electrons around the atomic nucleus started exchanging with that of the other nearby elements, and more matters and substances started to form. Lucien’s cognitive world became more abundant and colorful, in which his magic model of Elements Order had been further improved, and now the structure was already very close to being completed!

The quill-pen in Lucien’s hand moved fast, presenting Lucien’s profound thoughts on the parchment.

The darkness of the night outside of the window became denser. The moist air foreshadowed the upcoming rain.

……

In the lab, as more data had been collected, and the image gradually became complete, Brook’s eyebrows knitted in a frown.

Taking down the last group of data, Brook did not write down any conclusion. Instead, he looked out of the window at his demiplane, the Kingdom of Electromagnetism, and finally released a sigh.

Bang! Bang!

In the deafening thunder, fierce and thick bolts of lightning directly struck the twisted magnetic field from above and instantly tore the flowing electric currents and flashing electric arcs into pieces!

Under the ground of the demiplane, all the substances and matters were collapsing under the power of the strong magnetic field. The destructive power was dismantling the space as easily as crushing dry weeds and smashing rotten wood.

The momentum was unstoppable. This seemed to be the end of the entire Kingdom of Electromagnetism.

“Sir…” In the magic tower shaking violently, Barek looked at the upper floor helplessly.

……

In Brianne.

His eyes gazing upon the data and the experiment image, Lauren was unable to suppress his panic.

“Impossible!”

His hands trembling, Lauren tried to stop, but his drastically-changing cognitived world interfered with his soul, and he could not resist the urge to continue.

The experiment result was there, right in front of him. The look on Lauren’s face was distorted, as if he had been possessed by a demon. Boundless fear seized him.

He could not believe this.

“… based on the instantaneity of time, light presents the prominent property of quantum; based on time average, light shows the property of wave. Therefore, perhaps we should be more open-minded when facing the argument.”

Lauren recalled Lucien’s paper.

He could not understand. He shook his head, murmuring to himself. “How could something like this exist?”

In his cognitive world, the electromagnetic waves fiercely swelled up and snapped!

Like blowing up a balloon, Lauren’s head seemed to grow bigger and bigger. He burst out a painful cry.

His head had been blown up to its limit. Silently, the bloody firework bloomed.

There was red and white, falling down to the floor like raindrops.

……

“… In the radioactive substance, I have found the trace of the new element, which perfectly matches what I expected: In the process of radioactive decay, energy and the helium nucleus are released and thus new elements are formed…

“… Since human beings acquired magic, the dream of turning elements into gold has always been there. This is not merely our pursuit of wealth, but the longing for the truth of the world, as we always wish to master the secret of matter transmutation!

“… However, for thousands of years in the past, there was not a single alchemical reaction which had successfully transmuted a substance fundamentally without relying on a permanent magic circle… In front of the gate of the forbidden zone belonging only to gods, we human beings could not march further…

“… But now, after discovering the inner structure of the atom, by studying the nature of decay, we can find the path for fundamentally changing substances and creating new elements! Following my theory, although the product might not be worth the cost, we can finally take over the power once exclusively owned by gods! Now we see the deepest secrets hiding behind substances, and we are on the way achieving the shared dream of sorcerers for generations!

“… This is a big step forward in the history of arcana, but more of further improvement of the human civilization!

“… The journey waiting for us is full of challenges and even risks, but I hope that we can go much further together.”

Piling up the rolls of parchment, Lucien wrote down the title,

“New Alchemy”.

Outside the window, the spring thunder came, and lives started thriving.