Throne of Magical Arcana

After Neeshka and Samantha left, Bergner, after a long preparation, began to perform divination on the matter.

Crack. The crystal ball in his hands fell to the ground with a crisp sound. Thankfully, as an item forged with magic, it was not destroyed.

Frowning hard, he looked at the crystal ball on the ground in disbelief, while he murmured to himself, “Why is this happening? Why is this happening?”

For the first time ever, he did not see any result from his prophecy. There was nothing but a mist, as if the future cannot be decided at all.

“What disrupted my prophecy?” After he calmed down, he began to consider other possibilities.

According to the theory of the school of astrology, the future was decided by all the statuses at present, and the inaccuracy of prophecies was because the prophets were limited and not as all-knowing as ‘Thanos Demon’. As a result, their prophecy could be blurry. However, in any case, as long as they were not giving a prophecy when they did not know anything at all, they would more or less see a corner of the future. He had never seen nothing but an obscure mist before!

Bergner believed that he had enough understanding about the debate in the microscopic realm to get certain fuzzy hints. However, things turned out to be out of his expectation. He couldn’t help but begin to consider other reasons.

……

The Month of Gold (October) came as the hot weather faded away. The sorcerers in the Holt Magic College began to wait for the new issues of Arcana, Magic, Nature and other journals. After the few months, the magic apprentices who passed the College Entrance Exam of Advanced Magic had mostly become sorcerers successfully. The ratio of advancement had reached a remarkable 2/3.

It also increased the temptation of the Holt Magic College for the magic apprentices and the mysteriousness of the ‘College Entrance Exam’, as if it had become a standard to test if an apprentice could become a sorcerer.

Therefore, in the Douglas Magic School, in the magic schools of the branches, and among the magic apprentices, the books such as ‘Simulated College Entrance Exams of Advanced Magic’ and ‘Evans’ Secret Tests’ became popular. Heidi, Layria, Alfalia and the girls made a huge fortune out of it.

Before the class of the special theory of relativity, Ernesto went into the classroom again and distributed the journals to the sorcerers. This time, he looked quite normal, if not vaguely delighted, because he finally did not have to study the painstaking matrix mechanics anymore!

His attitude of easiness informed the students that there was no disruptive content on the journals. Therefore, they opened them and began to read randomly. However, as they read on, Onore, Clark and the other students became excited and learnt what was on them greedily.

Two of the first three papers on this issue of ‘Arcana’ were Brook’s, and the last one was written by Oliver. From the perspective of the wave equation, they resolved the problem of the hydrogen model, and their results matched various experiment data. They had established a new alchemy system that seemed entirely different than matrix mechanics. It was more simple, straightforward and easy to understand. Arcana was filled with charm again!

“This is real arcana…” Onore observed in a low voice. “Even in the entire realm of elements and electromagnetism, the Oliver-Brook Wave Equation will still be one of the top three classic equations. That’s a really great accomplishment!”

Clark followed him. “I feel like crying when I see the wave equation. This is arcana, instead of a complicated mathematical monster! In the past months, I only managed to preliminarily apply matrix mechanics but could not understand it at all. However, after studying the wave equation for only one month, I seem to have understood the internal structure of atoms and learnt that everything in the microscopic domain could be so fascinating!”

“Also, the wave mechanics that they established are based on the classic arcana theories instead of completely abandoning them. Math is only used as a way of thinking. Mr. Evans’ achievement is brilliant, but it is too brilliant for us the ‘normal people’ to imagine and understand.” His classmate next to him agreed.

Onore kept reading the paper while he said sincerely, “I’ll devote myself to that in the next year. I will study its mysteries every day. Huh. Mr. Oliver has proposed a theory to explain why electrons behave as particles. It’s called a ‘wave packet’?”

The theory was not very complicated. It claimed that many lines (waves) were jumbled in a certain way into a ball. Since those lines decayed fast when they spread out, they looked like balls in general. The bulging packets made the waves behave as particles.

Accepting such an explanation, Clark, as a supporter of the wave theory, was even more cheered up. He believed that it was the real truth of the microscopic domain that revealed the deepest law of the quantum world.

He was about to exclaim that the particle nature was included in waves, when he saw the papers of Douglas, Fernando, Hathaway and Hellen. They roughly proved that wave mechanics was mathematically equivalent with matrix mechanics, and they offered certain arcana changes that did not agree with the commutative law.

“…The two new alchemy systems are equivalent…” Clark couldn’t help but blurt out.

Onore had reached the part, too. “Douglas’ proof is the easiest to understand, but I don’t think it is very strict mathematically… If they are equivalent, are the wave feature and the particle feature also equivalent? Are the microscopic particles really a new object that we haven’t really recognized yet like Mr. Evans said, and we have to describe them based on the actual results instead of applying the previous concepts?”

It was not because he had understood the few papers, but because they all admitted that they were short of a strict mathematical method to prove the equivalence.

“Maybe.” Clark said, somewhat in frustration. However, after the electron diffraction experiment, he was already okay with such an explanation, so he exclaimed cheerfully again, “Since they are equivalent, we only need to learn wave mechanics in the future and don’t have to bother with the wretched mathematical monster anymore, right?”

“Of course!” The sorcerers around replied at the same time.

Clark smiled at Onore. “Last month, you said that the textbooks for the new alchemy would be changed, and I said that it was impossible. I need to apologize to you now. I was wrong, but I’m also very happy that I was wrong!”

“How many times have the textbooks changed?” Although delighted, Onore had the sense of suffocation when the changes were coming like a storm. In such an age, not working hard would mean being abandoned. They would never have a chance to catch up again.

Seizing the time before the class, they browsed through the journals, their eyes widened again. “The hypothetical model of electron spin?”

“Well, it explains the unusual splitting phenomenon very well, but the speed of spin on the surface is ten times the speed of light. That’s in violation of the special theory of relativity!” Clark skipped the content and focused on the conclusion.

Exclamations echoed in the classroom. They found it hard to imagine that such a paper was published on ‘Arcana’ which was best known for its rigorousness. However, as they read on, they found another paper from Annick and Sprint. It handled the spin problem with matrix mechanics, and the result was unquestionable. In the meantime, they saw Mr. Evans’ paper on matrix mechanics regarding the spin problem. He predicted that a certain calculated value in an experiment was wrong based on the model and confirmed the correctness of spin by the way.

Of course, he also managed to explain the spin speed on the surface, so that people wouldn’t be so against the spin theory.

Annick and Sprint’s spin model was not lambasted partly because they only submitted it for review until it was handled with matrix mechanics, and it was supported by Lucien’s paper; and partly because the focus of the arcanists’ attention was wave mechanics that was glowing brilliantly immediately after it was born!

“In such a case, the four quantum numbers in Fernando’s theory of incompatibility have all been found.” Onore discovered that every paper in the journals in the past months could’ve ranked top in Arcana a decade ago. However, they were either behind or could only go to Magic or Nature right now.

Clark, however, thought of something else. “Mr. Evans has two papers. One of them is about spin, and the other is a complementation to Chloe statistics. Neither of them is about wave mechanics. Does it mean…”

They recalled what happened again and again in the past. Such silence seemed to be foretelling a horrible storm. When Mr. Evans published a paper on wave mechanics, would there be a torrential red-and-white rain again?

“Now that the two new alchemy systems have proved equivalent, I don’t think it’s a big deal…” Onore comforted himself optimistically, before he took a deep breath. “The correctness of wave mechanics is without a doubt right now, and the explanation of the wave function has been proposed by Mr. Oliver. It seems that the second Evans Prize in Arcana will go to them.”

“They will also win the Silver Moon Medal and the Holm Crown Ring.” Said Clark in admiration. “But why do you sound so jealousy, Onore? That’s an achievement that only the grand arcanists can accomplish!”

Onore shook his head. “I’m jealous of Mr. Annick and Sprint. Their hypothesis of electron spin has improved the current model of new alchemy. Even though they cannot get Evans Prize in Arcana, they will surely win a Silver Moon Medal and a Holm Crown Ring. To think that they are of similar ages to us…”

“That’s true…” Clark was at a loss for words. They were about the same age, but the students were still working hard to become middle-rank sorcerers in the Holt Magic College, whereas they already had hope to claim the highest honor of their field, not to mention that they had become middle-rank arcanists and sorcerers a long time ago.

If only I had a great teacher like theirs… He couldn’t help but thought to himself.

After the day of classes was over, Onore returned to his dormitory and picked up his journal, writing down what he felt after the day:

“…I’m getting a deeper and deeper feeling about the urgency and fast pace of the development of arcana. It’s like the mysteries of the world are suddenly surging out like a tide, dying the whole world of arcana and magic a glorious gold. One can never see enough of it… In such a gold and insane age, even a second-rate arcanist can achieve first-rate accomplishments!”

“…Wave mechanics is the most sparkling gem of the year, and the preliminary proof of the equivalence of the two systems of new alchemy seems to suggest that this year is going to end in peace.”