Kyle Sichi returned home after finishing the day’s experiments, his wife had already baked flatbread, made him some mushroom soup, and poured him a glass of white wine.
The latter two were both goods that were sold at the convenience market, especially this sort of huge white mushrooms, which were just like the words on the signboard described them as: you won’t find any fresher, or more fragrant delicacy, after one taste you too will discover this to be true. If you eat even one piece, you will find it difficult to forget its full and unique flavor.
Of course, its price was also very alarming, one palm sized mushroom required one silver royal. If it weren’t for his good salary, Kyle would never be able to bear buying such an expensive food. But there were also a lot of other things similar to this, such as perfumed soap and mirrors. As long one had enough money, their life in Border Town would be much more comfortable than that of an average noble.
Roland was simply deep beyond measure, this was also the deepest of point he felt.
After he finished the evening meal. His wife handed him a letter.
This is?
The letter was delivered by the guard this afternoon, at that time you still hadn’t returned from work,
she answered, as she started to clean the tableware,
He said that it had apparently come from Redwater City.
Is that so?
Kyle asked as he entered his study. He cut open the seal using a knife then removed the parchment before spreading it out.
To his surprise, the first sentence was actually,
Dear respected mentor.
Seeing that Chavez was the one that had sent the letter, he couldn’t help but smile. He sat at his desk and began to read through it carefully.
Initially, when Kyle left the Redwater City Alchemic Workshop, another alchemist named Capola had become the new chief. But that person had been narrow-minded, and after obtaining the crystal glass formula left behind by Kyle, he not only claimed towards the Lord that this was his and Kyle’s work, he even excluded Chavez either intentionally or unintentionally from the alchemy experiment group.
Within the letter, Chavez complained, that this was perhaps because he wanted to borrow the idea of the double stone acid method from him, but in the end didn’t want to announce the achievement to the other side. Nowadays, several other alchemist apparently had also begun to intentionally or otherwise shun Chavez, which caused Kyle to feel quite troubled.
Kyle could roughly understand what those people must be thinking, Chavez was the youngest alchemist of the refining room, so many people still thought that it had only been by relying on luck and Kyle’s appreciation for him as a discipline that he had been able to stand out of the crowd. But the chief alchemist could only snort disdainfully at that sort of view. Saltpeter and green vitriol were both everyday things, so why had it been Chavez and no one else who had discovered the double stone acid method? This point alone should already sufficiently explain this issue. Perception, memory, making assumptions without fear, and being diligent during experimentation were all indispensable elements, in the end this young man’s innate skill was even above his own.
At the end of the letter, Chavez had attached two alchemic formulas, claiming they were two of his recently discovered acids he wished to share with his mentor. But even at the first glance, Kyle could see that the essence of these two formulas was just the creation of salt when acids and alkali react with one another, this was the kind of recipe he could write down dozens of time in a single breath.
With a sigh, Kyle Sichi put the letter down and glanced at the
Elementary Chemistry
laying on his table.
Everything had changed with His Highness and his so-called
ancient books
. If it hadn’t been for them, he was afraid, that he would still be the same as Chavez, still aimless, and bewilderedly wandering through the primal chaos, hoping to find some clay on the surface and still regard it as some kind of treasure.
Taking the book, Kyle immediately went to the last page.
It showed a table which was neatly divided into a hundred square box.
Every time he looked at the table, he couldn’t help but get goosebumps all over his body and feel a hard to describe reverence… and fear from within his heart.
Every box had a small serial number in the upper left corner which without a miss arrived at 118 at the end. Beside the first two rows, the majority of the boxes were blank, except for some symbols in the middle. For example, twenty-six: iron, twenty-nine: copper.
The name of this table was:
Periodic Table of Elements
.
While holding the book in his trembling hands, the chief alchemist had asked Roland about the contents of those blank boxes, merely to receive the answer that they had originally been filled, but he was unable to remember them.
If at that time, the other party hadn’t been His Royal Highness, he most likely would had taken the book and thrown it into the other’s face.
According to the records in the book, this table contained all existing elements on earth. If there existed a Canon of Alchemy, there was no doubt that this would be the most dazzling chapter in the whole book. What scared him the most was the question, what type of person was able to draw such a chart? And if they had already done this before, what were alchemists then supposed to be regarded as? They seemed to be merely a gang of children sitting within the silt and piling up some rocks.
Kyle suddenly thought of His Royal Highness’ promise, in case he was also able to call Chavez over, and also pull over the group of recently recruited apprentice, maybe he would be able to fill those three new laboratories. In that way, his dream of laying his hands on the
Intermediate Chemistry
would become a reality.
Thinking until here, he immediately took out a piece of white paper and began to write his response.
In fact, at the meeting when His Royal Highness had asked him whether he had any clue relating to large-scale acid production, he hadn’t told him the truth. Because the content was complex and lengthy, it would have been a waste of time doing so. The most important matter was that he still didn’t know whether his program worked or not. After all, he had based his production method entirely on the elements and reaction principles written within the book.
Compared with the previous alchemy test, this hypothesis was like a child’s nonsensical mutterings in their sleep. Wanting to use materials he had never seen before, together with an unheard of reaction method, to create something which seemed to have no similarity with the raw materials, only because they had the same type of element.
But within Kyle’s heart he still had a faint premonition, it felt like this method might actually be feasible!
After all, within the previous hundreds of permutation experiments, there had not been one time which where the book’s statement wasn’t correct.
With the initial plan concluded, the next step was for him to complete a full set of theoretical tests within the laboratory. Since His Highness had said that the industrial method could be used for large-scale production, it should also be possible to reproduce the results in the laboratory.
Kyle soon finished the letter, he didn’t waste any words on consoling Chavez, and instead straightforwardly told his previously marvelous discipline about alchemic knowledge that was both available and measurable. Kyle believed that there didn’t exist any alchemist who was brimming with the interests of a wise man, that would let the opportunity to seek truth pass them by.
After folding the letter, placing it into an envelope and sealing it with wax, Kyle could do nothing other than wait for the next day to give the message to a traveling salesman who wanted to deliver it.
After all this, his line of sight once again moved to the periodic table.
Thinking about those blank boxes which would never be filled again, Kyle felt as if his life no longer had any joy left to offer him. But fortunately, His Royal Highness had said one short phrase which had made his heart surge, and until today those words were still pacing back and forth within his ears.
Don’t put on that look, the periodic table arranges each element in a regular pattern according to an underlying law. You can fill it up by yourself.
Regular… pattern? Do you mean that those unknown elements can also be deducted, just like the derivation of an alchemical formula?
That’s right, even if you have never seen them before, you can still describe their appearance and characteristics.
That rule, what is it?
Do you want to know? It is written in the ‘Intermediate Chemistry’.
