—The single-chapter 24-hour subscription count actually hit 5,300. The growth is terrifying. Thank you all.
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Time seemed to freeze in the hall of the Magician Management Bureau, until other magicians entering broke the strange atmosphere and brought Eric back to his senses. Not caring that he was still standing right at the reception desk, he quickly began flipping through the remainder of the paper.
If he remembered correctly, Lucian Evans... x was the very same young man he knew—the one who had only been exposed to Arcane Magic for three months! He had actually written such a highly acclaimed paper?
The contrast between that rank of First-Rank Archanist, First-Circle Magician and the reward of three hundred Arcane Points and two thousand Arcane Credits was strikingly glaring, tremendously impactful.
As the pages of the Elements journal turned, Cindy and Donna also snapped back to attention, straining their eyes to see why their friend Lucian had received such a high evaluation.
The content before the Periodic Table shook Eric to his core. Those mysterious periodic laws made his heart pound wildly and his blood surge faster. Because of the prior review comments, he naturally assumed the paper's content was correct—it wasn't merely described as "highly discussable."
But when he reached the prediction and correction of atomic weight errors, Eric, Cindy, and Donna all wore expressions of confusion. Some elements were ancient, and had been measured by multiple methods with converging results, leading later arcanists to blindly trust authority without re-measuring using new methods—so errors were indeed possible. But for certain important elements, whenever new measurement methods emerged in recent years, arcanists had eagerly put them to the test. How could the data possibly be wrong?
"But Mr. Gaston and Mr. Overy's evaluations are nearly identical—they couldn't both have made the same mistake, could they?" Faced with such a puzzling situation, the normally lively Cindy also appeared subdued and bewildered. "If they merely valued the periodic concept in the earlier sections and considered it 'discussable,' the reward points would be at most one or two."
Having worked at Magic Council headquarters for nearly two years, Cindy had seen the evaluation results of many papers and could roughly guess the general standards.
Donna nodded along: "The reviewing arcanists of a journal at the level of Elements wouldn't possibly allow publication without experimental verification—and as the very first paper, no less!"
Eric suppressed his doubts and continued flipping. Soon he came upon the experimental report Lucian had attached, and the atomic weight correction data within left him stunned.
"But there still isn't conclusive evidence..." No sooner had he spoken than Eric's eyes widened again, because he saw the title of the next paper: "A New Element Discovered Through the Periodic Table of Elements and Its Measurement," by Woods, Fourth-Rank Archanist, Fourth-Circle Magician. — Ravendy had believed that papers of equal importance should ideally be arranged in chronological order of publication.
Reading this paper while simultaneously flipping back to Lucian's with trembling hands, Eric compared them directly, afraid that the citations in Woods' paper might be erroneous. As he read on, his face flushed crimson as though drunk, veins bulging at his temples—this was nothing short of miraculous "prophecy"!
The subsequent papers—Ravendy's discovery of the new element and Lazarus and other arcanists' measurement of atomic weights—with irrefutable facts shattered every dissenting thought, firmly opening a new door in the field of elemental magic, while also prompting people to question the reasons behind the erroneous atomic weight data for those earlier elements.
Turning back to the Periodic Table, Eric stared at the arrangement that clearly exhibited periodic changes, unable to speak for a long time.
The shock experienced by Magic Apprentices like Cindy was considerably lighter than that of official arcanists. They couldn't yet grasp the enormous significance of this Periodic Table; they were simply startled by the precise "prophecy" and the neat, orderly periodic variations.
"The periodic laws of the elements look truly wonderful, and like the Brooke Equation, they possess an ultimate beauty of concise, symmetrical, profound mystery." Cindy couldn't help but compare it to the Brooke Equation, which bore the title of "the Goddess's Poetry."
Donna also clicked her tongue in admiration: "It's as though there is a god, er, some existence beyond our comprehension, manipulating all of this—otherwise, how could the elements possibly display such orderly periodic patterns?"
Within the Holm Kingdom, although the Church's influence had been suppressed by the Magic Council, their sway among ordinary people remained considerable. Girls like Donna and Cindy, born to families of common citizens and farmers, had been influenced by the beliefs of those around them before being selected to study at magic schools. However, after witnessing the wonders of Arcane Magic, their faith had long since grown feeble. Rather than believing in a god, it was more accurate to say they were seeking spiritual solace and peace of mind.
"No wonder Evans was able to obtain those three landmark evaluations along with three hundred Arcane Points and two thousand Arcane Credits." Eric's emotions were calmed by the two girls' discussion, and he sighed softly. "In recent years, the only papers that have far exceeded this Arcane Point reward are Lord Brooke's paper that used arcane experiments to verify electromagnetic waves are light and measured the speeds of both, Lord Donald's paper demonstrating that spectra can be used to discover new elements, and the Storm Lord's paper opening a new door in electromagnetic wave magic—those only received around a hundred Arcane Points each."
The vast majority of high-tier arcanists never expected to earn enough Arcane Points from the Review Committee's evaluation rewards to advance in rank. Their main source of points was citations, which resulted in their arcane ranks generally being lower than their magic ranks. Only the most authoritative figures could achieve parity between arcane rank and magic rank.
"Heh, like Mr. Evans, whose arcane rank is 'far' higher than his magic rank—in the three hundred-odd years since the Council established the arcane ranking system, only eight people have managed that. Nearly half of them are now Grand Archanists or Legendary Magicians." Cindy reminisced wistfully about the legendary stories she had heard. She no longer quite dared to address Lucian by his given name.
At low ranks, it was normal for someone's arcane rank to occasionally exceed their magic rank thanks to a particularly valued paper. But being *far* higher was beyond what ordinary people could achieve. Of those eight, two had become Grand Archanists and one a Legendary Magician; one had died of illness, two had perished in battle, and two had later lost their brilliance, becoming no different from other arcanists.
Eric's pale gray eyes rolled as he glanced once more at the spread-out papers. "Fourth-Rank Archanist... Who would have thought that Evans, having been in Allentown for just over two months, would already have an arcane rank surpassing mine." It had taken him a full thirty years to become a Third-Rank Archanist.