The top floor of the "Tower of Babel"—the Grand Arcane Hall.
Deep black, heavy stone bricks reflected the light of the elemental planet outside, flowing with a strange layer of color. Silver lines drawn with some unknown material in between gave a slightly three-dimensional impression, as if possessing several constantly shifting faces, blurring the sense of space and time.
Lucian stood at the center of the Magic Circle, pulled out an ornate silver-white pocket watch, checked the time, then turned to glance out the window at the silvery-gray sword-light constantly flashing within the "Atomic Universe."
Nearly a month had passed since he submitted the "Lucian Equations" integrating special relativity and quantum mechanics. His Third-rank Legendary level had been preliminarily stabilized, and Natasha, having glimpsed the mysteries of matter's creation and annihilation, was drawing ever closer to the Epic realm, making final preparations for her breakthrough.
And so, when Lucian set up this spatial-jump Magic Circle, he hadn't told Natasha, not wanting to disturb her complete immersion. Instead, he had quietly prepared everything on his own.
"Good thing I'm only making a short trip to nearby space, not an ultra-long-range spatial jump to search for a planet, nor arriving at a fixed orbit—otherwise there's no way I'd have finished preparing this quickly." Lucian slipped the pocket watch into the vest pocket beneath his black double-breasted frock coat and murmured a quiet sigh.
This was his first time preparing a jump aimed at the stars rather than a transmission within the confines of the world, so he'd encountered no small number of difficulties. Fortunately, the goal was different—the precision requirements weren't high, the distance hadn't reached even a single light-year. He merely wanted to enter the cosmos to complete a certain experiment, which was why he'd been able to finish preparations successfully in such a short time.
It was worth remembering that back when Douglas and Oliver had set out to search for planets, a single ultra-long-range spatial jump required at least two to three years of preparation. An orbital jump demanding high precision was nothing to a seasoned Douglas, but for Lucian himself, it would likely take several months.
"Still, with this experience, my grasp of space-time has deepened considerably. Setting up similar spatial-jump Magic Circles in the future should be much more familiar and easier." Lucian adjusted his black bow tie as the silver-white lines around him were dyed one by one with resplendent radiance, and the entire arcane tower began drawing upon the power of the demiplane.
Beams of light converged, gradually forming a vast and crystalline dome of radiance. Then, with Lucian at its core, it contracted violently.
Lucian felt the surroundings lurch between crushing weight and utter weightlessness. The curvature of space shifted ceaselessly. The defensive barrier bestowed upon him by the "Scepter of Space-Time" was stripped away and destroyed.
He didn't know how much time passed before Lucian suddenly felt he had lost all weight, drifting aimlessly, surrounded by absolute darkness. Countless rays carrying lethal curses surged toward him like a tide.
"Elemental Aegis!" As Lucian uttered the strange, grating syllables that sent vibrations rippling through the surrounding space, multicolored motes of light materialized. Tracing mysterious trajectories, they coalesced into a translucent defensive layer that blocked out the incoming rays one after another.
Breathing a sigh of relief, Lucian understood that he had successfully arrived in the starry sky, exposed to cosmic rays containing countless marvelous particles.
Suddenly, Lucian's expression changed. Within the dome of Elemental Aegis, he spoke the incantation again: "Scepter of Space-Time!"
Some of the cosmic rays had actually pierced straight through the Elemental Aegis!
Shimmering ripples gathered together, and a scepter undulating like water appeared in Lucian's hand. He tapped it gently, warping the surrounding space-time, and several of the strange cosmic rays—still maintaining the shortest possible distance—curved around his body.
"Every step here is fraught with danger." Lucian wasn't certain whether these varieties of cosmic rays could harm his body and soul, but he dared not let his guard down in the slightest.
The reason he had come to the vastness of the stars was not, for the moment, to search for traces of planets, but to complete the discovery of the "positron" (anti-electron)—to finalize his Legendary-level spell, the "Positron Cannon," and maximize his combat strength.
Antiparticles stood as the counterpart to particles. The antimatter they comprised was the counterpart to matter. The moment the two met, they would collide and annihilate each other, releasing terrifying energy. According to the mass-energy equation, the energy release rate of this reaction far exceeded that of fusion—so much so that even a minuscule amount of antimatter could produce devastatingly exaggerated destructive effects, and annihilating an entire world together wouldn't require much antimatter at all.
Therefore, the "Positron Cannon"—or more accurately, the antimatter cannon—built upon this principle was absolutely Lucian's most powerful single-target offensive spell. It could, when facing most defensive barriers, "annihilate" the defense and the person behind it together.
Given that the improved version of the "Goddess of Ice's Wrath"—the "Goddess of Ice's Forgiveness"—still needed more time before completion, Lucian naturally wasn't about to gamble with his life and safety. The moment he could, he had set off for the starry sky to search for the "anti-electron"!
After tossing out the alchemical device, Lucian cast a spell to channel the cosmic rays through the electromagnetic field within, observing their deflected trajectories.
This was a test of patience—one had to find the specific trajectory sought among countless others, and there was no guarantee it would even exist here. Days passed one after another as Lucian shifted positions several times.
Deflected trajectories appeared one after another inside the cloud chamber. Lucian focused intently, distinguishing and calculating. Suddenly, he sensed something. He seized the alchemical device and blinked away in a flash. An instant later, a boulder the size of a mountain crashed into that very spot in the darkness at an inconceivable speed.
"An asteroid." Lucian murmured to himself. What the Council Chairman, the Professor, and the others couldn't find were normal planets—these wanderers drifting through space were occasionally discovered and counted among the great hazards of the cosmos.
Shaking his head, Lucian gave it no further attention. He produced a Dawn Crystal Ball and cast an astrological divination to confirm the surrounding conditions, then resumed his experiment.
A wondrous trajectory crystallized within the cloud chamber—the familiar curvature, the opposite direction. In Lucian's eyes, it was utterly dear and beautiful!
"Positron"!