Inside the "Realm of Truth"!
Douglas, who always wore a tailcoat, had "changed" into a set of black robes—solemn and imposing, radiating an overwhelming aura.
These black arcane robes were quintessential in the style of the ancient magic empire: deep and dark, not a sliver of light leaking through, yet beneath the darkness, countless arcane patterns seemed to shimmer faintly in and out of visibility, lending Douglas an air of mystery.
At this moment, Douglas no longer looked like a kindly elder. Instead, he resembled his title—"the Arcane Emperor"!
He stood with his hands clasped behind his back before the Magic Circle composed of countless silver-white lines and the crystalline, gem-studded gate, his gaze deep and unfathomable, lost in thought.
This was the scene Lucian beheld as he stepped out of the "elevator." He smiled and said, "I don't seem to have encountered the chairman of the Arcane Council. Instead, I've met a magistrate of the ancient magic empire."
Douglas gave a light cough, turned his head, and smiled. "When I was young, I deeply admired mages who dressed in this style. I worshipped His Excellency the magistrate of the Sylvanas Magic Empire—'the Radiance of Starlight'—so after becoming an official mage, I imitated them for the longest time. Until the empire fell, and I had to scrape by in the dark crevices of the world. To avoid drawing attention, I gradually followed the trends of fashion, slowly becoming this sort of gentleman in appearance. Then habit became nature, and I couldn't be bothered to change."
His words carried a faint tinge of reminiscence and wistfulness, as if his heart was not as calm as his outward bearing suggested. At this pivotal moment, when the Sun might finally be found—even after a thousand years and countless hardships, he found it difficult to maintain perfect composure. After all, this was the very "thing" he had pursued for the better part of his life, a yearning passed down from generation to generation of mages since the founding of the astrology school!
"The attire of mages past was indeed mysterious and imposing," Lucian remarked casually, "but far too gloomy, too oppressive, too frightening." He preferred double-breasted formal coats and tailcoats, anyway. "The teacher and Mr. Begner didn't come?"
Fernando and "the Prophet" Begner were among Douglas's few remaining close friends. At such a momentous occasion, how could they be absent?
Douglas chuckled. "The urgent need for stabilizing the reactor drove Fernando to rush off with Heathrow to conduct detailed experiments on neutrons, trying to uncover their mysteries as soon as possible. Besides, he's not optimistic about my results in 'finding' the Sun this time, so he wanted to use practical action to 'cool down' my overly hopeful heart, to spare me from a crushing disappointment."
"True enough—no expectations means no hopes to dashed," Lucian quipped lightly, then nodded. "The teacher has always maintained that the reason we can't find the planets must be connected to whatever lies in the depths of the Endless Ocean. Until we unravel the secret of why 'circumnavigation' is impossible, we'll never be able to locate the planets. It's not something that can be explained by gravitational lensing alone."
Hearing Lucian restate Fernando's viewpoint, Douglas shot him a keen glance. "You think so too?"
If Lucian disagreed with that position, he wouldn't have wasted time repeating it.
"My views are close to the teacher's, but…" Lucian answered honestly.
"But if you don't try, how will you know where the problem lies?" Douglas showed not the slightest trace of irritation, picking up Lucian's thread to make his own stance clear.
Lucian nodded. "That's exactly what I was thinking. Sometimes, even when you know an experimental design is flawed, you have to see it through to completion—because under special circumstances, the experience of failure can be even more valuable. It can help us find the right path."
Douglas smiled and nodded. "Your arcane philosophy and your attitude will keep you growing."
Then he brought up "the Prophet." "Begner fell into a state of aimless wandering after the Uncertainty Principle. Originally, thanks to General Relativity, he had hope of advancing to the third tier of Legend within a short time—but now he's stalled once again, just like Donald and the others. If it hadn't been for the lack of decisive experiments and phenomena to confirm it at the time, his World of Cognition would likely have collapsed."
"But in recent years' microscopic experiments, the probability interpretation and the Uncertainty Principle have been receiving ever greater attention," Lucian said, deliberately emphasizing the point.
Douglas sighed. "Yes."
He said nothing more, for he too could not accept Lucian's probability interpretation and Uncertainty Principle. Of course, his refusal was not a denial of experimental fact—it was, like Fernando's, a disagreement with treating them as fundamental properties of microscopic particles. He believed there must be hidden factors or variables yet undiscovered that gave rise to this probabilistic and uncertain behavior. If one accounted for hidden variables, it was still consistent with determinism.
"So Mr. Begner doesn't want to see me?" Lucian said with a touch of humor.
Douglas shook his head with a laugh. "Not at all. The real reason is that he's busy constructing the 'Cosmic Observatory.' Now then—let's prepare to set off."
He drew a deep breath, extended his right hand, and pressed it against the crystalline gate encrusted with arcane gemstones.
One by one, silver-white lines blazed to life, erupting with brilliant radiance. Enormous energy surged from every corner of the arcane tower, from every part of the "Realm of Truth."
The bright blue sky outside the window abruptly plunged into darkness—so dark that not a single star could be seen. And when that massive torrent of energy poured into the "Gate of Transmission," it was like a river merging into the ocean, without so much as a single ripple.