Chapter 1301 — Fell Right Into It!

Morgan seemed to have been set ablaze with fighting spirit. This old scholar, born into the ranks of the old Ansu court mages, had once believed himself a man who had seen through all things—the years had given him steadiness and equanimity—yet over the past two years he had discovered that his passion when facing new things had never truly faded. The last time he had felt his enthusiasm burning so fiercely had been when this very Paramel Observatory was first completed.

Back then he had looked through the modern enchanted lens assembly and the automated calibration array and observed a starry sky several times vaster than anything he had ever seen; the recording devices of the new age had chattered beside him, spitting out real-time parameters from other observation posts; greetings from the imperial capital had come through the communication terminal... When an entire era came crashing in at once, he had been just as excited as he was today.

In all fairness, his resistance to the conjecture itself in that awkwardly worded, grammatically infantile paper was not as strong as he had made it appear. Though the content of the conjecture was absurd beyond belief and gravely violated the common understanding of this world, as an old scholar who had spent most of his life exploring the mysteries of magic, he knew that many "truths" in this world ran counter to people's intuitive perception. But then again—understanding was understanding; that "Unified Fluctuation Conjecture" was simply too outrageous, especially its "theoretical support" section, which was downright unacceptable to a rigorous and traditional scholar like Morgan.

To make such a bold hypothesis about the cornerstone of the entire world on the strength of an extended interpretation of the nature of magical fluctuations alone, on guesses about a few phenomena alone, on a single "observation result" that no one else could reproduce and that had left no trace in any record—though the conjecture ultimately achieved internal consistency, Morgan did not accept many of its premises.

Not even if the person who proposed it was named "Mирмина"—and not even with His Imperial Majesty's name thrown in.

"So it seems you don't intend to duel me after all," Benjamin said, watching his old friend's sudden surge of fighting spirit, unable to keep a smile from his face. He drained the last of the now-cold tea in his cup, then glanced down again at the journal spread open on the table, the corner of his mouth still twitching despite himself. Clearly this thing was still not easy for him to accept, but he did not have Morgan's urge to immediately draft a rebuttal and publish it. He merely shook his head and rose from his chair. "This thing makes my head spin... You stay here and keep studying it. I'm going to go adjust my head over by the lens array."

"I'll come with you—the contents of this article won't be studied through in a moment," Morgan said, rising as well. "The observation conditions have been excellent these past two days. We can finish the re-measurement of the sixteen dark-III stars around the Frostsky Constellation. The materials we brought out of Saint Sunil are all far too ancient; correcting every omission and error in them is no simple task..."

The two master astrologers walked toward the "focus platform" at the center of the circular hall, conversing as they went—but just then, an assistant stationed beside the focus platform suddenly ran toward them of his own accord, a look of tension and confusion on the young man's face: "Masters, come quickly and look—the image has suddenly gone abnormal!"

Benjamin and Morgan exchanged a glance by instinct, then hurried after the assistant to the focus platform—

This so-called focus platform was in fact the terminal observation apparatus of the observatory's main lens assembly: a perfectly circular platform about three meters in diameter set on the ground, with a piece of artificial crystal, precisely ground and magically calibrated, inlaid in the floor at its center. A special alchemical solution had been infused into the crystal, allowing it to resonate with the lens assembly directly overhead and the rune array floating above the observatory, accurately projecting the starry sky observed by the main lens onto the crystal's surface. And through the control devices around the platform, the image projected within the crystal could be zoomed, recorded, or switched to mana-sight.

In essence, this observation apparatus was little different in function and principle from the magical devices once used by the royal observatory of Saint Sunil, but precision and efficiency in modern craftsmanship had given both the mechanically driven lens assembly and the focus crystal powered by the mana net stability and room for improvement far beyond the past. To Morgan, this thing was far more usable than the old antiques he had used in the old royal capital back in the day.

He came to the edge of the platform and looked at the focus crystal inlaid at its center, protected beneath a layer of transparent casing. His assistant stood at the control terminal to one side, adjusting the vast, precise, complex apparatus on the observatory's upper level. Amid the sound of machinery in motion and the hum of mana flowing through the mana-conducting structures, the old mage saw dark ripples spread across the surface of the focus crystal; the ripples gradually settled into the appearance of the night sky, and pinpricks of light appeared within that black curtain—yet around every star could be seen faint, elusive blue phantom glows, and the entire backdrop of the sky seemed covered in fine but irritating dim lines like strands of hair.

"It suddenly turned like this just now," another assistant said nervously. "Burke and I were adjusting the projection arm of the mana filter, trying to overlay the filter onto the main lens assembly. We've coordinated like this many times and it's never gone wrong—it didn't go wrong this time either. The system is completely normal, all the mechanical arms are at their prescribed positions and angles, the rune array reports no errors, and yet the image suddenly turned like this—no matter how we adjust it, nothing works..."

"You didn't touch the main lens? No mechanical impact or even the slightest scrape?" Benjamin asked with a frown, his expression very stern.

"No, we're certain of that," the assistant said hastily. "In fact, the image was still normal for several seconds after the system adjustment was in place, and then no one touched it, and it suddenly turned like this..."

"Strange..." Benjamin's brow was tightly knit. He turned to Morgan. "I've never seen a fault like this before. If the lens assembly were damaged, the defects in the image shouldn't be spread evenly across the entire crystal. If it were a fault in the non-physical filter, the rune array should have raised an alarm... Should we go up to the dome and check?"

Morgan had been frowning and silent all this while, and only when Benjamin finished speaking did the old mage lift his head thoughtfully toward the roof of the observatory, which stood open. Then he gave a light stamp of his foot, and his whole body rose into the air, flying toward that vast lens apparatus.

In but a moment the old mage had flown outside the roof. He floated in the cold night sky, his gaze sharply sweeping over the lenses, crystals, and rune substrates supported by the mechanical arms, and the semi-transparent barrier covering the entire set of equipment. Soon Benjamin flew out of the observatory as well, hovering in midair beside Morgan.

"Well? Have you spotted the problem?" Benjamin asked, studying the apparatus below.

"The lens assembly is fine," Morgan said in a low voice, then slowly raised his head to look at the sky. In the clear, deep curtain of night, the stars were twinkling. "The sky is the problem."