Chapter 172: Study Helps One Progress

Translator: Kris_Liu Editor: Vermillion

Seeing that Mr. Evans was being pretty serious, Annick, Layria and Heidi all nodded, although unsure of what exactly they were going to do. However, they definitely sensed something not that good.

"Mr. Evans, since this is the first time you are reading those arcana books, we will just leave you alone right now to let you stay focused. When you have a better understanding of them, please provide us with some direction." Annick stood up and said to Lucien politely, "We can practice meditating right now."

Although Lucien was actually capable of teaching them something about science, or, using this world’s expression, arcana, right now, he decided to make the whole thing more reasonable, since it would be very queer if his instruction started immediately after he just leafed through the pages.

"Good suggestion." Lucien smiled and nodded, "Probably tomorrow around this time, I should be able to start teaching."

"Tomorrow? Wow… That’s so fast." Layria was very surprised.

"I will teach you folks tomorrow what I will have figured out by then," Lucien answered. "That’s my way of teaching. I study and then I teach the knowledge to you three, which’s also a good way of giving myself some pressure."

"That’s so nice of you, Mr. Evans," answered Heidi cheerfully.

When the three apprentices went back to their own rooms to practice meditating, Lucien picked a quiet corner to focus on his own learning.

The book Lucien was reading now was Math Principles in the Philosophy of Magic, which read quite similar to one of the most well-known works of Newton. According to its content page, the book also focused on discussing all kinds of forces in this world by using calculus, while the major different feature of the book was that, within expectation, the researches mentioned all served for the purpose of developing magic, such as solving some questions in the school of Astrology.

Then, Lucien turned the book to the preface page and started to read the words left by the author:

"… We make all the effort of conducting all kinds of researches in order to seek the ultimate answers for some abstract questions, such as: What is ‘I’? What is the essence of the world? Where does the world come from? How all the things in this world developed and integrated themselves into a beautiful system? What do ‘I’ have anything to do with the world? And that is why I decided to use the word ‘philosophy’ to name the book.

We explore the word, trying to summarize and conclude laws from common phenomena, and based on the laws, we explain, construct, and create magic.

Your friend,

Douglas"

Lucien was not at all surprised that calculus was invented in this world, since all the complicated magic structures required accurate ways of calculation.

When Lucien started to read the book carefully, a quill on the desk jumped up on its own and started writing down something on a piece of paper automatically following Lucien’s thoughts.

Lucien found that, compared with those similar books written in his original world, this book was even more systematic and clearer, and hence it was easier for Lucien to understand.

Time flew past, and when the sunlight started getting dimmer and dimmer, Lucien realized that he already skipped his lunch. He found the book very fascinating since what this masterpiece was attempting to do was connecting magic and the laws of the world together.

If it had not been because of the inadequacy of the strength of Lucien’s soul, Lucien would have been able to start a.n.a.lyzing some second or even third circle spells already after reading a few more of these books. Lucien really wished that he could learn the better meditation way mentioned by Felipe that was only accessible to high-rank mages sooner rather than later.

As he stretched his body a bit in the couch, Lucien stood up and looked around.

"Good evening, Mr. Evans," greeted some of the apprentices in awe. After all, Mr. Evans was a real sorcerer who they were supposed to show respect toward.

Lucien casually burned down the draft of his calculation and nodded, "Where I can have dinner please?"

"The dining hall, on the first floor," answered Katrina respectfully. She already saw how hard Mr. Evans worked, and she always respected people who worked hard. She wished herself would become a sorcerer soon, so she could help her parents who had been in trouble for quite a long time.

...

The dining hall on the first floor.

"Evans, I’ve heard your diligence. No wonder you are a real sorcerer already before twenty," commented Astar. "After you become a middle-rank mage, and if you have a quite good understanding in shadow and light, I will definitely consider you to become one of my research a.s.sistants."

Although Astar was saying this, he was not very serious, since even throughout the whole congress, only very few arcanists could meet his requirements right now.

Beside Astar, Mercedes was working hard on her pan-fried fish in the plate with a piece of white napkin surrounding her fluffy neck. From time to time, Mercedes would mew and brushed Astar’s arm with her tail.

Lucien smiled and nodded, "Thank you, Mr. Astar. Arcana is still very new to me, and all I can do right now is work hard."

"Although your att.i.tude is surely great," Astar changed his tone, "hard work doesn’t solve all the problems. You gotta make progress gradually, Evans. What I mean is… Math Principles in the Philosophy of Magic and calculus might be too much for you right now. I’d suggest you to start with some basic arcana books, plus The Encyclopedia of Magic Creatures."

"Actually… I’ve finished reading most of the content in Math Principles in the Philosophy of Magic, and, of course, like what you just mentioned, I will start reading Basic Geometry of Magic and Common Algebra to better direct my three apprentices tomorrow," answered Lucien in a polite tone.

In Lucien’s mind, he still had lots of questions unsolved, but he also had this feeling that these questions actually involved the ultimate secrets of the world.

When Lucien compared the two books, Basic Geometry of Magic and Common Algebra, in his spirit library earlier today, he was certain that both of them were books introducing Euclidean geometry, a.n.a.lytic geometry and equations, and the principles of the concepts were basically the same with that of the knowledge on Earth, except the fact that Euclidean geometry was called Tower geometry in this world.

However, at the same time, Lucien still found many unexplainable things if he tried to understand this world based on his knowledge, for example, soul, spiritual power, those missing stars, and the unique element named Tai. Lucien was guessing that something micro or macro in this world was quite different from his understanding.

The latest issue of Arcana, of course, had been copied and saved in Lucien’s spirit library. The thirty articles in this issue were mostly about the a.s.sorted application of complex function in different "fields", for example, how to divide the sphere of spiritual power into multiple plane fields, while a small percentage of them were about finding new elements by spectrum a.n.a.lysis. Obviously, these topics had been gaining great interest of arcanists.

Lucien was well aware of the fact that the ultimate secrets of the world were still very far from them, so he asked Astar one of his most practical questions, "Mr. Astar, I wonder if I can learn the meditation promoted by the congress in advance?"

Lucien wanted to upgrade himself, for sure.

"I think I have the right to do so, yes, as a high-rank mage." Astar smiled, "But you gotta show me your potential, so I know it’s worth breaking the rules for you."

"What do you want to see specifically, Mr. Astar?" Lucien was not surprised. He was already used to trading and bargaining.

"I know you have pretty good spiritual power potential." Astar put down his knife and fork elegantly, "If you can do a good job on directing the apprentices, or make good progress on studying arcana yourself, I can consider teaching you Brook Meditation in advance before you arrive at the congress."

"I’m quite sure I can do it." Lucien smiled confidently.

"Show me, then." Astar nodded.

...

Ten o’clock in the morning, the second day.

In his own room, Lucien said to the three apprentices with a smile on his face,

"Are you three all following me?"

Annick nodded out of excitement, "Yes! Yes, Mr. Evans! It’s much better now!"

"I feel the same way, too, Mr. Evans!" said Layria in an admiring tone, "You’re a genius, Mr. Evans!"

"It’s hard to believe that you just started studying arcana yesterday!" agreed Heidi aloud.

"Okay… Okay, I’m flattered, and thank you all." Lucien nodded with his gentle smile, "These are some exercises for enhancing understanding."

As he was saying, Lucien took out a stack test sheet and handed them to the apprentices.

Then Lucien took out Math Principles in the Philosophy of Magic and continued to read the rest of it.

As time went, Annick, Layria and Heidi looked more and more serious as they were working hard on their exercises.

When it was close to noon, Annick first stood up and said to Lucien with a relieved face, "Mr. Evans, I finished all of the questions."

"How do you feel, Annick?" asked Lucien.

"These questions are surely tough, but now I feel like my understanding of the knowledge that I learned earlier has been enhanced like you said," answered Annick, quite excitedly.

Then, both Layria and Heidi put down their quills almost at the same time and handed their works to Lucien.

And they both agreed with Annick’s feedback.

Lucien put down the book he was reading and checked the apprentices’ work. He pointed out some details that they should have put more thoughts into.

After that, the three apprentices exchanged a look between each other and then asked together, "Mr. Evans, lunch time?"

"Sure. Time to eat." Lucien smiled.

Hearing that, the three apprentices released a long sigh at the same time.

"And I got more for you three after lunch." Lucien took out another stack of work sheet, "Study helps one progress."

The three apprentices, for a second, thought that they saw an evil smile on Mr. Evans’ face.