Commission Request Letter

A few hours earlier, in Griffin Town in the western part of the kingdom.

Hans was the editor-in-chief of Monthly Alchemist Griffin. The journal had such an unusual name entirely because, when he founded it, Hans had been obsessed with a publication called Monthly Witch Nozaki. In a moment of impulse, he registered the name. By the time he regretted it, it was too late.

Burdened with such an unserious name, the journal's fortunes had not gone smoothly either. Sales could not improve, and submissions were few and far between. Whenever publication day approached, Hans had to rack his brains to persuade people to write articles and fill enough pages. It was exhausting.

It was only the middle of the month, so Hans did not need to panic yet. Still, there were only three genuinely new papers suitable for publication this month. Most of the rest were replication papers. Such papers often merely used a different substance to conduct the same experiment, carrying no innovative value at all—just repetitive work.

"Ugh."

Just as Hans let out a long sigh and felt he had exhausted every option, the transmission array on his desk flickered. A paper appeared there, accompanied by a note.

"Huh, what's this?"

Hans picked up the paper first. Its title was long, but quite clear.

<Discussion of the Special Gas Produced in Limestone Heating Experiments and Several Issues with Traditional Combustion Theory>.

The moment he saw the title, Hans felt his heart stir. He could sense that there was something extraordinary behind it.

He picked up the note again, and the familiar handwriting made him smile.

"That guy really says one thing and means another."

The note was brief. It asked Hans to send the author a commission request letter after reading the paper. Yet the sender was Angre, the friend who had not supported Hans's decision to start an academic journal back then.

Though he always said that running a journal was a dead end, whenever Hans fell into deadline hell, Angre would always send over a paper just in time to save him. The two had developed a certain tacit understanding.

"Angre seems to have been serving as a review committee member recently. Does that mean he reviewed this paper?"

With that question in mind, Hans opened the paper.

Many years later, when Hans was interviewed and asked how he had felt upon first seeing that paper, he could still vividly recall the shock he had felt that leisurely afternoon—a shock no less profound than when he had first encountered magic.

Time passed quickly. An hour later, Hans closed the paper. He did not conduct a verification experiment, because Angre's note was the best proof.

If Angre had not personally verified it, he would never have recommended the paper to Hans.

"So the author is Rainer Ian Gray?"

Hans was a little dumbfounded. Wasn't the Ian Gray family absurdly wealthy? Why would someone from that family be doing academic research?

Setting aside that question, Hans found the contact address at the end of the paper.

"Crescent Academy? Isn't that a girls' magic school in a nearby province? Strange, don't they never admit boys?"

Hans instinctively assumed that Rainer was a student at Crescent Academy. He still remembered that during his own student days, Crescent Academy had been a fairly well-known magic school. However, it was famous not for the quality of its teaching, but because it admitted only girls. Everyone there, including the teachers, headmistress, and even dormitory supervisors, was female. It had become the object of countless boys' fantasies.

He admitted that in his ignorant student days, he had also imagined arriving at Crescent Academy for some special reason and becoming its only male student, surrounded by beautiful women as he rose to the pinnacle of life.

Shaking his head, Hans hurriedly found a sheet of parchment, picked up a quill, and began writing the commission request letter. He then handed it to an owl for delivery. If all went well, it should reach Crescent Academy by this evening.

"I can only hope no one else has noticed this paper yet."

Hans muttered to himself as he watched the departing owl gradually vanish beyond the horizon in the slanting afternoon sun.

While Hans's owl was still soaring through the sky toward Crescent Academy, Garon sat in his office at the Tower of Rainbow, a thousand miles away, seemingly waiting for something.

Knock, knock, knock—

A knock sounded at the door, followed by the entrance of a somewhat frail old man.

The old man had sparse hair, but his eyes were as sharp as an eagle's. He wore loose mage robes, with six golden bands gleaming at his cuffs—the mark of a six-ring mage.

A six-ring mage was already at the peak of mid-tier mages. Beyond that were the high-tier mages worthy of being called "Your Excellency."

"Garon, where's the paper?"

Without even greeting him, the man asked directly.

"Here it is, Professor Fleming."

Garon hurriedly stood up and gave up his seat, respectfully handing the paper to the old man.

The old man called Fleming sat down and opened the paper.

Garon was somewhat nervous, his palms sweating. He was worried that his teacher might suffer magical backlash. After all, Fleming was a master in Alchemy and had achieved a great deal under Master Hohenheim's theories. He should have been someone who firmly believed in modern Alchemy theory. Garon had no idea how he would react to such a paper.

Yet Fleming was far calmer than Garon had expected. After reaching the final page, the old mage let out a long breath and asked,

"You've already conducted verification experiments and confirmed that it's correct?"

"Yes, Professor, but I don't know whether this is—"

Before Garon could finish, Fleming raised a hand to interrupt him.

"In fact, several of us have been investigating this issue for some time."

Fleming's words stunned Garon.

Had his teacher been trying to overturn Combustion Theory all along?

"Your Excellency Hohenheim's Fire Element combustion theory is certainly great, but it cannot explain many problems. For that reason, several of us at Mercury Plain have proposed many conjectures and hypotheses, but none have been proven."

Fleming spoke calmly.

"For example, the increase in mass after combustion. We currently believe that Fire Elements possess negative mass, so when an object loses Fire Elements, its mass increases instead."

Glancing at the paper, Fleming continued his explanation.

"Like the experiment in this paper, combustion actually absorbs Fire Elements into the Limestone. That is why the Limestone's mass decreases after it becomes Quicklime. As for that extra special gas, it should be air that has lost its Fire Elements. That is why it prevents combustion. We will publish a paper on this theory in this issue of Alchemy. It is perfectly normal that this author was unaware of it."

"I see. Professor, you truly are brilliant."

Upon hearing Fleming's explanation, Garon immediately felt enlightened. The dark clouds that had hung over his head vanished at once.

Only Fleming glanced once more at the paper's author and frowned slightly.