Expensive Journals

Naturally, Rainer had no idea Charlotte was praising him in her heart. He checked Charlotte's work progress again, told her to mind her rest, then returned to his principal's office. Claire was already waiting for him there.

"These are the latest issues of Alchemy, Truth, and Tower of Rainbow Observer Monthly..."

Claire read out a long string of names against the catalog in her hand, then added at the end.

"Of course, there's also Monthly Alchemist Griffin. Their editorial department sent that to you for free."

She pointed at the thick stack of books on the desk. These were all top-tier academic journals, and purchasing them alone had cost nearly fifty gold coins, which made Claire's heart ache badly.

Journals published in the current issue were the most expensive. After several issues had passed, their selling price would drop due to timeliness, clearing inventory, and other reasons. So, to save costs, many schools chose to delay purchasing journals by a few months. For example, over the past fifty years, Crescent Academy had always maintained the pace of buying these journals one year late.

On the one hand, not every school had a need for the most cutting-edge magic research. Many schools that emphasized basic education only aimed to cultivate First-Circle Mages, or even simply to popularize common magical knowledge among nobles. Academic journals were not a necessity for them.

On the other hand, these academic journals were truly expensive. Take the most comprehensive Truth, for instance. One current issue of Truth required two gold coins. On the continent, one standard-minted gold coin could be exchanged for one hundred silver coins, and one silver coin could likewise be exchanged for one hundred copper coins. Simply put, one copy of Truth was worth six thousand bottles of cola.

In this world where knowledge represented power, intellectual property could be said to be the highest-valued form of rights.

Fortunately, Rainer had already earned quite a bit of money from cola over the past two weeks. For the research that came next, this kind of expenditure was necessary.

"Thank you."

Rainer said to Claire. This director of teaching had already changed out of her maid outfit and put that shabby robe back on, which truly made Rainer feel a faint sense of regret.

"Will things be all right with the cola?"

Claire already knew about the theft at Antoine Alchemy Workshop and was somewhat worried now. Pilam was, after all, powerful and wealthy, and he had no scruples. It was hard to guarantee he wouldn't do something over the line.

"The bait has already been cast. Now it just depends on whether that big fish bites."

With a smile, Rainer looked at the journals in front of him.

"Teacher Claire, could you help me pour a cup of coffee?"

"I'm not a maid!"

Claire puffed up her cheeks and said, but when she saw that Rainer had already opened an academic journal on his own, she could only sigh and go fiddle with the coffee beans and hot water.

Rainer had already thrown himself into studying.

He had always brooded over that line in his paper's review comments about his lack of understanding of frontier knowledge. It made Rainer begin to doubt himself a little.

Ultimately, this was a world with magic. Although judging by experimental phenomena, most physical laws were no different from those on Earth, Rainer still did not dare to casually nail his own understanding down as absolute. If he encountered some unexpected situation in the future, maybe his head really would explode.

Rainer now decided to verify his knowledge bit by bit from the beginning, while carefully constructing his worldview to avoid accidents.

First, Rainer opened Alchemy and scanned the table of contents.

"Several Speculations and Verification Processes Regarding the Arrangement Order of Elements"—Lanchester Stanien, Legendary Mage.

"Properties of the New Element 'Gemuier' and Its Compounds"—Maria Einstein, Seventh-Circle Mage.

"Properties of the New Element 'Kaila' Obtained by Electrolyzing Caustic Alkali and Its Compounds; A Discussion on the Application of Electrolysis"—Cornwall Penzance, Seventh-Circle Mage.

Without a doubt, the mainstream of the alchemy field at this time was the search for new elements. Mages used all kinds of methods to break down substances. Some succeeded, while others failed.

"But electrolysis?"

Rainer looked at that paper. In Earth's history of chemistry, electrolysis was an important discovery. Since many elements were chemically active and easily reacted with other substances, their true appearances had long been difficult to glimpse. Only when scientists used electricity to decompose substances did they discover these mischievous elements.

Of course, hydrogen and the alkali metals were among them.

Although hydrogen was not discovered through electrolysis, electrolyzing water remained one of the chemical experiments people were most familiar with. Its chemical reaction equation could be counted as one of the earliest reaction equations most people encountered.

Rainer quickly finished reading that paper. The new element "Kaila" obtained inside should be some kind of alkali metal, sodium-like or potassium-like. Clearly, because of long-held understanding that water was a basic element, that high-ranking mage had not attempted to electrolyze water.

"Or perhaps electrolyzing water can't produce normal results?"

Rainer wrote his thoughts down in his notebook and decided to prepare the related experiment when he had time recently. Since someone had already proposed electrolysis, then the decomposition of water was already imminent.

"Here."

Just as Rainer was thinking, Claire had already brought over a cup of coffee.

This girl says no with her mouth, but her body is pretty honest.

Rainer thought it out of nowhere, then thanked her and took a sip of the warm liquid.

The coffee's temperature was just right, and the amount of sugar added was also exactly what Rainer liked most. It seemed that the previous week of maid life had already let Claire grasp Rainer's tastes.

"Your coffee-making skills are getting better and better, Teacher Claire."

Rainer said with a smile, making Claire's face flush red. She stamped her foot, then left the principal's office without looking back.

Shaking his head helplessly, Rainer looked at the table of contents again. The title of one paper caught his attention.

"Several Discussions and Speculations on the Properties of the Fire Element in Combustion Reactions."—Fleming Ernst, Sixth-Circle Mage.

Could this paper about combustion reactions be the "frontier theory" mentioned in the review comments?

With curiosity in his heart, Rainer flipped to the page where this paper was.

In the paper, the author first displayed several combustion experiments and raised questions about the mass issues that appeared within them. The process was clear, the logic distinct. Even Rainer found it pleasing to read.

"It seems the mages have also realized the incompleteness of Combustion Theory and are attempting to solve it. My paper is only the tip of the iceberg among them."

Rainer mocked himself, then continued reading.

The author quickly proposed a conjecture: the fire element possessed negative mass. In other words, the more fire element a substance contained, the smaller its mass. He applied this theory to the previous experiments and perfectly explained the phenomena of mass change that appeared in them.

"This explanation somehow feels hard to find convincing."

Rainer muttered to himself. Setting aside whether the fire element existed, the concept of negative mass was extremely suspicious. If negative mass really existed, then why did the fire element possess this property? Were there other substances that had such negative mass? Why would negative mass arise?

The proposal of this concept came with a whole series of questions, but the author of the paper answered none of them.

By the time he finished reading all the journals, it was already late at night. Rainer simply ate the dinner Mrs. Freya had prepared, then went to bed early to rest.

Because starting tomorrow, he would begin designing experiments.