The so-called Ten Essences were the length, width, height, time, and spiritual attributes—coordinates—of things in reality, along with their opposites in the spiritual universe.
Vaughn did not know this theory in great depth. Although the Ten Essences theory's division into positive and negative, yin and yang, was quite inventive, it imposed hypothetical, rule-like and personified definitions upon the essences themselves.
For example, they stipulated that if one essence represented light, darkness must inevitably be born alongside it.
If one essence was life, then death must inevitably be born as well.
Vaughn had once guessed that the theory's creator might have been Muggle-born, too deeply influenced by the intense religious atmosphere of the Middle Ages, turning academic research into some sort of mysticism game.
But now—
Sure enough, Dumbledore said, "In fact, the Ten Essences theory was born after the Golden Soul Theory—just as I said, creating a god capable of encompassing the universe was fundamentally impossible for Earth, for humanity as tiny as dust."
"I don't know the exact time. It was far too long before my day, and I only heard Nicolas mention it. One day, a legendary alchemist proposed that, since we could not create a cosmic, omniscient, omnipotent god, why not split apart the concepts it represented?"
"Starting from the nature of the universe and using the material world as a foundation, we could subdivide it into rules. Each rule would correspond to an authority, each authority to a god. Why not first create a group of lesser gods with a high degree of correlation to one another? Once they were born, we could find a way to merge them together. Heh—what arrogant, admirable, enviable predecessors!"
By this point, Vaughn had recovered from his earlier shock.
Feeling the coldness continuously welling up from deep within his mind,