LIGHTNOVELWORLD Chapter 65
T/N: Chapter was cut halfway, completed and edited 10/31/24.
Late night.
The moon had risen to the middle of the night sky.
At a time when one would normally be enjoying tea time in a cozy room…
“……Huah.”
Eva Torricelli was still in the laboratory.
Not just her. Her senior lab mate, Johannes Born, and peer, Eugene Oslo, were both still there too, scribbling with pencils without heading home.
The reason was simple.
It was due to Professor Müller’s special assignment.
The moonlight falling into the lab seemed pitiful.
Thwoop.
The pencil that slipped from her right hand rolled across the desk, but she had no desire to pick it up again.
Her fingertips ached from holding the pencil.
It was understandable, having continuously scribbled equations for six or seven hours.
She was reaching her limit of endurance.
The late winter chill felt like it was slowly eating away at her whole body.
Unlike studying for exams, this was labor. Moreover, being extra careful not to disappoint Professor Müller made the mental drain twice as severe.
Just then, Johannes was also sipping coffee with a blank look.
Eva decided to risk being rude.
“Senior Born.”
“Hmm, what?”
“…May I ask when we might be able to go home?”
A question that could prompt a lecture from someone sensitive – a fresh junior asking about going home when even a senior with years of experience was struggling.
However, Johannes Born had quite a gentle personality, and Eva’s appearance was far more haggard than she herself imagined.
Johannes answered concisely.
“Sorry. Not today, I think. We’ve only finished about 30% so far.”
“I see…”
“Ah, but I’m not saying we have to pull an all-nighter! Don’t misunderstand! Just let me know whenever you want to rest your eyes.”
Though she wanted to nod right away, Eva’s lips wouldn’t move.
About an hour ago, she had seen Johannes lay down two old blankets he’d found somewhere, doubling them up near the window as a makeshift bed.
The Torricelli family was wealthy. To Eva, who had grown up accustomed to soft beds and warm blankets, that setup was practically homeless living…
“…I’ll work hard.”
“Thanks. Really.”
She finally picked up her pencil again.
A cool silence settled over the laboratory.
The only sounds were papers rustling and the scratching of writing, coming from three sources including herself.
While two sources would occasionally pause, one maintained steady noise without interruption.
Eva glanced sideways at the seat to her left with just her eyes.
Eugene was there.
“…”
It was astounding.
While it’s a universal truth that everything in the world changes and evolves, could this man be the exception?
At a glance, Eugene’s appearance hadn’t changed at all compared to three hours ago.
Except for occasionally asking Johannes questions, everything remained constant – his posture, the speed at which he wrote equations, even his eyes that seemed to emit their own light.
Eva narrowed her eyes.
Being human, he must feel fatigued.
Far from rubbing his eyes, he would occasionally smirk – rather than enduring fatigue, it seemed more convincing to conclude he simply wasn’t human.
“…Hah.”
While Eugene hadn’t recognized Eva…
Eva knew Eugene well.
No, it would have been impossible not to know him.
After all, that gray-haired man was the one who had given Eva the most humiliation during her three years as an undergraduate.
If Eugene Oslo was famous for entering and graduating as valedictorian, Eva Torricelli was famous for being the eternal salutatorian.
Even in the entrance exam, she only placed 4th because of that rogue Werner Ross Diemann.
Of course, that rogue would ace all the classes he found interesting while skipping even attendance in ones he didn’t care for.
She could quickly surpass the existing second place, but Eugene Oslo was different.
She could pride herself on the fact that her skills weren’t inferior.
However, Eva had never managed to surpass him.
Not even until graduation.
“What makes him different…”
“Sorry, I didn’t catch that. Did you say something?”
“Ah, n-no. Just thinking about equations.”
In the end, even her muttering leaked out. It was evidence that her drowsiness had reached her chin.
After shooting Eugene a resentful glance, she focused back on calculations.
Of course, there was no way she could concentrate, and Eva spent time repeatedly passing out and waking up.
Tick. Tock.
When the wall pendulum clock struck three in the morning…
Screech—!
“Hup—”
Eva suddenly came to her senses at the loud noise and hurriedly wiped the drool that had leaked from her mouth.
She had gone from drowsing to completely sprawled out sleeping.
They probably didn’t see, right?
They must not have. Look, even the senior is half-asleep.
Firmly believing this, Eva glanced to her left and…
“Ah.”
Made direct eye contact with Eugene, who had stood up from his seat.
Her whole body froze.
As her face was turning red, forgetting even her fatigue, Eugene briefly checked on Johannes who was sleeping face-down, then strode toward Eva.
Eva’s body trembled.
She was perplexed.
Why was he suddenly acting like this in the dead of night after staying still all this time?
And after checking that the senior was asleep?
Thousands of wild thoughts flashed through Eva’s mind, making her even more flustered.
“Ah, no.”
Eva hugged herself with her arms and shook her head, but Eugene showed no sign of stopping.
Right. To be honest…
She had her eye on him since the day of the entrance exam.
Resentment from losing the valedictorian position had suppressed her romantic feelings, and she had long given up, as somehow, whenever she tried to approach, she felt someone’s murderous gaze.
But if he approached first…
She would.
“No—”
Finally, Eugene stood right in front of her chair.
He bent slightly to meet her eyes and…
“The senior is sleeping so I’d feel bad waking him. I’m tired, so sorry, but I’m going to rest my eyes for about two hours.”
…reported to Eva’s face in an utterly businesslike tone, then brushed past her toward those blankets.
“…?”
Eva opened her tightly shut eyes.
What did he just say?
Due to her heart rate shooting through the roof, she hadn’t properly heard what he said, but it seemed he had said something about resting his eyes.
A few seconds later…
“Ah, aaaah…”
Eva’s face burned hot with embarrassment that welled up.
She wanted to protest something and whirled around, but no words came to mind.
Eva rolled her eyes and fumbled with her lips, but…
She saw it.
Eugene laid himself down on the blankets that Johannes had laid out on the bare floor.
“He’s already lying down?”
She muttered just loud enough for herself to hear.
He’s really going to sleep there? It’s practically like he’s homeless…
Eva, still hugging herself, tried to process this situation. But Eugene closing his eyes was faster than that.
His breathing changed in less than 10 seconds.
It changed from faint breaths to something like “snoring.”
After doubting her eyes for a while, Eva finally loosened her arms.
That guy, he’s sleeping.
He’s sleeping with an extremely peaceful expression.
“…He really is sleeping.”
#March 6th. Slightly cloudy.
“Mmm…”
Eva opened her eyes.
Given how stiff her whole body felt, she must have fallen asleep face-down on the desk without realizing it. For quite a while too.
Dawn was breaking outside the window.
While she was blankly staring at that daylight which somehow felt fresh, Eva noticed that the chilly cold had somehow subsided.
It was too early for the dawn light to have warmed things up.
The reason became apparent quickly.
A blanket.
The same kind Johannes had laid on the floor, but at least this one looked as clean as new, not like it had been rolling around somewhere – it was covering Eva.
The makeshift bed by the window was empty.
Was this blanket given to her by Eugene Oslo?
For her sake?
However, that misunderstanding was resolved the moment Eva sat up. Johannes too was sleeping covered by a blanket.
“…”
Eva’s features formed a thoroughly expressionless look.
Looking at the seat next to her, Eugene, who must have regained consciousness at some point, was also scribbling with a pencil while wrapped in a blanket.
Moreover, it wasn’t the old blanket from the lab but his own blanket with cute patterns on it. Crazy guy.
Even Eugene couldn’t ignore the piercing gaze flying at him from the side.
He looked at Eva.
“…Do you have something to say?”
“No. Ah, thanks for the blanket.”
‘The’?
Eugene tilted his head briefly before quietly nodding.
He looked much more energetic than herself who had just woken up from sleep.
“…”
Johannes was in deep sleep. After confirming this, Eva spoke.
“Eugene.”
“Yes.”
“How can you concentrate like that?”
“Well, through physical training.”
“There must be something beyond mere physical strength or perseverance that you have.”
Eva clenched her fist.
“Something that lets you be so passionate even about headache-inducing calculations, I want to know what that something is.”
“Before that.”
“Yes?”
“About how to address you… um. Miss Torricelli.”
Eugene put down his pen and looked directly at Eva.
“Was what we’re doing now ‘headache-inducing calculations’?”
“What do you mean?”
“Look at the notes Professor Müller gave us. Four-dimensional spacetime, imagine that. Professor Minkowski’s idea is groundbreaking, and then he immediately connected that idea to his own theory and wrote down a series of new ideas… At least to me, this isn’t just tedious calculation work.”
“But it’s just equations without any explanation.”
“Equations inherently contain meaning, don’t they?”
He carefully stood up from his seat.
This time Eva didn’t panic either. Because he headed straight for the chalkboard on one wall of the lab.
Eugene picked up white chalk and began writing quietly so as not to wake Johannes.
[ ∇ ⋅ E = ρ/ε₀ ]
[ ∇ ⋅ B = 0 ]
[ ∇×E = -∂B/∂t ]
[ ∇×B = μ₀j + μ₀ε₀ ∂E/∂t ]
Equations made up of two curls (∇×) and divergences (∇ ⋅). *1
The foundation of polarity magic studies.
They spoke in whispers.
“What are these?”
“…Are you making fun of me? They’re the Müller-Oslo equations. *1“
“Yes. They’re just equations. However.”
Eugene continued writing. Joint operations that just modified the existing equations.
After various intermediate steps, Eugene finally underlined something.
[ v = 1 / √μ₀ε₀ ] *2
“Benjamin Oslo transformed this into a wave equation form and found its velocity. You know this, right?”
Eva nodded. It was something she had learned.
“The speed of light.”
“Yes. It matches the measured speed of light with high accuracy. The notion that light might be a combination of two different magic waves – such an absurd idea was hidden in the equations.”
“B-But. Isn’t that just a special case?”
“No. Look at what we’re solving right now.”
Eugene went to his desk and picked up some papers.
“Four-dimensional spacetime, this concept was significantly influenced by the Müller transformation that Professor Klaus Müller devised a few years ago.”
“Are you saying that equation has meaning too?”
“Yes.”
The Müller transformation. *3
Currently one of the biggest concerns in the academe – the gap between classical magic and polarity magic. It was created to forcibly bridge that gap.
Everyone in this lab knew.
That the Müller transformation was created just to resolve contradictions, and even Professor Müller himself had never published its meaning.
However, Eugene whispered with a slight smile.
“There’s definitely meaning there. And I’m going to uncover that meaning.”
“…”
“The moment you think that way, this is no longer tedious work. It becomes unbearably exciting research.”
For a moment, Eva had to wonder if he had gone mad.
However.
The smile on his lips proved that everything he said was true.
“And, I think there’s some misunderstanding.”
“Eh?”
“I don’t concentrate that hard. I secretly goof off. When you thought I was being passionate and such, I was probably in the middle of getting distracted.”
Eva’s eyes widened.
Look at that sheepish smile.
She had to admit it.
He was already a proper scholar.
Eva let out a chuckle and relaxed, leaning back in her chair.
“Alright. When you put it that way, I’m curious about this ‘goofing off’.”
“Ah.”
“What exactly were you doing?”
Instead of answering, Eugene picked up a paper from his desk.
It had more of Eugene’s notes than printed ink.
Eva asked.
“What’s that?”
“Planck’s paper, ‘On the Theory of the Law of Energy Distribution in the Spectrum.'” *4
There is a peculiar phenomenon.
Sometimes when light is shone on metallic substances, particles with negative polarity fly out.
While the name of these particles is still under discussion, for now, they’re called magic corpuscles following the discoverer Thomson’s wishes.
The name isn’t important.
What’s important is that no one can explain this phenomenon.
Despite many magic scholars pondering its principles, no satisfactory explanation of the mechanism has been achieved, and it remains a mystery.
For now.
T/N (Added 10/31/24)
Enter the parallel to Maxwell’s equations! I mentioned these at the very beginning and I mentioned how they form the foundation of classical electromagnetics. Now that they’ve been formally introduced, I’ll go a bit deeper into the discussion. Here are some terms and definitions you need to know first:
E represents an electric field and B represents a magnetic field.
The nabla operator (∇) is simply the sum of the partial derivatives of each component (say Fx, Fy, Fz) with respect to that component (x, y, z).
The curl of a vector F is ∇×F while the divergence of F is ∇ ⋅ F. The divergence of a field shows how it behaves towards or away from a point, while its curl measures its “spinningness” or its rotational extent.
The constant εo (8.85 x 10-12 F/m) is the permittivity of free space while μ₀ (4π x 10-7 H/m) is the magnetic permeability in free space.
1 continued:
Here’s a summarized discussion of Maxwell’s equations courtesy of Claude.
1. [ ∇ ⋅ E = ρ/ε₀ ] – Gauss’s Law for Electric Fields
This is the divergence of the electric field. In point form, it states that:
The divergence (∇ ⋅) of the electric field (E) at any point equals the charge density (ρ) divided by the electric permittivity of free space (ε₀)
Physically: Electric field lines originate from positive charges and terminate on negative charges
The divergence measures the “outward flow” of the field from a point
Positive charges act as sources (positive divergence)
Negative charges act as sinks (negative divergence)
2. [ ∇ ⋅ B = 0 ] – Gauss’s Law for Magnetic Fields
This is the divergence of the magnetic field. In point form:
The divergence of the magnetic field (B) is always zero
Physically: There are no magnetic monopoles
Magnetic field lines always form closed loops
They neither begin nor end at any point
Every magnetic north pole is always paired with a south pole
3. [ ∇×E = -∂B/∂t ] – Faraday’s Law
This is the curl of the electric field. In point form:
The curl (∇×) of the electric field equals the negative time rate of change of the magnetic field
Physically: A changing magnetic field creates an electric field
The direction of the induced electric field creates a current opposing the change (Lenz’s Law)
This is the principle behind electromagnetic induction
4. [ ∇×B = μ₀j + μ₀ε₀ ∂E/∂t ] – Ampère-Maxwell Law
This is the curl of the magnetic field. In point form:
The curl of B equals the sum of:
Current density (j) multiplied by permeability (μ₀)
Time rate of change of electric field (∂E/∂t) multiplied by μ₀ε₀
Physically: Magnetic fields are created by:
Electric currents (μ₀j term)
Changing electric fields (displacement current term μ₀ε₀ ∂E/∂t)
To clarify why the 4th Maxwell equation is called so, Ampère’s law only contained the term μ₀ j on the right-hand side. However, Maxwell’s addition, taking displacement current into account, proved more accurate.
From Maxwell’s equations, this formula can be derived. It implies that all electromagnetic waves travel at the speed of light.
The Müller transformation will be mentioned later on, somewhere around Chapter 88. It will be explained more in detail then.
This paper by Planck is where he determines what we now know as Planck’s constant (h = 6.62607015 × 10-34 J⋅Hz-1). I won’t spoil how or why it is relevant but know that it is a proportionality constant between the kinetic energy of photoelectrons and the frequency of the incident light. Does that ring a bell?