In the evening, at the dining room in Prince William's palace.
On the long dining table, a candle flickered, and the entire house looked very dim.
Prince William sat quietly at one end of the table, seemingly waiting for someone.
The door opened and a figure sneaked into the room. Due to the dim lights, the visitor's face was undefined, but one could tell that he was a handsome young man from his profile.
"Your Highness." The man walked in and greeted William quickly and respectfully.
William signaled to him with his hand not to stand on ceremony and said softly, "Take a seat. I have been waiting for you."
According to etiquette, the visitor should sit at the other end of the dining table. However, William moved to the seat right next to him.
The visitor was taken aback for a moment, and then he sat down next to William fearfully.
William clapped his hands, and a servant immediately walked into the dining room. She placed the prepared food, which was rather simple, on the table. There was white bread, pork chops, cooled roasted hare, mushroom soup and ale.
The two began to eat. The entire meal progressed in silence, the atmosphere stiff.
William didn't say a word. He just focused on eating, as if it required 100% of his concentration. Regardless of the taste of the food, he carefully chewed before swallowing.
The visitor beside him was somewhat nervous. Although he was eating the food according to the standard etiquette of aristocrats, he was extremely slow. He cut a pork chop into many pieces before putting it into his mouth, piece by piece. Under the oppressive atmosphere, perspiration was oozing from his face.
Suddenly, William seemed to have thought of something. He gently put down the knife and fork in his hands, making a soft clang, and turned to the young man beside him.
Gulp. The man quickly swallowed all the food in his mouth. He also put down his dining knife quickly before meeting William's gaze.
"Your Highness."
"Yes," William said. "You know my brother very well, right?"
"His Highness' younger brother, His Highness Richard? O- of course I know him well," said the man cautiously.
"What do you think of my younger brother?"
"Eeh…" The man hesitated and pondered for a while. After organizing his thoughts, he said, "As far as I know, His Highness is very smart but very eccentric. He is always studying something about wizards or carrying out experiments. In short, he seems completely different from Your Highness."
"Indeed." William nodded and his eyes flickered. "Richard… Well, my brother is really smart but weird. In fact, he has been like this since he was a child.
"You must know that I am two years older than him, but I'm sure you don't know that he could already speak fluently and communicate with other people when I was three. And he was one.
The man put on a surprised expression.
"Of course, I didn't know about it either. After all, who can remember what happened when they were a child? My father told me this. My father also told me that my younger brother behaved very strangely when he was young. For example, he never cried. Of course, he never laughed either. He didn't behave like a child. It was as if someone else's soul had hidden in that small body of his.
"He picked up reading very quickly, and the teacher in the palace could no longer teach him when he was six years old. After that, the library was the place he visited the most. According to the librarian, he read a lot faster than ordinary people. While others read, he merely flipped through the pages. Most importantly, he could remember what he read very clearly. I remember that when I was 10 and he was eight years old, my father tested us and… do you know what the results were?
William looked at the man, who shook his head quizzically.
There was a perplexed flash in William's eyes. "I didn't even have a chance to think during the test. Basically, he answered even before my father could finish asking the question. In the end, my father asked him how to become a good king. In hindsight, I wonder if Father would have made him crown prince if he had given him a satisfactory answer then. But can you guess his response?
The man shook his head again.
"He said…" William had a complicated smile on his face. "He said that he could not bother to answer this question. He said being a king was a very troublesome thing, and that he had more important things to do. He didn't care about being king.
The man didn't know what to say.
William shook his head and muttered to himself, "Can you imagine how I felt then? Well, surprised, as well as afraid. Because I suddenly realized that this younger brother was much more formidable than me. If he set his heart on something, he would definitely do it better than me. But he didn't want to do it, as if he already knew the outcome in advance.
"My brother is such an eccentric man and prince. In particular after Father tested him, he became even weirder. He began doing experiments, researching wizards, and making all kinds of scary things. For example, acids that could easily corrode sharp iron swords, or stones that could cause large explosions when thrown into water.
"No one knew what he wanted to do, nor what his purpose was. In the end, my father was somewhat afraid of him, and that is why that misunderstanding three years ago happened.
At the end of the conversation, William sighed softly and looked at the man beside him. He said, "I called you here because I want to be a good brother, and I want to ensure his safety. No matter what he does, follow his wishes so long as he doesn't go overboard. At the same time, I also want to be a good king and protect this kingdom well."
"So…" William looked serious.
The man was stunned as he heard William say, "You have to do something for me. I need you to…"
The man's expression changed rapidly. After a while, his gaze was firm, and he said, "Yes!"
Night time, at Richard's palace.
Richard was reading The Writings of Monroe in his bedroom. His eyes sparked often, and he occasionally took on a thoughtful expression.
Although he had successfully cast his first spell yesterday, he was not even considered a Level 1 Apprentice Wizard. There were three levels of apprenticeship: Level 1 Apprentice, Level 2 Apprentice, and Level 3 Apprentice. He would successfully become a wizard only after reaching the third level of apprenticeship and then advancing again.
He had just entered the world of wizards, it was just the beginning. The journey remained to be explored, and he had to make choices. Besides, it was obviously impossible to analyze the entire world merely with the help of one wizard book. He had to acquire more knowledge about wizards, and he also had to interact with real wizards and magical creatures in the world.
"The journey ahead will take me far away and is nearly endless, but I shall keep striving until I get to the end someday. Much remains to be done," Richard said to himself.
The road ahead was long, but Richard did not think that magic wasn't something science could completely explain. No matter how amazing the spell was, it conformed with the common rules of chemistry and physics. It was impossible for flames to freeze and ice to scorch.
And even if they did not conform with the rules of chemistry and physics, spells conformed to logic and mathematics. Spells were not a random force, the power of two spells combined had to be greater than one.
Similarly, Archimedes, one of the leading scientists in history, who was famous for his remark "give me a place to stand on, and I will move the Earth," had understood that he could use a lever to move anything, including the planet. Or as the great mathematician and a circle fanatic he was, he could have just held a big stick and killed the Roman soldier who stopped him from drawing a circle upon his death.
The unknown seemed mysterious and unpredictable, just like many things beyond our knowledge are often regarded as magic. However, everything followed a certain law, and this law was science.
Science was not something immutable. It was a way of thinking and viewing the world.
What Richard really wanted to do was to figure out everything, including the science behind this spell and why he had come to this world.
Transmigrating and conquering the world might sound good, but after achieving it, one would know how illogical it was.
If he behaved like an ostrich, as described in many novels, he would be ignoring the problem and pretending to be normal. It would mean convincing himself to assimilate into this world and live according to their ways. He could also strive to become the strongest man in this world, this was obviously one of the choices.
However, Richard didn't want this either.
In Richard's opinion, he would be no different from those man-made or artificially raised bugs in a box. He would be a bug if he did nothing, and he would still be a bug if he worked hard to become the strongest.
Richard wanted to figure out what was going on with this box, why he had gotten into it, and then leave the box.
The reason for becoming a wizard was not to use magic to destroy the world, but to understand what this latent science—which had not existed on Modern Earth—was about. He wanted to understand its core principles in order to master and apply them.
The strongest wizard was still a wizard, a bug in the box. If he could figure out all the principles and get out of the box, he would be God. This was a qualitative difference.
After all, if he remained in the box, he would never know if anything could smash the box at any time and instantly destroy this entire world.
"There is a long road ahead," Richard said to himself. "So I can't waste my time. I have to walk ahead as fast as I can."