There was a loud explosion as the whole castle shook and everyone heard it. A speck flew out of the west hall library and something had firmly lodged at the ceiling.
"To arms! Men to the west wing." The guards shouted. They had been agitated ever since their Lord had come back in a sorry state. They were on their toes expecting an attack every second and when they finally heard a blast they all formed a platoon to expunge the enemy. They rushed toward the direction of attack. They could only hope that they could suppress it in time as their Lord had yet to recover fully. Fortunately, to their relief, they were stopped by Lady Aerwyna.
"It was an accident pertaining to a magic core no need to panic. I have already dealt with the fire. There are no intruders. Return to your posts guards and don"t call for the servants. I will deal with this matter myself." Aerywna commanded.
"As you command Milady."
In the ceiling there was a firmly attached baby four months old with closed eyes, breathing heavily. He had flown from the blast he was a firmly planted with his four outstretched limbs leaving an imprint on the castle ceiling.
"EZRA I TOLD YOU NOT TO PLAY WITH THE MAGIC CORES!" Aerwyna shouted reprimanding Ezra.
"You have become such a naughty child." Aerwyna condensed her magic and summoned water this water lifted her up as she froze it making a staircase. She grabbed Ezra tenderly and smashed the hole into a round shape so that it would not be in the form of a baby. The servants would probably gossip and their secret revealed.
"I will have to spank you. So that you will learn next time"
"Are you serious, woman? I have minor injuries and I got hurt from the blast but you are still going to hurt me even further? Are parents supposed to be like this?" Ezra thought this but did not say it out loud. He did mess up that was a fact. He thought that could do some experiments with magic cores. He saw one lying around and asked his mother about it. She told him that it was fully depleted of magic but she still asked him not to touch it as it was dangerous.
As Aerwyna was reading a book and enjoying her tea. Ezra crawled toward the magic cores. At first, he studied the material it was made out of. It looked like it was an opal or something similar. It was polished but it was not cut. It possessed a very smooth and spherical surface.
"Too bad I can"t test what the exact chemical composition of this rock is. But why is this seemingly ordinary piece of rock able to gather magical power. I thought that magic was supposed to be an energy? I"m really confused now on what magic really is. It seems that it is neither matter nor energy. " Ezra thought.
As he was examining the stone, however, he tried to understand its magical properties so as a depleted magical energy source he tried to infuse the object with magic. But it suddenly reacted violently it tried to suck magical energy from Ezra. Ezra tried so hard to stop the magic flow due to the fact that he might be discovered but as he abruptly ended the magic stream, the magic core acted violently then there was the explosion. He sensed the volatility and automatically shielded his body and face with his arms in the explosion. He thought he was going to die for a moment. Luckily he had achieved an astounding level of magic control that he could already strengthen his body so that he only received minor injuries as a baby but still he was thoroughly stuck in the ceiling.
As he was punished by Aerwyna for his stubbornness. He pondered on why a blast such explosive as that did not emit fire. The explosion it seemed was not combustion but just a shock wave. There was no heat involved as well. Even though his b.u.t.t was sore from the spanking he did not cry as he pondered this while his mother lectured him on the dangers of magic cores and why the laymen were not supposed to dabble in them.
He had been learning a lot about this world through the books that were provided in the library. He was startled because of the hundreds of books in the library there were only two books that even mentioned cores and crystals and they had explained them in a most basic way. Basically, it stated that magic cores gathered magical energy while magic crystals were catalysts of expelling that energy and forming it into different things. He already knew this from the explanations of his parents so he asked Aerwyna if there were any more books on the subject because he was really interested in them. He found out that such information was only available to the Primarchs and the house of Regaledeus. Reitz, as Praetorian, did have access to the knowledge just that it was kept at the capital, Rexasticus, and only there he could be able to read about the subject. Reitz, however, was not allowed to discuss it with his family though as it was forbidden by the powers that be.
"Well, that is one stupid policy. They actually promote strength and disregard technology? What a bunch of muscle-headed idiots run this country."
After the spanking, Ezra was banned from reading books.
"Mother please don"t" stop me from reading. I want to know more about the world."
"Since you like reading books I will take it away from you for a time since you have been so naughty."
"But mother." Ezra pouted.
"You should learn next time what and what not to do. I am your mother and I only do this out of concern for you."
"How about you teach me how to write, mother? I won"t touch magic cores again I promise."
"Okay then, I shall teach you how to write but first I"ll get you a pen and paper." Aerwyna smiled at the promise of her son so she conceded to his request. She really was worried about Ezra and thought that he would lose him when the blast happened. She could not forgive her self if something happened to her son.
She brought a quill for her and some ink.
"Here Ezra, let"s write the first letter of the alphabet first."
Ezra wrote for the first time. He was four months old an astounding feat on both earth and this universe. He noticed the rigid pattern of their writing. It contained thirty-two characters. He did it with much difficulty partially because his muscles on his arms hadn"t fully developed and partially because it was hard writing different characters from English.
Ezra had practised for a week since the incident and he was fairly proficient already.
"They don"t have zeros on their numbers. This is stupid. Zero is the most fundamental number in math. Without zero, you cannot do algebra or more advanced math."
Right now he was formulating a theory on how magic worked in this universe. He scribbled and scribbled at the paper. When Aerwyna saw this she thought it was the random scribbles of a child so she smiled. Little did she know Ezra was attempting to create a general unified theory to why this universe was so but he kept on b.u.mping into problems of ma.s.s and energy conversion and could not seem to reconcile this. One day as he was thinking and thinking about the equations of the universe he did not notice that he was using his magic aura to keep himself awake. This state made him drain his magical energy he was attempting to use his magic to propel his brain into a state of work and wakefulness. Ezra suddenly became dizzy. He felt that he was about to faint and vomit. The logical course of action, of course, was to rest but there was a gut feeling that made him want to continue.
"I must carry on, I feel like I"m on to something. I must not yield." Ezra thought about this.
As his vision was blurring there was something that was forming on the corner of his eye. He tried to concentrate even more. The wisp became a scribble. The scribble became words. Ezra widened his eyes in shock.
Then as he looked at the table with a pen sitting at the edge of the table and then as it fell. The scribbles became an all too familiar equation: K.E. = 1/2 m v^2. It was the formula for kinetic energy.