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Join the ServerThere was a storeroom in the mage tower that was normally used only for storing unused items, but now it had been completely transformed.
The walls were painted an absolute black, using a special alchemical paint that could absorb most of the light.
In the center of the room, a complex instrument taller than a person stood silently.
It was an interferometer that had been personally modified by Klein. Every component had been precisely calculated and calibrated, its accuracy far exceeding the antiques from Laurent’s era.
“Are you ready?” Klein stood at the instrument’s control console, his finger on the rune of the activation array.
Lia stood at the other end of the instrument, making the final fine adjustments to the collimator.
She had changed into a tight-fitting black leather armor today, her long golden hair tied up high, looking capable and heroic.
“We can start anytime.” Lia straightened up and clapped her hands.
“But I still don’t understand, why don’t we just use the conclusion of ‘the speed of light is constant’ to slap Laurent in the face? Isn’t that a fundamental part of your spatial magic theory?”
“That’s different.” Klein shook his head.
“My theory is built on observation and deduction, but it lacks a direct, visual piece of experimental evidence that can shut everyone up.
Laurent is exploiting this very point, which is why he dares to bring out his ‘aether wind’ experiment as a last resort.”
“So, what we’re going to do now is burn his last resort to ashes.” A dangerous curve appeared on Lia’s lips.
“No, what we’re going to do is make him watch his own temple crumble, inch by inch, starting from its most solid foundation.” Klein’s eyes were cold.
“I want him to understand that the ‘aether’ he believes in has been a joke from the very beginning.”
He pressed the activation rune.
The crystal at the core of the instrument lit up with a soft white light.
A beam of strictly calibrated monochromatic light was emitted from the source, passed through a half-silvered mirror, and was split into two.
These two beams traveled along two mutually perpendicular paths, were reflected back by mirrors at their respective ends, and finally converged on the same detection screen.
“See?” Klein pointed to the concentric rings of light and dark on the detection screen.
“These are interference fringes. If the paths of the two light beams are exactly equal, or differ by an integer multiple of the wavelength, they will meet and reinforce here, forming a bright fringe.
If they differ by an odd multiple of half a wavelength, they will cancel each other out, forming a dark fringe.”
Lia nodded. “This is a basic principle of optics.”
“Now, here comes the crucial part.” Klein’s gaze became sharp.
“If Laurent’s ‘aether wind’ exists, when the Earth moves through the aether, our instrument will also be moving.
Then, there will be a tiny difference in the time it takes for the beam of light traveling along the direction of motion and the beam of light traveling perpendicular to it to complete their round trips.”
“It’s like a swimmer swimming a round trip with the current versus swimming a round trip across the river. The time it takes is different,” Lia added.
“Exactly. This tiny time difference will cause a difference in their optical paths.
As long as we rotate the entire instrument by 90 degrees, so that the path that was originally with the current becomes across, and the path that was originally across becomes with the current, then the phase relationship of these two beams on the detection screen will change.”
“The interference fringes will shift.”
The entire massive instrument, driven by a silent magical field, began to rotate slowly.
Lia and Klein’s eyes were both fixed on the detection screen.
If the fringes moved, it would mean the “aether wind” existed, that the speed of light was relative, that Laurent was right.
If the fringes didn’t move an inch…
The instrument rotated 15 degrees.
The interference fringes on the detection screen were still clear, without any change.
30 degrees.
The fringes seemed to be nailed to the screen.
45 degrees.
Lia could even see a tiny flaw on the blurry bright fringe of the outermost ring. The position of that flaw hadn’t moved at all.
60 degrees.
75 degrees.
90 degrees.
The instrument stopped rotating.
Dead silence.
The interference fringes on the detection screen were identical to how they were before the rotation.
There was not even the slightest shift.
“See?” Klein’s voice was calm, but Lia could hear the suppressed excitement beneath it. “No shift. Nothing moved at all.”
“This means…”
“It means that no matter how the instrument is rotated, whether we are with the ‘aether wind’ or against it, the speed of light is always constant.”
Klein said, enunciating each word.
He turned his head and looked at Lia, his blue eyes seeming to burn with stars. “There is no such thing as a damned aether wind!”
Lia let out a long breath.
Although she had known the result all along, to witness the birth of a result that could subvert the cognition of an entire era still sent a thrill through her.
This was the charm of science.
It showed no favoritism, recognized no authority.
Data was the only truth.
“Laurent has lost!” Lia said.
“No, this is just the beginning.” Klein walked to her side and put his arm around her shoulder.
“We’ve only proven that his experiment is a lie. But that’s not enough to make him break down. He can still be stubborn, say that there’s a problem with our instrument, or that our theory has loopholes.”
“Then what do we do next?”
“Next,” a cold curve appeared on Klein’s lips, “we’re going to take away his last weapon.”
“What weapon?”
“Light itself.” Klein looked at the beam of light flowing quietly in the instrument.
“Laurent, and some of the masters of optics of this era, firmly believe that light is a wave, a mechanical wave that propagates in the aether. This is the foundation of all their theories.”
“But you told me, light is not.”
Klein looked down at Lia, his gaze deepening.
“You told me that light is made of individual particles. Like bullets.”
Lia’s heart skipped a beat.
“Now,” Klein’s voice was filled with a chilling pity, “prove to me that light has another, completely different nature.”
Lia looked at him, and in his eyes, she saw an undisguised craving.
It wasn’t a craving for knowledge, but a craving for subversion, for destruction, for the fanaticism of witnessing the collapse of the old world.
This man, at his core, was an out-and-out destroyer.
“Alright.” Lia broke free from his embrace and walked to another corner of the laboratory.
There stood another set of instruments. Compared to the massive interferometer, this set was small and precise.
A zinc plate, a highly sensitive electroscope, and a magical light source whose frequency and intensity could be precisely adjusted.
The photoelectric effect experiment setup.
“We already know that only light above a certain frequency can knock out electrons, and the kinetic energy of the electrons is only related to the frequency, not the intensity of the light.”
Lia explained as she operated the instrument. “This is completely inexplicable by wave theory. But if light is made of individual energy quanta, or photons, everything makes sense.”
She wrote the photoelectric effect equation on the blackboard.
“But, this is not enough.” Lia put down the chalk.
“This is only indirect evidence. Laurent and his followers can easily say that this is just a coincidental empirical formula. We need more direct evidence, evidence that can prove the ‘particle nature’ of photons.”
“For example?” Klein asked with interest.
“For example, proving that it collides like a small ball.” Lia’s eyes lit up. “Proving that it has momentum.”
She began to write rapidly on another blackboard.
“Imagine a photon, like a small ball flying at high speed, colliding with a stationary electron.”
“According to the conservation of momentum and energy, we can set up a system of equations.”
“After the collision, the direction of the photon will change, and its energy will decrease. A decrease in energy means a lower frequency and a longer wavelength.”
“And the amount of this wavelength change is only related to the scattering angle, and nothing else.”
She wrote down the decisive formula.
“Compton scattering,” Klein read the name of the formula.
“That’s right.” Lia put down the pen and turned to look at him. “Compton’s experimental data has already confirmed the correctness of this formula. But that’s just data. We need a more direct, more shocking demonstration.”
“What do you have in mind?” Klein asked with keen interest.
“Why don’t we just… see the process directly?” A sly smile appeared on Lia’s lips. “Since we can’t directly observe the collision of a single photon and electron, let’s amplify the effect.”
She walked to a sealed glass container.
The container was filled with supersaturated vapor.
“A cloud chamber,” Lia introduced.
“I’ve been working on this for a while. When a charged particle passes through this vapor-filled cloud chamber, it ionizes the vapor molecules along its path.
These ionized molecules become condensation nuclei, causing the supersaturated vapor to condense into tiny droplets along the particle’s path.”
“So, we can see the path the particle has taken. Like the white contrails of an airplane in the sky.”
“Exactly.” Lia snapped her fingers.
“Now, we’ll place a source that can emit high-energy photons—like X-rays—inside the cloud chamber. At the same time, we’ll place some targets that can be easily hit by the photons, like graphite powder.”
“When an X-ray photon hits an electron in the graphite, according to Compton scattering theory, the electron will be knocked away, and a lower-energy photon will be scattered at the same time.”
“The knocked-off electron is a charged particle, and it will leave a clear track in the cloud chamber.”
“And the scattered photon, if it hits another electron, will also produce a new track.”
A glint of excitement shone in Lia’s eyes.
“Klein, imagine the scene.”
“In the dark cloud chamber, an X-ray beam shoots in. Suddenly, a fork appears in its path out of thin air!”
“One branch is the track left by the higher-energy recoiling electron, thick and straight.”
“The other is the track left by the secondary electron excited by the lower-energy scattered photon, short and thin.”
“This fork, this V-shaped track, is the ironclad proof that a photon, like a small ball, has precisely collided with another small ball!”
“No wave theory can explain this scene. The scattering of a wave is diffuse; it could never produce such a clear, sharp track.”
Klein stared at the empty cloud chamber, as if he could already see the historic scene that was about to unfold.
“Are you going to demonstrate this at the seminar, in front of Laurent?”
“No.” Lia shook her head, smiling like a cat that had just stolen the cream.
“We don’t need to demonstrate it.”
“We just need to… ‘leak’ the design of this setup, and the expected experimental results, in advance.”
“Leak it to whom?”
“Of course, to those who hate Laurent the most, and who are most eager to prove Lia is wrong. For example, the particle camp, and certain alchemists who have been suppressed by Laurent.”
“Let them repeat this experiment. Let them fight for the glory of this discovery.”
“When the entire magical world has seen that V-shaped track, when everyone has accepted the fact that photons can play billiards.”
Lia walked up to Klein and reached out to smooth the slight furrow in his brow, which was caused by excitement.
“On the day of the seminar, when Laurent brings out his stale aether theory, what kind of expression do you think the people in the audience will have?”
Klein looked at her, his usually cold blue eyes now full of admiration and amusement.
He took her hand and gently kissed it.
“Lia, you really are a little devil.”
“Takes one to know one,” Lia replied respectfully. “Don’t forget who wanted to see his temple collapse from the very beginning.”
“Then,” Klein pulled her into his arms and whispered in her ear, “it’s a pleasure to cooperate with you, my demonic colleague.”
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