7 The Greatest Mystery (1)

Silas Fidi went from room to room in long strides. Everywhere he went, researchers and Spellcasters would either bow to him in greeting or scurry off in the opposite direction in an attempt to avoid him.

He didn't mind. It would be more accurate to say that he didn't care. Caelum's red hair reminded him of tomato sauce. The wires he had seen in the room reminded him of noodles. The pale yellow lights reminded of cheese. Noodles with tomato sauce and cheese reminded him of spaghetti.

Silas Fidi suddenly had an urge to eat spaghetti.

He sped to his quarters which was located at the far end of a detached annex in Elisium. Without turning on the lights, he took precise steps toward a table in the center. His hand found a phone and he automatically dialed a number in a darkness. A few moments later, one of the resident researchers knocked on his door and carried in a sealed cardboard box with a fork taped on top. Silas Fidi took the box from him, muttered his thanks, turned on the lights and shut the door.

Orange eyes swept through the room. When he was satisfied with what he saw, he double checked the door and made sure it was locked before going back to his desk. He carefully placed his takeout box on the table and made sure that the sides of the box was perfectly parallel to the sides of desk. He slowly tore the masking tape on the cardboard box millimeter by millimeter until he was able to remove the adhesive, fold it in half, and throw it in the waste bin beside his desk.

He took the fork, brought it to his personal kitchen, and religiously washed it with soap and water. He wiped it dry on a dish cloth and made sure he wiped the fork six times on both sides before lifting up the lid of the take-out box. With a serious look plastered on his face, he stared at the spaghetti and painstakingly separated the cheese, hotdog slices, ground pork, and the spaghetti strands from each other with the fork.

His phone rang. The man glared at it like it was the bane of his existence. The circular device that was mounted on it glowed faintly. With a flick of his finger, it opened and a face peered at him from the round screen. A crisp and high pitched voiced sounded from the speakers.

'Master! Your disciple is dropping by to play~!'

Silas Fidi didn't look up. He already knew who it was. He continued to pick the cheese from the tomato sauce while nudging the hotdog slices to a spot beside the spaghetti strands.

"Asha Claire, limit your interactions with Elisium. Have I not made it clear enough that you should not be linked to this place?"

The female on the other end of the line groaned. 'But Master… it's more interesting than the affairs here in Myron. Managing the Apothecary's Research Division is also quite boring. I would rather be experimenting on contaminants and poison than be here.'

Silas Fidi grunted. "You are no longer a child - you're two hundred years old. Stop whining. It's unsightly."

'But Master, I'm already on my way there!', Asha Claire began, her tone slightly bratty, 'Besides, I might contribute to your search for that missing girl or I might be able to help you with your research on Talents. Or, we could research on immortality!'

The fork stopped mid-air. A hotdog slice was stuck on it's end. The man with sunken cheeks finally raised his head and his tangerine-tinted orbs stared at blue-haired girl who was reflected on the circular screen. His flat voice echoed in the empty room. "Oh? Then have you found a way to hide your tracks from the other Magno Deorum?"

The female on the other end sighed and rolled her eyes. 'Master, I know you're apprehensive of the High Council. But I already assured you… no matter what, they wont be able to figure out that Elisium exists.'

Orange eyes studied the girl on the communicator's screen before looking down at his meal. His hands deftly moved clumps of cheese away from the tomato sauce.

"You know that I live for the sake of research, don't you?" He asked. "- that whether or not I can continue my research depends on whether or not Elisium stays hidden?"

'My talent can guarantee that Elisium will not perish. That's why we should delve into the endless mystery of immortality,' Asha Claire said. When the Great Apothecary made no remark, his disciple groaned. 'Master… don't you want to find the Fountain of Youth? Don't you want to know if a talent can give you eternal life?'

Silas Fidi snorted. "Until the composition and life-cycles of Talents are clear to me, everything else doesn't matter."

'Master… you're too single-minded,' the girl replied earnestly. 'There are a lot of mysteries in life that are interesting. It's a waste to be so obsessed with only one mystery at a time.'

"The only reason why those mysteries are so appealing to you is because they are unknown. Once you unveil their secrets, they become unappetizing," the man muttered under his breath.

His eyes stared at the disassembled dish in front him. Then, with much emotion, he remarked, "Like spaghetti."

Dark blue eyebrows shot up. 'Excuse me?'

The thin man ignored Asha Claire's confusion. With a swift motion, he mixed the pasta strands, tomato sauce, meat and cheese together. "Give me an endless abyss to pursue. Give me a mystery that will become even more unfathomable the more you know about it. If you do, then I might considered immortality."

His disciple scratched her head. 'Um… the female mind?'

Upturned eyes turned cold. "I have no interest in women."

'God?'

"Unscientific and baseless things that cannot be proved or quantified are simply notions created by human beings."

'This is exactly why I'm telling you to research on immortality!'

Silas Fidi shook his head. "I refuse to live forever. Once I'm done with my research, what would you have me do? Live without a purpose?"

There was a slight pause before the girl on the other end replied. 'That…Master, aren't you afraid of death? Everyone's afraid of death.'

The Great Apothecary gave a low chuckle, his lips curving up into a bone-curdling smile.

The female disciple scoffed. 'Master, could it be that you want to research on death?'

"Then tell me…with that Talent of yours, could you explain all the occurrences that happens when someone dies?" Silas Fidi began, his voice shaking with excitement, "Could you quantify and qualify the experience of death? Can you create a fundamental law that governs death regardless of circumstance, type of existence and method of death? Can you determine what happens to every living being after death? Isn't death the biggest mystery that no single Alchemist has been able to understand?"

Asha Claire's mouth hung open. It took her a few seconds to realize that Silas Fidi was serious. She rubbed the space between her eyes as she calmly pointed out, 'You need to die before you get those answers, Master.'

The smile on Silas Fidi's sunken cheeks widened. "And that is the reason why we will never see eye to eye with your love for immortality."

'Then, after your research on talents… will you research on death?' She asked.

Without answering the female, Silas Fidi took a few gulps of spaghetti and cleaned the entire take out box. "I doubt that the answer to that question interests you in the least."

The girl looked at him weirdly before sighing with emotion. As she shook her head, Asha Claire couldn't help but say 'Master… you're really too single-minded.'

The man didn't respond, ended the call, and dialed the cafeteria for another serving of spaghetti.