The Philosopher's Stone (1/2)

Burne, an alchemist looking for the secrets of the philosopher's stone, laughed maniacally as he noticed the scribblings of the ancient civilisation on the ceiling. The secret that he had been searching for strenuously— was finally in front of him. 

The secrets of the Philosopher's Stone.

He saw carvings of a man, who he identified as the king— encircled by a million people, praying to him with texts carved below the sketch.

He leaned on the throne as he examined the carvings. They were written in ancient Xerxesian but he was more than capable of reading them. 

"Interesting elements." Burne mumbled. "They are extremely rare and even if someone managed to find them, the complexity of the transmutation makes it impossible for an intermediate alchemist to craft it."

He went through the recipe without daring to miss a single detail. He knew the impact even a slight mistake can have on the product and the damage it can cause him. 

"A twelve elemental circle." He frowned. "Not even an advanced alchemist can make it. One needs to be at least a grand alchemist to be able to perfectly mimic the formula."

He moved his head towards the next part of the recipe but his frown deepened as he read the instructions. 

"Go to the ceremonial hall…?" 

'Is the next part of the formula in the hall?' He thought.

It was not unusual for alchemists to break their formulae into multiple parts and hide them in different places. But the formula was poorly hidden according to Burne. Alchemists were known for being secretive and this man… the King carved the secret of the greatest alchemic treasure on his ceiling. 

But it also made sense. 

Ancient Xerxesian was a language that only the royal family could read. No… only the King and the crowned prince were taught to read ancient Xerxesian but that didn't mean there were not others capable of reading it. His grandfather… a man that loved to explore the world, once met a man that knew this ancient language. After trading an expensive robe, the man agreed to teach his grandfather.

That man happened to be a descendent of the King's butler. 

"The king trusted too easily. The butler earned the trust of the king with ease and when the king happened to teach his son about the ancient language… he acquired the knowledge as well." Burned laughed. "Trust… such an interesting thing. A few sweet words and you start trusting that person… but even salt looks like sugar and if you are not careful, you might end up poisoning yourself." He sighed. 

He stood up from the chair and went towards the ceremonial hall. He knew its location. The ceremonial hall was one of Xerxes' most important places as it was used to offer sacrifices to the old gods.

He walked the stairs and went towards the hall. The architecture was admirable and he had never seen a build more exquisite than this castle. 

The sculptures of the great kings that once ruled this country stood proud on the ground despite suffering the years of torture from nature. Each king, while having the same sword, possessed different jewels. One had a ring, another had a necklace and the third had a bracelet. Each of those sculpts were crafted with extreme precision. But none of them stood out to Burne as much as the fourth one.

In terms of complexity and beauty, the fourth one was nowhere near as close to being beautiful as the other three. But something about the jewel stood out to Burne. It was a small oval-shaped gem, the colour could not be identified as it was a rock carving but the simplicity yet smoothness of the gem carving stood out to Burne. 

This place was even grander than the throne room. It had a massive ceiling with sun rays seeping through the broken skylight. The walls of the room had pictures of kings, gods and mythical beings drawn in them. To Burne, this was no less than the works of the grand architects that he read about in books. 

Soon he reached the centre of the hall and walked over the broken tiles as the rays of the garish sun enlightened the massive place. 

"Now where is the rest of the formula…" 

He sought around the place, looking for traces about the latter part of the greatest alchemic treasure. He searched for texts and found none, he searched for hidden symbols and again… found none. 

Knowing that it was somewhere around the room, he didn't give up. The first part of the secret of the stone was hidden right above his head and he was certain that the latter part wasn't hidden any differently. It was without a doubt hidden somewhere obvious, that a cynical person would never think of searching. 

The skylight had nothing written on it or the sun rays would have made the silhouette of the message on the ground. However, the glass of the skylight was mostly broken by the sands of time. And he didn't believe that anyone would be foolish enough to hide the secrets in a skylight. 

Shaking his head, he decided to look around and search the wall paintings and sculptures. 

He looked at the majestic art on the walls but they were nothing more than drawings. There were no alchemic secrets hidden inside them and if there were any, as an alchemic prodigy who spent years refining his skills, Burne would have easily spotted them.

Sighing at the current situation, he went to look at the statues. He climbed the stairs and started inspecting the statues one by one. He started with the one that had the gem-like oval-shaped jewel, but after minutes of searching, Burne found nothing. He walked up the stairs to inspect the other statue and just like the previous one, he found nothing.

Following the same technique, he climbed and inspected the other statues as well. And like the first two, the failure only added to his annoyance. Searching for a long time he was disappointed. He was unable to find anything that led to the second part of the formula. 

Standing atop the highest stair, he sighed in annoyance.

'This is not working….'

He wanted to use a detection spell to search for traces of alchemy but he couldn't do so because of two reasons. The first was the problem of time. The castle was centuries old and he was unsure if his spells could trace the remains of such old alchemy. And even if he could, he didn't dare to do it. The ancient form of alchemy was nothing like the current generation of alchemy. While both alchemy followed the same basic principles— the advanced forms of both generations of alchemy were totally different. And while many considered the current form of alchemy to be far superior to any older forms of alchemy, Burne didn't. He wasn't sure.

Many of the ancient alchemy formulae and secrets were lost in time and no one had any idea about how dangerous those formulae could be. And Burne was smart enough to not dismiss the possibility of encountering a high-level alchemic trap set up by the ancient alchemists. He wasn't sure if his spell would awaken any hidden trap. And the castle was weak which might collapse entirely if even one of the traps activated.

Losing interest in the statues, he tried looking around the room once again. He looked at the ceiling and found nothing. The walls looked completely normal as well. Groaning at the annoying situation, he hung his head. But when he looked at the floor, his eyes went wide as a confused and surprised look appeared on his face. 

While he stood atop the tiles previously, he didn't notice anything wrong about them. But now standing at a higher ground and looking down at the tiles, he was shocked. A lot of the tiles were either broken or completely missing. But the few pieces that remain fixed on the floor, were what drew his attention. 

Each of them had a marking, a unique pattern drawn on them. And as each of the tiles were arranged to form the flooring, a certain pattern was formed. It was a pattern that he was very well familiar with. Despite the multiple missing and broken tiles, Burne was able to identify the figure formed by the tile patterns very easily. The figure that those patterns formed was of-

'A transmutation circle.'