"That" he said rapidly, "is because thou knowest so little about the
future of this world. But I am famed as a student of the heavens; and I
tell thee it is possible, by means of certain delicate measuring
instruments, together with the highest mathematics, to keep a very close
watch upon the course of our world. And we now know that our year is
much shorter than it was in the days of the mulikka."

I nodded my head. "Rightly enough, since our days are become steadily
longer, for some mysterious reason."

"A reason no longer a mystery," quoth Maka. "It is now known that the
sun is a very powerful magnet, and that it is constantly pulling upon
our world and bringing it nearer and nearer to himself. That is why it
hath become slightly warmer during the past hundred years; the records
show it plain. And the same influence has caused the lengthening of our
day."

He stopped and let me think. Soon I saw it clearly enough; a time must
come when the increasing warmth of the sun would stifle all forms of
vegetable life, and that would mean the choking of mankind. It might
take untold centuries; yet, plainly enough, the world must some day
become too small for even those who now remained upon it.

Suddenly I leaped to my feet and strode the room in my excitement. "Ye
are right, Maka!" I shouted, thoroughly aroused. "There cannot always be
the two empires. In time one or the other must prevail; Jon has willed
it. And--" I stopped short and stared at him--"I need not tell ye which
it shall be!"