The ancients knew more about Alchemy than we do today. Now, we think it was some weird attempt to transmute base metal into gold.

Of course, back then, they knew what the real goal was. Alchemy was about transmuting the base nature of man into the golden nature of the divine. Little wonder then it was shrouded in such secrecy. Only the most worthy would be deemed fit to study the mystical arts.

Finneas Alderman was the most revered Alchemist of his time. A true believer, he never stopped experimenting. Right up until the end he was a seeker of knowledge.

When he finally left this earth his friends were not surprised. He had been drifting in and out of reality for a long time. He had discovered the secret he had chased for 30 long years and having found it he realised there was nothing left to learn. So it was on a cold and windy morning in March that Finneas dissolved into the elemental compound of the universe. That boundless force which permeates all that was, is and will be. In the most metaphysical sense possible, Finneas became the universe.

But I’m telling you this story out of sequence. Let me go back to the beginning, before Finneas was born…