Also, article skips over the chemical part of this: Vitriol, the name for the impure sulfuric acid they used, was green (due to some iron and cupper sulfates). You can use sulfuric acid to purify gold; it’ll dissolve the silver and copper in a gold alloy, but not the gold itself, giving you 100% gold.
However, the green lion can also ‘ascend’ by combing with nitric acid to make aqua regia, where it can dissolve gold, “devouring it”.
I mean, that’s the point of Dune? The ‘prophesies’ aren’t real, they’re seeded by the Bene Gesserit, the same group that spent millennia breeding the ‘savior’. And, he’s not meant to really be a savior, but their catspaw.
But also, he’s definitely not actually a savior, on account of all the death he brings. It’s complicated, but overall a deconstruction of white savior narratives and similar stories.