During the weeks to the appointed time when those dogs of the outer circle kitchen would come, Ming Yue really did as she thought. She started her adventure of stealing food and strolling around well, sneaking around you might say to collect information as much as she could.
When those imperial kitchens really did come, Ming Yue used her illusion technique which is a minor skill she accidentally learned from who knows where in her former world during one of her assignments.
This skill can only be used for a fixed duration a day and the rest time is up to three days minimum and five days to a week at maximum which is the reason she categorized this skill as minor since the duration of rest is too long.
This skill deceives the eyes of others about its user's appearance and if the user is to act accordingly, the people will not suspect a thing.
Standing outside, Ming Yue watched as those horrible outer circle members look condescendingly at her before throwing a box of expired food on the floor while motioning her to eat like a dog.
Ming Yue became angry immediately but decided against acting, 'Ming Yue, they are not worth your time, they are mere mortals, ants' she said to herself inside her heart while acting like the original owner who is timid and extremely afraid of these dogs.
She trembled before bending down to take the food, she stood up and bowed to the dogs while showing happy smile to show how thankful she is for the food while they look at her in disdain before leaving.
After watching them leave, she sneered and threw the box of food to the bin before returning to her dilapidated room to eat what she didn't finish due to arrival of those dogs.
~ fast forward ~
Three days has passed and Ming Yue finally found a way to enter the treasury after exhausting some effort.
She found a girl named Zhuang Ai who is a late bloomer completely unlike the original owner who is at the same age as her which is ten, she just re-demonstrated her martial potential to the emperor to tell him that she wasn't a waste so, the incapable ruler is letting her into the treasury to find a technique suitable for her. No matter how incapable the emperor is, at least, he does know that martial artists are the foundation of the country and cannot be taken lightly too bad though, if it wasn't for her lifelong dream, she wouldn't have minded joining one of these countries.
When Ming Yue found her, she immediately put thoughts into action and during these days, she started watching the girl and so learned to imitate her every action to the tenth digit and rechecking if she missed something.
Since she is going to enter the treasury on behalf of this girl who can be considered as her sister or half? ~Who cares~, she has to imitate all her actions so that when she uses her illusion ability to take on her appearance later on, nothing will go wrong to let others suspect her.
****
Inside the huge treasury, Ming Yue sighed in relief inside her heart. She has been anxious that the martial artist heightened sense will discover her illusion ability and kill her on the spot but, it all seems to be her over thinking which is good as now, she can choose one internal art that can be used to learn Qi and then an external martial art technique that fits herself.
Oh, not to forget, she has to choose a martial art technique and internal art for that suppose sister of hers? First order of things, she has to find the one that fits herself first and memories everything in it since she has an eidetic memory which is one of the thing she is the most proud of, it allowed her to learn skills quickly and one of the thing that helped her become king of mercenaries then, she has to choose for the other girl and just as the treasury keeper has informed her, she can only take two techniques out for five days since five days is enough to learn how to take in Qi thus improving the memory ability to absorb information quickly and subsequently, be able to memories the martial art technique without any problem if the person practicing is not lazy.
She followed what the treasury keeper told her and browsed through the shelves on the first floor since the treasury is of three levels and the last two levels are for high levelled martial artists who needs higher levelled martial techniques and those two places is filled with seals and can only be breached by those who has permission from the emperor.
Seeing the number of floating books and memory talismans on the shelves, Ming Yue finally believed that martial art techniques are indeed many types since there are fists, palm, leg, body, pupil etc images and they are being protected inside a spiritual array and the only way to take them out is by using the token the library keeper gave to her.
Sigh…she is amazed at the meticulous protection they are giving this library and has to admit that even in her prime days, if she wants to come steal anything from here, she would be caught immediately and praised her stars that she worked her brain for once to come up with this disguise which is now cost effective despite the hard work.
Browsing through all the arts of the treasury first floor, Ming Yue started trying to find the one that calls to her as the keeper said, seeing the one she likes, she stretched her token to deactivate the array around the book and took it out, opened it and wanted to read it but, she froze as if stuck by thunder, it took a while before she came back to her senses and started sweating as if she was bathing in her sweat, 'I forgot she doesn't know how to read and write and by extensions me!" She thought
She wanted to cry, after all the hard work only to be only a tiny step away from the sweet rewarding fruit just to come into realisation that she doesn't know how to read what was written, anyone will go crazy right?
She clearly overestimated the ten years old girl that has been cast away to die by herself, if no one taught her, how was she going to learn by herself? She was already doing something good being able to survive until ten okays!?
While she was chastising herself inside her mind, she was becoming even more desperate because with every book and talisman she looks into turns into alien language. She wants to howl in grief, there must definitely be a book she could read!
She started looking at more books and talismans while rambling and praying inside her head desperately for the book she could read to magically appear?
Ming Yue: 'please come out, I promise I won't use you for evil. I will be good, I won't be like all those protagonists who wants to expand the land and sea for their own use, I just want to live a lazy life with power so others won't disturb me! I will create a sect to teach others the technique if you want! Please don't let me go out in vain!' She continued to ramble on and on and magically as if her rambling and prayer has been answered, she saw a flash of light from the corner of her eyes, she immediately turned her head while ignoring the pain coming from her neck from the quick action which might have broken her already emaciated neck, although she has been eating well through the stealing of good food but, the time frame is too short so she couldn't fatten herself up, it was just enough to have energy for today's action well, which helped her now from dying from broken neck?
She turned her body to where her head was looking at while also massaging her neck to relieve the pain. She walked to an inconspicuous corner of the book shelves and finally saw what the flash of light was. It was a book, well, an almost tattered old book with worn out surface which is radiating with soft light when she got nearby.
She used the token to remove the restrictions from the shelf it was located in. She took the book and opened it; the inside doesn't seem worn out or look old at all? 'Well, it doesn't matter' she thought