The scene beyond the open door attached to the pillar was unfamiliar to Magnus.
It led to another area of the same library he was standing in, but the door on the other side was no longer connected to a wall like before; instead, it was somehow attached to a random bookshelf.
Peering through the door frame, all he could see was a maze of books, mirroring the very same maze behind him.
"Oh no, you've got to be kidding me..." Worry seeped into his voice as realization dawned on him. He was lost in a massive library, with doors that randomly transported him to different areas whenever he opened and closed them. Even with Basker's presence, it was hard for him to stay calm. At that moment, he began muttering to himself in a low voice.
"I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration..." As he repeated those words, he took deep breaths and continued reciting them. Surprisingly, it worked; his heartbeat began to slow.
With heightened senses due to the tension, he heard the sound of rustling paper echoing through the air again. The noise alone caused his entire body to tense up slightly as he strained to listen closely.
"Okay, best-case scenario, that's just the sound of another student reading a book, meaning I'm not actually lost. Worst-case scenario..."
Even his own thought process fell silent at the possibilities. Ultimately, he had two choices to consider.
First, he could stay by the randomizing door and pray to God that he could find a way out of here by continuously opening the door. Given the size of the library, the chances of it succeeding seemed slim. The second option was to face reality. He was already in the devil's den, so he might as well rip the bandage off and follow the noise.
This option was definitely one he was hesitant about.
In horror movies, the people who investigate strange noises are the first to die. But Seraline spoke as if she knew something like this would happen, and she didn't warn me. She wouldn't have been so casual about it if it could get me killed, right? I mean, I know we're not friends or anything, but that's just common human decency, right? Besides, this is Takerth Academy, a place where the children of nobles come to learn. There's no way they would keep a library like this open without security if there was even a chance students could die accidentally.
The more he thought about it, the more he started to lean toward the second option.
Wandering around randomly was definitely not a solution, and his morbid curiosity, along with the false sense of security his reasoning provided, formed a flimsy safety net in his mind.
Plus, one couldn't ignore the fact that he had the Command Console. He wasn't defenseless; he had Rokshaata on him even now, and as long as he was ready to use [Self Body Puppetry], he was fairly confident he could evade any danger the very moment he noticed it.
In the end, he let out a sigh.
"Wendy always said I'd die doing something stupid," he mumbled to himself.
"Did she now? Was she a fortune-teller or perhaps an oracle?" In that instant, his blood ran cold as a woman's voice danced its way into his right ear. Tantalizing interest oozed from the voice, and for some reason, a sense of danger that lit up every nerve in his body.
At that moment, he wasn't sure if it was instinctual or simply an accident, but he used [Self Body Puppetry] right away. Raising his leg, he struck out with a kick, aiming at whoever was behind him.
The kick seemed to ignore the concept of air resistance and bypassed the need to build up speed. If a normal person had seen such a kick, they would have immediately felt that something was strange about it but would be unable to pinpoint it. However, for the woman who was standing in the attack's path, her gaze seemed to immediately see through its oddities. The attack was moving in slow motion toward her, and its peculiarity elicited a small smile.
Who would have thought he would be the one to reach this place? And on his first time walking through my doors.
Without moving, she snapped her fingers, causing mana to fluctuate in the air and form a luminescent green barrier in front of her. Magnus's kick, straight as an arrow, met the barrier but didn't halt for even a moment. The surface of the barrier rippled before suddenly cracking like glass and finally shattering. It all happened in an instant, surprising the woman, whose expression changed from intrigue to confusion.
Huh?
As she had that thought, the mana within her body quickly mobilized. Before Magnus's kick came anywhere close to her, she vanished from where she stood, dodging the attack, before reappearing in front of Magnus's face. With all that happening in a matter of moments, Magnus was surprised to feel that his kick had hit seemingly nothing. But as he turned his head, he immediately jumped as he saw a figure appear in front of him.
"Agh, what the hell!" Regaining his balance, Magnus quickly backed away from where he had been standing, while the woman remained unmoved. She simply stared at him, with that look of confusion remaining on her face.
Still, despite not speaking, that didn't mean all sorts of thoughts weren't running through her head.
It may have been an incantation-less spell, but even a Master-level mage wouldn't have been able to break through it so effortlessly. Not only that, but that kick of his contained neither mana nor aura, yet for a moment it had completely dropped off my radar, as if the mana from my sensory magic had been cut off from me and frozen the moment it made contact with his body.
As she continued thinking to herself, Magnus had to look up slightly; the woman in front of him was extremely tall, much taller than he was, and he was just under six foot. Whether it was her looks or the way she was dressed, everything about her screamed abnormal. Just now, he was positive she was standing behind him, but all of a sudden, she appeared in front of him.
It was different from the teleportation he had seen Zeth use; it was simply instantaneous.
There was an awkward silence that lasted nearly five seconds. On Magnus's end, he was both curious and extremely cautious of the woman in front of him. Meanwhile, the woman in question was trying to figure out how Magnus had just done what he did. However, eventually, the silence was broken as a smile grew across the woman's face, much wider than the one before.
"How fascinating. You're much more intriguing than I initially thought." She leaned closer to Magnus, bringing their eyes to the same level. The moment their gazes met, a chill ran up Magnus's spine.
She was like an animal; that's the only way Magnus could describe it. Her eyes were human, yes, but the way they looked at him was anything but. It felt as if her piercing blue gaze was trying to unravel him, trying to peer into his very soul just to feed her curiosity about what was there.
Seeing Magnus's expression and tense posture, the woman's gaze relaxed as she stood back up straight.
"Oh, right, sorry. People keep telling me how uncomfortable it is to be probed by me. It's just that I don't meet interesting people very often. And speaking of interesting, how did you do it? Is it some kind of spell that can't be sensed, or perhaps a type of artifact?
It completely ignored the reduction effect of my barrier without employing anti-magic, or was it a unique method altogether?"
The woman bombarded Magnus with questions, and his mind could hardly keep up. Too much had happened too quickly; he had just attacked her a second ago, or at least he thought he did, and now she was talking to him as if there were no issues.
Taking a step back, Magnus held up his hands and asked a very simple question in a firm voice.
"Okay, stop! First of all, who are you?" The woman's next words were cut off by his sudden question. After blinking, she suddenly laughed while tapping herself on the head.
"Oh, right, introductions; I nearly forgot. My name is Eveline. I am the Keeper of Knowledge of this library, as well as the librarian of Takerth Academy." Upon hearing her introduce herself, Magnus's eyes widened.
"W-Wait, you're Eveline?" Seeing that Magnus knew her name, Eveline clapped her hands together.
"Oh, you know my name; perfect. That means we're practically friends already, aren't we, Magnus?" Another uneasy feeling washed over him when he heard her say his name.
"You know who I am?" To his question, Eveline nodded as she responded.
"Of course, the Vice Headmaster told all the teachers and staff to watch the boy sent by the Major General very closely. At first, I wasn't that interested, but once I saw you didn't have an ounce of mana or aura in your body, I couldn't help but be intrigued. Well, that plus the news of what happened with the Headmistre—Oh wait, I'm not supposed to tell you this stuff." Magnus raised a brow as she said that last part.
Despite her 'catching' herself, to Magnus, it didn't seem like what she had just said was a simple slip of the tongue. After all, her face hadn't faltered one bit as she was speaking.
So, I'm being watched? Well, that by itself isn't too bad; it's not like I planned on doing anything that would raise suspicions. Though that, of course, leaves her...
Magnus's gaze shifted to Eveline, though he avoided direct eye contact. Even if she didn't do her probing again, he just didn't like the way she stared at him. As for his thoughts on her as a person, well.
There's not much to say on that front; she's crazy.
Short and concise, he could practically sense the crazy energy radiating from her from the moment he saw her.
"What are you thinking about so intensely? You didn't answer my questions, you know." Eveline spoke directly to him, causing him to put his thoughts about her aside. As weird as he thought she was, it didn't seem like she was interested in causing him harm.
Hmm, I should probably be careful how I answer her questions. She might look into it. I already have that story I told Mia and the others, so I'll probably stick to that.
"Uh, I don't know how to really explain it. It's an ability and a gift I was born with. I still don't know how it works well enough to explain it to you." Hearing his explanation, Eveline put a hand on her chin as she looked him up and down.
Interesting—a gift, perhaps genetic? His hair color and build do resemble those of the elves, but there's no elvish blood in his body. If not that, then maybe...
A thought flashed through Eveline's mind, causing her eyes to shift, though just barely. As she was thinking, Magnus took the silence as a chance to ask a question of his own.
"So, the doors I walked through—are they portals or something? They change every time I open and close them." To answer his question, Eveline shook her head while chuckling, as if she had heard something silly.
"Of course not. Maintaining so many portals at once would be way too taxing for the library's core. It's just spatial stitching, folding the space between one door and another into a near-infinitesimal area. This allows you to cross a large distance in a single step and see the stitched area on the other side. The view can get a little distorted due to how much space is compressed, so it's not perfect, but I'm quite proud of it."
Magnus tried his best to wrap his head around what she was saying, but he had to double back when Eveline said that last bit.
"Wait, you're saying you created these doors?" Surprise washed over Magnus, leaving Eveline looking rather pleased with herself.
"Of course, this library is way too big. It would take millennia to walk through it all, so I came up with this method instead. It's a bit rough because it was one of my first attempts at setting up spatial magic on such a large scale." Listening to Eveline speak, Magnus hardly knew where to start.
"Alright, first, I'm going to ignore the fact that you just said millennia; this library has surprised me enough for one day. I get the part about making travel easier, but why did you make the doors randomize their destinations? What if students got lost, like I did? I mean, you should at least put up a warning sign or something."
Eveline waved her hand dismissively, as if he'd cracked a joke.
"Oh, no need to worry about that. Although it's funny, you sound just like the Vice Headmaster when we first met. Anyway, I've inscribed movement-based detection runes all over the library. If any students get lost, it won't take me longer than an hour or two to find them. Also, the doors don't lead to random places; that would be silly. What would be the point if they could take you to the exact spot you're already at? No, you see, I overlaid the spatial stitching on the doors with a touch of mental magic. That way, they always bring you to a section of the library that can quench your thirst for knowledge. Honestly, I was surprised when I first sensed you here. You must have a deep desire to learn more about the world, just like me."
Another chill ran up his spine as he heard her tone shift for those last three words, but he tried to ignore it. After Eveline's explanation, he glanced around at the books on the various shelves again.
Even though he was in a different section of the library than before, he still couldn't read any of the languages they were written in.
So, this part of the library has the answers to my questions? I guess just because books can tell you what you want to know doesn't mean you have the qualifications to read them.
Now that the eerieness was mostly gone, Magnus was slightly tempted to stick around in the library a bit longer, even if he couldn't read anything in this place. But eventually, he decided against it. After all, he had classes tomorrow, and being late on his first day would be a horrible start.
Plus, his sense of time was completely skewed in this place, so he needed to find a way to deal with that before getting any ideas.
With all that in mind, he asked Eveline if she could lead him out and back to the First Library.
"Hmm? Oh, no need for that, though it's a shame you're leaving so soon. There were a lot of other things we could have talked about." Her words felt drawn out as she snapped her fingers, generating another burst of magic.
A light gust of wind washed over Magnus and the surrounding area as a door suddenly materialized out of thin air next to her.
"Eh... you can just summon doors out of thin air like that?" Magnus hadn't expected that, though he probably should have.
"Of course, I need to be able to get around quickly, right? Of course, only my doors work like this; it would be too boring if everyone else just went where they wanted to go. And now, thanks to my system, I can find and track interesting students with unique minds a lot easier, depending on where they end up, like you."
Magnus didn't even know how to begin explaining what was wrong with everything she just said, so he decided that was the best chance to just leave. Giving the briefest goodbye possible, he walked over to the door Eveline had made and opened it. He was immediately greeted by the bright view of the First Library.
Compared to the dreary darkness he had gotten used to, it looked like heaven. As he walked through the door and took a deep breath, he felt another chill go up his spine as he heard Eveline's voice.
"Goodbye, do pay me and my library another visit soon... Magnus." Her words lingered in his ears as the door shut behind him. He didn't even get a chance to turn around and see what kind of expression she was making to match such harrowing words.
Staring at the door, Magnus nodded to himself.
Yup, she's definitely crazy. From now on, when I visit the library, I'll stay in the main areas. Well, at least until I know I can deal with her if she decides to dissect me one day.