Considering the size of the library, Alex could search a lifetime and not find the Grimoire. At first, he thought it was purely luck, but after a few hours of searching he knew there must be a trick to it, mostly due to the sneering kid floating behind him.

"How could I possibly find it?" exclaimed Alex.

"That's for you to figure out," said Jack, "you're a magician right?"

Alex sighed in exasperation.

"I am not a magician," said Alex, "I've been thrown here without being told a thing."

"Not my problem," replied Jack, as he folded his hands behind his head. 

"Seriously!," exclaimed Alex, "At the very least give me a hint." 

Jack knew if he didn't help Alex, this would've gone on forever, so he gave in.

"Fine, I'll give you a hint," sighed Jack.

Alex couldn’t help but smile, after all this wasn't the first time he asked Jack to help.

"Feel my energy and trace it to the book, but don't think that just by knowing this, you'll find it, it's not as easy as it sounds."

"It doesn’t sound easy at all," replied Alex," I can't feel energy, I've tried it before."

"Yeah, I suppose you wouldn't," said Jack, as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.

"What do you mean?" Alex was starting to wonder if Jack knew what he was talking about.

"Give me that pendant you're wearing," said Jack, as he extended his open palm toward Alex.

"How do you even know about it?" asked Alex.

Jack ignored the question, and kept his arm extended.

Alex took the pendant out of his pocket.

"Be careful, it's a gift," said Alex, as he gave it to Jack.

"This thing has been limiting your powers, and it isn't something you find in any neighborhood shop, it would’ve sucked you dry, if you didn't have enough mana to satisfy it, whoever gave it to you, obviously didn't want you to use magic."

Alex's mind was full of questions, why would his father limit his power? How did his father even make this pendant, since he's just a scholar? What power could he possibly have that would drive his father to hide?

"But that doesn't make any sense."

"Never mind that now, just try doing it again," replied Jack.

Alex pushed those questions to the back of his mind for now as, noting to ask his father for an explanation latter, and focused on sensing Jack's mana. He closed his eyes and tried to feel the mana, something that cannot be seen or touched, but nevertheless still present, he searched the air around him with a sixth sense he didn't even know he had. Slowly but surely he started feeling it flowing through the narrow passage, in and out, through the shelves, as a glowing blue aura. When he opened his eyes, to his surprise, he saw instead of felt those thread flowing around him. 

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"What in the world is this," was all Alex could manage to say at the sight in front of him. The flow of energy was going and coming from all directions, it was like a huge network of mana.

As Alex watched the mana flow he saw that a fine line was coming from Jack's back and passing through the shelf to his right. As he focused on it, the other threads slowly faded away leaving only the one coming out of jack.

Alex started following the flow, not quite convinced, was that it? Did he really just have to follow it? But as he was walking he glanced back at Jack, who was floating behind him, and suddenly felt his stomach lurch. Jack was smiling, and that would obviously mean that this test was far from over.

***

It wasn’t long before Alex encountered his first obstacle, the thread of mana ended. Rather it hit a huge, black, and thick wall about 6 meters tall, which seemed made out of some kind of black marble.

The wall was arched forward, in a way which hinted it being a circular fence, and extended as far as he could see. For the time being he decided to move along the fence, following the assumption that it must have an entrance.

It wasn’t long before he came upon a huge grey gate as tall as the wall, decorated with beautiful designs of ravens. It glistened with a metallic glow.

“I’m supposed to push that open!?” exclaimed Alex as he turned to look at Jack, who replied with a shrug.

Sighing, Alex approached the gate. The moment his fingers touched the gate, sounds of gears moving echoed across the area as the ground shook. Alex abruptly retreated from the gate as the eyes of the ravens glowed blue and both sides of the gate opened.

“That was… easy?” mumbled Alex no longer surprised by the flow of events.

“You’re quite lucky,” said Jack, after observing the whole spectacle, “I’ll give you that.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Well, things could have gone much worse”

Wondering what that meant, Alex entered the second section of the library.