The elder was slightly taken aback by Alz, looking at him with a mystified expression. After staring at him for several moments, he suddenly broke out into a resounding laughter, shocking Alz who was standing opposite of him.

"Hohoho, we sure have a curious one here..." after his loud laughter, the elder regained his composure and spoke with a wider smile than before, one which showed how happy he truly was.

However, his voice broke off halfway and he revealed a troubled expression as he continued on, "... but I'm afraid you're going to be disappointed, there are no such scrolls that can be found here."

"It was like this after all."

Indeed, a look of disappointment briefly flashed across Alz's face, but he quickly regained his smile and said, "It's okay, there are still many other things I would like to read on. How about ......"

Alz started to chat with the elder while asking about the locations of scrolls with the other things he wanted to learn about. The knowledge of the outside world was his primary goal, but there were also other things he was hoping to learn about here.

In fact, he had already foreseen this possibility before he arrived, so he had also prepared a separate list of information he wanted to obtain. Despite this, he still held a flicker of hope when he came to the library, but it was clearly not realised.

However, his disappointment faded away as quickly as it appeared, and he quickly got over this minor setback, started interacting with the elder by the counter. After all, even without that information he wanted, the library was still a place he would be visiting often in future.

The library was a sanctum of knowledge, containing many scrolls about the local records and culture that would provide him with the information he needed for his future plans, a location that would provide him with invaluable aid in the coming years of his stay.

To most other elves, reading was a chore and experiencing the culture directly was a better way for them to learn about it, but it went just the opposite for Alz as reading was a habit that had long since grown into him and interacting was the harder one of the two.

Alz only left the library after the skies completely darkened, and not of his own accord. The closing time for the library had arrived in what felt like a moment to Alz who was lost in his reading, snapping out of his trance only after the elder wrestled the book he was reading from his palms.

The elder looked at him with a helpless look that also contained gratification. This was the first time he had seen an elf who displayed such interest in reading, bringing joy to the elder who loved scrolls as well... except that Alz went beyond that with his reading habits.

In the entire time he spent here, he hadn't had neither a single bite of food, nor a single sip of water, spending his time lost in the world of information created by the scrolls, within the peaceful silence of the library.

The elder wanted to lecture Alz for this but found himself at a loss for words when it came down to it, settling for a heavy sigh instead as he personally escorted Alz out of the library, shaking his head slightly as he saw Alz's back out of the entrance.

Little did he know, this was merely just the beginning, as the young figure he saw today would continue to show up many times in the future, continuing to plow through the sea of information while maintaining his unhealthy reading habits, an act he had grown accustomed to.

Alz threw a final reluctant gaze back at the library before releasing long, deep sigh. He had been broken off from his reading halfway, a feeling he hadn't experienced in a long time, causing his mind to itch for more.

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However, he understood that this was no longer the archives where he had the freedom to do whatever he wanted. Rules were rules, and he had to abide by them now that he was in the capital.

"Someday, I'll read everything I want, whenever I want to."

A passing thought floated through his mind as he left the library, heading back to his new home where the golden flowers reside.

In the following days, he repeated the cycle of working on his workshop and visiting the library when his muscles were tired, dedicating all his time to these two matters.

During this time, he hadn't stopped by the guardhouse even once, reverting back to the old lifestyle he was used to. When the others tried to check on him, he would either be asleep or away from his hut, having no interaction during this period.

Yet, despite the lack of outside contact, this was the most comfortable time Alz had spent since leaving the tribe, days filled with fulfilment and discovery.

The days seemed to fly by with Alz repeating his routine until two weeks later, when he was finally done with setting up his workshop.

The workshop here was similar to the one at archives, but the layout was very different. Back then, he had cleared out an area to build the apparatus, guarding the surroundings with multiple layers of traps for security.

However, he was hesitant in setting traps around his current workshop, for fear that it would end up hurting his allies more often than not. Instead, he opted to build them within the midst of the trees, using the surrounding forest as cover.

There were also several additional structures found here such as those built for storage, as he no longer had the luxury of using the archives as a safe storage location. Among them, there were separate storage sheds for food, water, and various herbs with varying purposes.

"It's finally done!"

Alz lay with his arms spread on the floor, dead tired from the work he had been doing. He had been working continuously for the past two days without rest, unwilling to stop as the workshop was nearing its completion.

Today, his efforts had finally borne fruit, ending the long days of physical labour as he shaped the last bit of mud on his furnace, the last of the apparatus.

Alz slowly got up from the ground and looked around with a wide grin on his face, but his smile suddenly started to fade while his pupils started to lose focus as he looked at the familiar apparatus surrounding him, struck by a pang of homesickness.

After standing in place for a few minutes, Alz released a melancholic sigh before he started to stroll around for one final check on everything that he had built.

"Here it begins."

After making sure that nothing was wrong, a sharp glint flashed in his eyes for a moment before he turned around and started heading back to the field, planning to take a nice, well-deserved rest before he started on anything else.

Right before he returned, he paused and glanced at the training corner once more before he released a heavy sigh and left with a hardened expression.

Before, he had naively thought that the only obstacle he would face upon reaching was the difficulty in obtaining the information he wanted, but his outlook had changed entirely with what he learned from the library over the past two weeks.

From the snippets of history he read, he realised that the peaceful appearance on the surface was merely a facade, one that belied the true chaos that existed behind the scenes.

This discovery even made him have the urge to leave immediately, but there was also the group to consider. They might not have been something he considered before, but the warmth they repeatedly showed him had touched him and he didn't want to bring trouble to them.

He also hadn't obtained the information he wanted, so after much contemplation, he ultimately decided to stay on, while bearing a small hope that they wouldn't get dragged into the conflict.

However, from the look of things, the prospects of this were close to nil with what they experienced just at their arrival. All he could do was to remain vigilant, avoiding anything that might get him embroiled in the conflict.

Regardless, now that he knew of it, he had to make preparations for it as well, and this was one of them.

There were few ways to prepare for something that he didn't know if and when it would strike, so after giving it some thought, he decided to further refine his self-defence skills for now, although he hoped that he would never have to use it.

When he returned to the sunflower field, he felt his mind slowly relax as he gazed as the golden petals that welcomed him. A smile formed on his face as he looked around, feeling as though the worries that plagued his mind were melting away.

His eyelids began to feel heavier and he slowly closed them, falling backwards into the embrace of the flowerbed. Within a minute, smooth, rhythmic breathing sounds started to spread from Alz's while his chest began to rise and fall.