Sighing, I let myself fall onto my bed, laying on my stomach but my head on the side, staring out at my home for the foreseeable future.

After spending the entire day going to all of the listed classes, Lunia and I went our separate ways on account of our being assigned to different buildings.

Being one of the last to arrive at the U dormitory, and also due to all of C and D, the presumably largest grades, being the ones to use it, by the time I finally got the brass, numbered key to my room, the sun had already begun to set.

Already mentally exhausted from going to so many different classes, the fatigue I felt was only further compounded by my needing to spend half an hour to find my room on the fifth floor, all while having to lug the six inch thick rule book and my provided leather bound notebook with me.

Illuminated by a dozen, small light stones embedded into the walls, the room itself was more than serviceable, being about twice as big as what I had in Frosthelm. With a desk, chair, armoire, and bed, all made out of a dark brown colored wood, I had no complaints. The only thing I was completely ignorant the purpose of was a large, blood red magic circle at the center of the room. engraved into a different material than the rest of the flooring.

Blindly throwing the key to the room onto the desk opposite my bed, I closed my eyes, the blanket I lay on whispering sweet nothings into my ear.

Pinching myself, I forcefully sat up, my freshly washed hair splashing water droplets into the air.

I moved to the desk, checking whether or not the black golems had sent all of my belongings, and that they weren’t damaged in transit.

I unsheathed the sword, and seeing that there was nothing wrong with it, I nodded in self-satisfaction.

Chuckling to myself, I positioned the four-legged wooden monster statue Lunia had bought for me such that it would be looking over me while I slept. Despite having bladed horns sticking out from every square inch of skin, and possessing a face that only a mother could love, I found it to be strangely adorable.

Having verified that my belongings were undamaged, I leaned my fist onto my cheek, staring at the books I had bought when we were at Slyvenia.

Imario’s Beginners Guide to Mana: 361st Edition, Fundamental Alchemy, Sword King’s Theory of Martial Arts, and the 7th Compendium of Flora and Fauna.

Mixed feelings welled up in my heart.

Not only did I already know Imario’s guide was completely and utterly useless, thus lowering my expectations for the other three, Celestia also had an entire library at it’s students’ disposal.

Granted, I had yet to visit it, having spent the entire day wandering around with Lunia, but its mere existence eliminated any need I had for the books.

It was a near guarantee that anything Celestia had to offer literature wise would trump whatever odds and ends ended up at Slyvenia.

Even still, I had paid good money Thalric had given me for those books, and as such, I would extract as much value as I could from them.

Opening Sword King’s Theory of Martial Arts, I began to read.

Being of relatively short length, I completely finished reading in ten minutes, even while making sure to intently scan each of the pages top to bottom. By the end, even with my very limited, amateurish knowledge of martial arts, I could definitively say that I had been defrauded.

A feeling of disgust surged inside of me at having spent a couple gold coins for such trash. Although it got the basics correct, in that there were three different stages in martial arts, Weapon Aura, where the weapon and owner become indistinguishable from one another, and mana is thus able to naturally flow into the weapon, Assimilation, where the weapon aura is able to manifest in the body, and Separation, where the weapon aura is able to exist outside of the body, I had already learned all of that from Martial Arts 101 earlier in the day.

You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

Everything after that mentioned in the book was esoteric, obtuse, and completely useless to me.

Stupidly puzzling phrases such as ‘Your weapon is akin to the springtime,’ or ‘There is no king of weapons, only man,’ completely filled the booklet.

For having such an imposing title as ‘The Sword King,’ the man was a lousy teacher.

Clenching my fists in anger, I fought the urge to find a fire starter, and burn the trash.

My enthusiasm properly dampened, I set the Sword King's theory to the side, and opened Fundamental Alchemy, half expecting it to just be the word ‘useless’ repeated for 300 pages.

Giving the first dozen pages a lazy, cursory inspection, I very quickly devoted all of my attention into my reading, being very pleasantly surprised with the knowledge I found within.

It not only properly relayed the basics about alchemical circles; that they were powered from either absorbed environmental mana or the user’s own imbued mana, it also answered many questions I had, such as just what role the material used in the creation of such magic circles played.

Magic circles created with lower quality materials very often not only required the user’s mana, but they also had a limited number of times they could be activated in a time period before the catalyst was damaged, or even destroyed.

Higher quality catalysts were much more versatile, in that not only were they capable of absorbing environmental mana, so they were able to be activated even without the caster needing to use their own mana, but they also were much more robust, and able to be activated a number of times before degradation became even a remote risk.

The Fundamental Alchemy book even had basic potion recipes, with precise ingredient lists, concise, easy to follow directions, and an illustration of how the end product was expected to look.

My smile fully reaching my ears, I gingerly tucked the Fundamental Alchemy book underneath my bed. Logically, my actions made no sense, but it just felt right for me to do so.

The library most likely had material that dwarfed Fundamental Alchemy in every single conceivable category, but even so, it belonged solely to me.

Opening the final book I had bought, the 7th Compendium of Flora and Fauna, the characteristic smell of dust immediately hit my nose. The tome was a bit under a foot thick and had been weathered from the passage of time, each of the pages having thinned and become brittle from being turned so many times.

Bound in a purple colored skin, I ran my finger over the cover of the book, much too rough and jagged to be the leather of a cow.

Beginning to read the contents, I immediately gawked at the information detailed.

The information provided by the book was in itself quite basic, such as what it ate, what ate it, topped of with an illustration.

No, I was amazed by what surrounded those basic, relatively useless factoids.

Covering every square inch of paper, the margins of the pages were blanketed in tiny, handwritten notes about the specimen, whether it be what parts of it were valuable, how best to harvest or kill it, and even what months of the year they mated or bloomed.

Carefully thumbing through the entire book, I saw that the entirety of it was like that; full to the brim with useful knowledge able to be applied to the real world.

My mood becoming even better than before, I suddenly felt as if I was submerged into an ice cold lake, as an intense wave of melancholy came over me.

Those notes were personally hand written by someone.

They were most likely an explorer, or wanderer. After all, no other profession required one to be so knowledgeable on not just plants, but monsters as well.

And judging by the sheer depth and breadth of detail of the notes, they had quite a bit of experience in what they did.

But even with all of their experience, they had probably died while exploring some old, dilapidated ruin, or from fighting with monsters.

I knew well just how addicting the sensation of risking your own life was.

The nervous anticipation before the battle began, the rush of energy that came from narrowly avoiding death, and even the brotherhood and friendship that was forged between those you previously wouldn’t be caught dead associating with.

But any benefit that could be derived from risking one’s own life were heavily outweighed by the corresponding consequences.

The unnerving, quiet aftermath of struggles to the death, the feeling of stabbing a knife through the neck of the one who tried to take your life, and the rapidly dimming light and rapidly fading warmth of your vowed brother’s eyes and body as you hold them.

The previous owner of the book had probably grown addicted to the euphoria, unable to recognize they were digging their own grave, and instead of escaping when they still had the chance, dove deeper into the quagmire they found themselves in.

And now, everything that made them, their hopes, their dreams, their fears, their love, their hatred, all gone.

A story that had come to an end.

I offered a silent prayer for the previous owner, hoping that they were at least able to find solace in death.