After a healthy but lighter meal than her lunch, Mia was guided towards the library by Shishen and Narissa. It was still afternoon, with a good hour or two until the beginning of evening, so she had a lot of time to read.

“How big is the library?” Mia asked.

“As big as the cafeteria.” Narissa explained.

“What do you like to read Mia?” Shishen asked.

“I...” Mia tried to answer but was unable to. She knew she liked science fiction in her old life but something inside her was sure that even if she would enjoy reading it now, it wasn't really what she liked to read now.

“What's wrong?” Narissa asked.

“Nothing, it's just I didn't really read many books to have a preference.” Mia answered. It wasn't really a lie, but it wasn't the truth. Mia couldn't really put into words but she felt that at the moment, she liked to read stuff not really categorized as literature.

After a few minutes of walking, they arrived at the library building. From the outside it looked like a wooden mansion but once they got inside Mia noticed that the building was different from the inside than what you would expect from the outside. Definitively magic. The insides were made out of marble and some other type of smooth stone that Mia couldn't identify. The only wood Mia saw anywhere was on the bookshelves, tables and chairs.

“Hello Ma'am.” Narissa and Shishen said to a woman on the front desk of the place. Probably the librarian.

“Hello. Good to see students coming here again. The books were starting to feel lonely.” The librarian said cheerily. She was a woman that Mia could only describe as average. She was around 150 cm tall, had a somewhat pale skin, curly orange hair that went to her shoulders and brown eyes. She looked to be a mix of black and white races leaning a little more to the black side. She was wearing a one piece black dress that went all the way to her foot with a belt dividing the two halves of her body on top of it.

“You have sentient books here? I want to talk to one.” Mia said. The librarian couldn't help but give a smiley laugh at Mia.

“You might be a little young for those.” The librarian said, somewhat seriously.

“Why? Are they going to eat me or something? If they try, they will be eaten, right Onyx?” Mia said.

“Woof!” Onyx responded.

“Please don't eat the books.” The librarian once again said, somewhat seriously.

“You heard the lady Onyx. Only eat books that try to eat you.”

“...What can I help you with?” The librarian asked, seeing that this was not really going anywhere.

“Is the book club here already? She wants to become a member.” Narissa explained while pointing to Mia.

“Yes. They are in their usual place. I imagine that I don't need to tell the rules, do I?”

“Keep quiet, don't dirty the place, don't damage the books unless they try to eat you. Did I forget anything?” Mia said.

“...No.” The librarian said in a comedic defeated tone.

With that, the group went inside the library proper. They went up to the third floor where the book club had their 'base'. Once they reached the place, Mia saw a group of 9 people divided between two tables talking and reading. Taking into account that Mia saw other people reading on the other floors, they are probably all in the book club.

Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

“Narissa? What are you doing here?” An elf girl with purple hair asked once she saw the group arriving.

“Hello Zone. Good to see you.” Narissa answered.

“Stop calling me Zone. That is not my name and because of you a lot of people are calling me that too.”

“Your name is too long. Zone is better.” Shishen said.

“Hello to you too Shishen.”

“What's your name?” Mia asked with curiosity in her eyes.

“Zoneplastinavierga.” The elf girl proudly said.

“Zone, ok.” Mia said with a blank face.

“See! You only said it once and now she thinks it's my name. What would my family think of it if they knew my woes.” Zone buffed at Narissa.

“Your father would probably cry tears of joy, probaby. You know that it was his idea to have me call you Zone, don't you?.”

“But my glorious name was given by my mother, why can't people understand?”

“...You know, let's drop the topic as people are looking a little too much at us. Here, this is Mia, she wants to be part of the club.” Narissa said as she pushed Mia forward a little.

“Hello, I am Mia. Good to know all of you. This is Onyx, he is the best wolf out there. He is smart, strong and shiny.”

“Woof!”

A boy got up and approached the group. He also wasn't human, as a matter of fact he was the first aquatic humanoid Mia ever saw. He was some sort of fishman, or more specifically dolphinman. Either that or some sort of whaleman. He was very human all things considered, if not for the fin on his back and his skin, he could easily pass as someone with small deformities in his face.

“Hello, I am Kaatak, the current leader of this club. I heard you want to join. May I ask why?” He asked Mia.

“Because I need someone to pick the books for me in higher places and I don't want to ask the people working here for that all the time.”

Mia's answer gave a good chunk of the people there a good laugh, even if Mia didn't really understand why.

“I just want to read books and learn. I don't even know exactly what you guys do so I can't say I am here for that.” Mia added.

“Well, that is enough for the most part. As for what we do. We are somewhat the honorary staff of the library, not that it needs any. We read books, from time to time we give reports about what we read to Skani, the Librarian. It's also somewhat our job to inform about damaged books we find as well books with clear malicious wrong information.” Kaatak explained.

“I don't mind doing any of that, but what do I gain from it?” Mia wouldn't mind doing any of what the club does but it's not something she wants to be compelled to do. She wants to read some books and unless not being part of the club hinders her ability to read what the library has to offer, she is going to go solo here.

“We trade books not in the library with each other regularly.” Zone explained.

“I don't think I will have any books worth trading or will have any time soon.” Mia knew for a fact that she herself wouldn't have pocket money for a while. Much less the money necessary to buy non mass published books. Add the fact that as far as Mia knew, fiction in this world was really behind her old one, she really didn't offer anything here.

“That doesn't really matter. We are just happy to have people to talk with.”

“Still, I don't see much advantage of being part of this club.”

“...”

“Look. If you are really that desperate for members, just give Mia some magic books or ancient tomes you find, pretty sure that would entice her.” Narissa said.

“I wouldn't be against it.” Mia added.

“Wait! Are you that Mia?” Zone asked.

“What?” Mia asked in confusion.

“Are you the girl who made the magic dragons on the magic test? The one that took first place.”

“I believe that is me. Also, there is another girl named Mia here?”

“Don't know, but since it's you, I can pitch in to give you some good magic books, hell, I will buy you magic books if you enter the club.”

“Me too.” Kaatak said. The rest of the members of the club also said the same thing.

Mia was confused but it was soon explained to her, in a rather confused manner that took way too much time, that clubs had to defend themselves in some form of battle competition from time to time from other clubs and they had no fighters at all and due to that they lost on a good amount of benefits that other clubs got along the years. The bigger clubs are so stacked that most people just give up but if Mia was with then, they had a chance.

Narissa and Shishen were surprised by this too but it's not like they were part of clubs themselves so they never really had a reason to know about it.

With everything put on the table, Mia officially joined the Book Club. After quickly signing some papers she began the search for what she was looking for. A book about the beginning of mana in this world, preferably a really old one.