"Dying?"

"One."

"Hmmm… "

"Dying?"

"Forty-two thousand, three hundred, seven."

"Hmmm…"

---------------

Elliot stepped into the small library, glancing around cautiously.

The room was small, but absolutely filled with bookshelves set so close together that some of the heavier first years’ would have to squish to pass between them.

Each wall held two bookshelves, while a good number stood surrounding an empty area in the middle which contained a couple of tables and a bunch of chairs for reading. Two of the corners contained reading nooks as well, which Elliot automatically preferred, partially hidden away as they were.

At first, the number of books and shelves concerned Elliot, since Conner had said that the individual libraries only held the essential reading material, but upon closer inspection he found that there were about fifty copies of each title there, which put the total number of essential books from a monstrous amount, to something far more reasonable.

During his short investigation of the library, he hadn’t seen any sign of the mysterious white thing that had led him there, so he decided to peruse the books themselves.

The shelf nearest him held three different titles: What is Defence? An In-Depth Study by A’otsda Ra’vuib, What is Protection? An In-Depth Study by A’otsda Ra’vuib, and Aspects made Clear, by Miles Avard, none of which piqued his interest particularly.

Elliot sighed. While he was sure that he would spend a good amount of time in here, it was probably time to head down to dinner, what with seven flights of stairs to traverse and all that.

He began to maneuver his way through the small maze of bookshelves back towards the door, but as soon as he reached the middle area, he stopped dead in his tracks, his stomach dropping to his feet and his heart jumping to his throat.

Right on top of the central table, sat a huge, sleek, majestic, tiger. Its fur was pure white, its stripes a gleaming silver that glinted in the candlelight, the light shifting with its every breath.

The tiger stared into Elliot’s eyes, eerie white meeting cobalt blue.

Elliot couldn’t look away, even as the tiger rose and gracefully stepped off the table to circle around him.

The large feline paced around him, occasionally twitching its ears or its tail, thought whether it was in annoyance, or boredom, or some other emotion entirely, Elliot couldn’t tell.

After an extremely tense minute, the tiger was apparently satisfied with whatever it had been investigating, and returned to its perch on the table to resume the staring contest. This time, though, Elliot quickly glanced away.

Is there any possible way I can slip past it without it noticing? Am I dead? First day of Academy and already about to die? No, don’t be silly… the Elders wouldn’t allow a dangerous beast to roam freely in the student Dorms. There must be some logic to this. But for as many theories and possibilities that Elliot came up with, none of them seemed likely, let alone logical.

Maybe… maybe someone tamed it? Maybe it’s a pet of one of the older students, or of a teacher. But if it was, why would they let it up here? If it was a teacher’s why would it be in the student Dorms at all? Why-

I suppose I’ll start then, if you’re too scared for proper manners.

Elliot jumped, startled out of his thoughts. The voice sounded almost exactly like his, except softer, warmer, and deeper. But still somehow recognizably his. It also was entirely in his head.

“Is this an elaborate prank, or are you the Tiger?” Elliot asked without thinking. He’d meant to apologize for his manners, or to introduce himself, or to ask for help in getting past the tiger, or to scream or something, but instead he’d asked the single most naive and laughable question he could think of.

Am I being pranked, or is it the tiger speaking? Ridiculous.

The tiger twitched its ear. The second option. I am Baihu, also called Jian Bing, although you may call me whatever you like. What might I call you?

Elliot shifted back and forth uncomfortably. “Erm, my name is Elliot. Sorry, but who- or rather, what are you?”

The tiger, Baihu, tilted its head. You don’t know? That would explain your panic and ill-manners. I am the Guardian of the West.

Elliot tilted his head. “The Guardian of the West? So… are you a deity then? The only Guardians I know of are the Guardians of the East, the South, and Center.”

Baihu tilted his head to the other side. What are you saying? There have always been five Guardians. Why would no one protect the West or the North?

“I… I don’t know.” There was silence for a moment, before Elliot asked, “What do you want from me, please? Why did you lead me here?”

The tiger laughed. I led you here because you followed me. I meant to speak with you earlier, but you ran away. Baihu turned serious, straightening up and tucking his tail around his paws. The World has been broken. But it is mending. Slower than we had anticipated, and slower than is natural, but it is mending all the same. Ten years ago, I had hope that it was healed completely, but I was mistaken. Something has been reopening the wound, not letting it heal.

The tiger stepped of the table again and walked up to Elliot, and it seemed rather bigger than before, its eyes on level with Elliot’s, while still on all fours. Though I cannot do much, you are under my protection. You have my complete, undivided attention.

Elliot blinked, unsure how to respond. Fortunately for him, he didn’t end up needing to. Just a moment after Baihu had made his pronouncement, the door to the library (which had somehow been closed, though Elliot hadn’t done so when he’d entered) swung open.

Baihu turned around and disappeared in a flash of white sparks, just as Conner poked his head in.

“Ah, there you are! Everyone’s heading down for dinner, and you weren’t in the dorm.” Conner glanced around the quiet library. “Do you like reading much?”

Elliot nodded, not positive that his voice would come out properly if he tried to speak.

Conner smiled as the two exited the room and headed for the stairs. “Good for you. I don’t know a lot of people who do. I know I said as much earlier, but the main library really does have the interesting books. No one ever goes there either, since the Year specific libraries are so much more convenient, so I’ve found it’s a good place to get away from it all.”

Elliot hesitantly smiled back at the House Captain. “I’ll check it out, thanks.”

Conner nodded. “Don’t mention it.”

The two reached the next landing, at which point Conner stopped. “You go on ahead, I have to make sure everybody’s accounted for.”

Elliot nodded and thanked Conner for finding him, before scampering on down the stairs.

—

When he got down to the Dining Hall everyone was pretty much already seated and chatting with each other. Elliot shuffled his way over to where a bunch of the first year guys were, since he saw that Felicia was sitting with a bunch of other girls.

The group he sat down with were all the Crimson Hawk year one boys, as well as a few Emerald and Golden Dragons.

As he approached, one of the boys waved at him. “Hi! Come sit over here! We were just talking about what Aspects we think we’re aligned with best. I think Summer for me, but any of them would be good so it’s not too big a deal if I’m somewhere else. What about you?”

This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it

Elliot sat down hesitantly. He’d considered this question before, but had never come to any sort of satisfying conclusion. For as many times as he’d gone through the Sanctioned Aspects of Yang, none of them ever stood out to him as particularly similar to him. In fact, they’d all seemed decidedly not like him.

He shrugged, “I’ve never really thought about it… maybe Peace, I suppose.”

A boy with black and white hair, and startlingly pale green eyes tilted his head. “How have you never thought about it before? I’ve narrowed down my main alignment to either Protection or Uniting, though I might be something similar like Defence and Ally.”

Elliot shrugged again, feeling self-conscious, “I guess it never mattered my alignment. I’ve always wanted to be a warrior against the Corrupted, how I get there hasn’t really been a concern.”

This, of course, was not true. He had been very concerned about how he would become a warrior, and his seeming lack of attunement to any Aspect made him worry that he would fail out of the Academy. However, his explanation seemed to placate the other boys.

“You actually want to go out and fight the Corrupted? I don’t think you’re aligned with Peace then,” the green-eyed boy said with a laugh.

Elliot mentally winced. “You can’t have peace if you don’t fight for it, right?”

“I suppose not.”

A Golden Dragon boy spoke up, “Unless the Elders were just able to get rid of the Darkness entirely. Then the Corrupted wouldn’t have any power to fight with.”

The first boy tilted his head. “I mean, some of the Corrupted are Children of Yang. They could just use those Aspects.”

Elliot nodded. “They’d probably get more violent too. I mean, as evil as they are, they think they’re in the right and are fighting for their twisted sense of balance. If everything they’re fighting for was just ripped away, I feel like they’d probably just start killing people left and right.”

That brought a moment of silence, as the group imagined such a world.

The moment passed, and the group went on to talking about what they all thought the classes were like.

Over the course of dinner Elliot learned that the first boy’s name was Keith, the green-eyed boy was Royce, and the Golden Dragon boy was Sylvester. Also at the table was Cecil, a blonde boy who’d lived in the Center all his life and was looking to be a warrior as well, mostly just to get out of the city, Emery, a boy who had silver and gold stripes in his black hair and who had already learned some things from his older sister. There were a few other boys at the table, but Elliot was going to have enough trouble remembering his own house mates, so he didn’t even try for them yet. There would be plenty of time in the coming years for learning names.

After dinner, Cecil, Emery, Royce, and a couple of the Emerald and Golden Dragon boys ran off to play some games outside, but Elliot decided to head over to the Class building and explore the library.

Out of any of the three buildings, the library was the only room that indicated how old the Academy of Balance really was. An intricate carving of the Symbol of Balance adorned the thick double-doors, surrounded by similarly intricate carvings of six creatures, three of whom Elliot recognized. Starting at the top and going clockwise, there was the Golden Dragon, a tiger, a snake entwined with a tortoise, the Emerald Dragon, and what Elliot assumed was the Crimson Hawk, though it looked more like a quail than anything else.

The library reached up two stories, an elegant catwalk leading around the perimeter so that the higher shelves could actually be reached.

The shelves on the floor were set up in a spiraling winding mess that one could easily get lost in.

Like the student libraries, each corner had a reading nook, but unlike the student libraries, this also had a few reading cubbies tucked between shelves on the walls.

The upper balcony had quite a few tables and chairs set up, but they were far less cozy, and far more out in the open. From the view up top, looking down at the surprisingly large room, Elliot could see that the bookshelves, though placed chaotically, made the Symbol of Balance.

Elliot glanced at the books while he was up on the catwalk anyway, and was moderately disappointed to find that the majority of them were still textbooks. Specifically year five textbooks.

But Conner had promised interesting books, so Elliot dove into the stacks (metaphorically of course) to search for them.

Already, the books on the main floor were more interesting, as they didn’t have specific years attached, which meant they were supplemental at the very least, if not entirely unneeded. They had interesting enough titles, but nothing that really stood out to him, so he continued onward.

Eventually, after a good hour of meandering and getting thoroughly lost, Elliot arrived the center of the Yang half of the Symbol of Balance. What would have been the dot in a regular drawing, was a large circular pillar with slots for books or series’ of books carved into it specifically and intermittently, though the surrounding shelves were perfectly normal and filled with books.

On the circle shelf, one of the carved out sections held twelve thick volumes, no titles gracing the spines.

In fact, as Elliot looked, none of the books on the circle had titles on the spines, nor did the majority of the books in the nearby shelves. None of the books looked to be falling apart or particularly worn, but upon closer inspection he noticed that the construction of the books was far more… primitive than modern. Raw cut leather covers closed with twine, uneven pages, some of which looked to be torn instead of cut, and when he pulled a book off a shelf the title seemed to be hand-painted.

He reached out to take the first of the twelve volumes, but just as his fingers brushed against the leather, a voice called out, “Hello there.”

Elliot turned around to see a guy, probably only a year or two out of the Tower, standing behind him. He had straight black hair that fell to his knees, and wore a dark grey robe adorned with a winding green snake.

“What’s a young man like you doing in the Library? Shouldn’t you be off playing with your friends?”

Elliot shrugged. “I only have one friend here, and she’s hanging out with a bunch of girls.”

The man tilted his head. “What about the other boys in your house?”

“I’ve only just met them. Besides, I don’t really feel like running around outside. I’d much rather find a nice reading nook that’s out of the way. A space just for me.”

The man raised an eyebrow. “One might think that the woods would be a better place to find a quiet place instead of the very public library.”

Elliot laughed. “From what I’ve heard just from the other boys, they’re already planning a grand expedition to the woods. I have a feeling that nowhere outside is going to be a good hiding place.”

“Perhaps not.” The man idly ran a hand through his hair. “Well then. I wish you luck in your search.” He turned to go, and Elliot turned back to the large pillar.

“Oh, one last thing.”

Elliot glanced back.

“There are many secrets in this library, and not all of them are held between pages,” the man smiled. “Good evening, and good luck.” The man turned a corner, and was gone.

Elliot waited a moment, but the man didn’t return.

He smiled, turning back to the books. He had no clue what secrets the man was referring to, nor where he would even begin to look for finding them, but now he had something to do in his free time for the next few years.

But that could all start later. For now he wanted to look at books.

He soon discovered that the set of books were about the twelve animal spirits. He flipped through the book about the Rat, and read things very similar to what he’d been taught. However, when he went to read the next one, about one of the six traitors, the book was completely empty.

Further perusal revealed similar results for the other books about the traitors. In fact, as he circled the pillar, any book regarding Yin or her followers had been rendered completely blank.

But then, Elliot supposed this was reasonable. After all, if it was material from before the Shattering, then it might have led some unsuspecting Children astray. And it would do no good for the primary offense against the Corrupted of Yin to be recruiting for them.

Another hour of wandering led Elliot to the fiction section of the library, which mostly encapsulated the Yin portion of the Symbol of Balance. While none of the books on this pillar were completely blank, a quick perusal showed that many were edited with blank sections and sentences. Probably due to the same outdated beliefs from Before.

Curfew arrived a while later, but Elliot had had plenty of time to wander, explore, and browse, so he was decently familiar with the general layout of the Library, though the maze of shelves that made up the Symbol of Balance still confused him.

As Elliot climbed the many flights of stairs to the first year dorms, he found himself both nervous and excited for the next day. What would the classes be like? What would the teachers be like? Would he do well enough over the next few years to join warriors upon graduation? What in the world was the tiger spirit talking about?

Despite the questions and nerves racing through his ming, sleep overtook him mere minutes after Elliot got in bed.

—

Duan Zhelan breathed in the autumn air, watching as a swarm of children played in the woods. The little rats were within the school’s protective boundary, so nothing could be done about them at the moment.

He scowled, though had someone been watching it would have looked like the slightest of frowns. Like many times before, he wished that his devotion to Yin wasn’t quite so… visible.

But no. As long as Yin couldn’t choose her Children, they would have to choose her. Whatever the price may be.

He inhaled again, pointedly collecting some of the ambient aspects of Yin that thrived in this place. He didn’t let himself grimace as the shock of cold and pain coursed through him.

The bushes rustled as Lei Yahui, one of the newer confirmed members, hurried over, slightly out of breath. “Duan, a student came through the boundary and gave the signal.”

“Did you confirm his authenticity?”

The girl nodded. “Everything is in order. He said that we may have another potential among the new students. But surely it’s too early to tell, right?”

Duan shook his head. “When a Child of Yang is sympathetic to Yin, it is generally fairly easy to spot. If you know what to look for, that is.”

“And how do you know what to look for?”

“Because those who are sympathetic to Yin tend to be less Yang aligned than their brethren, which automatically puts them at odds with their peers. So if you see a child who is outside of the social groups, voila. Even if they aren’t sympathetic yet, they are far more likely to accept the truth than those who are fully aligned with Yang.”

“But you can’t be sure. And if you’re wrong then they’ll catch us and kill us.”

“We aren’t hasty, Yahui. We are patient. It may grate at us, but if it takes patience to destroy the Corrupt and bring the powers of Yin back into the world, then patient we shall be.”

Lei ducked her head, abashed. “Of course.”

Duan turned back to watch the children.

Patience. By the time you’d wrung one of their pitiful throats, the Corrupt would come down and kill me. It’s not a worthwhile trade, Duan. Remember that.

He glared through the trees at the oblivious students, his calm facade cracking away.

Another time. They cannot hide here forever.