Erik was enjoying his day, it had taken him almost a year to get here. But as he looked up and saw the monolith of a building in front of him, he couldn’t help but smile. Monolith is the only real word he would use to describe the building. It was slate gray in color with holes for the windows. But if it didn’t have any of those whole it would just look like a giant almost cube of a mountain. The sides of the building are one mile long at each side, and the 486 floors above ground were 12 feet tall making just over a mile tall above ground. It is the single largest structure in the world.
While normally something so big wouldn’t be independent in this world, many fallen kingdoms and empires have learned a harsh lesson from messing with The Library of Terminus and its librarians. A lesson that likes to get relearned by people every few hundred years, because they think the history books stored inside are just legends to scare people off. But Erik himself knows that's not true at all. He has seen the power a single librarian can wield. They could be considered a god amongst normal men. Erik himself would be lying if he said he wasn’t jealous of that power. But being a decently powerful mage himself, he has actually come here in hopes of learning more ways to increase his personal power and study a few things he hasn’t been able to figure out on his own.
Exhaling a breath he walks towards the front door, for The Library of Terminus. It’s the only floor that doesn’t hold the pattern of being 12 feet tall. The first floor is over sixty feet tall, the door that greets visitors is massive. Made from some kind of dark hardwood with thick black metal bands and rivets going across its surface. Many would think it’s an inconvenience for a normal person to even open the door, but the door silently opens for anyone who wishes to enter the structure, like it does now for Erik as he walks towards it.
Walking through the open gap in the door he is greeted with the sight of rows of books on dark wooden bookshelves, going as far as he can see. Slightly in front of him is a desk in the shape of a horseshoe. It goes from each side of the door and in the middle is a small, roughly 20 foot area which is the guest check in for library visitors. On the right side of it, is the inner entrance to the library itself and on the left side is the exit to the library. Currently there is only one person Erik can see, a librarian behind the counter reading a book.
Erik makes his way over to the counter and silently waits in front of the man. After a few minutes the man doesn’t look up, but asks in a bored tone of voice. “First time or returning visitor?
“First time sir.”
The man pulls out a sheet of paper with questions on it and sets it on the counter without looking up from what he is doing. He sets a weird looking quill down on the paper afterwards and says, “Fill this out.”
Erik looks down at the paper, picking up the quill, he begins to fill out the very basic questionnaire.
Name: Erik
Hometown: Plunder Bay
Purpose for visit: To gain knowledge.
Languages known: Common, High Elf, Dwarvish, Thieves Cant, Anbian, Viepselili.
Current profession: Wandering Scholar
Next of kin: None
If no next of kin, what would you like done with your body or what is left if you have an accident visiting Terminus: Burn it and scatter the ashes over a tree's roots.
Erik finishes and silently places the paper and quill in front of the librarian when finished. It’s another few minutes before the man picks up the paper and quills. He pops the quill away and looks at the paper for a few moments before he says, “Wandering scholar is just a fancy way to say jobless.”
You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.
“Hard to have a steady job, when I spent the past year traveling here.”
The librarian nods his head before speaking in Viepselili. “You know Thieves Cant isn’t considered a language, right?”
Erik smirks and says to the man while replying in Anbian, “It’s the only thing they really speak in Plunder Bay and it was the first thing I was taught to speak.”
The man finally looks up at Erik as he says in High Elf, “A cull wouldn’t agree with that.”
Speaking in Dwarvish this time, Erik says. “A cull would also lose their pretty pollys walking into the wrong rounder.”
The man smiles and says in common, “Welcome to The Library of Terminus young man. Just a moment and I will give you a library card. It is your pass to enter and exit the library. The first one is free, if you lose it, it’s ten large gold coins to replace.”
“Thank you sir.”
The man turns around and feeds the paper into a metal box. Erik can feel the hum of magic from the box and after a minute, something pops out on the bottom. It’s a small metal card two inches by four inches. The librarian turns around and hands it to Erik as he says. “Here is your card.”
Looking down at the card, it’s a dull silver in color engraved with Erik’s name in the middle. Nothing else is on the card, not even The Library of Terminus’s name. Erik slides the card into the front pocket of his pants and looks back up at the librarian. The man smiles again and says. “You are free to enter now, through that entrance to your right. If you are looking for spells to increase your potential as a mage, I would suggest going to subfloor 132 4D section 6. The complete works of the Sunfire Mage.”
Erik is stunned for a moment and doesn’t respond. When he goes to say something he stops, the librarian is already back in his book. He shakes his head and turns to walk into the library itself. Passing through the entrance into the first floor, he looks around for a moment and takes in the sight. Rows of bookshelves are before him, each shelf has numbers and letters. Walking into the first row of books, each book has a small tag with a code on the bottom and it looks like they go in an order. How that works he has no idea, since in front of him on this first shelf is over a thousand books.
He spends the first little while just walking through the shelves of books and looking at the titles on each one. Even when he walks a good way into the middle of the stacks, it’s still bright and the air is fresh. Like a nice summer day with a slight overcast to it.
Erik finally looks for the way to get to the lower floors and to his surprise there are signs hanging down from the ceiling telling him where things are. Each section, group, stairs, water stations, lavatories, where the help desk is and private research rooms. It’s actually really helpful. Making his way to the stairs in 4D area floor one, he begins to head down the stairs. It takes a while to walk down 132 floors, but he lucked out and 4D was right in front of him on subfloor 132. It looks like all floors hold the same pattern for group numbers.
It doesn’t take too long to find section 6 and find a whole collection of books by the Sunfire Mage. Taking the first thick tome he heads to the nearest chair. Which is at the end of the book shelf he grabbed the book from. Sinking into the comfortable chair he opens the book and begins to read it.
It’s hard to tell how much time passes for Erik as he reads the tome in his hands. The light never changes, and even though he is close to the outer wall, there are no windows underground. When his stomach finally makes a sound, he actually sits up in his chair and looks at the almost completed book in front of him. Erik decides to finish this first book then leave the library for the day to eat and think on the information he has found. While most people would need to take notes and study it for a long time, Erik has perfect eidetic memory. It’s part of the reason he knows so many languages and also the reason he is such a skilled mage at a young age.
Once finished with the book, Erik stands up and stretches. He returns the book to its proper spot on the shelf and begins to make his way back upstairs. It takes a while, but once on the first floor, he can see it is already dark outside from the windows. Heading to the front desk he makes his way to the exit of the horseshoe shaped desk. The librarian that helped him this morning is still there, he doesn’t seem to have moved and is still reading his book. Erik doesn’t say anything as he passes and walks to the front door, which swings open silently at his approach. Walking outside, he is greeted by the cool breeze of the night air as the door closes behind him.
Looking down the slight hill the library rests on, he looks at the city that has been built up and has been thriving on travelers coming to visit the library. Whoever was the first person to build a place to stay for library visitors was a genius, considering that their descendants turned the place into a thriving city that could rival most kingdoms capitals. A smile creeps onto Erik's face and he thinks about the book he just finished and how he can’t wait to begin practicing what he has learned. Just this first day of visiting The Library of Terminus more than made up for his one year of travel.