"So, about that dude at the entrance." I glanced back at Olya as he carefully touched the bump on his head.

"Ouch! Shiet, did you have to hit me so hard?" He winced before replying, "Yeah, what about him?"

"How'd he know that I was lookin' for you?" I asked.

"Oh, he didn't, actually." He chuckled, "You see it's actually pretty funny. Since he doesn't speak Entropic, he just went to me because he knew I did. He legit didn't know you and I were friends."

"What? But didn't you ask for them to call you up once I got here or somethin'?" I felt betrayed.

"Nope." He said flat out, "When I first came here, I just had a pleasant chat with the staff before exploring all the books they have in here. Of couse, I'm still glad you got here in one piece."

"You want me to hit you again, you fat ass bastard!?" I raised my hand at him threateningly, making him stumble before falling on his butt, "You had those teleporters, AND the recall device! Why didn't you use them to find me!?"

"How, you idiot!" He shot back, "If I used the monitoring device, I could ascertain that you're roughly in Simpleton, but nothing concrete! You said it yourself - You were in the middle of nowhere, whole kilometers away from the nearest city!"

"Tch..." I clicked my tongue at him as I turned back around to continue walking, "Whatever. Let's just get to the top and check outta here."

"Whoa, whoa, hold your horses." He got up as well, "Let's at least check some of these books out, remember?"

Ugh, frankly I couldn't care less about the books right now. The sheer amount of them all standing here in line is impressive, don't get me wrong, but it seems like even they're running out of books to fill the bookshelves with. I'm serious, the higher we go up, the less filled the bookshelves are, it seems. Like I'm sure they'll get filled up eventually, but I do definitely feel like we've got nothing to dawdle on even if we wanted to. Not to mention Shaid is fighting for his life back at base, even if he may not realize it.

"Fine, just don't take too long." I sighed as I let him do as he pleased, "I'll go check some books out too, I guess. Let's meet up at the top when the Sun sets.

"Sure, not a problem!" He flashed me a hearty thumbs up before retreating back down the stairs, "Ohoho, I found some really good ones down near the first few floors...! This is gonna be so much fun!"

Well, as long as he's happy, I guess. Can't say I really understand his passion for them all that much, but I guess since it has so much to do with his family business, I can sort of understand. But looking at these titles, I certainly can notice one glaring detail that just keeps bugging me. All the titles here, and over there too, and there... They're all in Entropic. I mean, I get it's the universal language, but that still makes no sense why there aren't any Simpletonese books around.

"The books written in Simpletonese are near the top." A friendly bystander noticed me staring intently at the bookshelves, "Don't worry, it messed with me quite a bit as well when I first got here, but it makes sense once you get used to it. They're alphabetically sorted, after all."

"You're a foreigner too?" I asked.

"Yep, and you're Schnell Douglas." He gave me a sly wink.

"H-Huh!?" I jolted once I heard my name come from his mouth, "How do you know my name!?"

"Are you crazy?" His Brown Eyes glistened with praise, "Everyone in the World knows THE Schnell Douglas! The famous adventurer from... Meridia! Who went to... Abyssus Solis, whoa."

"Mn?" I noticed the weird pauses in his speech, as if he was reading from a script.

"A-Anyways! Everyone knows you for you good merits, dude! I'm a big fan!" He patted me on the back as he slyly drew himself next to me, "And as your fan, I'd really appreciate it if you could give me some pointers."

"Pointers, you say?" I tilted my head.

"Yeah, I wanna be just like you!" He smiled innocently enough, "But I don't know where to start. You see, once I heard your story, I was so inspired that I immediately packed my bags and went out into the World, but I quickly ran outta cash, ha-ha..."

"Oh, I'm sorry." I felt genuinely bad for ruining the poor guy's life, "Y'know, Shaid and I started off by investing some starting capital into wares we would sell to get by at the start. Hope that helps."

"Shaid?" His Eyes then glew a soothing Brown before he went back into all smiles mode, "A-Ah, yeah, Shaid! Your childhood friend, the guy whose dad likes looking at his wife getting plowed!"

"Excuse me?" I raised an eyebrow, "Just how do you know such things about us? I mean, I doubt we're known for that."

"O-Oh, y'know..." He looked away, "B-But back to the topic at hand - That's some really good advice! I should've thought of it sooner, really! Goes to show you how experienced of an adventurer you really are, Schnell Douglas!"

Eheheh, I like getting praised. This guy is really nice! But to think, we're already famous from across the World!? That's incredible! And this guy, he knows so much about us, I didn't know fans were this hardcore! I really hope my advice works out for him, cause I want to see him succeed!

"Oh, but..." He scratched his head bashfully, "Damn, I guess it's too late for me, then..."

"Huh? What do you mean?" I furrowed my brows, "Don't give up! You haven't even started yet!"

"Well yeah, that's the problem." He reminded me, "I'm flat broke cause I spent all my money on just living expenses, and I can't exactly get a job when I'm traveling all the time..."

"Say no more." I started rummaging through my pockets as his frown turned 180 degrees, "Here, this much should be eno-"

"F-F-Five gold bars!?" He couldn't believe his Eyes as he barely carried all the weight in his hands, "Y-You're loaded!?"

"Huh? Was there ever any doubt?" I proudly puffed out my chest as I patted him on the shoulder, "Now you have starting capital! Good luck with your travels, friend, and make sure to remember me when you hit it big!"

"Y-Yeah, sure!" He waddled away happily as I waved him off, "See ya', man!"

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

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"And that's what happened." I finished my retelling of the events with our biggest fan to Olya at the very top.

"That's what happened?" He looked unamused.

"Yep. Cool, right?" I smiled.

"You're a fucking idiot." He sighed, "That guy scammed you, you egotistic lobotomite."

"Huh?" I actually laughed out loud at that one, "What's got you so suspicious? Come on, man, he knew my name and everything!"

"The name on your library card?" He pointed to the card I kept around my neck, "The one visible to literally anyone with basic reading capabilities?"

"O-Oh..." I thought about it some more, "But then how did he know about Shaid's dad and all that!? And where we're from!? And our trip to Abyssus Solis!?"

"Yeah, that's bugging me as well, but everything apart from that is standard scammer behavior." He explained, "They come up to someone who they see has a big head and act like that person's famous. The gullible idiot believes them and hears out their sob story, insisting on giving them some charity money as a form of empathy."

"Huh." I finally realized before just shrugging, "Well, we've got a lair filled with gold and treasures, so I don't really care. Let's give him the benefit of the doubt and trust him, okay?"

"You sound cool and charitable now, but everyone knows you're just saying that cause you're too embarrassed to admit the almighty Schnell got jipped."

"Screw you too, man." I patted him on the back, although quite roughly, I might add, "Now, we've reached the top, so what do we have to touch to check off the Library of a Thousand Passages off the list?"

"Oh, I don't actually know either." Olya shrugged, "I guess let's just keep touching everything until we see a Green light?"

You shit for brains...! I can't keep guessing where the hell the actual "Wonder" part of the World Wonder is! We'll be here forever if we do! Shit, gotta hurry it up, cause Gods know I'm already completely over this place. This book? Or maybe this one? Augh, maybe it isn't a book at all, but the bookshelf itself? Ohhh...

And so, we went through the entire floor, randomly touching each and every item inside, hoping to trigger that little Green light that indicated we were done with this place. We touched and touched until our fingers got numb, but still we wound up with zilch. Our hope dwindled with each and every failure, but then, we heard a commotion all the way at the bottom.

"What's going on?" Olya turned to me, "Think it's dangerous? Sounds like a damned rave down there."

"Well I don't wanna be the unlucky bastard stuck at the top floor if the entire building is shaking." I pulled him by the wrist, "Come on, let's go down for now and check it out."

"O-Oi! What about the light, though!?" He asked.

"Oh just shut up and take this God given break!" I rolled my Eyes, "Careful down the steps, come on!"

Running down at top speed, we then finally made it to the bottom, where it seems a large crowd of people were standing around the entrance. Could they be bandits or something like that? Cause if so, then these scrawny librarians don't stand a chance. We gotta save them!

"What's going on!" I shouted, grabbing everyone's attention as they made way for Olya and I, "Hm? T-That's...!"

The Green light! It's there! Right on the door frame of the entrance, below their feet! Ohhh, I get it now. Fuck are we dumb. Yeah, I see what's going on now, geez...

"Schnell, I think I get it now." Olya facepalmed.

"Yeah, I think I get it as well..." I followed suit, "If this entire place is a World Wonder, then we must've triggered the Green light when we first set foot in it without even realizing."

"Yep." He pulled out the recall device from his pockets, "Let's just go. Grab on..."

"Eh? In front of everyone?" I tilted my head, "No, never mind that. Why aren't you using the teleporter?"

"You just answered your question." He couldn't wait for me to grab him so he grabbed me by the shoulder instead, "People are around, and the teleporters aren't just exclusive to us, not to mention they stick around for an entire week."

"Oh, right." I nodded as he pressed the button on the device, instantly zipping us from here to the lair.

Being thrown into a similarly colorful spiral of hues as we did with the portal, it didn't even take a few seconds before we were dropped off at the familiarly warm and romantically lit dungeon. Weird though, judging from the walls, this looks like the pleasure room...?

"Ack!?" The doctor came the moment we showed up, which seemed to surprise literally everyone in the room, "Oh, w-welcome back. Phew, I got scared for a second there. Don't go sneaking up on us like that!"

"Yeah, that like, totally scared us!" The girls voiced their complaints as well.

"It wasn't our intention...?" We furrowed our brows, "Sorry for scarin' ya'. How's Shaid?"

"Oh, right. I guess I should give you the good news since you're back." He smiled, "It isn't much, but Shaid spoke in his sleep today."

Huh? No, not huh, but what? He spoke? While he was in a coma? There's just no way, like, is that even possible? But doc wouldn't lie about something like that, especially after we chewed him out recently...

"You sure you weren't hearing things?" Olya asked just in case.

"I'm certain!" He defended his claims, "I heard him say "Stop" loud and clear!"

"Stop?" We tilted our heads, "Why so ominous?"

"Ominous? You're reading too much into it." Doc shrugged before he continued humping away, "He must've just had a bad dream or something like that. In any case, I would rather you place focus on the fact he's slowly but surely showing signs of waking up. Who knows, maybe the closer you get to your wishes, the more he'll wake up?"

"That'd kinda be a waste." Olya sat down on a vacant bed as he gestured for the Green haired beauty, "Well, I guess that's still a cause to celebrate. Let's chill for now and continue our journey tomorrow, Schnell."

"Y-Yeah..." I hesitantly sat down as well, "I guess it's been a while since we've indulged in the lair's pleasantries."