Chapter 22: The World Library
At the same time, in his room, Adam stared intently at the new notifications.
The words displayed before him seemed simple.
But he instinctively sensed that what had just happened wasn’t simply an improvement.
It was something else.
An evolution.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Awakened Blessing
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Mana Body Lv. 1
Origin:
Mana Control Lv. 1
Body Control Lv. 1
Effect:
Allows you to control your body and mana
internally, precisely, and optimally.
Bonus:
Improved Mana Flow Reduced Energy Loss Enhanced Physical Coordination Automatic Movement Optimization Easier Learning of Physical and Magical Techniques
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Adam remained motionless.
Then he slowly closed his eyes.
The instant he activated Mana Body, a strange sensation spread throughout his entire being.
He no longer felt just his muscles.
He felt the fibers.
The tension.
The micro-movements.
The flow of his breath.
And even deeper...
The mana.
A subtle, almost invisible energy flowed through his body like a second blood.
Until now, he had manipulated this energy clumsily.
Like someone learning to move a limb they’d never used before.
But now...
Everything seemed clearer.
He raised his hand.
A faint green glow appeared around his fingers.
The healing spell formed faster than usual.
More stable.
Less wasteful.
Adam opened his eyes.
"So I can control my body and my mana together..."
He circulated the energy through his arm.
Then through his shoulder.
Then throughout his torso.
Each movement became more fluid.
Each breath seemed to strengthen the flow of mana.
"It’s almost like optimizing a program... but applied to my own body." "
He had barely murmured these words when a new window appeared.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Awakened Blessing
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Eyes of the World Lv. 1
Origin:
Analysis Lv. 1
Accelerated Learning
Effect:
Allows the user to obtain information about what they are observing.
" Partial Connection:
Library of the World
Description:
The Library of the World contains the recorded traces, stories, creations, values, and information about all things that exist.
Current Limitations:
Requires a visual connection to the subject. Complex information requires more time. Living information is restricted. To read a person’s deep information, physical contact is necessary. Some subjects may be sealed or incomplete.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Adam felt his heart beat faster.
"Library of the World..."
The name alone seemed absurd.
Almost too grand for a simple skill.
He immediately looked at one of the books on his desk.
A window appeared.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Eyes of the World
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Item: Book
Title: Introduction to Runes
Condition: Good
Creator: Valoria Rune Copy Workshop
Lead Copyist: Merina Solwen
Creation Date: 12 years ago
Estimated Value: 8 gold pieces
Accessible Content: Yes
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Adam froze.
Then his gaze deepened.
The pages of the book seemed to unfold in his mind.
Without opening it.
He wasn’t just reading the title.
He was seeing the contents.
Chapter after Chapter.
Diagram after diagram.
Note after note.
He could even perceive faint traces of the book’s creation.
The workshop.
The scribe.
The ink used.
The minor corrections made to certain pages.
Adam slowly opened his mouth.
"This is completely outrageous..."
He picked up another book.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Eyes of the World
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Item: Book
Title: Advanced Rune Structures
Condition: Excellent
Origin: Valoria Mage Tower
Author: Vespera Drakharis
Estimated Value: 420 gold pieces
Accessible Content: Partially
Restriction: Rune Understanding Level Insufficient
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Adam blinked.
"Vespera wrote this book?"
He suddenly had a very clear mental image of the black dragon, sitting amidst a mountain of spellbooks, punishing terrified apprentices.
"Yes... it looks just like her."
He then looked at the Urban Barrier Plan.
The reaction was immediate.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Eyes of the World
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Item: Urban Barrier Plan
Grade: Purple
Condition: Mint
Origin: Unknown
Creator: Sealed Information
Estimated Value: Incalculable
Accessible Content: Partially
Warning: Structure linked to acquaintances old
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Adam felt a slight pressure behind his eyes.
Not painful.
But heavy.
As if something immense lay behind a closed door.
"Still sealed..."
He immediately thought of Nocthar.
Then he shook his head.
"One thing at a time."
He went back to his work.
This time, everything changed.
Thanks to Mana Body, he could maintain his concentration for longer without tiring as quickly.
Thanks to the Eyes of the World, he could browse books without opening them, compare information, verify terms, trace the origins of certain symbols, and connect ideas.
The office quickly became a veritable workspace.
Plans.
Notes.
Books.
Diagrams.
Fragments of magic circles.
Adam drew, erased, and started again.
When a circuit seemed too cumbersome, he compared it with other structures.
When a rune appeared useless, Boundary Marker indicated a limit.
When a mana flow seemed unstable, Mana Body helped him feel the problem almost physically.
The hours passed.
Noon arrived.
Then the afternoon.
Adam hardly stopped.
He didn’t even notice that a maid had come to leave a tray of food at his door.
His mind was completely absorbed by the barrier.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Plan Analysis
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Estimated Overall Optimization: 3% → 7%
Stabilized Circuits: 4
Reduced Mana Loss: Small but Significant
Rune Understanding: Improving
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Adam leaned back against his file.
"Seven percent..."
The number seemed small.
But on a structure capable of protecting an entire city, even a minimal improvement could make a huge difference.
He stared at the plan.
"If I manage to reach fifteen or twenty percent, Vespera will probably lock me in a tower."
He remained silent.
Then added:
"No. She really would."
The sun was beginning to set when he finally put down his pen.
His eyes were tired, but his mind remained clear.
He carefully placed the plan, notes, and books in his inventory.
Then he stood up.
"I need to eat before I forget I have a body."
After leaving his room, Adam went down to the dining room.
The mansion was quieter than usual.
When he entered, he found only three people.
Isadora.
Elena.
And Lyriana.
The others had already left.
Probably returned to their guilds, their towers, or their responsibilities.
Elena immediately raised her hand.
"Adam! You’re finally out."
Isadora watched him intently.
"Have you been working all day?"
Adam sat down opposite them.
"Almost."
Lyriana narrowed her eyes slightly.
"You forgot to eat."
Adam froze.
"How do you know that?" "
She pointed to the tray placed near the door.
"A maid brought it back undamaged."
Adam looked away.
"I was concentrating."
Elena sighed.
"You already look like my mother."
Isadora raised an eyebrow.
"I don’t see the problem."
"That’s precisely the problem," Elena replied.
Lyriana calmly set down her cup.
"If you two start forgetting to sleep and eat, I’m quitting."
Adam smiled.
"You’re supposed to be my survival instructor, aren’t you?"
"Exactly. First lesson: eating."
Dinner passed in a more relaxed atmosphere than the previous meeting.
Adam told them about his new blessings, without mentioning all the sensitive details.
He explained Mana Body.
Then the Eyes of the World.
Isadora remained silent for a long moment.
"A blessing linked to information..."
Elena seemed impressed.
"You can read a book without opening it?"
"Yes. Well, if I can see it."
Lyriana asked a more specific question.
"And what about people?"
Adam shook his head.
"It’s limited. I have to be in contact with someone to get deeper information. And even then, I don’t know how far it goes."
Lyriana nodded slowly.
"That’s better."
Adam immediately understood what she meant.
An ability to read someone’s information too easily could become dangerous.
For him.
And for others.
Isadora continued seriously:
"Don’t use this blessing on anyone without a valid reason."
"I know."
"And don’t speak of the Library of the World outside of this circle."
Adam nodded.
"Understood."
After the meal, they discussed the barrier for a while longer.
Then Elena had to leave to check a report from the Order of the Knights.
Isadora returned to her desk.
Lyriana remained silent longer than usual.
Adam noticed her expression.
"Is something wrong?"
The dark elf blinked slightly.
"No."
Then she turned her head away.
"Not yet."
Adam frowned.
"Not yet?"
But Lyriana had already gotten up.
"Good night, Adam." "Good night..."
She left the room without another word.
Adam remained motionless for a few seconds.
"Strange."
Then he returned to his room.
It had been a long day.
A very long day.
He took a hot bath, letting the water, fueled by the magic core, relax his muscles.
Mana’s body reacted even during the bath.
He felt the heat penetrate his body more effectively, releasing tension and improving the flow of mana.
"This blessing is really convenient..."
After washing, he put on light clothes and prepared for bed.
He had barely sat down on the edge of the bed when someone knocked on the door.
Knock.
Knock.
Adam looked up.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Alert
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Presence Detected
Hostility: None
Danger: None
Emotional State: Unstable
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Adam remained silent.
Then he sighed softly.
"So this day isn’t over yet..."
He stood up and approached the door.
"Come in."
The door opened slowly.
Lyriana stood in the doorway.
Her long silver hair fell over her shoulders.
Her expression was calm.
But her violet eyes betrayed an unusual hesitation.
For a few seconds, neither of them spoke.
Then Lyriana gently closed the door behind her.
"Adam."
Her voice was lower than usual.
"I need to talk to you."