LSRO: Chapter 35 - Power Marks (Patreon)

Sooo here's another chapter...

I have no idea why I called this chapter Power Marks. Literally. No clue. But that's its name for now, and I'm sticking to it. 

Let me know what you think! (Or even if you can tell why I called it Power Marks)

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Chapter 35

Power Marks

Quinn watched as Misha scurried away with Narilin, both of them chatting amicably about books. A part of her wanted to follow them and see just how many books were piled high in the book hospital. What would Narilin think of how many books had been damaged?

Quinn frowned. "That was a very fortuitous recruitment," she said slowly.

Lynx shrugged. "Sometimes the Library works in mysterious ways."

Quinn scowled at him. "I feel like I'm missing something in this information you had me absorb. There's more you're not telling me, isn't there?"

Lynx shook his head. "What you received is the bare minimum to help you understand how the Library works. You’re not missing anything integral to the way the Library operates. It's more of a…” he paused, his eyes flickering for a moment. So long in fact that Quinn was tempted to balance some books on his head again.

But his eyes flickered back again, and he flashed her a small grin, like maybe he’d heard what she was thinking.

“Some species,” he continued “have a direct correlation to knowledge and the way knowledge is created, the way it's stored, preserved, and spread. Many of those species have always felt drawn to offer the Library assistance. They have voluntarily come to us and served us in whatever capacity we needed at the time. What I did, when putting out the call for assistants, was make sure those species were still in existence. 500 years can change a lot of things. Once I knew they were still around, I made sure to open the communication channel only to those species. It's nothing I'm keeping from you. It's simply a thing that the Library could access. Now let's get these books checked in so we get a little bit more juice in the tanks, hey?"

Quinn couldn't help the smile that came over her face. She glanced to the side where Malakai was leaning against the check-in desk, a thoughtful look on his face.

"What's on your mind?" she asked, somehow a little sad that she couldn't just read everybody's minds because that would just make life so much easier. Still, there were bright sides.

Malakai sighed. "I don't know. The salosier felt a little bit too prepared."

Lynx shrugged, as if he’d already thought of that and dismissed it. "Well, there was that initial pulse your grandfather felt when we were searching for his book. I'm quite sure that the selosier have a bunch of the culinary books that we require to open the culinary wing. Actually, I know they do. That pulse might have already alerted them to some activity in the Library and thus they were already preparing because they sensed that the Library had returned. Which would explain why they were already gathering books. That and their natural affinity for all things books. It could have been that."

Quinn watched Lynx, pretty sure there was something else he wasn't telling her. And she knew that he knew that she was thinking that because she wasn't thinking it softly or surreptitiously. She was very pointedly directing it at him. He ignored it, which meant he chose not to talk to her about it. He must have his reasoning, but she'd only give him so much time to let her in on it.

He was going to have to let her in on everything eventually. And if he didn’t realize it yet, she’d make him see that soon.

"Anyway," she said, "let's check some returned books in."

Quinn hefted the first book. It was thick and heavy, the leather binding scuffed. She read the title and balked at it: Culinary Delights: How to Find the Correct Spices for Cannibalism. She paused and turned to Lynx, her tone flat when she spoke. "Cannibalism?"

"Not what you think," Lynx replied. "I get it's anathema to you. There are some species who honor their dead by consuming their flesh. It's just an imperfect, shall we say, title of that book."

Quinn raised an eyebrow but checked the book in. "Can't we like name change it to: Burial rituals that sound disgusting?"

Lynx flashed her an unexpected glare. "That's very short sighted of you. How would you feel if that were your ritual? If it were your heritage? That's an offensive suggestion."

Quinn blinked. "Oh."

"The current title at least spells out what the content is without diminishing the meaning the species that practices those rituals puts into such events."

She took Lynx's words and mulled them over. He was right. "I get it now."

"I know." He said simply.

Quinn went back to checking in the rest of the books her head swimming once again with the fact that this wasn't earth. With the fact that she was literally able to travel to different worlds to retrieve books. Excitement welled in her as she quickly sorted through all of the books in the piles. Out of the 67 books, there were already 29 culinary-based ones. That was a lot of culinary books. She worked through each one of them, acknowledging the 'return book' on every single one. Then she paused.

"Hey, aren't I supposed to levy fines to people whose books are overdue? Why isn't that option popping up?" She frowned at the notifications.

Lynx stared at her long and hard, as if he couldn't decide whether she was truly asking that question or not. Then it dawned on Quinn. "Oh, sorry. Brain like a sieve. Because the Library's been closed for so long, the fees are all waived, right?"

"Precisely," Lynx said. "Only makes sense. It's not people's fault that they couldn't return the books. We give them a show of grace and a little bit of leeway. And if the people don't return all of our books, we will go and get them."

“Like we did with the other ones, right?” She gulped down the feelings of dread and anticipation that clashed. Traveling worlds was the fun part, but forcing the return of a book…

“Exactly like that.” he responded. “They shouldn’t all be as difficult as your previous retrievals.”

Quinn liked the sound of that. Retrieving books sounded right up her alley, although she didn't want there to be any more Kajaros. "Okay, so how long were we thinking?"

Lynx actually paused his own communication with the Library systems. "Well, I mean, I was gone for a very long time, almost 500 years. I say we give them like 30 days?"

Quinn raised an eyebrow. "Isn’t that a bit generous?" She really just wanted to get the Library back up to full power.

"Of course it is. The library is accessible anywhere, everywhere, all at once. I've lost count of how many times I've told you that."  He sounded slightly haughty as he spoke.

She ignored his mood. "So basically, they're just being lazy or they can't find the book if they're not returning it within the 30-day window, correct?"

“Or they’re dead.” Lynx said. “And the book is floating in obscurity.”

“In which case as long as we can locate that’s an easy retrieval, right?”

Lynx nodded. "Or they've decided they're going to keep the book regardless and see if they can escape the librarian coming to get them."

"Can they do that?" she asked, curious.

This time Lynx's stripes whirled faster in his hair, briefly descending in a fascinating runic pattern all down his body before flickering back up. "Oh. They can try."

Quinn got the distinct impression that trying to avoid returning the books wasn't going to end well for anyone. Kajaro was only the start. She shivered. Killing others wasn't something she relished, but he'd been particularly hellbent on meeting out the same fate to her. She took in all the culinary books, piling them high.

The Culinary Delights of the Fushpa People.

Culinary Intricacies and Etiquette.

Presence of the Royal House of Culinary Expertise.

"You would think the Library could use some magic to make this happen faster," she muttered under her breath as she separated the books into their categories.

Malakai laughed from his position in the corner where he was doing absolutely nothing as his assistant job. "You realize we're trying to replenish the Library, Quinn? We're not trying to use extra magic that we don't need to use right now."

She scowled at him. "Yes, I do.

Before she could say anything a notification popped up.

Remaining Culinary arts books required to open the Culinary branch:

253 Books/Tomes/Codex

225 Herbs/Spices/Plants

She frowned at the screen. "Do you think Cook is already working on the food portion of the restoration?"

Malakai shrugged. "Probably, they do seem oddly devoted to food."

"Comes with their territory." Lynx inserted and then directed his words to Quinn. "You can access what your assistants and golems are all currently undertaking if you utilize the Library properties information you have available to you."

Quinn blinked at him and willed the Library to show her that information. A sheer wall of data flickered past. So much it was impossible to retain it all, but it did let her know she needed to be more specific next time. Sometimes, it seemed, the Library was all too literal.

She turned to Malakai and crossed her arms. "You owe me a training session."

It was Malakai's turn to scowl at her, but before he could speak, Tim was there and the book stack was suddenly gone.

"Wow, our shelving golems are super efficient." she blinked in the wake of the whirlwind that was Tim.

"They're tuned into the Library, they know when the books have been returned and they understand when to come and get them." Lynx explained patiently. "You'd know that if you slowed down for an hour and properly perused the information you absorbed."

Quinn shrugged. She didn't really like to admit that after a week in this place, she just wanted to chat sometimes. "It's easier for you to just tell me. If I can't reach you, I know how to find out what I want to know. But wouldn't the trolleys usually come and get the books.? I mean they are return trolleys."

"The trolleys can do that too, but Tim was apparently between jobs."

What do we do now? Quinn thought to herself.

A graph flashed up in front of her.

67 books returned.

Flourish of magic accepted.

Magic confined to the filtration system.

Levels 0.37% higher than previous.

Addition of Salosier to the assistant tract.

Increase of 2% Energy Total.

Emergency power mode previously dissipated.

Critical power mode: low power mode still active.

Progression toward unsustainable - negligible

Quinn blinked. "Wait, I thought we were out of emergency power mode and in low power mode."

Lynx winced a little. "We are in low power mode but that is also known as critical power mode because we need to get out of the low power mode in order to reach one that is more stable."

She squinted at him. "What you're saying is we still have a long way to go."

"I thought that was pretty obvious with the fact that we have to get like tens of thousands of books back."

Quinn glared at Lynx. "I know, just... it's a lot, Lynx."

"Yeah, I get that." He actually reached forward with his solid smokey like hand and petted her shoulder. As she glanced down, she noticed, for the first time, that his fingers resembled claws. Quinn filed that tidbit away.

She felt it was a little anticlimactic to get such a chunk of books back and have barely any energy register on the scale of the Library. Everything felt insurmountable right now. But at least the numbers were going down, which made it quantifiable. It helped to keep it all together if she had something tangible she could reference.

Lynx squeezed her shoulder once more and then spoke softly. "Hey, you need to practice your skills and, well, we need to start thinking about what other skills you need to absorb. Also, and I think this is the most important, maybe it's time you went and had a nap," Lynx suggested.

Quinn looked up at him. "What, do I look tired?"

Lynx scowled at her and continued. "Look at your energy levels?"

Quinn looked down. She had 200 of 493. "Oh, does checking the books currently pull energy from me?"

Lynx frowned. "It's not technically supposed to. At least when the Library is up and running fully. But, like I said, I haven't been in quite this position before. The library has never been this bereft of books, nor has it ever been this empty of power, so I guess every previous experience I have doesn't count."

"It's okay, Lynx, you don't have to be perfect. You're not a god." She quipped, even if it fell a little flat.

He scowled at her. "No, I'm not a god. Would be nice though. But we don’t need to get into how I feel about gods."

Quinn watched him and his reaction to that statement. Little pieces of the Lynx puzzle were falling into place. She had a feeling there was something there that she didn't quite understand yet. About who the Library was, and by extension, who Lynx was. Neither of those things had anything to do with how the Library operated.

But with enough time she'd get there, she knew it.

"You know, I think you're right. I'm gonna go upstairs and have a sleep..."

Lynx cut her off before she could finish. "It's well earned, Quinn. I know I pulled you here without any information. The download failed, the worms went crazy. You had to go retrieve books from extremely unfriendly places, almost got killed by a raging psychopath, and have had to clean up the Library, learn how to defend yourself, and adapt to an entirely new world. I get it. It's tough." He sounded so genuine, like he really meant it, and she had to believe that he did." Thank you."

"Hey, it's okay. I mean, it is, it really is." And Quinn was surprised at how perfectly fine it actually felt. "Don't get me wrong, if I didn't know here, I wouldn't miss it. But I didn't have that much to look forward to back in my world. Could I have built a life for myself? Sure. But this? I think this is going to be a lot more interesting."

She paused. "Which is why I'm going to go and check out the book hospital before I sleep!" And with that, she patted Lynx on his mostly solid shoulder, ignored Malakai completely, and walked off sprinted off toward where the blueprints said the hospital was.