LSRO: Chapter 65 - Some Things Change (Patreon)

Happy New Year Everyone!

I hope you all had a wonderful holiday season and are excited for 2024. I know I am.

Here is the next chapter of Library. I hope you continue to enjoy it!

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Chapter 65

Some Things Change

The rest of Quinn's dreams were uneventful. When she woke the next morning, Misha stood next to her.

"Librarian, we convened while you slept and made some necessary decisions," Misha said.

Quinn raised an eyebrow, suppressing a yawn. She wasn't even completely awake yet to the extent that Misha was sort of blurry. "What decisions?"

"Milaro insists that you prioritize your knowledge absorption and training. I am sure you also agree this is the right course of action," Misha explained.

Quinn blinked, mainly because there was still sleep in her eyes, but also because this sounded like they were slowing down for some reason. She could get on board with that considering she'd barely had a breather for the last few weeks. "Okay."

Misha continued once Quinn spoke. "Dottie will be taking over your supervisory shifts, and we will manage without you for anything that isn't huge."

A short while later, Misha ushered Quinn into her office, where books were stacked chest-high on her desk. Quinn groaned and turned to the supervisory golem. "So you want me to learn all of these books?"

Misha shook their head. "No. These were merely some of the returns we cannot yet file away. Milaro will..."

"I'm here," the Elf King said appearing in a whirlwind of robes. "Today is a busy day for all of us. You need to build, break down, and rebuild your mental defenses until you level your skill up."

"Okay," Quinn said, well aware that she seemed to be agreeing to a lot of things this morning. But they all seemed to be making sense.

"In the meantime, you need to focus on mind multitasking. I want you to absorb these three books." He sorted three books out from the piles and set them on the desk.

A sliver of overwhelm wormed its way into her thoughts. Quinn sighed. "Sure, sir," she added a mock salute.

Milaro raised an eyebrow this time, a slight smirk on his face. "Sir?"

She was being sassy to a millennia-old elf. Maybe not the wisest choice. "You're acting like a teacher. I guess I need a teacher. I'm just..." But she was cut off as Lynx walked in with Aradie flying directly behind him.

The bird swooped down with a small pouch which she dropped into Quinn's hands. It held what looked like an apple and a small breakfast sandwich.

Quinn grinned. "Looks like you read my mind," she said to the bird and scritched its neck.

"Milaro, you need to go. I'll stay with Quinn." Lynx spoke up.

Quinn looked at the manifestation. He appeared to be fine. There was no flickering, and she couldn't see through him, which was more comforting than she'd realized it would be. He seemed very much like the Lynx she'd first met. Except in human form.

"So, what can I do for you, Lynx?" she said as Milaro waved and took off.

"I thought I would keep you company." He smiled at her, but there was some hesitance behind the expression.

"But there's more to it than that, isn't there?" she pushed.

Lynx grinned. "And I wanted to let you know that we have sent a broadcast out to the same planets and worlds that we originally did as well as a dozen more that we are attempting to contact - advising them that we require more assistants. Narilin has requested that we allow some of her brethren to come and assist with the Library as well."

Quinn wasn't sure what she thought of that, considering the recent encounters she'd had with the Salosier. But if there was one thing for sure, the beautiful willowy tree lady definitely loved the books in the Library more than almost anything. Quinn could at least sense that much sincerity from her.

"Fine," she said, "but we have to interview them all, and I'm not doing interviews until after I fix the damn filtration system."

"Perfect." Lynx inclined his head. "I have set interviews for a week's time."

"Oh, good," Quinn said. "That just means I need to refine the skills I have and learn some new stuff." Quinn reached for the calm spot in her mind that she'd learned from some of those original mind books.

She breathed in, calm now and leaned toward Lynx. "I've got this. Just let me go through these books, okay?"

Lynx flashed her a smile. "Thank you, Quinn, for adapting so well, despite everything."

"Yeah, what am I gonna do? Stuck in a fantasy world and all I got was a magical Library." She winked at him. "It's okay. I didn't really have much back home anyway."

Quinn waited until Lynx left the room before letting herself drop into her desk chair. Despite the case that absorbing books made it extremely fast to learn everything, Quinn felt like she didn't always process the information properly.

When she read from a book, she absorbed the knowledge gradually, or at least that's how the case had been back on Earth. But here, it was like she absorbed all of the knowledge and gradually everything would come to her. Like one of those sponge animals that gradually expands.

Perhaps she could combine the two methods. Absorbing the book, and then skim-read through the pieces that didn't immediately make sense. That way she could find the pieces of information that she was having difficulty processing. That made sense.

There was just something cozy and soothing about curling up with a big book and reading through it. She sighed and pulled the first book that Milaro had tugged forward to her.

Levels of Mental Fortitude Broken Down.

Energy Required: 289

Quinn cringed. She was going to need some of those energy balls. She pulled open the drawer next to her and popped the four she had remaining out. Her current level was 812 of 812, which meant the Library wasn't currently leeching off her energy levels at least.

Hopefully, the Library could keep that at bay while she learned these books.

Just as she was about to absorb the first book, the new shelving golems, Tank and Tide, came in with Carty. They moved to her desk and bowed ever so slightly. Tank, sincerely, looked like a completely normal red clay golem. He was big and burly and had only marginally defined his body a little more when he was given his name.

But Tide had this wispy type of clay hair that really seemed to be stranded. Tide gave off a general feeling of the soothing senses Quinn always associated with the ocean. They'd spoken to her more than any of the others, internally and with aura, not with words of course. Quinn got the distinct impression, as Tide picked up a pile of books, that Tide was actually smiling.

"Thank you," she called after them as they left.

Quinn absorbed the book. Levels of Mental Fortitude Broken Down was very technical, with descriptions of differing levels of mental control. It didn't tell her how to do them, it just explained to her what they were. She understood why Milaro had given her this book to read, but at the same time, she felt like her time might have been better spent on other books.

She needed to push through and practice enough to level her mental barriers up so that she could protect her own mind. Once they got there, from what she understood of this book, she and Milaro working together should be able to cast out the orb they'd imprisoned inside her mind.

Emphasis on should.

Quinn wiped her brow even though she wasn't sweating and took a bite out of one of the balls. Chewing away, she pulled the next book into her lap.

Recognizing Mental Manipulation and its Effects.

Energy required: 312

"Boy," she said out loud, trying not to cringe at the energy cost, "this one should be good."

That seemed like a lot of energy required. Flipping open the book, she saw an inscription on the inside. Donated by Milaro, King of the Elisabarres. She guessed that was the official name for High Elves. Maybe she should have called up his information a bit sooner. Still elf was much easier to say...

She wondered if the book contained magical knowledge passed down through his lineage.

This book explained to her how someone like Kajaro managed to get a mental hook into her. He had unsettled her while they were battling. To be fair, she'd feared for her life the moment he'd cackled from the other side of the lake. Using that fear and that insecurity, he'd inserted his insidious thread to build an entire world inside her mind.

But to do so effectively, it needed to be orchestrated. That was insane foreplanning.

Just on the off chance the Library got another Librarian? Seemed very sus.

She tsked as she put the book back down, gobbling up another one of her energy balls. She was still losing energy, but at least these were keeping it at bay. She cracked her neck from side to side and sat there, thinking through what she'd just learned from this book while eating the apple that Aradie had brought for her. Building and rebuilding her walls constantly while she processed all the information.

There were so many ways to get into somebody's head. It was frightening and this information was available to anybody who had a mental magic affinity from what she understood.

She flipped the book closed and looked at the tiny barcode on the spine. It had, if she counted correctly, 17 different color variations. Which, as far as she knew, depicted what affinities could absorb each book. Not to mention that anybody could read the book.

Was the Library too lax in its controls? Perhaps. But it wasn't a policing unit. Her own morals constantly warred with this juxtaposition of ideals. She sighed, tearing down her mental walls and rebuilding them once more.

Suddenly a message flashed up in front of her.

Mental Barrier: Level 2

Finally, maybe Milaro would be able to teach her a more secure way to keep her mind under control once he got back here. Maybe she'd even be done with these books by then. She pulled the next book toward her.

Dream Walking Through Mental Fortitude

"Could have used that last night," she muttered to herself, and got ready to absorb yet another book.

Energy Required: 298

"Okay," she said, "here goes nothing."

This book wasn't donated by anybody. At least, it didn't have an inscription. She opened it, splayed her hands on the pages, took a deep breath, and closed her eyes.

This time it felt like there was wind rushing out of the pages to fluff her hair. It was a good thing she kept it in a ponytail. Dream Traversing. It was so much more complex than she'd thought it would be. How had she managed to walk into his?

Did that mean that the orb inside her was leaking enough of his essence to enable her to latch onto it and enter his dreams? She frowned. That couldn't be right. Surely that needed to be a more deliberate action.

Quinn ran everything through her mind again, all the information she had just gleaned, everything about how she needed to level up her mental fortitude skill to protect herself from people like Kajaro, who could worm their way in through negative thoughts. This put a whole different spin on so much. She took a deep breath, trying to analyze everything that happened over the last few weeks.

There were inconsistencies in her mind, not just because the Library was malfunctioning, or that she'd been sent out to retrieve books from someone who wasn't going to give them back.

She'd even believed Kajaro to be dead. This thought weighed on her mind for weeks. Even though technically Malakai had been the one to land the killing blow, Quinn couldn't help but feel guilt as she'd contributed.

Over a book.

But they weren't just any books.

And Kajaro wasn't dead, which meant he had orchestrated this entire thing, and possibly everything that led to it. This thought stayed with her while she continued to build and rebuild her defenses.

She checked the other drawers and pulled out a writing pad and a quill. "Aradie, is this a magic quill?" she asked.

Aradie hooted a negative into her ear.

"Good to know." The last thing she wanted to do was create a tome of some sort about what she was thinking, but writing things down always helped. So, Quinn wrote herself a timeline.

• Lynx speaks to Librarian about retirement and goes into reset mode.
• Librarian decides to retire once he is out.
• Activates retirement.
• Suddenly all Librarian candidates disappear and there are none to be found.
• Over the next 50 years, the search becomes more frantic until the Librarian's retirement timer runs out and she dies, leaving the Library without a Librarian.

Hmm, that's very convenient," Quinn said mulling things over by talking to herself. "I wonder what happened while Lynx was technically offline. If the Librarian didn't think directly at the Library, then the Library wouldn't have known what was running through the Librarian's head, because by this stage, Korradine had had hundreds of years to perfect her own mental techniques. But why would a Librarian think this way? How could she want the Library not to be the Library anymore? That's what I don't understand."

She tapped the end of the quill against the desk, but being a feather, it was far less satisfying than the tapping of a pen.

"Hoot," Aradie said, as if she could understand every word Quinn was saying. Which she probably could, being a magic bird and all.

"Do you understand?" Quinn turned to the bird.

Images flashed in front of Quinn's mind of Korradine. When she was younger than Lynx's depiction. It was like a quick aging video that showed so much detail around the former Librarian and how Lynx and her interacted. The Library in full swing. The Library full of people.

And the Library returns desk piled high with books.

But wait...was that Kajaro in an image?

"Is that Kajaro?" Quinn asked.

"Hoot," Aradie said, as if it was obvious.

"Is that Kajaro borrowing the book he didn't want to return?" Quinn strummed her fingers on the table. "Can you show me that again? And pause it, don't keep it going."

Aradie showed her the image again. It was definitely DeKarlyle's Thesis of Spatial Distortion. He spoke with Korradine for a good couple of minutes before taking the book and leaving the Library.

"Well, that's not suspicious at all," Quinn muttered.

Suddenly, the pieces clicked ever so slightly. Not that they hadn't before, but this was proof. "Did you not show this to Lynx? Lynx doesn't remember? Okay. Okay."

She couldn't tell if anything had been done to the filtration system. Obviously, Aradie had not followed them to the filtration or core rooms. But this was important information. Korradine was the one who loaned DeKarlyle's book to Kajaro.

Quinn needed more information, more records that came from places other than the Library archives. But it was a good step.

The more urgent concern at this moment was the filtration system. Quinn was pretty sure it had been sabotaged as well. She needed Millaro to come back. It had been a few hours, and she knew he was busy, but she had too many questions. And Lynx, with the holes in his memory was in no state to answer them.

Too many things that weren't lining up. Glitches that she needed to be explained. She just wasn't sure how to contact the elf King.

She stepped out of her office and walked towards the front desk where Malakai was stood conversing with Dottie about something. There weren't many people at the check-in desk. It made her a little sad. Only two were being served by the Aracnio brothers.

"Malakai, can you mentally fetch your Grandfather, please?"

He sighed and a brief blank look passed over his face before he answered. "Done."

"Thank you. I'll be in my office." she said, heading back to work on her mental multitasking while she waited.

She didn't miss Malakai's raised eyebrow, but there were some things she needed to confirm before she shared the rest of her findings with anyone. At least right now, she felt like she things weren't stagnant.

She was actually beginning to make some progress.

~~

Yay for  progress... right?

Let me know what you thought.

Much love

KT