Otherworld Adventure

Class S finally reached the academy's library after a short walk. When they entered, there were already many other classes waiting in the lobby area of the library.

When class S arrived the other classes turned their eyes towards them. Admiration, envy, jealousy and many other feelings were present in the eyes of many of the other class' students.

Cecil had stopped caring about the stares people gave him and their group. So when they arrived in the lobby, he immediately searched for a place to sit and began fiddling around with his MID again.

Lucia as usual clung onto him and his other friends joined him. Their group was kind of unapproachable. So when some of the students from the other classes tried to get friendly with the students from S class, they avoided Cecil's group.

"Hey, everyone's getting all friendly with each other! Let's join 'em!" Lucia said with a twinkle in her eyes while tugging on Cecil.

"...no one's stopping you Lucia..." Cecil frowned.

"Cel~ it's because your face is so scary that they're avoiding us~"

"Pfft, Lucia's right you know!" Eli added with a laugh.

"Y-you should smile more Cecil..." Fina hesitantly said.

"...isn't this how Cecil looks like normally?" Ainz said in confusion. He couldn't find anything wrong when he looked at Cecil's face. It was the same dull expression, except he was frowning since Lucia began tugging on him.

Ainz looked around and saw that the lobby was beginning to become more noisy, he frowned and continued.

"What's the hold up? Shouldn't we go and pick out our books now?"

Eli looked around and counted the classes and said, "Yeah, all the first year classes are here, so what're we waiting for?"

Right after she said her words, the instructors of each class gathered together in front of the library's entrance.

After a moment, the doors of the library opened and in strolled the headmaster, Elufied Crescentia.

"Welcome, headmaster!" The instructors greeted in unison.

"WELCOME HEADMASTER!" The students followed in turn to greet the headmaster.

"Now, now everyone, do remember where we are. Stay quiet in the library, unless you want Elder Tohrun to haul you out of the library, hohoho~" The headmaster joked with everyone, but still nodded back in greeting.

He walked past everyone and stood just before the door that led into the inner area of the library, the area on the first floor where the manuals, spell books, and combat guides were kept.

"Now students, this is a rare opportunity that the school has granted to you, so please do not waste it! Choose something that suits you and don't pick anything that's too high for your level. You know best of what you can do, so please choose something appropriate."

The headmaster swept his gaze across all the students in the lobby, his eyes turned sharp and his voice turned severe.

"You will only have one chance to choose something and you may not swap your choice after you have exited the library. So if you pick something too advanced for your level and you are not able to learn it after the 1 month time limit before you have to return the book, then you can only blame yourself!"

Many of the hopeful and ambitious gazes of the students in the room immediately dimmed down. Many began to seriously ponder their choices again after having learned of the 1 month time limit.

"Remember, choose wisely. This time is a freebie for all of you, but the next time you want to enter the library and take out a book, then you must use the academy's contribution points or currency. You should know what these points and currency are by now, yes?"

In Cecil's group, apart from Cecil himself, everyone else nodded in understanding. Seeing this, Cecil looked around and whispered to Lucia.

"Hey, Lulu... what're contribution points?"

"... Cecil, have you ever been listening to what instructor Jin says these past few mornings?" Lucia whispered back.

"...no..."

"Figures..." Lucia could only tiredly sigh at Cecil's response.

"I'll explain later in class."

"M'kay."

"Now, children! Proceed into the library and make your choices wisely! Instructors please oversee the rest."

"Yes sir!"

The headmaster nodded his head to them and casted a warp gate next to him with a wave of his hand. He stepped through the black distorting gate and disappeared from the library.

Cecil couldn't help but wonder why the headmaster didn't just appear inside the library the same way he exited the library.

He would soon find out the reason later.

The instructors began arranging groups, the winning students would enter first and only 15 minutes later would the other students head into the inner area.

"Guys, let's quickly head up to the 3rd and 4th floor! There's nothing that will interest us here on the 1st and 2nd floor. The techniques are too low level for the likes of us." Ainz said in a haughty tone.

"Shut it Ainz, can't you see that the other students had begun avoiding us again! Now with your stupid, condescending remarks, they'll think it'll be beneath us to associate with them!" Lucia said with a scowl.

"Hey, I'm just stating the facts! These techniques, spells, and manuals are too low leveled for us! And if they want to socialize with us then they should man up and just do it! It's not like we're monsters or anything!"

"...we're not, but our identities are pretty...monstrous" Fina quietly mumbled.

"What's that Fina?"

"It's nothing Eli..."

While Ainz and Lucia were arguing like usual, but in a quiet voice, instructor Jin opened the door to the inner area of the 1st floor and a splendid and majestic sight came into Cecil's view.

"Woah..." The sight caused Cecil to unconsciously exclaim in admiration.

The library had bookcases and shelves not only on the ground, but also some suspended in the air. Magic arrays and formations were constantly floating around or hovering all over the place.

The first floor was brightly lit with light stones and the glows of the magic arrays and formations gave the floor a very surreal feeling and atmosphere.

Cecil's curious mindset immediately kicked in and he dashed towards the first bookcase he could see and pulled out a book.

"Beginner tier 2 spell, Flame Torch." Cecil read the title aloud. He flipped open the book and tried to find the table of contents.

He read through the table and found that not only did it introduce the spell's incantation and uses; it also listed some possible variations and strengthening. The Flame Torch spell was also a type of interlinking spell to another tier 3 spell called Scorching Torch.

'Wow! The spells are actually interlinked! The variations and other stuff are also listed here!'

Cecil was only surprised since this was the second time he saw an interlinking spell. The first was Lucia's lava bolt, lava rain, and lava storm originals.

Lucia had explained about these interlinking spells before, but he didn't understand the concept. Reading the book he now had some inkling to what it was. It was similar to his use of mana bolt, mana volley, and mana wave.

Cecil immediately put the book back and dashed to another aisle that had mana cultivation manuals.

He picked up a random book and began skimming through its contents.

'What the? Aren't these just breathing methods?' Cecil frowned after he skimmed through the book.

He looked at the title, "Breath of Flames."

The manual was a breathing technique used to cultivate fire element mana inside one's body. It was only for spell casters that had an affinity with the fire element.

Cecil frowned and put the book back, he walked further in before picking up another book.

"Iron Mountain Body Manual."

Cecil once again skimmed through the contents and found that it was a mana circulation technique used to cultivate earth element mana. The results of the technique would greatly increase the cultivator's bodily defense. It was a mana cultivation manual that leaned towards close ranged combatants that had an affinity with the earth element.

The next manual Cecil took out was called Spirit of the Beast. It was mana cultivation manual that didn't lean towards any element. The main focus of this cultivation manual was to help the spell caster or warrior in molding their mana into beast-like forms. For spell casters, it helped them in casting magic spells or creating original spells that had some sort of animal form.

Some examples are the fire element's Fire Hawk spell, water element's Shark Torpedo, earth element's Earth Demon Summon spell that summoned a hedgehog like animal created from dirt, mud, and stone. Then there was the wind element's Storm Beast Summon spell.

The manual would help with increasing these kinds of spells' strength while lower the mana required in casting the spell. For the summoning types it would also increase the duration and durability of the summoned being.

'Damn... there are a whole lot of these mana cultivation types...'

Cecil turned towards his dumbfounded friends who were staring at him in surprise. The zeal and concentration Cecil put in to read these low leveled mana cultivation manuals came as a surprise to his 3 friends.

Lucia was skimming through some manuals with some interest. She didn't take too long since the manuals couldn't hold a candle to the one her mother passed down to her.

"Cel, I'll be checking out the upper floors okay?"

"Yeah... I'll catch up with you guys later so just go on ahead without me." Cecil was zealously skimming through another manual.

Although it only looked like he was skimming through each page, it was the exact opposite however. When he flipped through each page Cecil would activate Hyper-sensitivity and speed up his thought process.

This way he could read through the entire page in a short amount of time and quickly continue on to the next page.

It was slow at first, but when he got used to the speed of activating and deactivating Hyper-sensitivity he only became faster and faster. They only spent 10 minutes inside the inner area of the first floor and Cecil was already on his 5th book.

To Ainz, Eli, and Fina, it was as if Cecil was just flipping through the book and not taking its contents in at all. But when they heard him mumble and frowning like he had read through the entire book, they could only stare at him in surprise.

"Okay, see ya later Cel~" Lucia bade Cecil good bye for now and pulled Fina and Eli with her to the next floor. Ainz looked back at Cecil and followed after the girls.

"I'll be going with them Cecil!"

"Okay, I'll catch you later..."

Cecil said this while his eyes had not left the book he was reading.

'This place is a treasure trove of knowledge! I can't waste any more time.'

Cecil upped his reading speed to the point where each page didn't take longer than a second for him to read and process inside his head.

Unbeknownst to him, a pair of wizened eyes was staring at Cecil in disapproval.