Archaeologists in a Magic Cultivation World

Chapter 6 Library

"Hmm, nice." William held up a manuscript from a cart. His eyes scanning over it intensley. So much, he ignored the surroundings. He entered a state of "Diving" by accident. Or basically that of Hyperfocus.

"Is teacher William ok?" One of his students asked worriedly.

"He is." A librarian said. "Your teacher has entered a state called Diving. It happens when a person finds something that interests them greatly. Or something compatible to them. I wonder what he found?"

William did not find it interesting the more he read when he got halfway. But the knowledge System did not allow him to pull away. The information was key to it unlocking higher features back, which felt ridiculous that a computer could upgrade in an out of time scenario.

Trying to stop a software upgrade midway was now added to the list of things he couldn't do. Oh, how he wished to be able to pull up task manager! he couldn't even disengage the scanner that was linked to his eyes. Blinking didn't work either.

Knowledge System: 15% of the Manuscript is missing. An extremely powerful Mind Cultivation can be acquired from this. Will take up at least a terabyte of space. An excess amount of Mental Mana will be produced from the application.

'Fine, fine.' William thought back after the notification didn't close away. In the end, the benefits would outweigh the large amount of space used up. 'Need to acquire a technique to take care of the strain, I assume. Maybe a small one and a big one.'

Placing the manuscript back once finished, William rubbed his temple. A bit of blood dripped from his nose onto his chest. It was dark black and quite thick. Feeling light-headed, he sat down before he would collapse.

"Congratulations, student." The Librarian said. Her bright smile was quite genuine as well as the sincere look in her eyes. Defintely one of the good ones. "The manuscript was meant to go in the back for storage, but since we are so busy today, I never got around to it."

"Thank you. Just need to get my bearings before I get up." Wiping the blood up, throwing it away was not top priority considering his fatigue.

"William," a student called out to him. It was one of the other placeholders. The 9th seat at that. Her name was Kasara. "I just wanted to apologize in person for what happened." Kasara was once a close friend of the original individual. Why she joined in with what happened was beyond William, and he didn't care.

William just blinked at her, not saying anything. The other students and even teachers in the room watching everything take place. After all, it was good entertainment considering. Even a few visitors to the library listened in.

"Just.. here." Kasara shoved a shrinking pouch onto him and left. A look of confusion on her face. 'He didn't even react and gave me such a vacant look. As if he didn't even recognize me! I hate it!'

The shrinking pouch was his own. During the scuffles before, when they screwed him over, the bags got mixed up. Thankfully, unthankfully, she didn't get anything from out of it.

"Hmm?" William opened the pouch up, looking it over. Inside were a few gold coins and a tattered Manuscript. The manuscript was one that the group found in an abandoned ruin during the freshman year. The reward he chose instead of the other items. "Don't tell me they did that for this thing?"

Knowledge System: Reflection Sutra: Incomplete and damaged. Allows rapid advancement but damages the Foundation. Previous individual was able to cultivate due to Soul State. Scanning and re-adding to the database. Complete in 5 minutes.

"How much is this worth?" William said to the Librarian. One could trade stuff in towards the Auction House, the Akademy, the Library, or even the Merchant Collective for resources.

"I will check." The Librarian walked away then came back with a crystal glass. As she scanned it over, the Knowledge System finished its scanning. "Worth a library token and 5,000 gold or 1.5 million gold."

She said nervously. It was worth more if it was in better condition. Wanting to haggle if need be, she gave some wiggle room. The students looked on eyes wide wanting to see what happened.

"Deal, if you explain what the heck is a Library Token." William didn't want the thing and since he had it in his storage it was all the same really. Well, until he deleted it anyway. "I am running out of time so let's make it quick."

"Right!" The Librarian spoke to quickly and loudly. "The token allows the owner to acces the upper areas of the Archives. Up to 5 hours a day and gives a discount depending on its level. The one I am willing to trade for will be.. Tier II."

She was getting ready to say Tier I but the head Librarian sent her a voice transmission to change the rewards quickly. As well as escort him to the office.

"That is good enough for me." William answered. He looked around and his students were pretty much done. "Like I said we need to make this quick I have other matters to attend to today."

"Ok course." The Librarian was happy this arrangement was good enough. She gestured for him to follow and introduced herself. "My name is Marisole, I am glad we could do this."

"Ditto, I needed the money. And with the token, I should be able to find a good offense technique." As the two moved, he kept an eye on the place she led him to. "Where are we going exactly? We just passed the last checkout desk."

"The Head Librarian wishes to speak with you."

"I am on a tight schedule I do not have time to speak with this person. We can schedule an appointment next time." William turned around annoyed. He did not like one who did not listen to what he said. "Nextime hopefully this goes better."

Marisole eyes shrunk as he walked away. No one just walked away after hearing the Head Librarian wanted to speak with them.

What was worse, he still had the Manuscript to. Considering the gold and token were not passed over, it was definitely still an open trade. A few that spied on William for the Placeholders already left to go and inform their masters.

"OK!" Marisole dragged him to the side forcefully. She was quite a powerful librarian! Even left bruises on him! "Token now and the gold! Even throw an additional 5,000 for wasting your time!"

The Head Librarian was ready to throttle her for not offering more. But William nodded along with that being fine enough. Rubbing his bruises as she pulled out the gold for him.

.

Library Later-

.

William returned later that same day. He needed to find some offensive techniques to use and find some course books for the Pillar Realm. To help facilitate breakthroughs for his students and himself.

In the next hour, he went through at least 33 books. Mostly bouncing around as one book mention another book and then that one mentions another and so and so forth. Luckily, he was able to mentally highlight passages scanned in his mind for later.

"Ugh.. my head hurts." William would kill for an aspirin right about now. But they didn't have them here. Which sucked. Forgetting he had some gold, he could have went and bought some medicine. "Well, at least I have a pretty good offensive technique now."

In his hand were the books that compiled an unusual sword tech quite well. Separate they were formidable but together they would reduce the strain on the person overall. All he had to do now was to start practicing it.

"You came back!" Marisole said excitedly. "Do you have the time?"

Nodding, William followed her to the back. She was actually expecting him not to come back until the very end of the week. Little did she know William didn't want to waste his time later.

William sat in a small room as he waited. Marisole went to go and get the Head Librarian.

"Let's see here.." William started reading everything over again while writing it down to piece it together better. Grateful the spellcheck from his computer was helping correct phrases and sentence structure.

"Well, Mr.Lancaster.." The Head Librarian interrupted his thoughts and writing. He didn't feel the old-timer come in at all. "..glad you traded the manual to us. Would you mind telling us where it came from?"

"Don't really know actually." William shrugged as it was the truth. The brain damage inflicted on the original had a lot of information missing. The Head Librarian would find that out after he ran a deeper search on him. "But I can jot down what I vaguely remember. The other 11 Placeholders of the Akademy should know."

"Oh, and why is that?"

"They were there when I acquired the thing." William jotted the information down, one-lining a few pieces as he was confused about some of it and how to get there. He started to get frustrated and finished up quickly before handing it over. "The best I got. Get the rest from the others if you want to know so badly."

Going over it, the Head librarian was glad for the accurate detail given from what he did put. And a small bit of disappointment that the brain damage prevented him from providing accurate detail. But with 11 others have gone as well, it would be easy to fill in the gaps.

"I won't pry to much, but are you cultivating it again?"

"Nope, considering my former colleagues tried to basically kill me for it, just happy to get rid of the thing. Plus it seems really difficult." William would acquire what he could from the thing and that is it. 'Plus it is basically a deathtrap if the little I have read is a hint.'

The Head Librarian was interested in what happened so William explained what took place not to long ago. Use to the type of backstabbing and whatnot, the Head Librarian nodded but remain passive.

Once finished, it was like a burden was remove from him. The headache disappearing as his Mind moved up a little. Reaching Gathering Realm IV came with some more space for storage.