"Oh wow!"
My mouth is wide open as I let out my surprise into the world. My blue eyes are the same way but they sparkle with excitement and to be honest the rest of my face is the same way. Yes, the sight in front of me sure is something else, something that I never expected to see in a place like this. But before I let my excitement take control over mer body, I carefully look around before entering the room. Who knows, maybe now, something will get me.
I carefully look at my left, right and of course forward to check the room and it's a marvellous sight. To my extreme pleasant surprise, nothing seems to be dangerous out here. Having reached the conclusion that, it is safe to enter, I step forward fully getting inside of the room and the moment I do so the door behind me disappears just like always. Once that happens, I quickly turn around, after all I have to check my exit. Just like the previous time, in the wall behind me a door is right in the middle.
"Alright! I can explore now!"
Well, with this I sound just like a kid. I'm way too excited for this and I should probably tone it down a little bit and to be more serious in a situation like this. However, this sight it's something you rarely if ever come across. I will describe it so that we all can feel excited, if anyone is here of course. I do hope not.
At first sight this is a library, there are several big bookshelves in all directions, ones that are several meters long and with god knows how many books on them as not only they are long, they have at least 10 rows of shelves, each one that can easily fit even large books. There also are a few tables in the middle of the library, with chairs next to them, it must be the place where we can sit down and read all those damn books. From this extremely well detailed observation, nothing seems special, but that's because I haven't finished.
This place in its current state is the pure definition of chaotic, yes, chaotic. It was as if it got hit by a gravity spell of some sorts. Bookshelves are levitating a few centimetres from the ground, some of them are tilted sideways, others forward, others backwards and others both, somehow. The books themselves, some of them are out of place, a large quantity at that. Some are in the ground, others floating around, some closed while doing so while others open and so on. A complete chaos if I wanted to read any one of them. The tables and chairs are no exception to this phenomenon of course, as the same happens to them. However, further down in the library right at the end, there is another desk like the previous ones that conveniently, not only has a small lamp on top of it, it's not affected by the current chaos. If everything has the same pattern as before, in that desk there will be something that will have more newspapers for me to read.
"Well, that's my target then. Will I find another picture though?"
This is something that I will only know once I'm close enough to see, from here I'm too far to see anything of that sort. But before I took a single step forward towards it, I noticed a window up in the wall where the desk is next to. Just like the previous room, I can only see a bright light from it, though because of the fog that is present here, a weak one but one nonetheless, said window shines the library with a purple like colour, giving the library a mystical feeling to it. As anyone can expect, this fog is not natural at all, instead, it seems to be several small magic particles that are purple and floating in the air, they are reflecting the light, creating this fog-like phenomenon.
"Fascinating and beautiful. A library straight out of fairy tales, if I say it myself."
I casually let this out, but I'm truly mesmerised by this site. Moving on, after a second or so of enjoying the view in silence I decide to get moving. Slowly but surely, after a few moments of walking, I'm near the desk.
"Well, it seems I won't have my blurry picture this time around…"
I say this with a little bit of disappointment, for some reason there is no picture here, only a few newspapers and of course, the small lamp. Without much else to do really, I slowly grab the newspaper to see what's on it. This one start like this;
"A massive barrier is erected! One that surrounds the entire city and some more!"
"Ah! So, this one will talk about the barrier! Now that is something that I want to know about."
I do have hope that it will give me information about said barrier. Before I came here, I had to cross said barrier and to my extreme surprise, I simply had to walk through it to enter the city. Then to leave the city I only had to do the same, which of course confused the living hell out of me. What's the point of such a barrier? This question quickly appeared in my mind at that time.
"Let's read this first and then I will draw a conclusion from it. Who knows, I might be missing something because of my intellect."
And so, I start to read the newspaper.
"A few days later after the colossal Shadow first and only appearance, a massive barrier was erected, surrounding the city and a few more hundreds of meters around it. This barrier however, even though it's very large in scale, it's extremely well done and sophisticated. Though its purpose is unknown as one can casually walk in and out of the barrier."
"And it ends here. Great! That didn't help me out at all!"
I might have gotten a little too annoyed but really, what was the purpose of this? To tell me something that I already know?
"Whatever, next one."
With my extremely justified annoyed mood, I grab the next newspaper so that I can read it and this time I do hope it will have something useful. The following newspaper starts like this;
"The barrier is preventing the Shadows from leaving! Another type of Crystal monster is discovered!"
"Welp, it seems I spoke too soon."
Oh well, you really can't criticise me to be honest. From all the information that I had at that moment; I was more than in my right to complain! Shut up!
"The barrier that once was thought to be useless just recently proved everyone wrong as it completely stops the Shadows from leaving the city into the world. The Crystal monsters on the other hand, seem to not have any troubles doing so, and because of this fact, some think that the barrier was created by them, however there is not enough substantial evidence to back this up."
"That explains quite a bit and from all the information that we have on the Crystal monsters, I don't think it is imminent doom if they do get outside, provided that no one messes with them of course."
Yep, this is still somewhat worrisome as those Crystal monsters are quite strong. If this is right and the Crystal monsters did create said barrier, it easily explains why some of them are outside of the barrier, and now that I do think about it, it seems they are patrolling the area, to see if any Shadows have escaped or if they are trying to escape. If this is the case, it has shown again just how intelligent they are. But, let's finish this first as I'm quite curious to what new Crystal monster they are talking about, although I don't believe it will be news for me but hey, still have to be sure about it.
"A few reports have been sent to us the past few days and we have the unfortunate information that a new type of the Crystal monster has been sighted and even fought against. Luckily no one has died but they are not in top condition at all. Please, carefully read the information up head, it will be extremely important as this monster is beyond dangerous. This Crystal monster is very similar to a shark in terms of shape, a floating shark to make things worse. However, its body is made of Crystals being that it is extremely sturdy, much more than the other Crystal monsters, with the exception of the biggest ones, those still seem to be on another level. These shark-like Crystal monsters, they are several meters long, wide and tall, yes, several meters in all dimensions, you read that right. They are roughly between 25-30 meters long, between 3-3.30 meters wide and another 2.80-3.10 meters tall. As you can expect, their strength matches their size. Not much is known about their fighting style as the team who first discovered it, it got incapacitated by the sheer amount of magic those things have, which makes everything about them even more dangerous. However, with the few unfortunate reports that we got, it is known that, they will headbutt anything that dares to cross its path just like the small golems, but thanks to its massive size, the strength of those headbutts are several times bigger than the small golems, easily destroying an A rank barrier for example.
From this point on, everything that you will read is mere speculation as we have no more information about them. Their bite strength for their size and since they seem to be sharks, its expected for them to easily destroy anything and everything, not only that, they can easily rip and tear any metal or enchanted metal or anything of that sort really, in other words, avoid their mouth at all costs. This next bit of information is too unbelievable to be believed however, please keep it in mind in case it becomes true. The most dangerous aspect of them is their magic as once stated, not only it has a massive amount of it, it also has been sighted using a type of magic ray from the tip of their horns that are in its face. Unfortunately for mankind, it's a magic ray that is extremely powerful, capable of destroying anything on its path, easily an S rank spell. All of this if true, it makes him between S rank and S+ rank but it can reach SS with more concrete information about it. Please do not engage with such a monster, death will be imminent and unavoidable."
And the newspaper ends with this dramatic note, but once again, my final thoughts about it.
"Unfortunately, everything turned out to be true. Those shark-like Crystal monsters are terrifying even for myself, and for more reasons than what they wrote in the newspaper. Those things are at SS- rank, barely scraping the rank but they still are there, making them extremely powerful and dangerous."
I can defeat them without much worry but that does not make them beyond dangerous as an SS- rank monster can bring down a nation all by himself. For one, their speed is something that you would not expect at all, in fact you would easily mistake them for being slow thanks to their massive size and you know, because they are sharks in land? Floating in this case. Seeing them float around as if they are swimming is quite the sight to be seen, because of it I've underestimated them, a mistake on my part, since they are not in water, I thought that they would be slower in the air. But nope, those things are crazy fast and somehow even more agile, easily doing corners and manoeuvres at high speeds and with good flexibility to back it up! Even though they seem to be made of only Crystals, they still are extremely flexible, another thing that I didn't expect. The magic they can use through their horns is also quite diverse, from Electro, Anemo and even Hydro. The first Crystal monster to use several primal elements, the squid looking ones can use Electro but that's it really, at least for the primal elements. All of them seem to possess a type of magic that even I have no clue what it is.
"Sigh… who decided to open Pandora's box?"
Seriously, what in tarnation are we getting ourselves into? An A rank monster is already strong enough to do a bit of damage to a city, but an S rank is a walking catastrophe let alone an SS- rank that can send a damn whole country into ruins. Somehow, those monsters are being "summoned" left and right like it's nothing. For now, I don't have any answers for it, and the same can be said about this fantastic library, as there isn't anything left for me to explore. With that in mind, I decided to get out of here, but unfortunately the moment I look around, it quickly put despair into my face.
"Welp, time to go I guess-"
I mean it, so much that I didn't even finish my sentence. But why? Why am I making such a face? The answer is quite simple, the door is gone. Yes, the door that is supposed to be in the wall opposite to where I am, in front of me in this case, my only way out somehow is gone and I didn't even notice it. GREAT! Curiosity took the best of me as I decided to walk forward, however, worry brought back my guard up, making me aware of my surroundings once again.
Slowly I walk up to the place where the door was supposed to be. And after a few long steps I stopped a few meters from it. I carefully inspect the wall in an attempt of finding something, something that can explain the door disappearing or with high hopes to find the door itself. But even with the skill Magic Sense I'm unable to do so.
"Unbelievable, am I this incompetent?"
I say this with a disappointed look on my face and some frustration too. Seriously, how do I end up missing something like this? Upon closer inspection I noticed that the place where the door was supposed to be, there is magic in that area, illusion magic in this case. It was an illusion, a mirage, my hopes and dreams, gone the moment I wanted to achieve them. Anyway, since I was too occupied with the library view and if there was any danger at all, I've missed that small detail, that the door was never there and in fact, I was already trapped the moment I got in.
"Now what? How can I leave this place? Should I do something dramatic?"
Because of this I feel stuck in this place. Should I force my way out? Destroy anything in my path? But what if there is someone else here with me? Not in this room of course but, in the same situation as I am? Imagine me going kaboom in this place only to hurt an innocent person that happened to be stuck here just like I am. Maybe the owner of this weird place will come directly to me if I do so? Many options but none of them seem appropriated for now.
"I think it's better if I find other ways first. Going kaboom in this place might end badly for me. Or not, I really have no clue what will happen."
And so, after reaching this fantastic conclusion, I decide to look around again, but this time, to find a way out.
"Maybe one of these books has the way out? I never bothered to look on any of them, so I would not be surprised if that was the case."
This is the first possibility that came across my mind, and to be honest, since this library is so mystic looking, I really wouldn't doubt if something like that was the way out. Something that is cool, really cool, but annoying. Since I don't have any clues at all, I start to walk towards the closest book. One that is floating roughly my head height, around 1,80 centimetres from the ground to be extremely precise for some reason. Once I was close enough, I grab said book, though I do so with care, who knows, it might be a damn trap waiting to be triggered.
"Let's see what we have here..."
Fortunately for me, the book is not a trap. Unfortunately for me, the contents inside of it are rather unusual.
"Huh? It's empty!"
Paper noises!
At least the very pages that are in front of me are empty, maybe I just need to check the other pages. And so, I quickly turn the pages in hope that I find something.
Paper noises!
But page after page-
Paper noises!
The only thing I can see on them is the emptiness of them. Completely blank, not even a single trace of magic nor ink. I say magic because with it, you can easily hide the contents inside of it but in this case, it's nothing of that sort.
"No way... Do I really have to check all of them?"
I let this out with a massive annoyed tone of voice and with another massive annoyed look on my face. All of this because I will have to look in every single book that there is here for the way out. I will have to open them one by one, then I have to see if what's inside of it is useful for me or if it is like this one, a bust. To make things worse, I have to sense if there is magic on them, so that its contents are not possibly hidden by it. After doing that I will also have to organize them, so that I don't end up rewatching the same ones by mistake.
"What a pain in my beautiful Heroic rear end..."
A complete and utterly pain in the ass in other words. Do I have any other choice? Of course not, so, without the possibility of another choice, I get my rear end moving.
Book Noises! Paper noises!
Then, one by one I start to check the books.
Book Noises! Paper noises!
One by one, my desperation grows with each book.
Book Noises! Paper noises!
One by one, my patient does the opposite as each book that I've seen in the past 15 minutes, all of them have been empty.
"Am I missing something? All of these books later and nothing! How's this possible?"
I'm definitely missing something. I can't be wasting my time going through all the books only for all of them to be empty. Because of this, I decided to switch my strategy. Instead of looking through each book individually, I will instead increase the efficiency of my Magic Sense skill so that I can find all the books with magic on them, even those with the smallest particle of magic. The idea behind this is that, if someone was to put the way out inside of a book, then said book would have magic on them. At least that's what I think it will happen, but who knows, whoever did this, maybe they didn't use magic at all.
"No, that's impossible."
I reach this conclusion quickly, to me it's just impossible for such a feat. A second or so later I close my eyes, with it, I concentrate as hard as I can, increasing all my senses to the maximum, not only the magic ones, hearing, smell, touch, everything. Even the slight difference in temperature or humidity I will feel.
.....
...
...
"Sometimes I wonder how I got the title of Hero... How did I miss this?"
I do say this with disappointment in myself, after all, the answer was always under my nose and I've missed it. But sometimes I'm a little clumsy, so this was expected to happen. I was too focused on finding something that could tell me more about this place, not only that, the library itself and its mystic looks also drew almost all of my attention towards it.
"A lesson to be learn then!"
I try to lift my embarrassed spirits up as I confidently say this out loud. Of course, it did not do anything, but hey, a guy needs to keep his spirits up. But enough of this charade, I did find something that will tell me what I need to do to get out of here. First of all, that door truly was an illusion, secondly, the way out is right in front of me. I walk up to the middle of the room and slowly raise my right hand at around chest height and then extend it towards the front.
"Aaaa!"
Magic noises! Swoosh!
From the palm of my hand, I let magic flow from it, just enough of it to hit the invisible door in front of me. Once my magic touched said door, it revealed it in the process, leaving me with a soft smile on my face and at the same time, a relieved look on it.
"How did I miss this? It was right in front of me for crying out loud!"
I once again question myself and my abilities as I get closer to the door. To me this does not make any sense at all. First, I went right through this spot and consequently right through the invisible door. I did this a few times and I didn't feel anything, no magical contact, no physical contact, nothing at all. If this only appeared with my magic or magic in general, then just me going through it, it would end up appearing thanks to my natural magic output and yet it never did. This can mean that, it wasn't actually here all the times that I went through it. Maybe it "appeared" when I walked up to the wall that had the illusion? That area could have a trigger that would make the invisible door appear. But now that I think about it, rather than being hidden, the door simply was in a different dimension, a paralleled one I would guess. Either it was the trigger that I mentioned before that made the door switch dimensions or someone is watching me. This individual waited for me to "see" that the door was an illusion and from there, it switched dimensions with the real door and made it invisible if it wasn't at first. This really is starting to worry me, I feel like a rat trapped in a box, being carefully watched by someone.
"I need to get out of here, I'm starting to not like this at all."
As I say this, I switch my mood to a serious one, a battle ready one. My worries are growing with each passing second, it's better if I do so. I have to be ready for anything that might come from this door.
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