Speedrun 33

"So... Are we just going to go around collecting every magic in this world?" Aly inquired, her voice muffled by the screeches of a massive, dark blue, humanoid demon in the background.

"That wasn't my plan, although now that you mention it, maybe I can attempt something," I mumbled as I retrieved the Reality Marble from my pocket. "Also, stop puffing up your chest. That's not the reason why I taught you the Giant magic... You look ridiculous," I deadpanned, making her puff up her cheeks in response and look away, while I casually raised my palm and deflected the death ray aimed directly at us.

When the lime-colored beam of energy hit my palm, my magic resistance completely nullified its destructive effects. The course of the beam was altered by a good ninety degrees, blasting through the city landscape, leaving only destruction in its wake.

"Fluffy," I said in an annoyed tone, shifting my focus from the comically oversized melons to the 'David versus Goliath' fight, Fluffs was currently enjoying. "What did I say about playing with your food? You're much stronger than that demon. Just finish it, and let's move on," I added, rolling my eyes as an overly dramatic 'Shaa' resounded in the background.

"What do you have against us girls having our fun?" Aly interjected, and Fluffy agreed with an enthusiastic 'Shaa,' making me question why I was even bothering with them.

"I have nothing against you girls having fun, but there is a time and a place for everything," I said, gesturing to the peanut gallery, consisting mostly of men and a few bi-curious women who were gawking at my secretary.

Finally noticing the stares, Aly shyly averted her eyes while deactivating the spell. "I was just excited to learn a new type of magic," she mumbled under her breath.

"That's fine," I said with a chuckle, giving her a light pat while Fluffs continued her battle against the monstrous demon in the background. "But be more vigilant of you surroundings."

"Alright..." She muttered shyly, while looking downtrodden. 

"Anyway... Take a few steps back. I want to try something," I said with a grin, tightening my grip around the marble.

Aly turned back and, seeing the crazy glint in my eye, involuntarily took a step back. "What are you planning to do?" she asked with a worried expression.

"I simply want to make a book," I said, my grin widening.

"And for that, you need a nearly infinite energy source," she noted, taking another step back, her confusion morphing into concern, which she couldn't shake off.

"Yes," I simply stated, my voice oozing with excitement, as I was about to attempt something utterly ridiculous.

Aly took one final step back, moving out of the danger zone, while I activated [Universal Physique], enhancing my stats with mana.

A low rumble resonated the moment I activated the skill, and the air around me instantly vaporized from the release of energy. The ongoing fight in the background came to a halt, and the crowd dispersed, frightened for their lives.

Even Deliora, Fluffy's sparring partner with limited cognitive capabilities, realized the danger and decided it was time to evacuate the premises. As it nimbly turned its massive body around, it allowed Fluffy to capitalize on its momentary lapse in focus.

Fluffy used [Air Dance], disappearing from her location with a sonic boom. She activated her newly learned magic, increasing her body size by a good fifty times. Then, with a single empowered chomp using [Atomic Breath], she swallowed the demon whole before atomizing and consuming its complete essence.

[Quest: [Deliora] Completed 2,000 WP (1/4) (500 WP) Received]

I ignored her loud burp, and the accompanying system notification, and drew inspiration from Aly's earlier comment about magic. I raised my palm, and a 'simple' hardcover book materialized into existence, enchanted with spatial expansion magic, size adjustment, indexing, search, translation, mana-to-matter alchemical enchantments, elemental resistances, and physical reinforcement.

The book appeared as an ordinary tome with a black cover, devoid of visible features, except for the two words faintly glowing on its cover: 'Akashic Records.'

A smile spread across my face as I tested the book's features.

Pushing some mana into it, I rapidly flipped through its pages while simultaneously creating new ones. It was a fascinating sight: an open book with pages flipping from right to left endlessly, even as the book's thickness remained the same due to the pages being safely stored within the spatial expansion.

I halted the flipping and tested the information input by placing my palm on an empty page and thinking about a specific spell. It took but a moment for my thoughts to be transcribed onto the page and the seven additional ones containing spell names, usages, affinities, complete spell diagrams, chants, mana circulation, and other requirements and explanations.

Satisfied with this test, I repeated the process several times before willing the book to return to its first page.

I checked the index, and I wasn't surprised to find the indexing enchantment working as intended, displaying all the spells currently stored within its expanded covers.

The next thing I tested was the search function.

I thought about needing a specific spell available inside of it, and the book instantly flipped to the corresponding page. Then I thought about ice-affinity magic, and the book flipped back to its cover, with the index now displaying only two spells containing the word "ice" in their texts.

Satisfied with my swift tests, I grasped the book's cover with both hands, hoping that my ambitious idea was feasible.

While the enchantments were energy-intensive, I didn't actually need to raise my stats or use the Reality Marble for them; I needed them for the next step.

I activated both [Relativity] and [Existence], focusing all my mental instances on their temporal and informational aspects.

[Existence] had a useful ability that allowed me to create anything that existed within the confines of a reality, even if I didn't know how it was created, provided I paid the corresponding price.

That price would vary depending on how much information I had and how much the skill drew from reality itself.

That got me thinking. Shouldn't it be possible to simply draw any kind of information without creating anything?

On a side note, if the answer was no, I was pretty confident I could create a text, page, or a book, about the information I was searching for.

By employing [Relativity] alongside [Existence], I had the ability to fine-tune the parameters for where and when the information would be sourced. However, this would require a doubled energy expenditure.

Projecting both of my authorities across the globe and drawing energy from the Reality Marble like crazy, I willed the information about the magic that currently exists, has existed, and will exist to be imprinted into the book before me.

It appeared that for [Existence], it didn't matter if the information about something was never physically recorded because reality had a record of everything that happened within its confines, and that's where the authority seemed to draw the requested information from.

Reality shuddered and the day lost its luster, as massive tendrils of otherworldly energy seemed to seep into the book. The wind howled, screeching in protest as a vortex of mana-empowered air formed around me. The book was alight, its pages flipping at such speeds that they lit the air around them on fire.

Hundreds of thousands of pages, filled to the brim with information, appeared out of thin air with every single breath.

I stood at the epicenter of a cataclysm, holding the open tome in my hand, like a beacon illuminating the darkness around me.

It must have been quite a spectacle to observe from the outside, as I could pick up thousands of eyes glued on my location within my sphere of perception.

I wasn't learning the information directly but drawing it into a container. So the price I was paying wasn't as steep as it should have been. Nevertheless, the mana layers surrounding the Reality Marble peeled off at an ever-increasing speed as, like a tidal wave, information poured into the tome.

My grip around the marble tightened as I felt its size shrink at an alarming rate, its energy generation not sufficient to support my audacious actions.

That's when I understood how costly information actually was. I was sinking the energy equivalent of thousands of universes into the two authorities, yet I had only scratched the surface of what could be obtained.

So I altered my request, changing the variables of my initial idea and drawing only the finalized versions of all and every magic that this reality could offer.

Once again, reality shuddered and obeyed, and the massive tendrils of information transformed into billions of thin threads, all converging directly into the tome before sinking into it effortlessly.

Slowly, each and every thread dissolved, safely infusing the information into the book, and with a final rumble, a last pulse of energy, my authorities shut down, dispersing the typhoon of energy surrounding me.

I grinned like a madman, holding the smoking book within my hand.

The environment around me lay in ruins, the block demolished as strong winds toppled trees and walls alike. The ground was scorched, and I was comfortably standing in about a foot of molten stone.

But I couldn't care less about it, ignoring the screams and annoyed berating from Aly, who rushed to my side, genuinely scared for my safety. I closed my eyes, drawing on my title of [Arcane Book-Thief], consuming the entirety of the information from the book in an instant.

Everything was safely deposited into my memory, but even with my current cognitive capabilities, it would take quite a while to sift through all that information.

While the Reality Marble slowly grew back to its original size, I deactivated my mana reinforcement and waved my palm, restoring the decimated town to its former glory.

With a smile on my face, I looked at the annoyed, yet scared vampire girl and handed her the tome.

"Here, a little present," I said with a smile, making her stop mid-sentence.

"Oh, you're not going to get away with this with a small present!" She exclaimed in annoyance.

"Oh, yes, I will. Peace out," I said childishly, sticking out my tongue and giving her the peace sign as I activated one of the newest spells in my repertoire, Assassination Magic.

My body became translucent, erasing every sign of life and energy I produced, and even the memories of my presence became vague, especially to those currently near me.

"Huh," Aly muttered , looking around and scanning her surroundings in confusion, not truly understanding why she was here, or why she was mad just a moment prior.

"Must have been the wind," she mumbled, before finally noticing the weight in her hand. She looked down and exclaimed, "Where the hell did this come from?" in confusion before opening it and starting to flip through it. The more she flipped, the wider her eyes grew, and the closer the book was pulled to her face, as if she was afraid of missing anything.

I chuckled, and while she was immersed in the book, I dismissed the concealment magic and reappeared next to her. The moment I did so, her memories of my existence and actions returned. For a fraction of a second, she looked up at me, furrowing her brows before averting her eyes and shyly saying, "Thanks," then getting back to reading, completely forgetting her annoyance at me.

"You're welcome," I said with a smile, happy to dodge a bullet as I called Fluffy back into my shadow. "The first page of the tome has an index and search function; just think of what you would like, and it will display everything it can find," I stated, receiving only a nod, but I was sure she didn't register my words.

Unfazed by being ignored, I shrugged and refocused my attention on my system screen.

[WP: 9,132]

We were close, less than a thousand WP away from granting Aly her own access to my system, and the next three quests I was willing to complete would grant us enough to do so.

With our current capabilities, the [Deliora] quest was laughable, but the reward it provided was quite handsome. Also, let's not talk about the fact that by doing the quest this early, I had altered the fate of a notorious nudist ice mage, who was currently a few blocks away, still with his family.

"I wonder how the story would change if the Eclipse Gate was never opened," I mumbled aloud, going through the mental simulation of possible futures and how they would affect the world.

However, with a sigh, I dismissed the idea. There were too many variables, and the future without Dragon Slayers would be altered too drastically.

Not opening the gate could lead to the world's destruction, as the Dragon Slayers played a pivotal role in saving it multiple times.

So instead of preventing the opening of the gate, I decided to change the fate of yet another person.

Time and space warped around us, speeding away like a hurtling train, and the next moment, we reappeared in a mansion on the other side of the continent, precisely as an eclipse was happening on the 7th of July x777.

With a swift motion, I backhanded the butler who attempted to seize me and my companion to prevent us from interrupting his master's important work.

Aly, noticing the massive amount of mana swirling in the room, temporarily looked up from the book. Her gaze was drawn towards the stunning blonde woman holding eleven golden keys.

Aly looked away from her and gave me a suspicious glance. "Do you have a thing for blonde women in distress?"

"I won't confirm or deny it," I replied with a chuckle as the woman my age looked at us with a worried expression.

"I'm not sure who you are or how you got here, but you cannot interrupt the ritual!" Alarmed by our appearance, she exclaimed in a desperate tone, thrusting the eleven keys into the magical artifact before her. "The future of the world relies on this." She mustered the courage to infuse her remaining life force into the gate to supplement the missing twelfth key.

I simply rolled my eyes, waving my hand to freeze her in place and force her energy back into her body, making her eyes widen in horror. "NO!" she screamed desperately as she struggled to kill herself, to complete the quest left to her by her ancestors.

"Calm your tits, Layla," I said with an annoyed tone while sending a fraction of my energy into the gate, forcefully opening the temporal gate myself.

Her eyes widened in realization as her gaze returned to her gate. The magical artifact hummed to life as all eleven keys clicked, unlocking its mechanism and funneling celestial magic into the apparatus, finally activating the internal spell, and releasing a massive wave of energy throughout the continent.

I felt the fabric of space and time contort and wobble as multiple spatiotemporal ruptures occurred all around the world.

"You've done well," I said to the woman, as I detected numerous new entities entering this time period. "You deserve a reward," I added with a smile, activating [Existence] and removing the disease that had been plaguing her being while fixing up her frail body.

[Quest: [Mrs. Heartfilia] Completed 200 WP (1/4) (50 WP) Received]

Her eyes widened in shock as her labored breathing became relaxed. "W-who are you?" she stuttered.

"It doesn't matter. What matters now is that you'll be there for your daughter. Cherish the time you've been rewarded with," I said with a wink, turning around to place my palm on my vampire secretary's shoulder, who had been observing the interaction with a curious glint in her eyes.

However, a thought swiftly formed in my mind, and I turned back to the kneeling woman and added, "Oh, by the way, train your daughter, and in seven years, send her to the guild named Fairy Tail. The future of the world depends on it." I said with a smile before disappearing from the location without answering any questions, leaving the stunned woman wondering what she had just experienced.