10.5: The magic princess

My name is Ronagma. I am a princess. Well... Maybe it would be more accurate to say that I was a princess. Right now, I am a student of the Ouma Republic's Central University. I was adopted when I was very young, at the tender age of five. Back then, I remember crying. A lot. I, who had lived my whole life as a princess, suddenly had her parents killed, and his brother fate was unknown. Rather than unknown, he was more likely dead. I had to leave my siblings so suddenly... It was just painful to remember. The director of the school, acted as my grandpa, and gave me a place to live. Back then, I was told I could do whatever I wanted, but... "Boooored..." I had nothing to do. Back then, I would always play with toys, read books, or have mom read them to me. But... 'I couldn't do that here.' And so, I kept walking aimlessly around the university. And suddenly, I found the building that I would be in for hours and hours... The library. It was a huge building, almost bigger than any of the rooms in the campus, but contrasting to the sized, it was decorated with wood, and cheap materials (though maybe the size was the reason for the tacky decoration), but even with cheap materials, the building was still well-decorated, with fine finishing.

I got in, and the first thing I saw, was a sea of libraries full of books, aligned perfectly. I couldn't see an end to those rowes of bookshelves, and the silence in the room, that would only be broken by the ocasional sound of the pages turning from side to side of the books, made me stand in daze for some seconds, just wondering if that apparently infinite sea of books had an end or not. But just after that, I became curious about how the books would be in the school, compared to those back at home.

I ran back to the director's office and entered the room running, with loud footsteps, as if to announce my arrival.

Grandpa was sitting on his seat, reading calmly documents in which he would write something every now and then. I got near to him and asked him in an excited way. "Grandpa, I want to know how the books in here are different to those back home!". He raised his head and looked at me with calm eyes that hid a spark of hope inside them. "Hohoho... So you have been to the library?" "Yes! It was very big, and it seemed as if there were endless books! Can you read some for me?" For a moment, he seemed surprised, and asked me "Oh... but don't you know how to read?" I scratched my head embarrassedly... to be honest, I didn't really know how to read. "Well..." "Ronagma, big and intelligent girls need to know how to write and read, and you are already a big girl, aren't you?" "Yes, I am already a very big girl! But I don't know how to read..." "Hohohoho... Even someone who doesn't know anything can become a sage as long as he or she has the will to learn... Do you want me to arrange a few classes for you, Ronagma?" Back then, I didn't understand how true his words were, but I just cared about the second part of what he said. "Yes!" "Okay... Don't worry, I will take care about it..." The next day, I had my first classes. I only had to learn how to read, but it was something very difficult for me... But I tried and tried, until I became able to read 1 month later. After that, the director - my grandpa - gave me my first two gifts. They were two thick books. There were many pages, many more than the amount I could count. "What is this, Grandpa?" I asked curiously. His old eyes gleamed with pride and endearment as he looked to both, me and the books, as he slowly opened his elderly mouth to say "This one is a Global Dictionary... With this book, if you don't understand a word, or a phrasal verb, you will be able to search it here. If you are reading, and there is a word that you don't understand, you will be able to search it there. The words are ordered alphabetically. You already know the alphabet, right?" "Yes, they taught me in class. But grandoa, what is the second book?" Though I thought that it would be useful to have it, it probably weighed a lot, so I was hoping that the second, which was even bigger, would be useless so that I wouldn't have to carry it to the library. "This big book... It is the Global Enciclopedia." His voice, unlike before, that was slow and passive, had become prideful, and even though his voice wasn't loud, it echoed through the room. "The Global Enciclopedia is the book that has all the knowledge that the humans have discovered until now. Every time that we discover something, we add it to the enciclopedia, and everytime, we make new versions of the enciclopedia, so that everyone can access to knowledge." 'All the knowledge that humans have discovered until now.' Those words kept repeating in my head. Being able to understand anything. 'With this, will I be able to understand anything?' But of course, I couldn't be more wrong. The knowledge that humans had discovered until then was like a drop of water in the ocean. But still, it ignited something in me. The thirst to learn. The hunger of knowledge. My eyes gleamed, and my face didn't differ much from the face of a kid with a new toy. And from then on, I went to the library every single day. I began studying many things, but I enjoyed elemental cultivation the most. Every afternoon, I would practice magic, and every morning, I would go to the library to research more information and find new tricks with dots and threads. I didn't talk to anyone in all that time. And so, in this fashion, 6 years passed by.