Guidebook

Obviously, the first thing I had done after getting the message about the mission rewards was to hurry back to my apartment. In it, I found a large, normal-looking book with a brown cover sitting on my desk.

And now, as I was looking through it, I felt my temper rise as it had done so many times since I arrived in Ghael.

'This is... why didn't you give me this before, you stupid god!'

The guidebook was divided into four different parts. First up was information about Alex Winter's past, who I was in this world how it had come to be that I was now attending the academy. Despite my having unlocked a part of it, it was clear that a lot of information was still missing.

The second part was an in-depth manual of the Psion class. Starting with a walkthrough of what the class was, the history of it, as well as some stupid inspirational quotes. It then went on to talk about my current skills and talents in great detail, while also showing ways of practicing these

The third and fourth parts of the guidebook appeared to still be 'locked', as all of those pages were still blank, but I assumed that just like the backstory, they would also be unlocked at some point in the future.

But even this was still more than enough for me to feel angry. Because now I got my very first insight into whoever kind of person I was supposed to be in this world, or at least what kind of person I had been in this world.

My backstory was still very sparsely filled out, and despite there only being one page of it, it was still incredibly interesting, though it really only explained how I had come to attend the academy.

'Saved by an unknown traveler, no one truly knows who Alex Winter is, but due to the traveler being a good friend of the principal, he was accepted into the Stellar Academy. The traveler, however, knew that Alex had some sort of connection to the forgotten clan of Psions. However, as he passed away the same day that he left Alex at the academy, there is now no one but Alex himself who knows about his own, dark past.'

Which, I didn't, but now I at least had some understanding of the context regarding who I was. It was by no means a lot of information, but it was more than enough to understand that I was currently in a very precarious situation.

Because, if I wasn't stupid, I could only think that the author would absolutely create missions related to my past, something along the lines of getting revenge or finding out more about the Psion clan. In other words, if I was going to become part of a coherent storyline, it was obvious that my character would also need to be developed.

"Seems like this is going to be harder than I thought."

Closing the book, I stuffed it into my bag, as I didn't feel comfortable just leaving it out in the open in my apartment and there weren't a lot of good hiding places for it anyway. Although the appearance of the guidebook had made it so that I returned to my apartment after saving Lya, I still had a lot of research to do in the library.

After walking across the campus and entering the library, I was yet again exposed to a very weird thought. Because although I didn't see any of my classmates, the campus was still full of students, and I just couldn't understand how that could be the case.

Stellar Academy was an academy based on a three-year program, so it wasn't as if there were sixth--years or even seventh-years attending it. So, taking into account that we only had twelve students in my class, which should then naturally be the same for all the older students as well, why were there so many of them?

Yet, as I didn't have anyone to ask about it, I had no choice but to forget about it for now. I had enough to think about as it was already.

"Oh, Alex. Are you here again?"

As soon as I stepped into the library, I was met by a smiling, glasses-wearing librarian with pigtails. She was the one that had helped me before with finding books, Ms. Turner. So, while smiling back at her, I walked up to the counter.

"Yeah, there were still a few things I have left to research, after all. Oh! While we are on the topic, did you manage to find the books I was looking for?"

"Mm, I did. Just wait for a second."

Ms. Turner turned around and nimbly managed to find the books that she had put aside for me, placing them on the counter in front of her. It was a total of five books, all of them containing very different kinds of information, but all very vital to my life in Estaria.

"Thank you, Ms. Turner!"

"Don't mention it, Alex!"

==========

'My head... is going to explode...'

Sprawled out over the table, I felt as if my head had reached some sort of limit where it just couldn't process any more information.

It was a shame that the students weren't allowed to borrow books and bring them out of the library, unless they got permission from a professor, as that would allow me to continue reading tonight at my apartment.

However, the five hours that I had spent reading still allowed me to gain a somewhat decent understanding of a lot of different things.

In Ghael, there were five major nations, with Estaria being in the center.

To the west there was Garek, to the east there was Lumin, to the north there was Frel and to the south there was Madol. All of these nations had similar structures of power, with a royal family sitting at the top and nobles managing parts of the lands.

This, I already somewhat knew from the novel, but what I didn't know was exactly how this power structure actually worked. It turns out that it was very similar to the way the Englishmen had ruled their country in the past.

In Estaria's case, there was the royal family at the top. The next stop on the ladder was the four dukes, all managing just about a fourth of the nation, all carrying immense amounts of power. That land was then further divided into four additional parts that the viscounts managed.

When it came to earls and barons, things weren't quite as clear-cut as with dukes, who all pretty much ruled over a fourth of the nation each, with the exception of Esta where the royal family had direct control.

Earls and barons also had their own territory but these territories were still part of the viscounts' lands, meaning they were still subjects of the viscounts despite that, who in turn were subjects of the dukes. And this was obviously going to affect the environment inside the academy as well.

There was a very good reason why Mike felt comfortable acting however he wanted, and that was because he was the heir to a duke. It wouldn't surprise me if he could even make it so that students that he didn't like suddenly 'disappeared' just by pulling some very deadly strings.

This newfound information also made the main cast of the story a lot more interesting to me.

Samantha and George aside, as one was a princess and one was a commoner, the other three were all nobles, but their origins were very different.

Thomas was the simple son of a baron, Lya was the heir to an earl and Eva was the daughter of a viscount. Did any of this actually matter? Yes. It mattered a lot. Because I had a feeling that, no matter what, I would probably be forced to interact with them quite a bit.

In the academy, all of the students were supposed to be equal, but that was obviously not the case. It did seem like nobles were more or less free to interact with other nobles, but even that had a limit. So, what would happen if a commoner was thrown into that mix?

As even nobles were probably at least somewhat cognizant of whom they interacted with, there was no doubt that even a simple quarrel could likely lead to the death of a commoner depending on their whims.

There were already at least two people who probably didn't like me much, and though I forced myself to believe that they probably wouldn't go as far as to kill me, it wouldn't be surprising if something happened.

George had also been subjected to a lot of bad things due to the whims of a noble, but as he was the hero, he had been mostly safe due to the fact that he had strong allies around him and he was individually very strong.

So far, I had none of that, and unlike George, I also wasn't sure if I was ever going to attain those things. But that didn't mean I wasn't going to try.

Even if I had to resort to doing some things that could be called... morally gray.