1 Sleep

"You who read me, are you sure of understanding my language?"

― Jorge Luis Borges, The Library of Babel

***

One night, I fell asleep. And then, I was in the library. The first night that this happened was strange; I felt awake. I could feel the air passing through my lips, and a slight chill on my skin.

The air felt dry, and as I felt the leather spines of the books lining the walls around me, I could feel every little crevice and crack beneath my fingertips.

At first, I was awestruck. And then I was scared. Terrified, actually. The walls were bookshelves, each taller than a three-story building. It was claustrophobic and cold, and there were no people in sight. I couldn't see a ceiling, and I couldn't see any end to the countless books surrounding me. That was a week ago.

Since then, I've gone to the library every night, and have yet to find a single book that I could read. Until tonight. After every trip to the library I would make, I would return the next night in the same spot that I left from. I ran through the corridors of the library for a week, before finally, I reached what I deemed to be the center.

An open space, where I found an empty desk, a pedestal behind it with a single book upon it, and a door. The door was sitting in the center of the open space. When I opened it, although there was no wall behind it, it lead to a completely different space than the Library. In fact, this space was one that I recognized very well.

Through the door I could see my ceiling. I recognized it by the poster that I had taped up there a couple months ago. I walked through the door, and before I knew it, I was laying in my bed, eyes open. I had woken up.

"Strange..."

I muttered to myself. After grabbing a glass of water and taking a bathroom break, I managed to fall back asleep and arrived in the library once again. It seemed that the door could serve as an exit to the Library.

Now, I decided to check out the book on the pedestal. It was thick, thicker than any book I'd ever seen. I tried to pick it up, but couldn't manage to lift it more than half an inch off of the wooden pedestal.

In fact, it was shocking that the pedestal even managed to hold such a crazy book without collapsing under its weight. It was nearly the size of my torso. I lifted the thick cover, bound in old, brown leather, and before I could even attempt to read a single word that was written on its pages, the paper began to tear away from the binding and enter my chest.

A blinding light filled my eyes, before familiar characters began to print themselves in my vision.

[Welcome, operator. You have been selected as the newest Librarian. This is a great privilege and honor! Please, treat the Library and its books with respect and care.]

[Congratulations! You earned the basic skills and authority of the Librarian.]

[You can now view your status by accessing your personal record in the Library!]

[Name: Calvin Sanchez]

[Title: Librarian Operator]

[Skills:]

[Interpreter (0/1) /Active/ [LVL 1]:

Learn any language recorded in the Library by hearing it spoken or seeing it written and subsequently activating the skill.]

[Book Search /Active/ [LVL MAX]:

Search the records of the Library for a specific book by title or keywords.]

[Body:]

Human Body (Librarian Enhancement)

An average earthen human body. Minimum mana required for survival. Untrained muscles. Above average intelligence.]

[Authorities:]

[Authority of the Library Operator]

[Binds:]

What the hell...?

These words plastered themselves in front of me, and as I read them over, I started to question more and more whether this was really a dream. Something strange was certainly going on. I looked over the "skills" tab, and was intrigued by the skills I had supposedly been granted by the Library.

I decided to run a little test. The concept of mana fascinated me, and according to the description of my body, I had some of it already. I decided to give something a try.

I shouted, "Book Search!"

Surprisingly, a white marble tablet appeared before my eyes. engraved onto it were two small rectangles.

Within them read:

[Title Search]

and

[Keyword Search].

I pressed my finger into the one labeled keyword search. It glowed white, and the tablet changed to show what looked like a search bar and a keyboard. I typed in the words, "BASIC" and "MANA" into the keyboard, and pressed the enter key. A series of title names showed up on the tablet. As I scrolled through them, I realized that I couldn't read a single word of what was written in any of the book titles. As such, I took a gamble.

I looked over one of the titles, and shouted

"INTERPRETER!"

Suddenly, the words started to make a little more sense. My perception of them changed and morphed until finally, I could completely understand what was written on that line of text.

The "(0/1)" in the description of the interpreter skill in my status had also changed to "(1/1)", and after some experimentation, I discovered that the skill wouldn't activate again. This was a bit disappointing, but I decided to focus on the book I had just translated. I was thrilled to see what powerful magics might lay within...

"Basic Mana Techniques for Impotent Men!"

I shuddered, thinking that the first magic book I chose only served the purpose of making me better in bed. I scrolled through the countless books, finding a few in the language I just learned, but all of them being pointless. Such as:

"Basics of Applying Mana to Scalps for Instant Hair Growth!"

Come to think of it, I might need that when I'm older...

No, for now, this was just a dream. I didn't even know if this mana stuff was real yet. I searched on.

Finally, I found one that suited my taste.

"The basics of mana for novice magicians. For whomever may stumble upon it."

Strangely, there was no author listed, but I pressed the "find" button next to the book title.

Nothing happened.

I began to grow a bit worried, but before long, I saw a book floating between the shelves heading for me. It lightly floated towards me, until it finally stopped, floating in front of my face. I reached out at grabbed it.

It stopped floating as soon as my fingers wrapped around it. It was a thinner book than I expected, being about two inches thick. I sat down at the desk to read it, but before I could even lift the cover, more words began shooting across my eyes.

[Welcome, Librarian! This is your desk. Your task is simple: open and close the Library, mark books as missing on their due date, and check books in when returned. Here, you can utilize your authority as the operator of the Library to its fullest extent! Analyze the contents of your desk to find the Librarian's monocle, an item that allows you to view all that passes in the Library, and the Librarian's Fountain Pen, a pen that never runs out of ink. While at your desk, you can use the temporary skill "Library Overview".]

I decided to check this out before opening my book. I opened my desk drawer to find three things: a monocle, a pen, and a letter. I already knew what the monocle and pen were for, but the letter was foreign to me. I opened it, and it was surprisingly completely readable. It read as such:

"To whomever finds this letter,

If you are reading this, that means that you managed to find your way into the Library proceeding my death. I'm sorry to leave to you this job, but my life was waning, and I had no choice but to close the library and pass on the keys to the castle. Whoever you are, whether you're a powerful knight or a simple farmer, treat this task with respect. Your world and many others will treat you as a hero for reopening the passageway to the Library.

May good fortune be with you always,

Newfur"

It was concise, and to be honest, not very informative. It seems the last person to have this job was someone by the name of Newfur. A strange name, to say the least, but this was a strange place. What was more interesting, though, was a key with a chain around it inside of the envelope. I had no idea what it was for, so i placed the key back in the drawer and got to work.

First, I cast the "Overview" skill.

The same marble tablet from before appeared on the desk, but larger in size and with much more to look at. There were the same buttons as before, but new ones had appeared as well. Buttons to open and close the library, "library staff", and finally, there was a grayed out tab labeled "Administration".

I decided to ignore all of that for now, and first decided to finally read the book on mana that I had been waiting to read for what felt like ages. But then, I had a better idea. I opened it to the back, and saw the standard sheet for checking out a book.

I signed my name and the date with my fountain pen, and the paper glowed. Something about the book felt heavier. Finally, I realized just how long I'd been in the Library. My alarm would probably go off in just a couple minutes.

After waiting around and exploring a bit more, I woke up with a book in my hand. The feeling of its leather cover in the real world was thrilling. It meant one thing: the Library was real. I quickly tore my covers off.

It was a weekend, and I wouldn't have to attend school. I was 17, and it was my final year of high school. Normally I would be studying math or science, but today I would be studying magic. I could feel my blood pumping through my body with anticipation.

The first page of the book presented itself to me as I cracked it open. It was a foreword from the author. In summary, it told me that he had died, and if anyone found this book, they should teach its contents to their young and revitalize the age of wizardry.

I cared little for this. I desperately wanted to learn some magic already. My imagination was already racing with ideas of what to do with all the newfound power I would have. Girls, money, all of it would be mine!

I managed to calm myself down and started to read. The book was extremely informative. It taught of a method of exercise that would activate your cells and help them to produce noticeable amounts of mana, breathing to move the mana through your body, and meditation to increase its connection to your imagination.

The regime was to be done once a day, taking up two hours of exercising while utilizing the breathing technique, and three hours of meditation with the breathing technique. This would go on for two weeks before the body would begin to produce denser quantities of mana on its own, and your breathing would naturally adapt to follow the rhythm that the book taught. The book was somewhat thin, but was filled with detailed diagrams on how to perform this method.

That was only the first third of the book, but I decided to leave the rest for after I'd practiced the mana cultivation method as the author suggested to wait to learn anything else about magic until after the body was already producing mana naturally.

And so my training began. The thrill of magic motivated me to an extreme. During the night, I read works of literature in the language that I had learned through my librarian skill, and brought them to school to read during the day.

Strangely, I noticed that although my mind was constantly running while I was in the Library, I would wake up completely refreshed. Although, I didn't worry about this too much, as it was actually quite a blessing. Two weeks passed like this, and I managed to finish quite a few books (and returned them all, of course).

What I learned from these was that the language that I learned was from a country called Pamar, a country that had been constantly invaded by monsters, and despite massive amounts of foreign aid, was in a constant struggle to survive. This was due to the magic books in it being burned, thinking that the age of magic was over and the age of technology would support their efforts instead.

This was all in an effort by their new emperor to profit off of the weapons industry. I wondered if they had been completely wiped out, but I really had no idea of knowing.

It seemed that exercising with the technique taught to me by the book truly did awaken something within me. I could feel it coursing through my veins. It felt cool and smooth, but also vibrated with power. I could sense it within me to a greater degree after meditating.

Finally, after the two weeks had passed, the mana naturally moved through me, and I could feel it without meditating. I finally got to the second part of the book. This section described how to train your body to produce more mana, and how to shape, compress, and wield raw mana.

It seemed I would finally see some fruits to my efforts!

I holed myself up in my room, practicing control of my mana. This was a much more arduous and time-consuming practice regime. Forcing the mana to materialize in and outside of my body put a massive strain on me, and had a much greater effect than all of the exercise I had done in the first half of the regime within only a couple days.

My muscles ached, but the cool feeling of mana passing through them after I released it from its materialized form was also extremely soothing. It took me another three weeks, and when I came out of my training, I realized that my body had gone through a substantial change.

I had toned, defined muscles, something which I never thought I'd have as someone who'd never played any sports. My senses were sharper, and I could feel the mana moving through my body far more acutely.

I'd been in a state of meditation for almost three weeks, only taking ten minutes out of every day to eat, drink, and excrete, so I'd never had the chance to view the state of my body like this since I didn't want to leave my meditative trance and break my focus.

As my mind was clear and not being strained, as well as my body not moving and being in a state of only semi-consciousness, I also hadn't slept for the last three weeks, and hadn't accessed the library. Before returning to school or the library, though, I decided to read the final section of the basic mana control book.

This section was labeled "forming a mana reservoir".