After the right turn, a left turn appeared at about the point the other aisle should have intersected. I was tempted to go back and check if it was a dead end or went off in a different direction. I could do that on the way out, I decided. I followed the aisle between the empty floor to ceiling bookshelves as they turned left and right a few times, until the aisle eventually emerged into a sitting room, the walls lined with more empty shelves and a passageway on each of the three other walls.

  Three players were standing around a table in the middle of the room discussing the two books they had before them.

  “It looks the same as Densen’s did in his stream, and he got an Ice spell.” One of male players was saying.

  “It kind of looks more like the one Cryon had…” the other one said. “That was fire.”

  “Hi!” I said when I was within speaking distance. “Is this where I can find the spell books?”

  “Hi, bit further in. Any of the passages will lead you deeper into the maze.” The one claiming it was ice said without turning around.

  I got to the table and looked down at the books. They looked old and damaged, one possibly by water the other looked like it was burnt.

  “It’s pot luck what you get. We were hoping there was a way to identify what sort of magic each book has…but so far no one has been able to figure it out.” The female player said. “The system just identifies them as ‘Old unknown spellbooks.’

  “Shocking Grasp,” I said looking down at the water damaged book, which was identified to me as a ‘Old partial shocking grasp spell book.’

  “What?”

  “And the other one is ‘Fire Dart’.”

  “You guessing?” the first man asked, turning towards me, Kenton according to his name plate.

  “I got an arcana prima as part of a quest reward, and that’s how the books identify to me. I’m guessing you take these back to the mage outside and he gives you a full copy of the spell?”

  “Yeah. What is this one?” the woman, Selma, asked, pulling another one out of her [Inventory].

  “Ray of Frost,” I said.

  “Hah! I told you.” she said to one of the men, before storing it again. “It’s almost identical to Violina’s screenshot.”

  “Fire Dart suits me,” said the second guy, Franks, picking up his book. “Has anyone seen Shocking Grasp yet?”

  “It’s not been shared on the forums if they have.” Kenton said, and I realised his hand movements were him searching through a website.

  “It’s a melee spell,” I said. “You charge up the spell and then release it through a touch attack or a melee hit. Stronger than Spark, but obviously you need to be in melee range to hit with it…”

  “Explorator Mage? Oh my god, you are her??! From the stream! I love your outfit!” the teenage-sounding girl suddenly shrieked.

  “Errr.” I replied slightly taken aback, and then realising I now had the full attention of her two companions.

  “It looks even better than the stream…look at the stitching!” she said, circling me. “How much grinding did you do to unlock the store so quickly???”

  “It was a quest reward for completing an environment quest…”

  “A what?” one of the men asked.

  “I found a letter written by a dead explorator, asking to be buried with his wife, so I did. I got the side quest only after I decided to do it. Gear was the reward…”

  “The Arcana knowledge?” the other one asked.

  “Another reward for finishing something her husband had started before he died, the game likes to reward players going beyond the bare minimum.” I said.

  “I noticed something like that…but thought it was just my imagination.” Franks said.

  “Right! We need to get a move on or we will be in these starter duds forever!” the girl declared. “We are joining the Explorators next!”

  “Are you going with Shocking Grasp, Bro, or are we looking for another book for you?” Franks asked Kenton.

  “A melee spell…” Kenton considered. “Sure, most of our fighting is at that range anyway, maybe I can be a spell blade!” He stored his book.

  “There are rumours going about that the best books can only be found deep in the aisles, but if you go in too far you start getting attacked by rats and tentacles… we didn’t take the chance and took the first books we found…” Franks told me, before hurrying to catch up with his excited companions.

  The three headed for the door I had entered by and it was only after they had left a thought occurred to me. “Tentacles?”

  I looked at my three options for all of two heartbeats and then headed for the left hand one from the way I came in. The aisle of bookcases eventually came to a cross-junction. I continued to follow the left hand rule, and quickly realised I was in a room of bookshelves. The stacks ran from floor to ceiling, and there were gaps between each shelf allowing me to see clearly across the room. There was nothing on any of the shelves I could see by bending or jumping, but when I climbed up, there was something in the far corner on the second from the top shelf.

  Disappointingly it turned out to be a copy of Spark. I left it for someone else to find.

  The next room I discovered had some players fighting some small rats. Looking at them as I approached it seemed the rats were raiding nearby rooms for their books and dragging them back to their nest. The players were trying to kill the rats, and claim the book if one dropped before another rat scooped it up. One of the players with a bow turned on me though as I approached, and told me to back off as this was their nest.

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  I chose not to contest it and left them to it as I moved on to the next chamber. I was pretty convinced at this point that euclidean geometry had been sent on a vacation when this place’s builder had gone to work. I certainly shouldn’t have been able to make six left turns in a row with the aisles between the turns getting longer, without at least crossing a path I walked along. This place was weird.

  The next chamber found me in a small reading nook. A copy of Flame Dart was on the top shelf above the couch. As I stood on the couch to grab the book, a rat scurried by it, seemingly storing it in its own storage and darting out the far door. It was gone before I could finish casting spark, so I ran after it.

  I almost lost sight of it a couple of times, just seeing its tail flick around a corner at a junction, and while it wasn’t getting away from me, I wasn’t closing the gap either. The rat led me on a merry chase for what felt like thirty minutes. I probably should have given up, but pride wouldn't let me.

  I came around a corner to see it scurrying into a small hole at the base of the bookshelf that blocked the end of the aisle.

  “Damnit.” I muttered to myself. All that effort, and for nothing. Then I saw the book on the top shelf above the hole…well maybe there was something there after all. I reached up to pull the book. It tilted and with a grumble the bookcase became a door.

  A door, at the top of a flight of stairs. I’d been told I didn’t have access to the floors above…but he hadn’t said only the ground floor. I pulled my Battlestaff from my [Inventory] and started down the stairs. The flickering lights below reminded me more of torches than the candles I had seen so far.

  The bottom of the stairs opened up into a more dungeon-esque feel. The room was lit by the larger flames of torches mounted to the rough cut stone walls. Mahogany bookcases fill every other alcove and a double row of matching library study desks fill the middle of the room.

  The rat was nowhere to be seen.

  I took the left door out of the room. Instead of a bookcase line aisle, it was more a rough stone carved corridor, with the occasional alcove with a bookshelf or padded seat. I did find a copy of Shocking Grasp on a padded seat…but I left that one too. I wanted something new.

  The corridor opened into a room with a pentagon in it. A unlit sconce at each point.

  Not going to lie. It screamed trap.

  I may have kept my back to the wall and edged my way around to the first door. With a definite feel something was watching me with amusement.

  I’m not sure what happened in the next chamber, I was about half way across, the lights went out. I stiffened when something slimy touched my face.

  Nope, I don’t want hentai gameplay.

  There was an “Ook,” followed by several loud thuds, a hairy arm then gave me a push and I found myself back in a corridor.

  I opened my eyes to find myself staring at a flickering torch which I’m pretty sure hadn’t been there a moment before.

  After I got my heart under control, I turned to face what had pushed me and found myself facing a solid bookshelf, with a single book on it. I was hundred percent sure I had come through this way. I tried pushing. Felt solid. I looked for a lever or some kind of way to open it. Stones looked like they merged with the ones around me…the only thing which stuck out was the book.

  I picked it up. ‘Old Fire Ball spell book.’

  It didn’t say partial…was this a full spell book?

  I looked down the corridor in both directions, both leading to turns. I went left, hoping to find a reading nook or a sitting room. If this was a full spell book, I wanted to savour it.

  The corridor led me to a familiar room, which had study desks and a flight of stairs going up. I took a seat at one of the desks and opened the book.

  Sadly my translation was only one word in three at best, and my best guess this was a spell for throwing balls of fire...which was about what I had gotten from the title. I spent a few minutes reviewing it, seeing if I could learn anything more from it or pick out patterns which might extend my understanding, but there just wasn’t enough context clues.

  I stored the book and headed for the stairs back up to the ground floor.

  There were definitely some non-Euclidean shenanigans happening because the corridor led from the staircase's hidden door, then just two turns before coming out in the room where I met Selma, Kenton and Franks.

  I wondered if this place was telling me ‘you have your spell book, it was time to leave.’ from how quickly I found my way back to the entrance.

  The crowd had thinned slightly when I stepped back out into the sun.

  I walked over to the crowd and got a few questioning looks from some of the newcomers, more checking out my gear set, but they went back to focusing on their rings trying to get them to light up pretty quickly.

  “Were you successful in finding a spell tome?” the robed mage asked. In response I pulled out the spellbook I had found. His eyes widened at the sight of it, took it from me and started to flick through it. “A rank 3 tome. A rare find from the lost archives. There is also an additional reward for bringing out a full spell manual, instead of a partial one.”

  ‘Professor Song wishes to transfer two spells to your spell book:’

  ‘Fire Bolt: Rank 1’

  ‘Fireball: rank 3’

  ‘Do you accept [y/n]’

  I accepted the spells.

  “Thank you.” I said with appreciation, I had really just expected Fireball.

  “My pleasure, it is not often that the lost archives share such rewards with those on their first journey within. It is a rare privilege that I get to see rank 3 spells come out. I suggest a trip to the spell forge, the professors there will be able to help you comprehend and cast your new spells.”

  “Is it possible to learn more Arcana? I was only able to understand a few of the words in the tome?”

  “You know Arcana?” He asked, giving me his full attention. “Who taught you?”

  “I had the privilege to run into High Exploritor Mage McCoy…” he sucked in a breath through his teeth when I said her name.

  “Well…she is probably one of the best in the language. Vice Principal Jasween does teach a class on it to anyone who is able to cast spells in all three schools.”

  “How do I…”

  “Gain more spells? Master the two you already have, Girl, before you look to start expanding. In the Art, a Master of none is never better than a master of some.” he said dismissively and turned away from me.

  I raised an eyebrow. A bit rude.

  I looked around at the other groups and they mostly seemed to just be friend groups trying to help each other power up their rings to show membership in the school.

  “Excuse me?” said a girl a head shorter than myself. I had the novel experience since starting the game of looking down at someone. “How do you power up your ring? ‘Push your power into the ring’ doesn’t make sense. I don’t have power.”

  “Errr..” I looked at her and shrugged. “So the way I saw it. In our core we have this pool of power. If you close your eyes and imagine looking at yourself from the outside, you should sense a density in one part of you…if you imagine that density is a bright ball of power, that is you mana well. You then need to imagine your mana well has paths leading from it, out to your limbs, and splits like roots down your fingers. Then you need to imagine that power flowing out of the root and into the ring…well…at least that's how I picture it…supposedly we all have different mental images, so find the one which works best for you…”

  “Ooooh” the girl exclaimed in sudden realisation. I can see what you mean, like a reverse river flowing into the tributaries and not out of them…” her ring started to glow and a model of her appeared above it. “Thank you!” she cried out and then rushed to the mage. Several others moved to join her.

  We must have had different upbringings, with different fiction, because that was the first idea I had gone with when Wendy had told me to picture my power spreading to my limb…

  In the mean time: