The moment Blythe stepped into the spacious library, she realized it was the stuff of dreams.

  Towering glossy wood bookshelves offering the most sumptuous spread of books made up aisles and aisles of different sections, with ladders attached to metal poles across the bookshelves to allow for sliding. Strangely, while she was expecting to smell something like parchment or wood, the aroma of hot chocolate and marshmallows surrounded her instead. Several wooden tables, replete with blue and white upholstered chairs, in the center of the room were already occupied by students poring over the books in front of them.

  She’d only just stepped foot into the place, but she already knew she wanted to stay here forever.

  As she headed for the stairs to the next floor, she finally discovered the source of the hot chocolate smell. A large open doorway in the wall led to a café space where at least seven students were enjoying a beverage or some sort of dessert. Saliva rose in her mouth from the thought of something sweet. She swallowed.

  Did they serve pastries? Promising herself to check the café out once she was done exploring the rest of the library, she continued ascending the stairs.

  The ceiling for this floor was as tall as the previous one. Here, there were fewer bookshelves, but she could see why—it was designed as a sort of cozy reading space, with armchairs and a few coffee tables in the middle of the room for students to place things on. Unlike the first floor with its polished wood flooring and fluorescent lighting, the carpeted flooring and warm lighting here really added to the comfy atmosphere.

  Blythe walked around, browsing the titles on the bookshelves with her eyes, noting that they all seemed to be fiction, albeit of different genres. There were also poles along the sides of the room on which news publications and tabloids hung. She could see herself spending time on this floor for sure.

  A quick glance at the floor guide on the wall next to the stairs informed her of the five floors the library had. Apparently, the first floor was named the Reference Area, and this floor was the Reading Space. On the next floor was the Quiet Zone, presumably to be conducive to studying. The fourth floor was titled Advanced Reference Section, and the fifth was designated as the Records Corner.

  She found herself eager to check everything out.

  The Quiet Zone truly lived up to its name. There were more students on this floor than there were in the Reading Space. All of them had their heads bent over in the cubicles they sat at, either reading a book or scribbling down something in a notebook. There weren’t any bookshelves on this floor; the space was dedicated entirely to cream-colored cubicles and their respective study chairs for students to do their work in peace.

  Courtesy of the plush, deep-blue carpet spanning the entire floor, Blythe’s footsteps were effortlessly quiet as she made her way around. The spacious area narrowed into a hallway of numbered rooms on both sides. The metal plaque affixed to the wall next to the rooms indicated that these were Meeting Rooms. She made a mental note of it and moved on.

  The Advanced Reference Section was empty save for a single student seated at one of the large wooden tables. Before him sat a tall stack of thick books, and he was currently perusing one.

  It was just as silent as the Quiet Zone, and just as crowded with bookshelves as the first floor.

  Blythe walked through the bookshelf aisles, coming across a lot of complicated-sounding titles that seemed very dry and academic in nature.

  The bookshelf aisles in the Records Corner on the fifth floor were far more interesting. They contained strange circle slabs similar to the hall pass she’d received from Professor Easley yesterday, except that these were indigo in color. Each one had a sticker label with text scrawled on it. The bookshelf aisles were also labeled according to their categories, such as ‘history’, ‘botany’, and ‘fiction’, among many others.

  There were about ten armchairs here, an abysmal quantity compared to the other floors. Nobody was occupying them, however. The few students present were busy browsing through the slabs on the bookshelves.

  Curious, Blythe picked up a slab at random. The label ‘Growth Guide for Euphrocs’ stared up at her. Above the sticker label, two buttons sat flush with the slab. She touched the left button with an exploratory thumb, but it surprisingly sank down under what she’d thought was barely any pressure—light shot out from the front side of the slab, casting a video against the shelf of slabs she was facing. A man standing in a large field beamed at her.

  “Good day, my fellow botany enthusiasts!” a cheerful voice boomed out, shattering the serenity of the area. “Today, we’re going to—”

  “Shh!”

  Embarrassed by the angry shushing from someone in the room, Blythe fumbled, with panicking fingers, for something on the slab to turn it off.

  “—look at the environmental conditions in which—”

  This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

  As she hit the button on the right, effectively shutting off the weird video projection and its accompanying sounds, stomping footsteps rapidly drew near. Blythe tensed, sensing a reprimand right around the corner. She was in the middle of putting the slab back onto the shelf when a girl appeared at the entrance of the aisle.

  “Don’t you know that you’re not supposed to play the recordings in here?! This is—”

  The frustration on the girl’s face transformed into shock, and her voice faltered when she locked eyes with Blythe.

  “I’m so sorry!” Blythe squeaked out, her heart sinking. Due to her carelessness, she’d disrupted the peace in the library.

  “Blythe?” the girl said, squinting like she wasn’t certain of Blythe’s identity.

  Granted, Blythe was standing in the middle of the aisle so she was a good few feet away from this girl, but she thought the lighting in the library was more than decent enough to be able to make out people’s faces. She certainly could see this girl’s golden hair and blue eyes and haughty features.

  Wondering if she was supposed to know this person, Blythe pulled up her profile.

  The name didn’t ring a bell. Judging by her age, she was probably in her fifth year. Still, the way the righteous fury had gone out of Erica the second she recognized Blythe was interesting. It was also possible that her reaction didn’t mean much beyond the fact that she knew Blythe was a duke’s daughter and the crown prince’s fiancée.

  “Erica?” she ventured, on the off chance that Blythe knew this person. After all, Erica had called her by name.

  Erica started before regaining her composure after half a beat. “Pardon my unruly outburst. I hadn’t realized it was you. I thought perhaps a first year was … well, do excuse me.”

  “No, it’s alright. My … my hand slipped. I apologize as well for the disruption.”

  An awkward smile appeared on Erica’s face. “I have no doubt it was an accident. Well, I had better return to my research. Have a good day.”

  Blythe echoed it back to her, and Erica left. Clearly, they knew each other somehow since Erica hadn’t seemed taken aback Blythe knew her name. She had no idea how they knew each other, though. With nothing to go on, she brushed the encounter aside and continued exploring the floor. Further down, there were ‘Watching Rooms’ in a hallway reminiscent of the ‘Meeting Rooms’ on the third floor. She figured it was probably to give students the opportunity to ‘play the recordings’—as Erica had put it—while in the library.

  She went back down to the first floor, reasoning that the information she sought was unlikely to be in the advanced section. After all, she just needed basic information about the world. She took brisk strides past various bookshelves, keeping an eye out for categories like ‘history’ or any interesting keywords. ‘Beast Care’ jumped out at her when she strode past the third row of bookshelves.

  They have a whole bookshelf for that?

  She was wrong. They had whole bookshelves for it. She quickly scanned the shelves for anything that might be helpful. A few titles caught her eye, so she pulled them out. As she left the bookshelves with a few books cradled in her hands, she couldn’t help smiling to herself.

  She might be in trouble as the villainess, but it was still fun reading to learn more about the game world’s lore. Reading was such a safe way to extract the information she needed. She didn’t have to worry about people looking at her funny or thinking she’d lost her mind when she showed herself ignorant of the world’s everyday workings.

  Placing her chosen books down on one of the many unoccupied wooden tables, Blythe pulled out a chair and sat down. This chair was nothing like her public high school’s library chairs back in her original world. Unlike those hard plastic chairs, this was practically a lounge chair. She could just sink into this and sit here for hours.

  The first book she pulled toward herself was Beginner’s Guide to Beast Taming. It seemed like a good place to start. The foreword was the most fascinating part. It read like an open letter to the reader, the tone friendly and casual.

  Through inference, Blythe learned that some people had an innate talent to communicate with certain animals. This enabled them to form a strong bond with animals from the specific species they were able to understand, although they could only have this deep bond with one animal at a time. Once they formed this bond, the animal would recognize their person as their trainer, and the person would be able to take the next steps to be certified as a beast tamer. The rest of the book focused on teaching the reader how to instill discipline in their bonded beast and how to make training more effective.

  She browsed through the next book, History of Beast Taming: A Quick Overview. Apparently, it was unknown why some people had this ability to understand a specific species but others didn’t. Although it appeared hereditary, it sometimes appeared in individuals coming from families without a history of beast affinity. Furthermore, the ability was known to skip generations in bloodlines that were known to have it, so people generally didn’t bother with it unless they stumbled upon their own ability while going about their everyday routine.

  Blythe was devouring every word with rapt attention, utterly enthralled, when a yell broke into her thoughts and drew her out of the book. Disoriented, she raised her head and sluggishly looked around.

  Her brain hadn’t even registered what the shouting had been.

  Then she noticed several students’ heads were turned in a particular direction, giving her a hint. A girl stood at one of the tables with her head down. Blythe caught sight of Noel sitting at the table, frowning up at the girl.

  “Huh?” Noel said very ungraciously, resting his forearm across the pages of the open book in front of him. “Keep it down. You’re disturbing the others in here. Actually, you’re disturbing me too.”

  “I-I’m sorry …” she spoke in a hushed voice this time, but, owing to the quietness in the library, every word was easily overheard if Blythe just concentrated. “But I can’t keep pretending anymore! I have to tell you how I feel. I … I like you, Noel!”

  Blythe’s jaw fell.

  It was all coming back to her now. This was the prelude to the first in-game encounter Daisy had with Noel.