A stream of students walked past Alex on their way to their morning class. Most ignored him; some gave him sympathetic looks. By now, Aro had left him out in the hallway for some time. The lion-boy hadn't lied when he said he would just show Alex where the library was and then ditch him for Cynthia.

  He wasn't sure why he was dreading going inside so much. It was just a library after all. What was the worst that could happen? The sign hanging beside the door wasn't helping though. The library's rules were written on it in big, fat letters to make sure everyone knew them before entering.

  Underneath, someone had hung their own note with a warning scribbled onto it.

  From the way Aro had talked about the head librarian and the note scribbled underneath the rule sign, Alex didn't know what to expect of her. Aro also mentioned her relation to Fillonia, who was the first person in this world that had been nice to him. So how bad could she really be? He inhaled deeply, rolled his shoulders and muttered to himself, "It's just a library. Just go inside."

  Alex slowly pushed the door to the library open. The door itself wasn't unusual. It looked like almost every other door he had seen in the main building of the campus. In fact, the only reason Alex knew this place was the library was because of the sign next to the door, the small engraved symbol of an open book at the top of the door, and the fact Aro had told him so. It was mostly that last part. If the upperclassman hadn't pointed it out, Alex would probably have walked straight past it.

  As soon as he entered the library, it was as if an unnatural silence fell on him. Libraries were supposed to be quiet, but this just felt off. Aside from the unnerving silence, nothing else really stood out about the library however. The place was filled with tall shelves filled with leather-bound books. A few of the shelves had special holes for scrolls underneath the regular bookshelves. While that might have been unusual for a modern library back on Earth, it only seemed natural to Alex given the rest he had seen of this world. It was as if he had fallen into some standard fantasy academia novel.

  The library also had a few long tables set aside for students who wanted to read inside the library. Although, most of the tables were vacant. From what he had heard from Aro and the first-years he had scared away, the library wasn't a popular spot at the academy. A shame really, Alex had always enjoyed going to his local library to check out a book or two, or even just to read there in the calming peace and quiet compared to the rest of the city. The quiet of this library wasn't calming though, and Alex couldn't quite put his finger on why that was.

  "Can I help you?" a voice suddenly said from beside him.

  Alex almost jumped into the air from the sudden sound. He hadn't heard the owner of the voice approach him at all. He tried to calm his nerves quickly as he looked at the person beside him. Even at first glance, it was immediately clear this must be the head librarian, Miss Philaxter. The resemblance between her and Fillonia would have been immediately clear to anyone, even without knowing they were related. They had the same pointed ears, the same small round nose and green eyes. Their hair was the same shade of auburn, though she wore hers in a tight bun, while Fillonia wore hers loose. And while those features had looked motherly on Fillonia, on the head librarian they looked stern and unforgiving.

  "Are you Miss Philaxter?" Alex asked, holding out the piece of paper he had ripped from the Notice Board. While he was fairly certain that she was, it couldn't hurt to check.

  She grabbed the piece of paper out of Alex's hands and lowered a pair of small round glasses from the top of her head to her eyes to look at it. "Hmm, I am, and I don't recognize you, so you must be a new student."

  "I am, Miss. The name's Alex. I arrived on the campus only yesterday." He said, trying to be as polite as possible. For a moment he wanted to extend his hand towards her to shake, like he would whenever one of the big chiefs at the office would visit, but then he remembered he was now a sixteen-year-old boy. Would a sixteen-year-old offer his hand to shake? It had been so long since he had been sixteen that he barely remembered if he ever did back then.

  Miss Philaxter placed the small glasses back on her head and carefully folded the piece of paper before putting it in a pocket of her long, black dress. "And you're already here to help me, good. But first tell me, boy, have you always had those eyes?"

  This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it

  His eyes. The assassin had mentioned them as well. Were they that strange? Why had nobody else said anything about them if they were? Alright, don't freak out. He can't tell anyone the truth of where he came from, at least not yet. What should he tell her? She's smart; she might know something that might help him figure out where he came from, how he got to this place. So, no full lie, sprinkle some truth in it again, like he did when he first met Fillonia.

  "Uhm... at least since yesterday. My memory is a bit fuzzy from my life before that," he said, hoping he wasn't giving away too much.

  "Hmm..., alright," Miss Philaxter started, her eyes narrowing for a moment. There was something telling about her expression, and Alex just knew that she now had an inkling of who or what he was. Though it seems she wasn't about to divulge that information to him. "Follow me, Alex. I'll show you where you can start."

  The head librarian turned around and headed deeper inside the library. Being on her good side was his best bet to learn the truth. He turned to close the door behind him, but was surprised when it was already closed. Had someone else closed it? He hadn't heard anyone close it, and he was almost certain he hadn't closed it himself. It didn't matter. Shaking his head, he followed the librarian deeper into the library.

  After a few steps, he noticed something strange. His footsteps, they barely made any noise. He looked towards Miss Philaxter. She was clearly still moving, but he couldn't hear her steps at all either. With it being this quiet in the library, he should have been able to hear them. His gaze shifted to the few students sitting at one of the long tables. He could see their lips moving, but once again heard nothing. Then it hit him, the unnerving silence when he first entered the library, the reason it didn't feel calmingly quiet in here, something or someone was muffling all sound in the place.

  He wasn't sure exactly how it worked. Some things were clearly audible, while others were not. He could have a conversation with Miss Philaxter without a problem. It wasn't just talking to her that worked, though. The other students, they clearly could talk to each other as well, but Alex couldn't hear them. His best guess was that it might be proximity based, but then why couldn't he hear the librarian's footsteps, or even his own? He wanted to figure it out, but he had been standing still for too long and by now Miss Philaxter had stopped and was looking straight at him, an annoyed look on her face already. Not a great start.

  To make up for making her wait, he was about to run towards her at a light jog. Then he remembered the sign next to the front door. No running, it was the first rule on the sign, so most likely also the most important one. Why was he having so much trouble? This was supposed to be an easy job. A way for him to earn some credits while learning more about this world. He chastised himself inside his head as he walked over to Miss Philaxter, at least trying to step up his pace from his usual walking speed. That seemed to satisfy the stern woman, who turned around and started walking again herself.

  As they walked, Alex tried to experiment to figure out the rules of this impossible silence. He started by tapping his fingers together. Nothing, no thuds, no clicks of fingernails clashing against each other, nothing. At first glance, any sound made by movement didn't seem to produce any noise.

  Next up was speech. People could clearly still talk to each other, but how far did that go? He tried saying something small to himself, not meant for anyone but his own ears. While he could feel his lips moving, his vocal cords trembling to produce sound, no noise came out. Speaking to himself didn't seem to do anything.

  His next theory was that if you wanted to be heard, you needed to direct your speech towards someone. But who could he test it with? He wasn't going to try it with Miss Philaxter, that was for certain. Instead, he looked towards the students sitting at the long table. A genuine smile crept onto his face when he noticed a familiar face.

  "Hey," he said softly towards his intended target, remembering the no talking, only whispering rule on the sign.

  Henry looked up confused from his book as he suddenly heard someone talking to him. He was glancing around to see if anyone had sat next to him, but all the surrounding seats were empty. He smiled when he saw Alex further into the library following Miss Philaxter. "Hey to you too, runt. What are you doing?"

  "Just testing something."

  "Ah, the Field of Silence," Henry said, immediately knowing what Alex was talking about. "Clever construction, right? I was surprised too when they first added it to the library. Now, I kind of like it."

  Alex knew that speaking to Henry was a smart choice. The black-haired Fairy had given him more information without even knowing it. The Field of Silence, apparently it was a something and not a someone that muffled all the sound. And it was a recent addition to the library. Given that it wasn't here when Henry first arrived at the campus and the fact that he was a third-year, meant the Field of Silence couldn't be over two years old.

  "It's... strange to say the least," Alex continued the conversation.

  "It takes some getting used to, that's for certain. But you figured it out pretty quickly. Most students still don't know how it works." The compliment felt good to Alex. While this world might be strange, his mind still worked. There was something logical about this world. If he didn't understand something, he could figure out how it worked.

  "Does Aro know?" Alex asked, curious if he knew more than his boisterous guide to the campus.

  "Aro, no, definitely not. Though he doesn't visit the library that often either. None of the Combat students really do. Most of them are more focused on how they can hit something harder, and the library definitely isn't the place to figure that out." Henry laughed, at least Alex thought he did. He could see the motion in his face, but the laugh wasn't audible. A shame. "So what are you doing here anyway, runt?"

  "I picked up the library shelf restocking job from the Notice Board," Alex answered, glancing over to Miss Philaxter to make sure he was still following her.

  "Not a bad choice for a first job. Also explains why you were following the librarian. It also means I'm going to let you go and head back to my studying. It's not a good idea to keep Miss Philaxter waiting," Henry said before opening the book in front of him again.

  While the older boy was probably right and he should focus on his first job now, Alex would have loved to talk to him more. Compared to Aro, Henry was an actual pleasure to talk to. He looked back over at Miss Philaxter to see her standing still again, waiting for him.