037 – FOUR YEARS LATER

Benedict was crying out in his heart as heard the sound in the library, his withered white hair fell to his chest his white beard stretched to his stomach, in all his life he had never cried as much as he did since Sir Lirian entered the library.

He could hear a book being ripped to shreds and then being slammed around, he feared the entire bookcase would fall over, and his heart pained him like never before as the sound of ripped paper filled the room.

He could rebuke most people but not the child of the empress, he rushed to look at the catastrophe occurring, and sure enough, it was one of the old books, with an aged spine and almost four times the size of the young master. A historical masterpiece that had survived for millennia he was proud to have a book as old as that one in his archives, and now it was ruined, even worse it wasn't the first ageless masterpiece ruined by the hands of the young master.

He had tried buying new books and due to the funds, he received from the empress he had acquired numerous new collections, he continuously tried to promote them to the young master but unlike other children he held no adoration of new and shiny things instead, he would look for the oldest and most valuable of books.

"Y-young master what travesty did the book commit this time?", he asked failing to hide several sobs of pure grief.

Lirian released the torn-up pages and looked at old Benedict, "I hope that those are tears of joy, for me sparing you from reading that travesty, it doesn't even deserve to be called a book, truth be told calling it one would be an insult to all other books in existence."

"Y-y-yes, t-these... are tears of pure joy," he sobbed even harder, he hated his child so much and all he could do was let out heartbreaking sobs in his presence.

"Good, good, I'm glad you feel that way, in all honesty, it would be too good of a fate for it if I use it as toilet paper so I'm just going to burn in my hearth at least it will provide some usefulness before it disappears."

Benedict jumped with agility an old man should not possess at the torn-up papers, grabbing everything he could into his own two arms, he sniveled and cried as he cradled the torn pages and broken spine, he looked at Lirian like some monster and fled the scene.

"That's the eight-time you made that poor old man cry," said Anya she had been standing behind a row of books and watched the scene with pitying eyes.

"It's not my fault that old man collects such inaccurate biased rubbish, he should be sincerely thanking me for stopping other people from wasting their time with those books," said Lirian, he had grown taller over the past few years but he was still short for his age.

"It used a dating system filled with errors, if I followed it up to the current times, I'd be three years in the future, its star maps have way too many missing pieces and if I followed its star map to get out of the Garo star zone and into the Opal star zone, I'd end up in the Arami asteroid belts."

"If that old man spent more time traveling and less time collecting useless books he'd know, no wait if he followed his books to go on his travels, he'd be dead, smashed by some asteroids and his empty body would be floating in dead space."

Of course, due to his system, it was easy for Lirian to make all those calculations and find the errors and if he pointed out all the historical errors they'd be standing there for days.

"That's a weeks' worth of reading time I'll never be getting back, he should be glad that I only ruined that book."

"A week, that book was like four times your size!" exclaimed Anya in surprise.

"Oh, it was very derivative, it stole half its words from other books, all things I've browsed over," he lied to hide his abnormal reading speeding, in truth the book only took him an hour to read through.

A few minutes later he was called to his room.

"Again Lirian," Taliyah snapped from the start, ", this is the twentieth book in the past six months, and it's the eight-book that cannot be purchased again."

"Well good riddance, the less of those books in existence the more people will thank me for saving them from months' worth of wasted reading time," he said quickly. ", and I'm okay with receiving my punishment, at least I made a contribution to society by getting rid of that filth."

Taliyah took a very long breath to calm herself, she could feel her bones shaking, she wondered where she went wrong in raising him, she did her best but it didn't stop her from hearing at least a dozen complaints a day, 'Your majesty, Sir Lirian felt the pictures in the dining hall had no symmetry to them, so he ripped them down and threw them into the hearth.', '...Lirian found a chipped cup, so he tossed out the whole set, it was a three-thousand-year-old set, the last one made by Carol Hartigan before he died.', '... Sir Lirian has set fire to the hedges in the atrium, he claims it was an accident.', '...another one of the front garden fountains seems to have imploded on its self we suspect Sir Lirian.'

"242 antiques, 7 fountains, 58 books, 14 teachers, 302 accidental fires, 111 staff panic attacks, Lirian these are all things you've ruined, destroyed, or caused; do you have anything to say for yourself, anything at all?", Taliyah shrieked in horror, by the gods she loved her son, he was a brilliant genius the likes of which no one would ever compare to, a child that would make any parent proud to no ends, but his ability to make her have anxiety was incalculable, she feared saying that to his face because he would probably say, 'it is calculable we just need...' and he would proceed to make a list of instruments and tests that need to be run.

She felt that dealing with a rebellion was easier than dealing with him.

She knew the saying that geniuses were eccentric, but when she looked at Lirian she just wanted to cry, he was only 4 and a half years old, what would it be like in the future, would garden fires turn into a city decimating fire or worse.

"Honestly mom, I did you a favour with all those antiques, most of them looked like a dumpster would be too good for them and the ones in sets became valueless when a single piece got a chip or scratch on it, as for the fountains, I was just testing energy control, by blocking the water spouts, the pressure did the exploding, in truth the real crime there is the water pressure, why is it so high, if it's focused it could cut a person in half."

"The books were atrocities, as for the teachers it's not my fault they were so stupid, the fires were accidents, it's not easy to control energy without cultivation, and the staff get scared of things very easily.", only the last one was a lie, in truth sometimes, he'd get annoyed that he couldn't cultivate and his other selves were still boycotting him, which resulted in him releasing his horrifying aura by accident.

Taliyah did a very unempress like action by face palming, why did I ask him if he had anything to say, of course, he did, he always does without fail, she still remembered his first math teacher the best in the star cluster, he was a space navigations expert, he also specialized as a mental psychic, a month into the lessons he came crying to her with his resignation letter.

He had a complete mental breakdown, he quit his job and went to live in the wild, when his former boss found him, he cried like a baby saying that a two-year-old monster showed him how futile and insignificant his life's work had been.

Every etiquette teacher, rage quitted on her calling Lirian a barbarian, the language teachers had taught him diligently and praised his learning ability, the history teacher was also ecstatic about him and filled with praise. The only two positives.

"Lirian over my knees this instant," Taliyah said with shaky breathing and her beautiful lips pulled into a thin line.

A few minutes later she left Lirian lying down on his bed with his butt raised in the air.

She went back to her office with Anya beside her, in truth she wanted to scold Anya for letting him do all his mischief, "Why don't you stop him, Anya?" she asked.

"Would you prefer that I did that, your majesty?"

Taliyah turned to look at her like she asked the stupidest question in the world, "Your majesty, he only gets up to so much trouble so he can spend a little more time with you,", Anya added, ", haven't you noticed that he only started to get out of hand when you gave him his own room."

Taliyah sighed as she thought about it, when he turned two, she turned the nursery into a proper room for him, and since then they spent less time together in the mornings and evenings, and because she got him, teachers, she stopped teaching him as well.

"Are you sure?" she asked, her eyes filled with guilt.

"Do you know that he smiles every time you call him up to his room to get punished for his misbehavior, either he is a masochist or he feels happy to spend time with you."