Chapter 13 - More Shelves

Seraphina's eyes fluttered open in the familiar infinite darkness, and unlike her previous visits, she wasn't overcome with isolation or confusion but instead happy.

This place was quickly becoming somewhere she welcomed as it provided her with something she greatly craved.

Taking a deep breath, she began to walk through the darkness towards the glowing spot in the distance. As she moved, the space around her began to shift and change, responding to her thoughts and carrying her quickly.

Before long, she found herself standing before the bookshelf that had previously appeared, and this time, it wasn't the only one there. Three new bookshelves had appeared beside it, bringing the total number of bookshelves within the space up to four.

Each of them was now filled with books that were neatly sorted based on their type and genre— keeping the place organized according to her will.

Approaching one of the new bookshelves, Seraphina ran her fingers over the spines of the books. She recognized a lot of them as books she had merely touched earlier, her eyes gleaming with excitement as she realized what that meant.

Before she got too excited, however, she was first sure to check the book, muttering to herself as she reached out for one she hadn't read previously.

"Let's see here."

The book covered a little of the geographic layout of the land north of the Empire, so she didn't pay much attention to it before. However, as she opened it, the words that should have been there were all there, filling the pages with a soft glow.

The information in the book she hadn't even read, merely touched, was all within the book for her to read freely. It was something she had hoped for but never actually expected to work— it was simply broken.

"This will be very useful.

She thought as she placed the book back on the shelf for the time being. Instead of reading through them, she checked what other books were on the shelf.

Most of the books were sorted together based on what they covered, Geography, History, Theories, and Knights. Even the books on Magic and Cultivation were on the shelves in different locations.

One of the books on the shelves caught her attention. It was 'The Art of Magic,' which she had read during the day.

Curious, she decided to open the book and skim through it to see if all the information was the same— and it was as she had expected. It was a direct copy of all the information she had read before, and this time, when she had finished reading through it, the knowledge was stored in her mind.

Satisfied with the way her ability worked, she had learned of a new way to make the most of her capabilities. Tomorrow, she would go through the entire library and simply touch every single book in there; that way, she could fill this space with all the books in the library.

Over time, she would read them inside of here rather than outside in order to store them in her mind perfectly.

For now, she wanted to read through all the books she had stored in her but not actually opened— plus, she wanted to reread the things she did to properly store them in her mind.

So, without much else to do, she made a couch appear and sat down to read.

Seraphina spent what felt like hours in the mental space, pulling book after book from the shelves and absorbing their content.

Each time she did, she would feel her understanding of the world and the information from the books imprinted in her mind— with a thought that she could bring up any subject she wanted.

Eventually, she finished reading every single book on the shelves that she hadn't read before, and it was still wasn't time for her to wake up. It was odd— she read for what felt like hours, yet she didn't wake up.

The question of how time flowed in this space popped into her mind, but she had no real way to measure it— she could count it manually, but that would be torturous.

"What now?"

She had free time in the space and wasn't sure what to do; humming to herself, she tried to think about what she could do in this space. Experimenting was a fine idea, but she didn't have enough mental energy to create too much in this space as far as she knew.

Rereading the books was pointless as she already remembered them— and there wasn't like she could put into practice what the books said. This was a mental space, so working out was out of the picture, and she had no practice method for magic or cultivation, so that wasn't possible.

Stumped, she could only conclude that staying here any further would be pointless for now— she wanted to try and wake herself up.

Closing her eyes, she tried to empty her mind and force her body to wake up— at first, it was hard to focus with the constant thoughts flowing in her mind, but eventually, she was able to make everything come to a blank.

With a thought, it felt as if her body was suddenly jolted, and the next second, her eye shot open.

However, this time, she wasn't within the empty darkness but instead inside her room— the place still dark as the sun hadn't fully risen yet.

Her body was fine; she didn't feel tired or drained even though she had just woken up, and after a few seconds of calming down, her mind also felt perfectly normal.

'So I can force myself awake, can I force myself to enter it?'

She was curious if she could make herself enter the space at will. If she could do that, then it would grant her more use for the ability. She wouldn't need to wait till she fell asleep before entering it.

Closing her eyes once more, she tried the same thing; this time, however, instead of trying to wake herself up, she tried to calm her body down and fall asleep.

Slowly, her mind drifted, and while it took a while, she found her thoughts slowing down and soon enough fading. Her body grew limp, and the next second, she woke up in the darkness again.

"So I can enter and exit at will, but it takes longer to enter than it does to exit."

She took note of the time difference for the future and decided to just wake herself up and get started on her day early.