Studying

Ivan sat in his living room thinking about the story the young child had just told him. Right now, he was confused about something. After Alan left, he spent the next two hours asking the victims what had happened to them. They all recalled Alan freeing and destroying the cages they were trapped in. This led Ivan to believe that the child was a prodigy from a wealthy family.

Right now, his main concern was the boy's identity. Ivan felt a familiar feeling from the boy. But he just couldn't wrap his head around what it was that he was feeling. Before the boy left, he had asked for his name, but the name the boy gave didn't ring any bell.

What Ivan didn't know was that the boy had given him a fake surname. Had he known of his real surname, Ivan might have lost composure.

'Ah, whatever. It's probably not that important,' he thought as proceeded to leave his house. Right now, he had to go inspect the hideout of the village traitors, so he decided to put a stop to his thoughts.

****

Alan was looking at a small dinky house that looked more like a box than a house. It was shaped like a cube and looked like it was standing on its last legs. He put the key inside the door and proceeded to unlock it.

When he walked inside, he was surprised to see the interior looked better than the house's outer appearance. The house was just a single room with a bed in the back and a kitchen on the side. It was nothing compared to Alan's old room in his family mansion, but at least it was better than a tent.

'It will do," he thought.

Alan was surprised by how clean the room was. It looked as if someone cleaned it regularly. 'Maybe his granddaughter just left, not too long ago.'

Alan went to lie on the mattress and eventually fell asleep.

Once he was asleep, Alan's consciousness arrived in the library of genesis. This was the second time he had entered this place, but unlike the last time, Alan didn't come empty-handed. He had a bunch of tokens to spend and was excited about all the possibilities.

"If you need any help or recommendations, feel free to ask," Izmos said.

"Will do," Alan replied.

Right now, Alan had absolutely no idea what he wanted. The plan for him, right now, was to explore the library to see all the sections it had to get a better understanding of it. He had a month inside the library before he had to wake up, so he decided it would be best to use all of it since, right now, he was clueless about its contents.

While living with his family, Alan's father told him he was not worthy of holding their family's sword art. Alan didn't question his father's words at the time because he agreed. However, this didn't stop Alan from wanting to get stronger. Even though he didn't have any mana, he still spent his time researching magic and was quite familiar with the concepts behind the use of mana.

Alan had dreamed of developing magic artifacts capable of going against the world's strongest individuals. However, this dream was destroyed once his family threw him out. Luckily for him, he got a chance to become strong once he met Izmos.

'I promise I won't let this opportunity go to waste,' he thought as he explored the library.

Alan didn't need to develop artifacts anymore. After all, now he had the opportunity to become anything he wanted. Even though he didn't know what the future had in store for him, he felt confident for some reason. This was the first time he had felt this way in his entire life. Even so, he promised himself not to become cocky because he had seen firsthand what those kind of individuals were like.

He continued to venture into the library and stopped once he found what he was looking for.

[Magic Section: Beginner Level]

The area Alan went to contained all the magic that could be used at G-Rank and F-Rank.

Since most children could sense mana by the age of 6, their parents would train them in hopes of making it big. After all, in this world, the wealthiest individuals were mainly top-ranked heroes that protected humanity from the dungeons and monsters.

Alan was two years behind the other prodigies of the world and decided that the first thing he should do to catch up was learn how to use mana. He went to the mana aisle and picked up the first book on the shelf.

[Beginner Level Mana Control: Part 1]

[This book teaches how one can get mana to respond to their body. This book is the first of two explaining beginner-level mana control.]

[Understanding: 25.7%]

[Purchase: 1000 exchange tokens]

Alan's eyes opened wide when he looked at the price of the book.

"Why is this book priced so high. According to the system, 1,000 tokens should be classified as an E-Rank item," he asked Izmos.

"That is correct. However, the differences in the those values are different for each jump in rank. For example, from G to F you could get 5 times more times more tokens. On the other hand, from F to E you would only be able to get 2 times more tokens," Izmos replied. "This is based on useful each rank of item is towards me. I'm sure you are already aware of this, but you could exploit this to get more points for yourself. For example, you could trade 2 B-Grade items and get the same amount of points as 1 A-Grade item. Therefore, the library has adjusted it's prices to stop you from cheating it."

Alan looked at Izmos before kissing his teeth. He had thought of this idea before and was disappointed that he couldn't use it to his advantage. 'I guess he isn't the god of knowledge for nothing,' he thought.

Alan then proceeded to buy both beginner-level mana books for 2,000 tokens and took them to a study room located inside the library. Alan spent a week's worth of time memorizing everything inside the two books. It took him longer than he expected since the books he was reading were far more advanced than those on Earth.

Usually, he could memorize an entire book in one day, but the two beginner-level books took him a very long time. He felt exhausted thinking about how long it would take him to learn a more challenging book.

Alan was now ready to absorb this knowledge into his head. He had experienced absorbing memories before but didn't know how absorbing a book would feel.

"Am I going to suffer pain if I absorb too much knowledge," he asked Izmos.

"No. You only feel pain when absorbing memories because your brain has no prior knowledge of them," Izmos said. "There is a reason why there is a 95% understanding requirement given to you by the system. It's so you don't fry your brain after absorbing everything into your head."

Alan felt relieved once he heard Izmos' words. This was something that was lingering in the back of his mind for a while. Now that he had cleared his doubts, he proceeded and asked his system to absorb the books into his brain.

< You have learned Beginner Level Mana Control: Part 1 >

< You have learned Beginner Level Mana Control: Part 2 >

< Your Magic Power has improved: [G-] ⟶ [G] >

Alan smiled as he read the notifications. The first part taught him how to manifest mana, while the second taught him how to manipulate it.

"Do you want to test out your power," Izmos asked. "There is a simulation room inside the library that allows you to do so."

Alan nodded his head and went to the simulation room. He assumed that he would be able to use his powers here since he was dreaming, and Izmos had confirmed his assumption.

Alan stood in the simulation room and started concentrating on the mana in the air. He manipulated the mana to move in various directions and conjured the mana to be a multitude of different shapes.

The technique he displayed was far more impressive than others of the same level. This was because Izmos had written the book he read, which contained information that most humans did not know. All he had to do was memorize a book compared to others that practiced day and night.

Since he was only at the beginner level, his control wasn't anything special, but Alan didn't care about that. What took others months to learn, he had learnt in his sleep. Alan smiled as he walked out of the simulation room.

Now, since he had learnt how to use mana, it was time for him to look at all the powerful abilities the library had to offer.