Poetry was usually harder to read compared to a fictional text or play, given that it relied on complex wordplay and aphorisms of language that usually did not translate well. And, given the intricacies of the writing of someone like Shakespeare, even a short work was doubly difficult to decipher.

  With a short work like this failing to read it once or twice wasn’t too much of a setback, though if one failed to read something like a Rank Three grimoire it could mean days of progress would be lost.

  It took Zeke half an hour to do so, but the grimoire finally turned to dust and he relaxed a bit, his gaze going to a certain drawer in his study.

  There was a reason why most Rank Four Liberomancers only had one or two Rank Four grimoires at most. Back in the days of the Ruler of the Astral Winds - many Rank Four Liberomancers at the time had six or seven Rank Four grimoires, and some had even filled out half of their Rank Four slots.

  The Ruler of the Astral Winds was a man who believed in hoarding power - and that meant hoarding grimoires. Many powerful Rank Four Liberomancer had been slain by his hand, which meant that there were many Rank Four grimoires that were now lost to time.

  Not only that, but he had died unexpectedly, meaning that his own stash of grimoires had never been found or passed on to anyone. The loss of so much was much like the destruction of the Library of Alexandria back on Earth - there was so much that had been tragically lost to the sands of time..

  That was why the ‘power level’ of Liberomancy in Libraria had declined greatly since his death.

  People speculated about where his secret stash of grimoires might be, if there was such a thing.

  There was another reason why the Ruler of the Astral Winds was such a significant departure from the rest of the world when it came to his accomplishments - humans had a lifespan of about a century, and most races were very similar. Not a single intelligent race within Libraria lived for much longer than that.

  This was another reason why Rank Four grimoires were hard to find - because those that had the talent to make new Rank Four grimoires usually passed away before they got a chance to make a second one.

  However, the Ruler of the Astral Winds had lived for at least two hundred and fifty years - possibly even longer. The earliest records documented the time when he had risen to power in the region that was now known as Hansini, and the period of time from then to his death spanned two hundred and forty-seven years. He was probably at least twenty or thirty when he began rising to power, so one could somewhat estimate what his total lifespan had likely been from that information.

  Too many independent sources documented this large length of time for it to be false or an exaggeration.

  This meant that there was either a Rank Four or Rank Five grimoire that could extend one’s lifespan.

  The only other person said to have an unnaturally long life was the Goddess Serragnin herself, who was said to have roamed the mortal realm for around a thousand years. But that was a religious story and many people, Zeke included, felt that little stock could be put into it compared to a documented historical fact like the life of the Ruler of the Astral Winds.

  Had the Ruler of the Astral Winds been able to extend his lifespan indefinitely, or just by many multiples of a normal human lifespan? No one knew as whatever method he had used seemingly died along with him.

  Zeke’s eyes went to that drawer in his study again for a simple reason. When he had been studying abroad in Hitutsa, he had chanced upon something that could’ve possibly lead to a location that might have a treasure left behind by the Ruler of the Astral Winds…

  He shook his head. He had dreamed at times of leading an expedition to that place, finding that treasure, and returning triumphant to Chipker, with a full set of Rank Four grimoires and even some Rank Five ones in tow.

  He now realized how childish those dreams had been given his station and how he would have to remain in Arconia as the likely future governor. He couldn’t go around traipsing through the continent looking for buried treasure!

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  He then went to go join his brother for an evening walk.

  I was greatly disappointed by the interaction with that guy earlier during the weekend, and remained in a sour mood for the rest of the week because of that. I did start working on another Rank Two grimoire, but it would take time to finish.

  I still had work eight out of ten days, the only real change was that I now mostly made Rank Two grimoires instead of the usual Rank One grimoires like I did before. There was still a demand for grimoires like Sonnet 95 but it was much lower now, so overall, in terms of time and cost effectiveness it made more sense to write a Rank Two grimoire. The price of Sonnet 95 had been pushed up due to the Book Fair, but now that it had departed Arconia, it was no longer the hot item it once was.

  That was why people rushed to get to as high a Rank as quickly as possible - because it ultimately made moving forward much easier with the higher amounts you could earn.

  It was just another day at work - that was until some of the city guard arrived.

  I wondered if they were here for me again.

  They had talked to me and told me that it was apparently some rule that all Liberomancers had to declare themselves when they entered the city, and I should’ve done that when I first arrived - though I had smoothed things over when I told them that I wasn’t a Liberomancer at the time. I don’t think they would’ve believed me if it was just me telling them that but I also had Granny Qi’s word to back me up on the matter.

  In actuality, while that was true, the fact of the matter was that I had never passed through the gates in the first place when I ‘arrived’ in Arconia.

  However, these guards were all lizardmen, while those prior had been humans. So perhaps they weren’t looking for me?

  “Ah, is there an issue?” Mark asked them.

  “Yes,” the one leading them said. “If I could have your attention for a moment, please.”

  All activity in the shop paused for a moment as all eyes were on him.

  “There has been some distressing news,” he said. “Yesterday, a delivery was made of a template of a Rank Three grimoire for Sir Drake. However, after it was brought into the city limits, midway on their journey, the guards were attacked by an assailant and the template was stolen.”

  There were gasps at that.

  A template was just the words that made up a grimoire but non-magical. As in, I could write Polonius Advises Laertes in normal ink, without imbuing it with mana whatsoever. The benefit of this was that some longer grimoires could be made into templates by non-Liberomancers, or Liberomancers who had not achieved sufficient rank for to make them.

  Sometimes Liberomancers made templates themselves in case they wished to forget a certain grimoire and relearn it later on - just so that they would have an easy record of it.

  Once you overwrote a grimoire from one of your slots, you no longer had a photographic memory of it.

  Templates could also be mass produced with a printing press, but most were not. The reason was that most templates were of high ranking grimoires, and as such, could not be distributed freely.

  But, because templates could be produced relatively cheaply, they were sometimes sold as a substitute for grimoires. The issue was then that the buyer would not only have to know the language it was written in but also copy it by hand themselves.

  Still, a template being stolen was almost equivalent to the corresponding grimoire being stolen. If the grimoire in question contained a spell or skill that was specially developed by a nation, the text being spread around would weaken that nation’s strength by revealing one of its trump cards and also by making it less valuable.

  There was no notion of intellectual property like copyright law in this world - so if you didn’t want something to be circulated without your permission, the only real way to do so was to restrict it physically.

  Back on Earth, I had heard of a market where bookstore owners kept their books in the open at night without fear that they would be taken. The saying went, “The reader does not steal, and the thief does not read.”

  Such could not be said to be true in this world!

  “We do not know the identity of the assailant,” he said. “Because all of the guards were found slain and the template missing. However, it is likely the thief will attempt to sell the template or move it somehow, so we wanted to let you all know to watch out for such. Additionally, if you see anything suspicious please let us know.”

  That would’ve been it, but then something hit me.

  “Hello - please wait!” I called after the guards just as they were about to leave.

  I could’ve been wrong about this - but my gut told me there was something off, and so I felt it didn’t hurt to tell the guards about my suspicions.

  “Yes?”

  “I… did see something suspicious, or rather, someone,” I said. I told them about the foreigner I had met over the weekend.

  The way that he had been talking about stars and diamonds and the like made it sound like it was part of a saying, and I was supposed to say the other part.

  In other words, it was part of a code of some sort.

  What kind of people spoke in codes? Spies and thieves. It seemed like he was either delivering or selling something.

  I gave them a detailed description and they even sent a sketch artist later for me to better describe the man’s features.

  When I was done with this, and as I sat back down to work, I couldn’t help but have second thoughts.