Sylvia felt like she was a kid in a candy shop as she craned her neck to her left and right, taking in the complete view.

No matter where she saw, there were neatly stacked books.

To someone like Sylvia, this was heaven on earth.

She was sure that Prince Mikel's personal library was at a completely different level when compared to even the Kingdom's famed public library.

The young woman felt a sudden surge of energy and she started hurriedly exploring the enormous bookshelves standing tall like giants.

Just the ground floor alone had at least twenty such tall bookshelves which stretched all the way to the ends of the chamber.

There had to be a thousand books or more on just a couple of these shelves.

There were books about the history of the Kingdom, books about magic, and even books about gardening and the various plants and herbs. The list was truly endless.

There were also some books written in languages that Sylvia had no knowledge about.

There were more than plenty of choices for her to choose from, but Sylvia directly headed to the section labeled Magic.

As a commoner, since she was tested with zero affinity for mana, she never had any access to these special books.

So naturally, Sylvia was curious.

She wanted to read and know the contents of an actual book about magic.

She hurriedly glanced at the various book titles, at least whichever she could decipher.

Luckily, it didn't take long for her to pick out a good book, something named 'Magic for dummies'.

Sylvia smiled lightly at the name and quickly opened it up.

"Lesson 1 - The ebb and flow of mana"

The woman's brilliant blue eyes sparkled and she subconsciously began reading things aloud out of excitement.

"Hmmm… So just like air, one should be able to breathe in and breath out mana through the pores in our skin."

Sylvia shut the book and sat cross-legged attempting to sense the world energy around her, whilst breathing in and breathing out at a steady pace.

She did this for a few minutes.

And then a few minutes.

And again for a few more minutes.

But unfortunately, all she did was simply breathe puffs of air in and out.

"Damn it." Sylvia scrunched her face out of frustration.

But she wasn't too disheartened. After all, she was just trying this out for fun.

Every child of Kalindor was tested at an age of 10 for affinity to the world energy or mana.

So she already knew that she had absolutely no affinity at all and hence couldn't sense any amount of atmospheric mana.

But she had never been upset about that.

Some are gifted. Some are not.

Sylvia didn't dwell too much on such a finite thing.

She always believed that no matter what cards we are dealt with, the win or loss ultimately depends on the player.

Such maturity in a young girl was uncommon but she had lost both her parents at a young age and had to grow up in a house full of strangers who called themselves her parents' distant family.

Back then she had blindly trusted them, but in the end, they had mercilessly sold her out.

Tears spilled from Sylvia's eyes without her permission as she dazedly looked at the worn-out book on her hands.

Small salty drops started falling like flower petals on the pages and Sylvia hurriedly tried to wipe them off, lest the book gets damaged.

She still hadn't quite grasped the temperament of the master of this castle, Prince Mikel, but she didn't want to test it out by ruining one of his books.

So she quickly tried to salvage the wet page.

Unfortunately, her tears had irreversibly made the crispy clean page dirty and soggy.

Damn it. Silvia bit her nails nervously.

The damage was already done. Now there was no route of escape for her, except to hide it somewhere in the back.

And she needed to do it quickly!

She turned around in panic and tried to quickly shove the book far back in when suddenly a pair of legs appeared in her peripheral vision.

Sylvia's heart sank as she instantly knew who that was. She recognized those familiar black boots, perfectly clean and shining.

She hesitantly removed her hands from the book and gulped nervously.

"Gr… Greetings, your highness." She mumbled under her breath, quickly standing up to bow respectfully.

Standing right beside her, leaning casually on the bookshelf, was the tall and handsome figure, the man who owned her.

Unlike her flustered actions, the person in front of her didn't respond immediately.

Mikel took his time. His gaze was impassive but there was a hint of a subtle smile on his face.

He slowly bent down and picked up the book which Sylvia had tried hard to hide.

"Hmm... Interested in magic, are we?" His deep velvety smooth voice tickled Sylvia's ears.

She slightly nodded, praying for him to not notice the ruined pages.

"Do you have any affinity with magic?" Mikel asked. His gaze was fixated on the woman in front of him, eying her from head to toe.

Silvia again nodded. "No, your highness."

"No magic huh? Interesting. Do you know the meaning of your name, S - y - l - v - i - a?" Mikel slowly spoke, enunciating her name, syllable for syllable.

"Umm... No, your highness." Sylvia had never thought about something like that.

"Your name is derived from one of the mythical creatures, nymphs. A forest nymph to be more specific."

Sylvia nodded again, not knowing how to react. Why is he interested in my damn name? She cursed her bad luck.

Mikel let out a cold chuckle. The woman in front of him was clearly terrified of him.

She looked like a frightened little kitten, who was begging to be pinched and teased.

He was too tired to notice it previously but the girl's features were quite exquisite. She had an innocent pure charm about her.

It was very much to his liking.

Mikel leaned in a bit more closer, pinning the poor woman against the wooden bookshelf.