Chapter Six - A Limpet and Books

“I think that in those first few days--that is, the first few days after awakening--I was operating under the mistaken assumption that strangers would act in good-faith towards someone they didn’t know.

I’ve since learned of your staggering arrogance.”

***

“That one’s no good.”

I carefully set the book down and turned my attention away from it and to the limpet.

Now, I’m aware that she had a name. Most people do. But certain people match their title and station so well, that they become it.

Such, I felt, was the case with the limpet.

“Forgive me,” I said. “But I don’t recall asking you for your opinion.”

The girl shrugged, one hand adjusted the crooked frame of her spectacles. “That’s okay. I’m just trying to help out.”

“Sorry, but what I meant was that I don’t want, or desire, your help. Go away.”

The limpet’s mouth worked, her brows knitting together as she, no doubt, pushed her thinking ability to its limit. “You’re forgiven,” she said.

It took me a moment to parse that.

“When I said ‘sorry’ I wasn’t apologizing. It was a comment on how I feel sorry about how incredibly pitiful your intelligence is.”

The girl puffed her cheeks out and had the temerity to glare. “I was just trying to help.”

“No. You’re trying to ingratiate yourself with me in order to gain an advantageous position from which to ask me favours. Notably, you suspect--rightly--that I am in every way more powerful that you, and want some of that power for yourself.”

And now she was blushing.

The limpet reminded me a little of some of the undergraduates I’d conscripted for some research at one time or another. Just barely an adult, and still with some growing to do. Baby-faced and wide-eyed, and most of all, dumb as a rock.

“Go grind your intelligence by... oh, I don’t know, using Magic Missile on a tree trunk a thousand times, or whatever it is youngsters do to train nowadays.”

The girl nodded, then paused. “What’s Magic Missile?”

I no longer had a brain, not a physical one mind you...

Mind you! Oh hoh!

Despite my lack of a meat brain, it seemed that I could still suffer from a headache. “Go away,” I ordered.

The limpet squeaked and ran off, jingling the doorbell as she went.

“She was nice,” Alex said.

“Oh, shut up,” I huffed before returning to my perusal of the books I had before me. I picked the one I’d just set down and flipped through it, reading the odd page and taking in the diagrams within. I don’t know if it was a product of my spectacles’ translation, or if the writing was really as poor as it seemed, but the limpet was correct in her assessment that it wasn’t any good.

The quality of the books I found were a little strange, to put it simply.

The bindings and materials used in their making was actually rather impressive. Not the greatest I’d seen, but the average quality was higher than I would have expected from such a backwater little shop.

The scrolls were nothing too special, just rolls of vellum and wooden rods. Occasionally they had some embellishment on their end caps, but that was all.

No, the quality of the physical parts of the books was more than satisfying.

It was the information that left much to be desired.

The history books I found were often accounts told in the forms of ledgers. Some stretched back to the start of some ‘Great Immortal Empire of the Five Paths.’ That was laughable. If it was immortal and great, I would have run into it already, and from what I could tell, its history only stretched back some millenia and a half to a point where the ‘great empire’ was little more than a single small kingdom.

Pathetic grandstanding and patriotism, probably designed to give its citizens something to be proud of while they starved on the streets.

It was disappointing to see that politics had changed little.

The history books--as dubious as I found them-- were at least sensible. I didn’t doubt there was plenty of embellishment and so on, but that was almost to be expected.

No, the true cause for concern were the books on the arcane arts. That was, the lack of them.

There were no less than sixty-two guides on meditation techniques, a dozen on different martial disciplines for beginners, and a few books that looked like class skill books for different combat-oriented skills and feats.

Not one book about proper spell casting.

That was nonsensical. Even now, with just a minor expansion of my senses, I could feel some weak enchantments layered on the shop, more on the till at the back and plenty beyond that and into the city proper.

Magic was still very much used here. So why the lack of knowledge?

Some possibilities came to mind.

One. Magic had changed. This was the possibility that I suspected had the least potential of being accurate.

If magic itself had changed I suspect I would have noticed already. My entire unlife was sustained by it, and while I had hardly tried spells of every sort, I had touched upon a few of the more common schools of magic already with no noticable changes. If magic did change though, then it was possible that certain magical knowledge was lost.

Two. Magic was guarded and kept secret. Not the existence of magic. The limpet had expressed some willingness to learn, so she had to know the basics at least. She didn’t act like someone who saw something utterly incomprehensible.

So, based on that possible conjecture, magic was known, but the hows of magic were guarded or at least not sold to the general public in a common bookstore.

I truly disliked the idea, but I could imagine a scenario where certain kinds of magic were banned or guarded, and that eventually transitioned to all forms of magic over time. I had seen some nations banning necromancy in my day, not that a law would stop a horde of the undead from storming a gate.

Three. I was just really unlucky and someone else had purchased all of the books pertaining to magic, or this store simply didn’t sell that. Maybe there was a magic-specialist store somewhere and the owners agreed not to compete.

It was a dull possibility, but a very plausible one.

I picked up the first pile of the few books I had decided to purchase and set them atop Alex’s waiting arms. The second pile masked the butler’s face, and the third and forth pile couldn’t fit atop what he already held without impacting the ceiling, so I waved my hand and summoned a casual mage hand to raise the books off the ground.

“Greetings, sir,” I said as I approached the man by the counter.

He took one look at the piles of books floating behind me and bowed at the waist. “Hello master. How can Hongqi assist you this afternoon?”

Finally, someone polite! “Hello Hongqi, I wish to purchase these.” I gestured to all the books. “Unfortunately I don’t have any of the local currency.”

I noted the strange expressions flitting by the man’s face. “I do not wish to offend, great master,” he said with a bow. “But I cannot give my books away, else I would lose my livelihood.”

“Oh no no,” I said. “Forgive me, I mean that I cannot pay in normal currency, not that I wouldn’t pay. Do you accept gold bullion?” I reached into one of the pockets of my tweed jacket and rooted around the pocket dimensions within.

Pocket dimensions.... In my pockets! Hohoh!

I found what I sought and pulled out a brick of gold. “Is gold still valuable?”

The man nodded very carefully. “O-of course, master. Though I must admit that I’m not in the habit of trading in gold.”

“Give yourself a good mark-up,” I said. Greater Transmutation was one of those spells that was quite handy in making infinite wealth, insofar as any type of currency other than knowledge was worth something.

The man bowed twice, and was soon assisting Alex in setting down all the books I intended to purchase. “You will want these packaged, master?” he asked.

“That would be nice. Do add their name to the packaging. I dislike rummaging around in a disorganized heap.”

“I understand fully, my lord,” he said. Soon, the shopkeeper was carefully wrapping each book in plain paper and carefully writing the name of the tome and a short description beneath that on the packaging. It was a good job.

“Tell me,” I said as I set a second golden brick next to the first. “Where might one acquire magical tomes?”

“Magical tomes? Ah, I suppose master speaks of books that instruct one on the use of cultivation?”

That was the second time I’d heard the word. “Forgive my ignorance,” I said. “I’m speaking through a translation enchantment. What is cultivation?” I was using a spell, but enchantments seemed more common and less likely to raise suspicion.

“It’s... ah, the practice of an art, to gain Qi and become more powerful.”

Did he mean gaining experience? Was this cultivation thing just grinding? “I see,” I said. I suspected that there was more to it than that, but I would learn more when I had the time for it. “And where could I find out more about magic?”

“The local sect would be the best place, if they’re willing to accept you. They are, ah, I wouldn’t speak ill of them. Perhaps master would be best to hire guards, and leave his riches behind when he visits the local sect. Just in case?”

I nodded in thanks. “I’ll see what I can do,” I said. I’d long grown past the point of fearing for my unlife, but if this kind bookkeep was willing to warn me, perhaps I would heed his word. I wondered if there was a cemetery nearby?

I noticed Hongqi looking past me and towards the entrance of his shop. A quick glance over my shoulder didn’t reveal any young fools looking for a second lesson, but instead the head of my limpet that quickly disappeared when she saw me staring.

“Ah, please master, don’t be hard on Fenfang,” Hongqi said. “If she bothers you, I will speak to her.”

“She seems unfortunately persistent,” I said.

“It must be because the master seems so powerful,” he said. “She has been looking for her own path to cultivation for some time, but with little luck.”

“Are there not goblins to murder around here?” I asked.

“Ah, well, yes?” he said. “But they are fearsome and warped by evil energies.”

I assumed that ‘evil energies’ was some necromantic power or other. Else the locals were just needlessly supersiticious. “I won’t harm her, if that’s what you’re asking. Not as long as she doesn’t bother me overly much.”

Maybe I’d teleport her over the lake.

Next to a boat, of course.

Once all the books were nice and packed, I added a final golden ingot to the pile. Better to overpay and remain on friendly terms with the man providing me with my entertainment. “I think this will be my farewells for now,” I said.

Hongqi bowed once more. “It was a pleasure serving you, master.”

“Certainly. Have a good evening.” I waved my hand and the neatly packed books warped and wavered before folding away into my book keeping dimension.

It also doubled as my accounting dimension. Hohoh!

“Come along, Alex! We’ve a sect to visit,” I said. “New, or perhaps very old, magics to discover. And one limpet to get rid of.”

“Yes, Papa Magic Bones,” Alex said as he jumped to follow me. “Are we getting clothes too?”

“Ah yes, I had quite forgotten.” I nodded along. Alex was still dressed in pauper’s clothes. Hardly fit for a butler at all. “Books and magic first, clothes second. We do have some priorities.”

***