Ascendance of a Bookworm (LN) - Volume Short Story - Chapter 17

Solange — Closed-Stack Archives and the Old Diaries

Several days had passed since the graduation ceremony’s conclusion. Once the students had all returned to their duchies, and the Royal Academy was mostly empty, the library received almost no visitors. That didn’t mean I was without work, however. After finishing breakfast, I brought Schwartz and Weiss to my office and started operating various magic tools. I could feel a gentle smile playing on my lips just from watching their ears flop around.

“This year truly was a fun one, thanks to Lady Rozemyne,” I mused aloud. My life here had changed drastically thanks to that book-loving archduke candidate from Ehrenfest. Schwartz and Weiss had been given life once again, and then there was the tea party held in my office. “I was also the first one to hear a new song dedicated to Mestionora.”

Not even pleading with the royal family directly about the state of the library had convinced them to assign more archnoble librarians here. It was unfortunate, but just having the opportunity to ask them was a big change for me.

“What work, Solange?”

“Same as yesterday?”

Lady Rozemyne had prepared feystones filled with mana for me, which would allow me to stay with Schwartz and Weiss until next winter. I nodded at them both and smiled, then opened the door to the reading room.

The bookcases of the reading room were packed with neatly lined-up books—a sight I still wasn’t quite accustomed to. My usual routine had been to forlornly browse the half-empty shelves for books that I knew were missing and then send letters of complaint to the dormitory supervisors of the duchies that had taken them out. This year, however, things were completely different.

It is thanks to Lord Ferdinand that so many documents were returned.

Now that Schwartz and Weiss were operational again, their master Lady Rozemyne had used them to produce a list of those who had overdue books, then had Lord Ferdinand send ordonnanzes pressing for their return. This had proven so effective that the library had temporarily descended into a state of chaos as students came running with books clutched to their chests.

This mayhem had only been temporary, however; soon after Lady Rozemyne gleefully volunteered to help, the students had started to behave themselves. Archduke candidates were exceedingly powerful authority figures in the Royal Academy, since they were afforded opportunities to speak to the aubs of other duchies, and the offending students didn’t want to risk getting in even more trouble. They were already in hot water for failing to return their books and, in some cases, removing them from the library without permission.

This year, the two shumils helped me check that the books were all in the right places and that we weren’t missing anything. Because they had information on all the available resources, the whole process was completed dozens of times faster than I was used to—if not even quicker than that.

“First floor, finished.”

“Time for second, Solange?”

“We will take care of the second floor in the autumn,” I said.

Now that the students were gone, the professors could immerse themselves in their research. They would start accessing the second-floor documents on a more regular basis, so I tended to hold off on organizing them until autumn, before the school term began.

“I ask that you two clean the carrels. Once that is done, we will check the closed-stack archives. Goodness... How many years have passed since I last did that?” It was heartwarming to know that I finally had the time to do these things.

I went to fetch the key from the office, and when I returned, the door to the reading room creaked open. “Solange, I should like you to find some documents for me,” said the visitor.

“Oh my. Professor Fraularm. Good evening. It is rare to see you here this late. What documents do you require?”

Fraularm was a professor of the scholar course, where she taught gathering information, taxonomy, and the like. One could say that scholars worked more closely with the library than did any other profession, but this was the first time that Fraularm had ever asked me to find documents for her.

“Do take me to one of those archives of yours,” she said. “I wish to learn more about the written lessons of Clemens, my predecessor.”

“Oh? Did you not say previously that you do not need to see them?”

It wasn’t unusual for a class’s syllabus to change dramatically when a new professor took charge. As one professor left, documents on their syllabus were either stored in one of our closed-stack archives if a new syllabus was being introduced, or left in the reading room for their successor if not. I had consulted Fraularm about what to do with them when she was first assigned to her role, and she had told me to put Clemens’s documents away, as she intended to teach entirely new lessons.

“I have grown used to teaching here in the Academy,” Fraularm said. “I believe now is a good time to review the work of my predecessor and adopt any good ideas that I might find.”

“That is truly splendid. There are many who struggle to obtain books after returning to their duchy, and upon coming of age, their daily workload prevents them from learning new things.”

“Indeed. These lessons are a precious opportunity. Rather than having the students focus on passing their exams on the first day, I am of the opinion that they should learn much and gain more knowledge,” Fraularm said passionately, her sharp voice ringing in my ears.

I could agree with her position that it was in the students’ best interests to learn as much as they could while in the Royal Academy. The content taught prior to the civil war was seen by the elderly as common sense, but as it was no longer being covered in lessons, the younger generations were more or less oblivious to it. Recent graduates were apparently struggling quite a lot, as they would start work only to discover that there was a significant gap of understanding between them and their senior coworkers.

“I am moved by your passionate spirit, Professor Fraularm, but the Third Archive where the documents are stored can generally only be entered by librarians. My sincerest apologies, but I must ask you to wait here in the reading room for a moment. I will return with them at once,” I explained. “Schwartz, Weiss, we are going to the Third Archive.”

And with that, I started walking down the hallway opposite my office, leaving Fraularm in the reading room.

In broad terms, there were three closed-stack archives in the Royal Academy’s library. The First Archive was in the central building rather than the library itself, and to enter, one needed a key entrusted to the professor of the archduke candidate course by the royal family. Inside were documents and teaching materials used for the course, as well as magic tools best not seen by any non-archduke candidates. As a mednoble, I had never been inside myself; I simply had a copy of the key in my care.

The Second Archive had an entrance on the first floor of the library’s reading room. It was for storing aged, rarely needed documents, and it had most recently been used by a group of students from Ehrenfest. They had wished to see old documents related to previous Interduchy Tournaments, so I readily obliged them. Students could enter this archive if accompanied by a librarian, but at the back was a door to another archive that only archnoble librarians could enter. There were records of members of royalty having used it as well.

Last of all was the Third Archive, my current destination.

At the end of the hallway was a wall engraved in Schutzaria’s likeness. I opened up the feystone part at the center of her shield to reveal a keyhole, then stuck the key inside and turned it to reveal a door.

The room beyond was an empty white space containing a teleportation circle. Only Schwartz and Weiss could operate it, so in the past, whenever someone had asked me to access the archive, my response had been for them to ask royalty about making the two shumils operable again. Of course, nobody had ever done so; they feared incurring the royal family’s wrath.

“Pray, Solange.”

“O Mestionora, Goddess of Wisdom. O ye who seek all the wisdom in Yurgenschmidt. I offer up my learning as a guardian of knowledge. I seek your blessing to touch upon the knowledge that Schutzaria protects.”

As I prayed, the bracelet I had been given upon becoming a librarian began to glow. At the same time, the feystones on Schwartz’s and Weiss’s heads shone with light, and a magic circle appeared a short distance above me. It slowly descended, and by the time it reached the floor, I was in one of the storage archives.

“How many years has it been since I was last here...?” I wondered aloud.

The Third Archive was where the documents and research results of those executed as political criminals were stored. Such resources would rest here until the wheel of time turned and they were needed once again. Among them were many exceedingly old and rare documents, but the archive was made such that they could not be taken out until a librarian confirmed that they would not be stolen by contemporary authorities or disposed of.

“Schwartz, Weiss, please look for Clemens’s documents,” I said. “Student-made lecture notes will do; I cannot yet take out his own personal documents.”

As the two shumils began their search, I started checking the magic tools in the archive. The preservation magic tools in the reading room have stopped for mana-saving purposes, but these... I thought back to the pained voices of the archnoble librarians who had once been my coworkers.

“Please, Solange. You will be the only guardian of knowledge left!”

“We don’t know how many of us will be purged. All we know is that you will surely be safe, since you are from Klassenberg. You must preserve as many documents and as much information as you can.”

“All these men and women who will ultimately be executed despite having committed no crimes... You must keep their memory alive and carry the knowledge they created to the future.”

It was right after the fifth prince won the civil war and was crowned the next king. Werkestock—a massive duchy that had allied with the fourth prince—had not been pleased with the results of the war and conspired to take the king’s life, driven by the belief that he would not be able to commit any wide-scale executions. Once he was dead, the throne could go only to the fourth prince, who had been imprisoned in an Ivory Tower. That was no doubt their goal.

Those from Klassenberg were infuriated when they found out about this plot, as the same mindset had resulted in the third prince being assassinated immediately after his victory. Soon after, the duchies that had allied with the fifth prince united to ensure that he was not soft on the losers. Because of their influence, it was decided that the fourth prince would be not just imprisoned, but executed as well. The winning duchies also began to discuss purging the losing duchies responsible for Yurgenschmidt’s descent into chaos—starting with Werkestock.

The king had apparently voiced his concern on many occasions, stating that a purge on such a tremendous scale was too much. His supporters did not listen, however, and simply reminded him that his life was at stake. In the end, the king rethought his position when a group of rebels kidnapped his newborn daughter and threatened to take her life unless he surrendered the throne to the fourth prince.

Soon enough, even those who would normally have received a fine at most for being indirectly associated with the criminals were instead executed. It was a violent and terrifying time, and anyone who appealed to reason by saying that things were being taken too far was immediately suspected of colluding with Werkestock.

Werkestock’s higher-ups were naturally executed, as were the archducal couple and their children for supporting the fourth prince. The purge then extended to those from Werkestock who had become citizens of other duchies through work or marriage. It even became a crime to accommodate those from Werkestock or exchange intelligence with them. The execution of the Royal Academy’s archnoble librarians had taken place because of an incident where documents containing valuable intelligence were lent to Werkestock nobles.

In the first place, it most likely wasn’t a librarian from the Royal Academy who lent out the ancient construction documents within the palace library... but the royals didn’t care about that whatsoever.

The librarians had made no attempt to resist when they were told their fate; they had asked only for a few days to settle their affairs and prepare for their work to be handed over.

“We cannot allow the results of so many people’s research to disappear forever, simply because they were born in the wrong duchy,” they had said. “We must move as many documents to the Third Archive as we can, while we still have time.”

The librarians did not weep; instead, they dryly accepted their executions and focused on getting the work of professors being executed and documents related to Werkestock into the Third Archive. Then, for my benefit, they drank as many rejuvenation potions as they could stomach and filled Schwartz and Weiss with as much mana as possible.

“We are guardians of knowledge; we offer the wisdom born in Yurgenschmidt to Mestionora,” they had said to me. “Solange, we leave the rest to you.”

And then they were gone.

I remembered all this as I walked through the archive, then my eyes fell on a number of old diaries sitting on a shelf. They had been written by the executed librarians and were being kept here to ensure their preservation. I picked one up, feeling nostalgic.

“That too, Solange?”

“Another for Fraularm?”

“No, I intend to read this myself,” I told the two shumils. “They are the diaries of other librarians...”

I made my way out of the Third Archive with the old diaries in hand, locked the door behind me, and then went straight to my office rather than the reading room. A morose smile crept onto my face as I put the key away and left the books on my desk; it felt as though the clock had turned back to a happier time.

“The reading room, Solange.”

“Books to lend.”

At the shumils’ prompting, I returned to the reading room and delivered the study guides from the Third Archive to Fraularm.

“I expected more...” Fraularm said, her lips twisting into a dissatisfied frown as she thumbed through the resources. “Oh my! Are these not study guides written by students? Solange, I am specifically interested in the documents that Clemens left behind.”

“Unfortunately, this is the most I can lend you,” I replied. “He was executed for political crimes.”

“Ah, so none of his documents remain. Very well. I shall take these.” Fraularm handed the study guides to Schwartz, who then carried out the standard procedures for her to borrow them. I couldn’t help but sigh in relief.

I returned to my office, having told Schwartz and Weiss that their work for the day would be over once they finished cleaning the carrels, then sat down at my desk. My fingers trembled slightly as I opened one of the old diaries. I recognized the handwriting, and one fond memory after another came to mind as my eyes traced the familiar characters.

“Come on. We need to hurry with our preparations. Royalty is going to be here soon.”

“Opening door, milady.”

“Just a bit more. We’ll be returning to the Sovereignty once the Archduke Conference is over.”

“Work done, milady.”

In the past, the Royal Academy’s library would close after the Archduke Conference, and everyone would move to the palace library. Now, however, there was so much work for me to do here that I could no longer afford to leave. It seemed that the palace library was suffering from a lack of staff as well, although I only knew this through letters. I sincerely hoped that the librarians there were doing well; I only got to see them once every number of years.

My mind continued to wander as I thumbed through page after page, and soon enough, I reached the final entry. The last page was dated the day before the librarians had been taken to the execution grounds, but nobody who read it would guess that—the librarians really had continued to dryly record their workdays until the bitter end.

“Solange, live on and protect this place. I expect that your job will get much, much harder than it ever has been.”

“Welcome the new librarians who serve in our stead.”

“Indeed. As guardians of knowledge, our birthplace has no meaning. All that matters is one’s respect for humanity’s wisdom.”

They had entrusted me with Schwartz, Weiss, and the library... but I had not been able to protect them all on my own. The two shumils eventually stopped working when they ran out of mana, I was forced to decrease the number of active magic tools, and it became more and more of a struggle to get borrowed documents back on the shelves.

But now...

Now, Schwartz and Weiss were working with me again. Lady Rozemyne’s prayers to Mestionora had produced the lights of a blessing. I wondered how moved my fellow librarians would have been, had they been alive to see life return to the shumils.

“Everyone. Oh, everyone... I am doing well,” I said, speaking to the diary. “I am still alive, but... no librarians have come to serve in your place.”

Of course, there was no response.

“Finished, Solange.”

“Done for the day.”

Schwartz and Weiss returned to my office after cleaning the carrels. I welcomed them as I closed the old diary, which they stared at quizzically and with their heads tilted.

“For milady? Reading?”

“For milady? Writing?”

They recognized the diary as something for librarians to write in, so they must have determined that I was giving it to Lady Rozemyne for her to make her own entries in. I giggled and shook my head. “No, I simply thought that I might like for her to read it. Perhaps I can allow her to borrow it during a tea party at the library next year. Lady Rozemyne said that she wishes to become a librarian, so she would surely enjoy reading about their daily lives.”

I wanted someone to share these memories with, even if only for a brief moment. The strength of these feelings had driven me to voice my intentions, and although I was mostly talking to myself, Schwartz and Weiss began to eagerly hop around.

“Milady loves books.”

“Milady very pleased.”

Having received the shumils’ approval, I decided that I would give Lady Rozemyne the diary to read. I opened a locked drawer, stored the book inside, then took out a feystone filled with her mana.

“Schwartz. Weiss. Let me supply you with mana.”

May these peaceful days last as long as they can.