“As I said before, we’re closed, so you really shouldn’t be here,” she said, pushing her glasses up the bridge of her nose. “But since you made such interesting inquiries last time you were here, I am curious to know what you’d like.”

Max cut straight to the chase.

“What do you know about the different exits and entrances between the tower-zone and the outer-rim?”

Her eyebrows raised and her eyes widened, shocked by the question.

“Such information is not publicly available,” she said. “But there are old books on the planning and building of Zestiris in the restricted section. As a librarian, I had the privilege to look some of them over. If I were to tell you anything though, I could get my librarian status revoked and, worse, be arrested.”

They were asking a lot of her, Max realized. But without a way to follow Samuel’s henchmen, they’d be leaving the entire city—both zones—at risk.

“Listen,” said Max. “We believe something very dangerous is going on. So we’re going to check it out. Worst case scenario, I’ll personally take the blame for any trouble you get into. Best case scenario, you’ll be commended as a hero of this city.”

The girl’s cheeks blushed.

“Not too many librarian heroes are there?” said Casey.

“No,” said Max. “But there should be.”

The librarian sighed.

“Okay you’ve convinced me,” she said. “What do you want to know?”

68

A few days later, Max and Casey went to Hawker’s Alley to pick up supplies.

The market was less crowded, people still sleeping off their new year’s hangovers even a few days after all the celebrations.

There were even less stalls open, but the one Max was hoping to be open was.

“That’s the one,” he said to Casey as they walked towards it.

The stall was one that sold magical weaponry and artifacts. Max had normally avoided it as Sakura had told him he should rely more on training his body and mana as weapons and learning as much about other traits as possible. A weapon would only make things confusing for his training and create new obstacles for when he needed to be quick on his feet. But for this current operation with Casey, there was a specific tool he had in mind.

The owner of the stall was a skinny grizzled looking man with a scar over his left eye. The scar-covered eye was blind and glassy looking. Some people would opt to cover part of their face with an eye patch but that was clearly not this merchant’s style. Intimidating customers was clearly part of his business plan.

“Whaddya want?” he barked at Casey and Max as soon as they approached.

Max gulped.