"The third floor?"
Hearing Li Heng’s words, a flash of astonishment crossed the face of the teacher on the left. He took the One-Card System Li Heng handed him, and a white glow enveloped his hands.
After ten seconds, the teacher handed the One-Card System back to Li Heng.
"Li Heng, you have one opportunity to borrow from the third floor. You may check out any book from the library’s third floor for one month. Remember to return it on time. When you go upstairs, just hand your One-Card System to the teacher or volunteer at the staircase."
Li Heng nodded to show he understood, thanked both teachers, and walked into the library.
After Li Heng entered the library, the two teachers didn’t watch him go. They remained focused on their work, but took a moment to speak with each other.
"A promising seedling! We had Gu Qingwu two years ago. I didn’t expect another one like Li Heng this year."
"Yes! And he’s polite! But only giving him one chance to borrow from the third floor... The university is being a bit stingy this time."
...
Li Heng had no idea the two teachers at the entrance were discussing him.
For now, his attention was solely on the Meteor University library. Its design was based on the Moon-Picking Tower, with an exterior resembling a pagoda with flying eaves. The interior was "simple" yet not plain; as far as he could see, the first floor was filled with nothing but bookshelves.
Students moved between the rows of shelves, making it much like any other library Li Heng had been to.
After a quick look around the first floor, Li Heng headed for the staircase and handed his One-Card System to the teacher stationed there.
The teacher was momentarily surprised, but after checking the One-Card System, he let Li Heng pass. He even offered a word of praise as Li Heng went up.
Li Heng replied humbly and thanked him before heading up to the second floor.
The second floor was somewhat different from the first. Though bookshelves still dominated the view, there were far fewer upperclassmen walking between them.
Furthermore, the second floor had two additional areas. One was a wide, open space with a dirt floor, furnished with a few sturdy-looking steel training dummies. A handful of students were there, practicing with their weapons.
This brought Li Heng to the biggest "difference" between the Meteor University library and those he was used to: this one was incredibly "lively"!
The libraries he remembered were quiet places where students did their own work in silence. Here, however, conversations between students seemed to be perfectly normal.
There were even steel training dummies for practice, the sounds of swinging weapons filling the air.
But what surprised Li Heng most was in another part of the "open space," where a teacher was giving a lesson to more than a dozen students.
Having never experienced a Soul Energy University class before, Li Heng was tempted to audit it. However, after a moment of thought, he decided against it.
After all, he didn’t know that teacher’s "rules." If it turned out to be a professor who disliked auditors, he had no desire to get an earful for no reason.
Besides, dropping in midway might disrupt the lesson. So, Li Heng watched from a distance for a moment before turning his attention away. ’I’ll have my own classes soon enough,’ he thought. ’My curiosity can wait.’
And so, after another quick look around the second floor, he walked to the staircase and took out his One-Card System.
Guarding the stairs on the second floor wasn’t a teacher, but an upperclassman in a green robe who stood about 178 centimeters tall.
Throughout the entire process, from Li Heng handing over his One-Card System to him stepping onto the stairs to the third floor, the green-robed upperclassman remained completely expressionless, showing no discernible emotion.
However, as Li Heng stepped onto the staircase, the upperclassman commented flatly, "Junior, you’re not bad."
"You’re too kind, senior."
Since the upperclassman had been completely impassive, Li Heng couldn’t get a read on him. He offered a polite reply and didn’t dwell on it, turning his attention to surveying the third floor.
If the first and second floors bore some resemblance to a library, the third floor had the atmosphere of a "skill shop."
Here on the third floor, the bookshelves were arranged in a grid, organized both horizontally and vertically.
The horizontal rows were divided into major categories like Weapons, Unarmed Combat, and Body Techniques, each clearly marked with a sign.
The vertical columns were sorted by elemental attribute: Wind, Fire, Lightning, Water, Earth, and so on.
’This layout is really convenient! And so many elemental Soul Energy Skills... Meteor University’s resources are...’
Li Heng clearly remembered spending nearly all his money to buy the Snow Patterned Flying Knife from a skill shop.
1.5 million Alliance Coins!
A rare-grade Soul Energy Skill!
Before him now were rows upon rows of bookshelves. He didn’t try to count the exact number of books, but he conservatively estimated that if all the volumes on the third floor were converted into Alliance Coins, the total would be an astronomical figure.
Li Heng didn’t bother with the specific calculations, but he understood the gist of it. In a way, Meteor University was handing him a massive fortune in Alliance Coins.
Aside from the grid-like arrangement of bookshelves, the number of students on the third floor was drastically lower than on the first two floors; he could only see a few scattered individuals.
"Excuse me, what type of book are you looking to check out?"
Just as Li Heng was taking in the third floor, a very cold voice suddenly spoke from near his ear.
Li Heng instinctively turned toward the sound and saw that, at some point, an upperclasswoman wearing glasses had appeared just behind and to his left.
Having met Jiang Hongtao before, he wasn’t surprised that something like glasses could be one of the Soul Energy Items.
What surprised Li Heng was her attire. The upperclasswoman wore a long purple dress—a color that should have been alluring, yet the feeling she gave off was utterly "cold."
Just like her voice, the upperclasswoman’s aura was cold and detached. Her looks, however, were off the charts.
The term "cold beauty" immediately came to Li Heng’s mind.
"Hello, senior! I’d like to look at Swordsmanship techniques related to the snow element."
He didn’t sense any malice, just a detached tone, so Li Heng replied politely and stated his purpose. As his gaze drifted down involuntarily, however, a single phrase popped into his mind: ’A goddess of legs!’
He quickly snapped his eyes back up, having taken only the briefest of glances.
The purple-dressed, bespectacled upperclasswoman didn’t answer right away. Instead, she suddenly took two or three steps closer to him.
"You have a snow-type affinity?"
The purple-dressed senior stopped abruptly less than twenty centimeters from Li Heng before speaking again.
Startled by her sudden proximity, Li Heng instinctively took half a step back. He watched the cold beauty and nodded, confirming his snow-type affinity.
Seeing him nod, the senior blinked, pushed her glasses up with her right hand, and said, "I’m the administrator for the library’s third floor. Third-year grad student. Give me your One-Card System."