He Was Never Booksmart

I look at the card on my desk again. Nope, not a hallucination.

It suddenly appeared in front of me while everyone was leaving the classroom.

I know what it does. It's a library card that takes its owner to a pocket dimension. The Demon Hunter club gets these, but I'm not a part of that. I mostly do my own thing, and occasionally, I bump into them.

So I didn't expect to get one.

Well... classes are over, so I might as well.

I grab the card and slide the classroom's door closed.

"I want to... enter the library."

I slide them open, and my vision is filled with bookshelves and a girl with a witch's hat.

"Greetings, cursed one. I am—"

Hey, I've seen her before.

"What's poppin', Amane-chan?"

Her face goes flat. "It's Amaryllis."

"Oh, sorry."

I keep forgetting this is a thing with demon hunters. Ichioka-chan told me names have incredible power, so we must take titles to protect ourselves from enemies. Aozaki-san told me they do it because it's cool. Either way, I want one for myself. At least to fit in.

I can't think of anything, though. Cardcaptor? Deck Master? Everything feels so derivative...

"Er-hem. What do you wish for, visitor? Perhaps some tomes on the usage of demon auras? A catalog of shadow demons? A—"

"I just wanna see the manga section."

"O-Of course."

She points to the right. "4th aisle. When you finish reading them, leave them on the desks. Do not attempt to put them back on the shelves. Our staff is responsible for that."

"'Kay."

I give Amane-chan a thumbs-up on my way to the aisle. "Nice customer service."

She gives me a weird look.

Hmm...

"Thank you for the aid, o' Grand Librarian."

She nods, then disappears in the blink of an eye.


[He Was Never Booksmart]


"Welp, time for volume fourteen," I say to pump myself up, reaching for the manga.

rrrrip

I take off a page and curl into a mini-scroll. In front of me sits a bottle with the leftover orange juice from my lunch.

I open it, dip the page, and bite half of it.

"Bleh."

Honestly, the taste is still pretty awful.

"W-What are you doing?!"

"Ah..."

Amane-chan is watching me chew on the soggy paper. How embarrassing.

"I thought it would taste better if I dipped it," I explain, finishing the page. "But it was a foolish idea. I should have eaten it raw and washed it down with juice."

Like I was doing before.

"I don't care about that! Why are you eating it?!"

"The demon of Gluttony within me demands it."

"The... you... did you even come here to read?"

"Already did."

Before she can say anything else, I point at the desk, specifically to the copy of the volume I'm holding sans eaten page. "See, I made a copy, so you don't have to worry about me eating this one."

"Still... as the owner, I should be warned about any... modifications you make to the books. And what if the copies fade someday?"

She's right. Even though it's overall harmless, it was pretty rude of me to do this without any warning.

"Sorry, but... I've already eaten and copied volumes one through thirteen. Just so you know."

She winces.

"And don't worry, the copies won't disappear."

She doesn't look like she believes me, but she can't do anything about it except thug it out. Or make me puke the pages. But she seems like a nice girl, so I doubt I have to worry about that.

Thug it out, Amane-chan. Thug it out.

"What was that?"

"Nothing."

I clasp my fingers together, waiting for her to return to her duties.

But she stands in place, almost leaning against a bookshelf, watching me.

"..."

"..."

We stare at each other for a few seconds. Not into each other's eyes, though. That's a rookie mistake for someone in our profession.

"... aren't you... going to finish that?" she asks, glancing at volume fourteen with a curious air around her.

"Nah—erm... Nay. A single page is more than sufficient for a work this short... although there was this one time I had to eat a whole DVD to—"

She turns around and shuffles away from me. Too much information, I suppose.

"Thanks for not kicking me out, Amane-chan!" I say, genuine.

"Don't scream in the library," her voice rings out, and I nod, returning to my manga.

Well... volume fourteen had some riveting material, so it might be time for a little trip.

"Sloth provides the key, opening the door so I may wave the old world goodbye..."

I look into the pages, and the world around me wavers, blending into monochrome tones, but only briefly as I cross the barrier between reality and fiction.

Then, colors return, and I'm in Shibuya's streets. Now all that's left is paying Sloth before I grab what I want...


[He Was Never Booksmart]


Amane-chan jolts as I reappear inside the library.

"... back so soon?" she asks, fixing her clothing, and I pretend I didn't see her surprised reaction, nodding in response.

"Sure am. That manga was just what I needed for my collection."

I fish out my most recent addition from my pocket, showing it to her.

"Look."

"It's a... thing with wings for eyes?"

"It's a copy of the Eight-Handled Sword Divergent Sila Divine General—"

She puts a hand up to cut me off. "That's very interesting, err..."

She doesn't know my name. Somehow, I forgot to introduce myself to the librarian. How shameful.

"Aki Hitoyoshi," I tell her.

"Hitoyoshi-san. Are you going to... read more books? Rent anything?"

"Nope. Thanks again for the manga, Aman...ryllis."

Amane-chan looks like she heard my blunder, but I still saved it at the last syllable, and really, that's what counts.

"Right. Please take your juice bottle from aisle four, and don't leave it there again."

Damn. I got too excited and forgot to put it in my bag before my world-hopping. Even more shameful.

I bow to her, scratching my head. "My bad."

I power-walk to my bottle, take out my library card, and run to the closest door.

"I'll be here tomorrow again. Bye~!"

"Don't run in the library—"

Her shout disappears as I stumble inside the empty classroom.

The bottle goes into my backpack, the library card in my pocket, and the shikigami card stays in my hand as I walk home.

Maybe I can fight some demons on the way to test this thing out.

Then again, it might be overkill...

Oh well. If one of those glowies appears, I'll simply capture them, too.

Edit Report
Pub: 07 Jan 2024 23:58 UTC
Views: 735