"Absolutely not."

Kai blinked.

"...What do you mean, absolutely not?"

Lyra folded her arms and stood directly in front of the library door.

"You've been reading until midnight."

"You leave before sunrise."

"And now you want to explore abandoned ruins?"

Kai coughed.

"They're not abandoned."

"They're... historically underappreciated."

Finn nearly fell off his chair laughing.

"That's the most librarian sentence I've ever heard."

Breakfast at the Aldren household had become strangely entertaining.

Since Kai began awakening forgotten knowledge, everyone watched him differently.

His father watched with quiet curiosity.

His mother watched with concern.

Lyra watched to make sure he didn't accidentally walk into danger.

Finn...

Simply enjoyed teasing him.

"So," Finn said between bites of bread.

"What life-changing discovery are you making today?"

Kai shrugged.

"I don't know."

"Maybe an ancient spell."

"Maybe a forgotten profession."

"Maybe a legendary artifact."

Finn grinned.

"Or maybe another wagon."

Even Edric laughed.

Just as breakfast ended, loud knocking echoed through the library.

BANG!

BANG!

BANG!

A frantic farmer rushed inside.

"Master Edric!"

"My chickens are possessed!"

The room fell silent.

Finn whispered,

"...What?"

"They won't leave the barn!"

"They're attacking anyone who goes inside!"

Kai blinked.

"...Attacking?"

"They chased my son onto the roof!"

Lyra tried very hard not to laugh.

It didn't work.

A few minutes later...

The entire Aldren family stood outside the farmer's barn.

Angry clucking echoed from inside.

The farmer pointed dramatically.

"They've gone mad!"

As if to prove his point...

A chicken burst through the doorway.

It flapped directly toward Finn.

"AAAAH!"

Finn ran.

The chicken followed.

The entire village watched in stunned silence as one teenage boy fled in terror from a bird half his size.

Kai laughed so hard he nearly dropped his notebook.

"I can't breathe..."

Lyra wiped tears from her eyes.

"I've never seen someone lose to a chicken."

"I am NOT losing!"

Finn shouted while sprinting around the barn.

"It's unusually aggressive!"

The chicken pecked his boot.

Finn screamed.

The villagers applauded.

After several minutes of complete chaos...

Kai finally noticed something.

The chickens weren't random.

They all avoided one particular corner of the barn.

He frowned.

"That's strange."

His father noticed.

"What is it?"

"They're protecting something."

Kai slowly approached.

The chickens immediately became nervous.

Not aggressive.

Protective.

His mind searched through countless pages he had read.

Then...

One title surfaced.

Understanding Domestic Animals Before Monster Ranching.

A paragraph appeared vividly inside his memory.

When peaceful animals suddenly gather in one place, they rarely guard food.

They guard their young...

Or hide from a predator.

Kai looked upward.

The roof beams.

Dark.

Quiet.

Then he saw it.

Two glowing yellow eyes.

"A snake!"

Everyone looked up simultaneously.

A large tree serpent coiled silently above the nest boxes.

The chickens hadn't gone mad.

They had been protecting their chicks.

The farmer's jaw slowly dropped.

"I..."

"I would've never looked up."

Kai smiled.

"They weren't attacking people."

"They were asking for help."

Finn slowly climbed down from the water barrel.

"...So I got chased by responsible parents."

The entire village burst into laughter.

With the serpent safely removed by several hunters, peace returned to the farm.

The grateful farmer handed Kai a basket filled with fresh eggs.

"I don't have much."

"But please."

Kai accepted gratefully.

His stomach immediately approved.

As they walked home, Finn looked suspiciously at him.

"How did you know?"

Kai shrugged.

"I read it."

"You've read books about chickens?"

"...Several."

Finn stared.

"There are books about chickens?"

"There are excellent books about chickens."

"I refuse to believe that."

Back at the library...

Kai eagerly opened his notebook.

But before he could write...

The Nameless Book suddenly slid off the shelf by itself.

It landed directly in front of him.

"...Again?"

He slowly opened it.

Silver letters appeared almost immediately.

Forgotten Skill Resonance Increased

Animal Insight

Progress:

7%

New Passive Effect:

Calm observation reveals patterns overlooked by others.

Kai blinked.

"It evolved?"

The previous Skill...

Beast Observation

Had changed.

It wasn't becoming stronger through combat.

It was becoming stronger through understanding.

His smile slowly widened.

"This is incredible..."

That evening, while shelving returned books, Kai accidentally placed a weather almanac beside an ancient navigation journal.

The moment the two books touched—

Both glowed.

Only for a heartbeat.

Kai immediately pulled them apart.

The light vanished.

"...No..."

He carefully placed them together again.

Glow.

Apart.

Nothing.

Together.

Glow.

His pulse quickened.

"It's reacting..."

He quickly gathered several more books.

Ancient Masonry.

River Engineering.

Seasonal Weather Records.

Navigation.

One by one he experimented.

Most did nothing.

Until...

He placed Weather Patterns of the Northern Coast beside Traditional Sea Navigation.

Both books shimmered brilliantly.

Silver words appeared across the Nameless Book.

Archive Discovery

Compatible Knowledge Found.

Forgotten Combination:

Sky Reading

Requirement:

Weather Knowledge + Navigation.

Status:

Incomplete.

Collect missing records.

Kai nearly shouted.

"The Archive combines books..."

Not just Skills.

Knowledge itself.

Two ordinary subjects had formed something entirely new.

His excitement grew.

"If Weather and Navigation create Sky Reading..."

"What about..."

He rushed through the forgotten shelves.

Medicine plus Botany?

Nothing.

Blacksmithing plus Geology?

A faint glow.

Cooking plus Herbalism?

Brilliant light.

Construction plus Mathematics?

Glow.

Cartography plus Astronomy?

Even brighter.

Every successful combination produced another hidden entry inside the Archive.

Kai laughed aloud.

"This is amazing!"

He wasn't collecting isolated Skills.

He was rebuilding an entire civilization's network of knowledge.

Later that night...

Edric found his son sitting on the floor.

Books surrounded him in enormous circles.

Dozens remained open.

Charts covered the wooden floor.

Lines connected different professions.

Kai had even borrowed Lyra's colored ink.

Blue for Water.

Green for Nature.

Brown for Engineering.

Gold for Healing.

Silver for Unknown.

Edric looked around the room.

"...Should I be concerned?"

Kai looked up excitedly.

"Father!"

"I think ancient knowledge worked differently!"

Edric smiled.

"I'm listening."

"Modern professions specialize."

"But the Archive..."

Kai pointed enthusiastically.

"...connects everything!"

He showed his father the diagrams.

"Weather improves Navigation."

"Navigation improves Exploration."

"Exploration discovers Herbs."

"Herbs improve Medicine."

"Medicine improves Survival."

"And Survival lets explorers discover even more knowledge."

His father quietly studied the web of connections.

Finally...

He smiled.

"I always wondered why old librarians carried so many different books."

Kai looked up.

"You knew?"

"I suspected."

Edric gently tapped the center of Kai's diagram.

"Knowledge was never meant to stand alone."

"It grows..."

"...when shared."

That night, Kai returned to sleep with dozens of new questions.

As his eyes closed, the Great Archive welcomed him once more.

This time...

The endless shelves looked different.

Golden threads connected one bookshelf to another.

Every book was linked.

Some by a single thread.

Others by hundreds.

Grand Archivist Asterion stood in the center, smiling.

"You've begun to see it."

Kai looked around in amazement.

"The connections..."

Asterion nodded.

"The greatest mistake of modern scholars..."

"...was separating knowledge."

He gently touched one golden thread.

Instantly, thousands of others lit up.

"No skill was ever created alone."

"No profession ever stood by itself."

"The strongest kingdoms were not built by heroes..."

"They were built by people who understood how every craft depended upon another."

Kai slowly looked upward.

The golden web stretched farther than the eye could see.

It wasn't a library anymore.

It resembled a living mind.

And somewhere, hidden among millions of connections...

One brilliant silver thread pulsed brighter than all the rest.

Asterion's expression became solemn.

"When you find that thread..."

"You will discover the Forgotten Skill that even the gods tried to erase."

The dream dissolved into silver pages.

Kai awoke smiling.

For the first time since the attack on the library, he wasn't merely searching for lost books.

He was uncovering the forgotten blueprint of an entire world.