Chapter 17 nightly castle tour
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After some time I ended up before a door clearly leading put of the hidden hallway, out on the main hallways used by the nobles. The door was marked with a big sign displaying three books next to each other. I had three signs indicating a library. They were only differentiated by the amount of books shown. I had decided to follow the one depicting three hoping that it would lead me to the main library.

The door was wooden and big enough in size that nobody would have a problem to go through the door. It took me some time to figure out the opening mechanism of the door. After some tries I managed to open the door and slide it open. Seeing the door from the other side revealed to my why I had such a hard time opening it. The door was disguised as a cabinet filled with trinkets. One has to move one of the trinkets in a special pattern in order to unlock and move the door. From the backside I had access to the backside and inner workings of the mechanism and had to move it in a mirrored pattern to open it.

I closed the hidden door with ease, making a point to remember the way to unlock it again for later. Just like the inscription had promised I was next to the library. A few steps away from the cabinet was an old and heavy looking winged door made of wood. It visually screamed entrance to the library, if it isn’t I would eat my shoes.

The door was looked, denying me entrance. At least I wont be bothered once I manage to go inside. I spread out my senses to get a grasp what is behind the wooden door. My suspicion was correct a picture befitting of a library constructed itself in my mind. With the image in my mind I begin to construct the magic sigil in order to shift behind the doors. Even before a heart bead had passed after I activated my spell I had changed locations and was on the other side of the libraries entrance door. In front of me rows and rows of bookshelves extended into the room. The shelves where higher than I was tall by a fair bit and where filled to the brim with books. And the library even extended upwards to a second layer. A paradise!

I would have loved to lounge around the library and read every book before the fireplace in one of the armchairs found in a library. The thought of holing myself up in such a library and reading books covered in a cozy blanket in dim light fills me with warmth. Sadly I don’t have time for that. I have a debt to collect. Damn Demons I’ll make them pay even more.

I am not exactly her to learn about Demons or the history of this part of the world. I came here out of private interest. Venturing out of the plains had made me curious what happened to the Oni and Ogre, in the time I was busy with my Inn. It’s been more than fifty years after all, that I had a proper exchange with another Oni eye to eye.

The royal library can hopefully help me with this. The library should have some books about the Oni and Ogre and how they have been faring until now. I also came to check if the library has books from Royal archivist Geril. His books about the Elysian are very interesting.

Searching the books I am interested in, without a plan will take far to long. I don’t know the layout of the library and how the books are sorted. Just randomly searching for a book will take way to long. Sadly I don't know any spell to search for books. So I have top do it the old way. I hope the librarians have an inventory book hidden somewhere. I walked over to the librarians workplace and started my search. I quickly found a half empty bottle of liquor and the books I was searching for.

The books contents was the libraries contents sorted in different manners. Enabling someone to search for a book in different ways. I used the book that sorted the libraries contends by topics to search for the ones about Onis and Ogre. The book revealed one thing, Oni and Ogre are categorized as a Demon subspecies by the Humans and are only characterized in books about Demons. In other words a loss for me.

The second inventory book I grabbed, sorted the books by author. I quickly found the author I was searching for, Royal archivist Geril. Sadly the library only possessed one book of him. No the only thing left to do was to figure out where row eight, section twelve, shelf ten was located. I took the bottle of liquor with me. Having alcohol at hand is always a god idea. You never know if you have to get someone drunk or need a flamethrower. I went of into the library in search for row eight.

It took me a while until I realized that the library was neatly organized and labeled, making the search for my destination a task of not even a minute. I only realized that after about a good ten minutes of stumbling around in the dark library. I guess I was a bit drunk after all. The book I was searching for was hidden in the place the inventory book told me. That meant that it was stored away in a shelf out of my reach. I had to use levitation magic to reach the book.

The good thing about this is, that it won’t be discovered that it is missing until someone has an interest in the books stored in this shelf. Guessing by the dust, it had been a long time since someone was at this particular shelf and I hope that will be the case in the future too. The book was titled, “The war of the End – A report about the cataclysm that brought the Elysian here”. A long and interesting title. I will definitely have a good time reading this.

I left the library the same way I had entered it, taking liquor and book with me. I shifted through the door once again and moved in the hidden paths of the castle, using the cabinet, once again. At first I only backtracked until I reached on of the bigger intersection. There I tried to find a sign that would direct me towards the castles dungeon. I didn’t find one so I went of in search for another intersection. I finally found a useful symbol at the third intersection, A box with three vertical lines. Hopefully depicting a prison cell.

Following the symbol took some time. I had to go through what seems to be the entirety of the maze, that are these hidden paths. I even encountered some stairways I had to go down. Those stairways mad me realize just how big this castle truly is. The glamorous hallways I was lead through by the attendants were just a minuscule fraction of the castles layout.

I left the hidden paths through a door depicting the symbol I had been following the whole time. This time the door was a simple piece of wood disguised as a part of the stone wall. The symbol hadn’t lead me into the castles dungeon, instead it lead to the hallway before the dungeons entrance. The walls and ground was old gray stones lit up by the torches inserted in the walls. If I didn’t know it any better I would have thought that I was in another castle. All the glamour, noble and rich appearance was gone. I stared at a dark poorly lit hallway smelling, nicely put unpleasant. In other words I had found the skeleton in the closet.

After a big sip of the liquor I had brought with me I moved on, following my nose in the direction that smelled worse. The prison cells sadly are located in that direction. At first I tried to move as quit as possible, but I couldn’t prevent my shoes from making any sound on the stone floor. I wasn’t going to take them off to walk barefoot, even with my barrier intact and I was to lazy to cast a spell to muffle the sound of me walking. So I opted for walking like I belonged here, not caring if I was heard. I discarded my cloak and put it in my magical storage, so that nobody would mistake me for somebody trying to sneak around undiscovered.

Reaching the entrance to the prison cells, revealed my first real challenge of the day. Four guards stood attention, two looking in the hallway I was in and two looking towards the prison cells. They made sure that whoever came from witch ever direction would be noticed. They had yet to notice me, because I was hiding behind a corner.

I was pondering on how I would manage to most efficiently take care of the four guard without hurting them to much. I was thinking for quite a while and my only more or less useful conclusion was that I had to use the bottle of liquor I had, but I had no Idea what I should do.

Suddenly a commotion broke out. The guards started to shout hectically, before the started to scream in pain and then feel silent. Prison break was also a viable strategy to take care of the guards and let me in the prison cells unbothered. The perpetrator rushed around the corner and attacked me the moment he saw me. Taking me hostage before I even could properly react and pressed a rusty knife at my carotid artery. He even brought me down on my knees so he could properly hold me hostage.

He was disgusting mess of a human. Long unkempt brown hear and beard that smelled like vomit, his skin and clothes were equally dirty that I had problems distinguishing them. Overall he smelled like shit and vomit. I was more or less completely occupied with not vomiting that I didn’t notice that he was saying something. So I simply interrupted him.

“Could you repeat yourself. I didn’t listen to what you said. I was focusing on not vomiting.”

The knife pressed deeper into my skin.

“You stupid bitch! I kill you, if you try anything funny. I know that you are a magician and I can kill you before you can get of a spell.”

“Fine can I go now. I have business to do in the cells.”

“Oh no your coming with me, bitch! Your my lovely tickets to freedom after all. Don’t worry I will make you love me after I am free. You will never think of leaving my side ever again.”

“No thanks. I am not interested.”

I didn’t let him time to get enraged about my answer. I grabbed his knife arm and tossed him over my head into the wall. He crashed into the wall with a loud thud and bounced of onto the ground. Before he could get up again I took a big sip of the liquor I still had. With a flick of my finger I created a spark and simultaneously a green sigil appeared in front of my mouth. Guided by the wind magic the ignited liquor came out of my mouth like a flamethrower. I thoroughly bathed the man in the flames, until he stopped screaming and the smell of burned flesh and charcoal had replaced the stench of shit and vomit.

“The best way to disinfect filth is by incinerating. What a fool he thought just because I am a magician he could beat me and use me as a hostage. I am still an Oni in the end.”

I said my thought out loud on purpose, so that they would be heard by any fool who had a similar idea. Then I took the corpse and threw it past the dead guards and in the hallway with the prison cells. I could hear some sounds of terror and fear and the sound of metal being moved. Hopefully inwards further into their cells. In only have enough alcohol two or three more disinfections.

I entered the hall with the prison cells, they were all in a row to my left and right each door closed except on that was now unoccupied. A black charred was in the middle of the hallway. My intimidation had worked, nobody in their cell seemed eager to leave or attract my attention.

I stopped before the seventh cell of the right side. In there was a familiar sight, a one horned Oni, his shape was worse than when he was caught, but he was alive. I grabbed the lock of the cell and casted a fire spell on it heating the metal up until I could open the door without a problem. Feeling mercyfull I grabbed him by his neck instead by his remaining horn and dragged him along to the other cell were the Oni woman was at. There I repeated the same process of opening the door. I threw him in and closed the door.

“Answer my questions and I promise I wont weld this door shut.”

They stayed silent for a moment looking at each other and communicating with each other, using stares and body signs. After a while they came to an agreement and the woman started to talk.

“We only talk if you also don’t hurt us. Breaking our horns won’t work a second time.”

“Fair enough. Hereby I also promise to not hurt you in any way until I the next light of day. Are you fine with that?”

“… Yes …”

“Good first question, what is the current state of the Oni and Ogre?”

“We are allied with the Demons and are there most trusted and valued. Our domains are prospering. Currently we are on friendly terms with the Ogre.”

“~Tch~ Idiots! What were the Oni up the in the last fifty or more years? Only the most important events and short.”

“We had to flee from our original settlement, because a dragon attacked it. They tried to exterminate us whole. This was before we were born. I was told only the weak and young managed to escape, because all who could had to fight the dragon to ensure that we wouldn’t be annihilated. Those who escaped to here and settled with the Ogre who had the same fate brought upon them. We allied with the demons, because it was natural to do so.”

“Why did the dragon attack our kind?”

“According to the elders there is a prophecy that there will be one day a child with horns on its forehead be born that will become the god of annihilation.”

“That will take ages. Your horns are pathetically small!”

“Why do you have such horns? Your a magician a disgrace! Your family would be disappointed, that you wasted your potential like this!”

“Well I did disappoint my family, but not because I became a magician. Enough of that I have no further questions.”

I stood up and left the Oni and walked out of the cells. The moment I was behind the first corner I bolted to the hidden door in the wall and quickly shifted through it, to hide in the hidden hallways. I didn’t want the two Onis to find these. I leisurely backtracked, through the hallways to my room. For that I followed some promising symbols and the magic beacon I had left in my room. On my way there I stumbled upon a small wine cellar and abducted some good locking bottles. Not all of them made it back into my room.

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