Chapter 30: Hidden Entrance- 30
"W-w-what are you?" The elf queen managed to stutter out.
"I am a cultivator. No. I am The cultivator." Zhou Fan said, putting an emphasis on 'The'. Although he had no proof that he was the only cultivator, it didn't matter. He felt it in his soul, he was the first cultivator. If he was wrong, so be it.
By the elf queen's expression, you could tell she had no idea what he was talking about.
"... We submit." She unwillingly said. Although she had no idea what a cultivator was, she was intimidated enough to accept her fate.
"Kneel to the new king." The elf queen said to her surrounding elves. Although the elves had unwilling expressions, they too didn't have the heart to resist.
However, as they were falling to their knees, Zhou Fan spoke out.
"I am not your king," he said. "I have no intention to control or affect you in any way. Just don't try to fight against me."
Zhou Fan looked at the elf queen and spoke.
"Do you have a library?" "Yes," she responded.
"Take me there," Zhou Fan commanded.
The elf queen wasted no time and led him out of the palace. As soon as they left, the elves in the palace let out a breath of relief.
"Why was he calling us elves," one of the elf men said.
"If you're asking me, who should I ask," another elf responded.
"I believe he has named our race that," the oldest elf in the room commented.
"Preposterous!" One of the elves angrily exclaimed. "We are the proud valeks! How dare he change the name of our race!" He angrily shouted.
"Oh," the old elf sounded. "So are you going to tell him that? Why didn't you tell him to his face while he was forcing you to the ground earlier." He mockingly said.
The angry elf deflated and lowered his head. Deep inside, he knew that if Zhou Fan called them the elves, no one would dare resist.
"Maybe 'elf' isn't a bad name," one of the elves said in an attempt to keep some pride.
The rest looked at him understandingly and sounded out their agreement.
As they were talking, Zhou Fan followed the elf queen to the world tree.
"Why are we here?" He said, confused.
"You'll see," the elf queen said, trying to seem mysterious.
The world tree had a perimeter of about 300 feet. Therefore, there was a backside that was outside of the elf village. In fact, that entire area is considered a forbidden zone according to Mark.
The elf queen made her way to that area. Although the passerby's were astonished to see the elf queen roaming about, none stopped their journey.
It wasn't long before they made their way to a hill right behind the world tree. The elf queen went to a seemingly normal stone and pressed down on it.
"The library is sacred. Even I rarely go to it. Therefore, it has to stay hidden." She said.
Zhou Fan was confused why she pressed the stone. After pressing the first one, she went around pressing stones in a seemingly random fashion.
On the twentieth stone a creaking noise was heard. All of a sudden, a 4 foot by 4 foot area on the ground opened up like an entrance to an outside basement.
Zhou Fan was dumbfounded. This was the first time he had seen something like this.
"It works similar to a gate bridge." She said.
Zhou Fan recalled that the gate bridge was a bridge that could be drawn upwards and then lowered by a pulley. It was usually featured over a pit of lava in story books.
"Of course, it's 100x more advanced than that." She said smugly.
Although Zhou Fan had the urge to slap her, he just stood there and watched as she walked down the stairs under the hidden entrance. He soon followed.
Zhou Fan and the elf queen went down about 100 feet before the stairs came to a stop. In front of them, there was a long narrow hallway lit up by torches on the walls.
The elf queen grabbed the nearest wall torch and led Zhou Fan down the hallway. They walked around 100 feet before a big door appeared. Zhou Fan now estimated that they were directly under the world tree.
The elf queen walked over to the side of the door and pulled a big lever. When she did, the big door opened.
"Now this is closer to the gate bridge." She said.
Zhou Fan ignored her and walked in front of her. When he entered, he saw bookshelves lining the wall. There was no natural light, yet there were so many torches that the room was without a hint of darkness. There were roots along the ceiling and a giant one pierced directly through the middle.
"Wait," Zhou Fan suddenly stopped and said. "How are all these torches lit?"
Zhou Fan was confused. The elf queen said that she rarely came down here, therefore, it was weird that both the hallway and this room were lit.
"Ah yes." She said. "A long time ago, we elves created a substance that could burn for 2 years before it had to be replaced. We considered the invention of the ages. However, it is extremely hard to make. It took an equivalent of 1 million gold coins to make a batch the size of a barrel. Luckily, the prior elf empire was so rich that they made thousands of barrels. We are still relying on those today. Every two years, I come down here and re-light the torches." She used the word elf instead of valek due to Zhou Fan's earlier words.
2 years! 1 million gold coins! Thousand of barrels!
The more she talked, the more Zhou Fan was amazed. Something that could burn for two years! Who could make something like that? A million gold was more than an average kingdom's treasury would contain. Also, thousands of barrels meant billions of gold coins!
You would need to combine the treasury of 3 or 4 of the top 10 empires to have that amount.
"Wait," Zhou Fan stopped. "Elf empire?"
He thought he heard her say such a thing earlier.
"Indeed. Read through the library, you will find everything about the elves here."
Nodding, Zhou Fan looked around. By quick estimations, there were 2000 bookshelves here. Zhou Fan inwardly prepared himself and got ready to read.
Chapter 31: The Human War - 31
Zhou Fan walked over to the left side of the library.
"The left side and the middle contain information about the elves' history. The right side has the elves' research, the geography at the time, and many many other things."
Zhou Fan nodded his head at her and picked up the first book on the first bookshelf. He finished it very quickly and moved on to the next one.
It wasn't long before he had finished the first bookshelf.
As he continued on, the elf queen, Penny, had a dumbfounded expression on her face. She had never seen someone flip through a book for a couple seconds then move on to the next. Many thoughts filled her mind. At first, she thought he was playing a joke on her. However, when he didn't stop she threw that theory away. She then thought that maybe he wasn't all there. Perhaps his brain had suffered damage as a child.
However, she then thought of his incredible acts earlier.
'Perhaps he is actually reading all those books!' She thought.
'Maybe it is a perk of being a... a cultivator?' She continued. She had almost forgot the word he had used earlier.
After 100 bookshelves, Zhou Fan was feeling surreal. The information he had gained in these few minutes changed his world view. The info dated back to thousands of years ago. The earliest record he had read in the Yang Lang library was 500 years old.
Maybe it's because the older information is on higher floors?
Nevertheless, Zhou Fan kept reading. And reading. And reading.
Zhou Fan didn't stop for 33 hours. By that time, the elf queen had taken multiple naps and food breaks.
In fact, it only took Zhou Fan that long because the book's conditions were old and he had to be extra careful. Afterwards, many of his unanswered questions were solved.
Firstly, Zhou Fan wondered where the prophecies came from. It turns out, when the elves moved down here, the oldest tribe member said it. However, there was nothing magical about it. It was simply a logical prediction according to her own words.
Speaking of the elves coming down here, they did so a whopping 3500 years ago. For reference, the oldest current empire was the war empire ranked 2nd. Although he had seen no records, rumor says that it was founded 1500 years ago.
However, that was not all he found in the library. He had also learned about the elf empire and the other empires at the time. In fact, the other empires were also ran by different races. For example, the barbarian tribe ranked 1st. It was composed of a race that called themselves 'Barbarians.' Each barbarian was at least 6 foot and 200 pounds.
However, they suffered from the same problem as the elves. Reproduction rates. It was said for every 100 attempts, 3 babies would be successfully born. Even at their peak, the barbarian tribe only had 100,000 members. In fact, every top race at the time had the same issue.
That was the only reason why humans would end up on top. Zhou Fan also learned about what was referred to as the human war by elves.
Humans used to be considered as the weakest race due to their innate blandness. However, they had one thing other top races did not. Incredible reproduction rates. Before the human war, the estimated human population was 100 million!
The top races, seeing this, decided that they could become a threat and tried to eliminate them. However, they were too late. A human had risen up and secretly inspired the race to revolt. His name was Lu Bing. He was later referred to as the freedom king. Back then, the human race was reluctant to go against the top races. What opened the floodgates was the massacre of humans from fear that they would grow too powerful.
Unknown to the top races, they were already far too powerful. The first uprising happened quickly. Humans had taken out the top races' branches. After the first success, other human settlements started an uprising. The final battle began not long after and the leader was none other than freedom king Li Bing. Although outnumbered a million to 100 million, the top races put up an incredible fight. However, in the end, numbers won. The 10 races were beaten to escaping and fleeing to unknown places, likely assumed to have been killed. Afterwards, the human race ruled the world as the only sentient race left.
One question that Zhou Fan had was why hadn't he heard of this. However, he recalled the records of the greatest human libraries being burnt or destroyed 2500 years ago. Many records had been lost.
Also the humans had not spared even a bit of the buildings of the 10 races. Libraries, castles, and houses were burnt to ashes. Then, their ashes were burnt again.
Zhou Fan had also learned of the inventor of the 2 year burning substance. However, he died in the war and all records of the substance's creation were destroyed.
Surprisingly, he found no records of the beasts. Not even legends. He had also seen no records of the underground caves. When he asked queen penny, she said that they randomly stumbled upon this place while retreating. The surviving elf members had ran through the snake tunnels since it was their only hope of survival. Most had died, and out of 1000 runners, 30 survived. Just from that, it can be seen how terrifying the snake tunnels are.
That sums up the most important information down here. After reading it all. Zhou Fan went back outside the hidden area.
However, when the doors were opening up, he saw a familiar face.
"Xiaolong!" Zhou Fan said.
As soon as Zhou Fan stepped out of the hidden area, Xiaolong coiled around him in what seemed like a hug. Of course, the other beasts weren't an exception.
Queen penny was almost shocked to death when she saw the beasts. It has to be remembered, they were each the size of elephants. It's actually incredible that she didn't pass out. At the very least, she was a trained queen.
Weekly Power Status
200+ Power
Ranking 
121 Power
stone 
Paragraph comment