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.
Chapter 32: Uninformed Elves - 32
After a while, Queen Penny managed to calm down and accept what she was seeing. After all, she had seen some crazy things recently and was getting used to it. Unfortunately, not all the elves were able to accept what they were seeing.
As Zhou Fan and the rest were walking back to the palace, they saw many limp bodies. They were not dead, but simply passed out with fear. It could be concluded that they had seen the beasts earlier.
When they made it back to the palace, the elders had the same reaction to the beasts as Penny. At first, they almost passed out, but once they thought about yesterday's events, they quickly accepted it.
Zhou Fan went inside and made conversations with the elves. After a while, they realized Zhou Fan truly had no intentions of taking them over. Soon, all earlier tensions were resolved. Zhou Fan even admitted that he had over reacted earlier. Soon, the elves started asking him questions.
"How did you get down here?" The eldest elf from earlier asked.
"We went through the tunnels. I'm not sure why, but the snakes don't attack me or them." Zhou Fan said while pointing at the beasts.
"WHAT!" The group of elves collectively exclaimed.
"In that case, is it possible for you to bring us out of here?" One of the elves excitedly questioned.
"I could, but it would be far too troublesome. Not to mention, you all have no place up there. Although much time has passed, the grudge between our races still exists. Why else would you have prepared for an attack the moment I came here." Zhou Fan said.
At first, he had believed that the queen was just naturally wary of him due to the prophecy, however, after reading the books in the library, he came to the conclusion that she instinctually disliked him. After all, the elves alongside the other races ruled over humans like slavemasters for thousands of years. There was naturally some hatred when they were dethroned.
Of course, Zhou Fan didn't exactly hold a grudge against them. It had been thousands of years. And although he believed that few or even no humans knew of the past war, nothing can remain a secret forever.
The elves shut up when hearing that. To his surprise, the majority had confused looks on their faces. It was as if they had no idea about the grudge he was talking about.
Seeing that, Zhou Fan looked at Penny for an explanation.
She had a troubled look on her face as she started to talk.
"Well, most elves nowadays don't know about the cause of our demise. In fact, most of the people don't even know what a human is. The only reason everyone in this room does is because they were educated. However, they were only taught that there was a war and not what or who caused it." She explained.
"In fact, the war is the shame of the elves. To some it is shameful that we lost, to others, the cause is shameful. Either way, it is only passed down to some by their parents. But after all this time, the hatred has mostly disappeared." She continued.
Hearing that, Zhou Fan was enlightened.
"Well I understand, but other humans may not. In the end, I am only one member of the human race." Zhou Fan said. "However, at some point, I can consider freeing the elf race, but my current residence doesn't exactly have the capacity for 129 people."
"How about one," Queen Penny spoke up.
Zhou Fan looked at her with an inquiring gaze, wondering where she was going.
"One of us could go up and live with you. We could learn about the current world and understand the human race." She explained.
"I guess you could theoretically do it, but I assume you all have close to zero interaction skills with people you don't know."
Hearing his words, the elves nodded their heads.
"We'll have to do it at some point. At that time, wouldn't it be better to have a guide?" Queen Penny said.
"I suppose I could do that, but which of you will come?" Zhou Fan asked.
After hearing him, the elves started to talk among each other. Zhou Fan on the other hand started to think.
'It's been a while, the weekend should be ending and I need to get back so I can work' Zhou Fan thought. Even though he wanted to continue to explore the tunnels further, Zhou Fan had a job. In fact, Zhou Fan had almost considered quitting. However, he still needed money.
'Even as a cultivator, I am restricted by human needs.' He thought.
"Okay," Queen Penny said. " We have decided on three candidates. Me, Mark, or Yipeng."
Yipeng was the name of the oldest elf who had mocked the angry elf from earlier. Without hesitation, he chose Yipeng.
Firstly, Mark had a family to take care of. Zhou Fan had found that out as they were walking to the elf village. As for Penny, not only was she the queen and needed to rule over her people, but she also seemed like a needy person.
Also, Yipeng looked quiet and calm. Zhou Fan predicted that he could essentially leave him to his own thing and he would make plenty of friends.
"Okay then, good luck Yipeng." The elf queen said.
After they all wished him good luck, Zhou Fan mentioned that he needed to head back to the surface. After declining their invitation to eat, Zhou Fan left with the beasts and Yipeng following him. He had declined their invitation due to the fact that they were vegetarians. It wasn't because they refused to eat meat, but because the animals would quickly go extinct if they tried to feed 129 people meat everyday.
It was different for the beasts because there were only 5 of them and they ate moderately.
They all quickly made it back to the tunnel he had first come through. Although Yipeng had some fear, he was willing to go when the snakes created a path. Before long, they made it back to the beasts cave. Zhou Fan bid farewell as he and Yipeng flew up to the surface. Of course, Zhou Fan was dragging Yipeng along, who was almost fainting from fright.
When they made it back, Zhou Fan grabbed a hat and handed it to Yipeng. He would need it to hide his ears after all.
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