Royal Academy/Library

The Royal Academy Library is located in the Royal Academy and managed by Solange. It is said to have the most reading materials out of all libraries in the country bar one.

Once the library opens with the beginning of the classes new students are allowed to register at the library. This would grant them permission to enter the library and borrow books. There is a registration fee of one small gold per student. The introduction for new students would proceed according to the duchy's ranking and after that it is freely accessible.

If a student decides to register at the library, they have to get in touch with a librarian. The current librarian Solange prefers to register many student at once, making new students of the same duchy getting an appointment together. The librarian would hand out a wooden board acting as invitation to register at the library. When arriving at the library there is an opening in the door meant for the wooden board to be put in. It would inform the librarian of the arrival of unregistered students and open itself.

Behind the first door lies a bright hallway ending in a second door illuminated by the sun shining through the windows. The librarian would await the students behind the second door. Another door towards the left would lead to the reading room, the heart of the library. The registration would be executed in the librarian's office which is located to the right.

The Library is split into two floors.

To make sure that even students deeply absorbed in their reading do not miss the sound of the bells by accident, the library has a magic tool that shines multicoloured light down on the entire place at the chime of the bells.

Spoiler for Part 4 Volume 2 According to the estimation of the current librarian Professor Solange, including the ones in storage for preservation, the library currently holds between thirty- and fourty-thousand books and documents.

The library employs a number of magic tools both for protection of the books and documents and for convenience. These include tools to manage humidity, protect from sunlight and employ lights that are syncronized to the academy's bells. Currently only the most vital magic tools are active, since Professor Solange lacks the mana capacity to keep the full complement running all on her own.

The books on the shelves, save for the chained books on the second floor, can all be borrowed and brought from the library to the dormitories for a deposit. It is also possible to request the librarians to bring material from storage, but those may not be taken out of the library and can only be read within it's halls.

It is relatively common for students that aim for a career at the academy itself to start out as assistants to professors. Being sent to the library for errants is often one of the first duties fulfilled by such freshly minted assistants.

The first floor is where the main entrance and counter are located. Off to the side are office-facilities for the staff. Going straight ahead from the entrance leads into the reading room and then the library proper, containing the bookshelves and carrels, providing the students with spots for reading and working on copies. Spoiler for Part 4 Volume 2 The first floor holds an estimated twenty-thousand books and documents - ranging from simple wooden borads to bound and leather-covered books - dealing mostly with subjects lending themselves as study ressources. There is however also a small corner in which story books and bibles are kept. Due to most students and even many professors considering the academy library as a place only for studying and research, few ever learn of the existence of this corner and show open surprise if they end up finding out by change.

Spoiler for Part 4 Volume 2 The second floor consists mainly of three-layers bookcases with attached writing desks. While some contain regular books, there are also many that contain barrels with scrolls and there are also bookcases with chained books. Unlike most other shelves, in these the books are put horizontally. The reason is that the metal plates and rivets used to chain the books to the shelves could damage the neighboring books if pulled out carelessly, so they are put on stacks on top of each other, so the readers are forced to carefully lift the desired book off, without a chance to scrape the others. The chains are only long enough to reach to the attached desk. This way of storing in addition to leather belts around the books also helps to prevent the parchament of their pages from swelling if exposed moisture.

This floor holds mostly material pertaining the reseach from past professors. Since many of these materials were written by professors while they were doing the research, few tooks the time, effort and tedium of transcribing their findings and binding them into proper books, preferring to instead just write everything down on scrolls.

Apart from the bookcases, the second floor also contains a big statue of the Goddess of Wisdom Mestionora and the living quarters of the library staff.


 * To reach the library one has to leave the central building and walk south.
 * The building for the specialised course for apprentice knights is the furthest away from the library out of all three specialised courses.