An awkward silence ensued as Ye Tian Yun stared back at the Elder who had just run back to the second floor, leaving him on his own.
Shaking his head with a wry smile, Ye Tian Yun entered the Third Floor.
The Thud Floor was smaller in comparison to the other two floors below it. But here, the design and placement of manuals were a bit different.
With the spiral stairway at the middle, acting as the gate to this floor, the area around it wasn't actually spacious, but rather there were many shelves and racks full of old and new manuals. These stacks of books were parallel to each other and in between were tables and chairs for disciples to sit and study.
The disciples here were mainly in Inner Court robes while few Core disciples were also studying.
Just in front of the stairway gate was a counter, where a manager was sitting, and in his hands was a big register, most probably to maintain the records.
As soon as Ye Tian Yun stepped on the Third Floor, the manager looked up and gestured at him to come forward, towards the counter.
When Ye Tian Yun came near, the manager asked him with an expressionless face, "Outer Disciples and Inner court disciples of peaks other than the Second peak are not allowed to enter. State your business."
Ye Tian Yun replied, "I wish to exchange my reward from the Inner Court Entrance Hunt with a chance to study manual from here. I have received consent from Elder Xie from the Second Floor."
"Oh? May I have a look at your token?"
Ye Tian Yun toom out his token and handed it over to the manager.
Seeing the token, the manager's face relaxed a bit, this time with a visible softness in his tone, he asked, "Oh, then please go ahead. You can study any manual present on this floor till dusk, however, just a soft reminder, you can't take any manual out of this floor, so don't waste much of your time."
"Yeah, this is the hundredth time I have heard this." Ye Tian Yun nodded while replying.
The manager ignored his response and asked, "Disciple, any specific manual you are looking for? Maybe I can help you out and save some of your time."
Ye Tian Yun smiled as he replied, "I am looking for manuals on the Arcane Path."
The manager pointed at the left corner shelf and said, "All books on Arcane Path can be found there."
Ye Tian Yun nodded and headed towards that direction.
He observed that this section was least crowded, with almost no disciple present at the desks to study the manuals.
When he reached the desk, near the shelf, he found a special notice stuck on it. It read:
[Arcane path is not a fully developed branch of cultivation and disciples shouldn't be arrogant, thinking that they can reach the heavens by practicing the manuals on this section.
P.s: Alchemy is easier than Arcane Cultivation.]
Ye Tian Yun read the notice. Then ignored it and moved forward.
The shelf wasn't a huge one, in fact, it was a bit small compared to the others on this floor.
Ye Tian Yun started to study and look for any 'special' manual on this shelf.
One by one, he flipped through the manuals in the hope to find something out of ordinary. However, it wasn't easy. Even though this shelf was the smallest, there were hundreds of manuals compressed in it as if the sect didn't wish to waste another shelf for manuals on the Arcane Path.
'Damn, I wish those informants had been more specific about this manual. So many incomplete manuals are here, but I can't find anything eye-catching.'
Ye Tian Yun continued to look through the manuals but nothing caught his eye. After about an hour or so, he started to have a bad feeling that the worse had happened and Xiao Ming was already in possession of that manual.
Still, suppressing his thoughts he continued to search. But except for a few old tattered manuals, nothing seemed very special.
'Even if Xiao Ming did take away that manual, how in the world did he choose it? Even if that manual wasn't in the sect records, he shouldn't have known about this loophole. How could it be that the book he randomly found wasn't in the sect records?'
Ye Tian Yun gritted his teeth in frustration as it was now afternoon and he didn't find the manual he was looking for.
'If I don't get this manual today, things will definitely get troublesome in the future.'
Ye Tian Yun knew that if he missed the manual, he would have to rethink his plans because Xiao Ming's plot armor will become thicker.
Plot armor. Yes, this is the term his informants gave to lucky encounters the members of God's Legion received in their younger days. And these encounters were not few. All members had at least two to three such encounters which affected their future in a better way and this did not include the Token and Emblems.
The only way Ye Tian Yun was going to stop God's Legion from rising once again was by destroying or taking away their plot armors.
He continued to browse through the shelf, however in the end, he had no results. Taking a deep breath, he sat on the chair near the desk.
'Damn it. To think I missed such an important task and ended up with nothing. I wish I knew we were allowed to take rewards as soon as the hunt ended, I wouldn't have waited for a whole night.'
Ye Tian Yun was now very frustrated. He now had to change his plans. And keep in mind that not all information he had was accurate.
While he was lost in his thoughts, he suddenly heard the movement of chairs in front of him. Raising his head, he found a beautiful girl in core disciple robes. This girl was quite familiar to him because he had seen her with the elders at the Inner Court Entrance Hunt.
She was Yuan Shuchun.