Chapter Thirty: Refusing to Admit It?

Yet after this round of transfers, Luan Shangyu still hadn’t discovered that person.

Standing atop the Sutra Repository, Luan Shangyu gazed mutely at the darkening horizon, lost in thought.

Elsewhere, Ye Han had already reached the periphery of the Sutra Repository.

He could sense more and more people in the vicinity.

“Will I be discovered if I enter the Sutra Repository at this hour?” Ye Han wandered aimlessly around the building. Whenever disciples of the Lunar Sect passed by, he would inconspicuously follow behind. He did this purely to mask his own movements, uncertain whether the thermal sensors here could intelligently track and analyze a person. The thermal sensors should not be able to remotely detect his features, so he needed to use the heat signatures of others to cloak his own.

“This pouch contains a sensory chip, probably implanted by the examinee upon arrival.” Ye Han touched the pouch at his waist, which, like his clothing, had been taken off someone else. If he wanted to entirely erase his tracks, he’d have to discard it. But what if he used the pouch to enter the Sutra Repository?

He quietly observed for a long while and realized the Sutra Repository was, in fact, open to all. Apart from an old man at the entrance with the air of a sweeping monk, the other guards were negligible. Moreover, disciples entered without any form of verification.

By rights, this made no sense—how could the heart of a sect’s legacy be so casually guarded?

“Should I take the gamble?” Ye Han licked his lips, hesitation flickering in his eyes, his heart torn. It was a game of psychological chess.

If he discarded the pouch, he could evade potential risks and sneak in at night when everyone was resting. It was a gamble. If the others were truly at rest, he could obtain what he wanted without revealing his abilities. The risk was exposure and, subsequently, tighter security.

If he kept the pouch, he could walk in openly, using it as cover. If he wasn’t stopped, he’d have plenty of time to ferry away the treasures. Even if discovered later, it would only expose his spatial jump ability, a price he could accept.

“Let’s gamble, then!” Ye Han glanced at the darkening sky. At this point, it was simply a matter of exposure or not. He didn’t even know the name of the disciple he’d killed, let alone wait at their dormitory until midnight. Now, within the Lunar Sect, he couldn’t just wander aimlessly, or he’d risk even greater exposure.

Ye Han was not one to hesitate. He acted as soon as he made up his mind.

While dusk still lingered, Ye Han strode straight toward the Sutra Repository.

The mountain peak housing the Repository was shorn in half, and the edifice stood proudly atop it. The sect’s Sutra Repository was vast, its ground floor spanning more than ten thousand square meters. There were seven stories in total, each ascending level smaller than the one below, the top floor barely more than a thousand square meters.

To call it a “pavilion” was a misnomer; it was more akin to a stone tower.

Ye Han hurried to the summit, standing before the Repository’s plaza, and looked up.

At this distance, the Sutra Repository appeared far more imposing than from the foot of the mountain. Its architecture resembled ancient Hua Xia structures, adorned with paintings and carvings, primarily traditional and solemn motifs. The sweeping eaves and layered brackets echoed one another in vibrant hues; around the edifice stretched a blue-stone corridor, adding to its austere grandeur.

Yet the building bore a peculiar flair. Its walls were constructed from pale golden monolithic stone, carved all over with mysterious runes. Under the night sky, faint glimmers of light flickered across them. Though Ye Han couldn’t determine the array’s function, he surmised it was defensive in nature.

“This is it—now or never!”

Ye Han set foot on the stone steps, his expression calm as he walked inside.

His senses now covered a ten-kilometer radius; nothing escaped his awareness. He was ready to flee at a moment’s notice.

On Xiyuan Star, an eighth-tier expert’s might was comparable to a nuclear blast; ninth-tier cultivators could suppress the world. In the face of such power, even with his spatial jump, Ye Han wasn’t entirely confident of escape.

Fortunately, Lunar Sect was only a branch of the Dongli Dynasty. The dynasty’s pinnacle was eighth tier; even if discovered, Ye Han’s odds of escape were better than half.

With a deep breath, Ye Han stepped inside.

The old man guarding the entrance didn’t even lift his eyelids, reclining leisurely on a bamboo chair, fanning himself with a broken plantain fan, the very picture of advanced age and indifference.

“Just like that?” Ye Han found it hard to believe. Without betraying a hint of emotion, he surveyed the interior.

The first floor was immense, bookshelves lining the walls in a great circle. At the center stood a winding wooden staircase spiraling upward to the second floor, though a door barred the way above.

“So the first floor isn’t very important after all,” Ye Han thought. Still, he didn’t mind. He began at the first shelf and methodically worked his way through, transmitting every word and diagram via the sigil on his chest to Chen Xu.

Meanwhile, Chen Xu, who hadn’t heard from Ye Han in half a month, dropped everything when the transmission came. He couldn’t comprehend the contents Ye Han sent, but the control chip in his clone faithfully relayed everything back. The data had to be routed through Hanlan Star, but Ye Han trusted Yan Qiluo could organize it all.

“To read every word and picture in a single book takes three seconds.”

As Ye Han flipped rapidly through the books, he kept his senses extended outside.

The cultivation manuals on Xiyuan Star ranged from a few hundred to ten thousand characters apiece, each book occupying its own compartment. Ye Han worked his way methodically upward, unafraid of repeats.

Despite the speed of his work, Ye Han’s nerves were taut. There were 85,857 books on the first floor alone. At three seconds per book, it would take him three days without pause or sustenance to finish.

“If only my senses could read the text directly!”

He swept past one shelf after another, fingers moving at lightning speed. Fortunately, it was night, and there were few disciples around. Otherwise, his frantic speed would surely draw suspicion.

But there was no other way. His senses could only distinguish books, not the contents of each page. In the world of his senses, it was all a blank expanse.

“If only these were all written in braille, I’d be done by now,” Ye Han complained, his fingers aching from the effort.

Time passed, and soon it was deep into the night. Ye Han had only managed to finish a dozen shelves. The monotony and repetition were exhausting; he had to expend precious energy to keep his body and mind at their peak.

As he became increasingly absorbed, he failed to notice the sigil’s position had changed drastically.

Atop the Sutra Repository, Luan Shangyu twirled her pen with an odd expression. Moonlight flowed like water through her hair, casting a lonely, cold shadow in the loft.

This fellow came all this way just for the books in the Sutra Repository?

Luan Shangyu found it hard to believe.

Someone in the Ninth Sequence harbored such an outlandish obsession!

When Ye Han first entered the Repository, she hadn’t paid attention. But as he quickly flipped through the manuals, he became impossible to ignore.

As night deepened, the Lunar Sect’s disciples gradually left the Repository. Now, only she and Ye Han remained inside. As for the old guard at the entrance, he was oblivious to what happened within.

The runic arrays carved into the Repository provided not just defense but also flight suppression, dust-repelling, soundproofing, and sensory isolation. Without these formations, Ye Han’s erratic actions would have had him dragged out for interrogation long ago.

Watching him switch shelves again, Luan Shangyu shifted her position, adjusting the sigil’s orientation with equal cooperation.

“I want to see how long you can keep this up!” she thought, biting her lip, her senses locked firmly on Ye Han.

The unknown made her uneasy, but now that she understood his purpose, she felt oddly calm. The sect’s manuals held no value for unlocking the gene lock; to her, they were as useless as scrap paper.

Ye Han’s relentless pilfering didn’t bother her. If anything, she was curious about his endurance.

Time flowed, days and nights turned. Three days passed without rest, and even with his energy restored, Ye Han felt spent. His fingers, after three days of constant motion, had developed small, hardened muscles.

“Maybe I should rest…”

Returning the last book to the shelf, his vision swam with stars, a wave of exhaustion washing over him. And this was only the first floor—six remained, with tens of thousands of shelves and more than two hundred thousand manuals yet to be read. The thought left him dizzy.

“No, I have to persevere!”

Gritting his teeth, Ye Han looked up at the stairs to the second floor and started up.

The first floor’s books were only half cultivation manuals; the rest were records of strange tales, alchemy, and artifact forging. Judging by the data he’d scanned, the quality of the manuals here was middling—not common, but far from rare. Ordinary, varied, but easily mastered if cultivated.

This was precisely what Earth needed.

Quantity could spark qualitative change. These meager foundations were indispensable.

Ye Han believed, if he could successfully transfer the upper floors’ manuals back, Earth could make great strides in the realm of mystical arts. If, in the future, he could gather more sects’ records, then with big data and Earthly ingenuity, they might blaze their own trail in this domain.