LRAB Chapter 118 Midnight Operation: The Library Heist and the Silent Punishment
Chapter 118 Midnight Operation: The Library Heist and the Silent Punishment
In a suite on the top floor of the Imperial Hotel in Tokyo, night had fallen, and the hustle and bustle of the city outside the window was gradually fading. Lin Yan stood in front of the floor-to-ceiling window, overlooking this city reborn after the war, but his gaze was as cold as a blade.
"Is everything ready?"
"Young Master, all ready." Lin Gang and Wang Yuling stood respectfully behind Lin Yan, while Lin Er stood slightly forward. The four of them had already changed into dark casual clothes that were easy to move in.
With a slight movement of his divine sense, Lin Yan summoned four detailed maps of Tokyo onto the table—these were "borrowed" from a stationery store near the hotel that was still open.
"The route is planned." Lin Er's finger swept across the map, accurately marking four points. "From closest to furthest, they are: Seikado Bunko Art Museum, Institute for Oriental Culture at the University of Tokyo, National Diet Library of Japan, and finally, the Institute for Research in Humanities at Kyoto University in Kyoto."
Lin Yan glanced at the map; the route was clear and logical. "Kyoto is a bit far. On the way back, I'll test the effects of the newly crafted 'Thousand-Mile Instantaneous Talisman.' Let's go, first stop: Seikado Bunko Art Library."
The four affixed invisibility talismans, their figures vanishing from the room instantly, as if merging into thin air. The next moment, they had quietly appeared on the hotel rooftop. The night wind was biting, and with a thought from Lin Yan, a barely perceptible stream of light flashed, and the four swayed slightly before landing steadily on the enlarged flying sword.
"Go!" Lin Yan shouted, and his flying sword silently sliced through the night sky, hurtling toward the first target.
First stop: Seikado Bunko (Setagaya Ward, Tokyo)
The Seikado Bunko is nestled in a quiet residential area. It is a Western-style brick and stone building with Meiji-era features, red brick walls, and arched windows. Under the moonlight, it appears simple and solemn, surrounded by trees, creating a serene environment.
The four invisible figures landed like ghosts in front of the library's tightly closed doors. There was a guardhouse at the entrance, but the guard was dozing off. Lin Yan's divine sense flowed like mercury, instantly penetrating the entire building's interior. Its structure, the layout of the books, and even the combination lock on the vault were all clearly presented in his mind.
"That saves us trouble." Lin Yan sneered. He didn't even need to enter; his powerful divine sense, like an invisible giant hand, directly covered the entire library!
Inside the library, the ancient books, scrolls, and cases on the shelves—whether they were placed on ordinary bookshelves or treasured in temperature- and humidity-controlled safes—whether they were Song Dynasty editions, Yuan Dynasty editions, Ming Dynasty manuscripts, or even Japanese national treasures such as the old manuscript of the Nihon Shoki and Fujiwara no Teika's manuscripts, all of them trembled slightly at this moment, as if drawn by an invisible force.
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"Receive!" Lin Yan silently chanted in his heart.
In the next instant, a faint light flashed, and thousands of books, along with their dedicated bookshelves, temperature-controlled cabinets, and even catalog card cabinets, vanished without a trace, as if erased from reality by an eraser! The vast library was instantly empty, leaving only faint traces of dust on the floor and the lingering scent of ink in the air.
All these carriers of knowledge and history have been moved unharmed to a huge storage area specially designated within the space, where they are neatly stacked and categorized.
The entire process took only a few breaths, completely silent, and the guards outside didn't even notice anything unusual.
Second stop: Institute of Oriental Culture, University of Tokyo (Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo)
The flying sword arrived in an instant. The building housing the Institute of Oriental Culture was more modern, a five- or six-story reinforced concrete building, square and orderly, exuding the rigorous atmosphere of an academic institution. At this moment, only a few offices inside were still lit, perhaps where professors or students were working late into the night.
But this did not hinder Lin Yan in the slightest. In their invisible state, they hovered outside the building. Lin Yan's spiritual power far exceeded ordinary people's imagination, easily penetrating the walls and the metal partitions of the vault, bringing every corner of the building under his control.
The same scene unfolded once again. All the books in the institute's library and archives, whether ordinary books in the public reading area or rare books from the National Library of China in Beiping, collectors in Jiangnan, rare books marked with "special origin," local chronicles, precious archives, research materials on oracle bone inscriptions and bronzes, as well as a large number of Japanese Oriental studies research documents and unpublished academic manuscripts... were all stripped from their original places and placed into the space in an instant.
Even the dusty old file folders, microfilm readers, and preserved film reels in the basement archives were all meticulously examined. Lin Yan's goal was to achieve a complete "generational break," so naturally he wouldn't overlook any form of knowledge carrier.
Third stop: National Diet Library of Japan (Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo)
As the national library, the new Library of Congress building was not yet completed at this time (the old building was located in the Red Brick Hall), but its collection was enormous. The vast stacks were like an ocean of knowledge.
Faced with such a massive target, Lin Yan remained unfazed. He hovered above the main library building, unleashing his divine sense power, comparable to that of a Golden Core cultivator, which instantly enveloped the entire library and its attached stacks like a vast, intricate net!
Whether it was ordinary books in the open lending area, precious documents in the closed stacks, or even materials being cataloged and organized internally, and various documents received after the war… all paper-based media disappeared at the same time. Stacks were emptied at an alarming rate, as if the books had never existed. This included a large amount of materials looted from various parts of Asia during the war, which were now uprooted.
Fourth stop: Institute for Research in Humanities, Kyoto University (Sakyo Ward, Kyoto City)
"It's a bit far, try this." Lin Yan took out four newly crafted talismans and distributed them to the three of them. The talismans shimmered with silver light and contained the power of spatial fluctuations—the Thousand-Mile Instantaneous Talisman.
As their spiritual energy surged, the four figures distorted slightly in the Tokyo night sky, and in the next instant, they appeared in the quiet night sky of the ancient capital of Kyoto. Below them lay the campus of Kyoto University, built against the mountainside, with the Institute for Research in Humanities being an academic building characteristic of the Showa era.
Following the same method, he used his divine sense to cover the entire area, pinpoint the location, and then—collected everything! Whether it was rare Chinese classics, historical texts, philosophical works, or research notes by Japanese sinologists, or academic materials accumulated by the Kyoto School, all the crystallization of knowledge on the bookshelves and in the cabinets was swept away.
After the operation concluded, the four used the Instantaneous Transmission Talisman once more to silently return to the penthouse suite of the Imperial Hotel in Tokyo, as if they had never left.
Standing in the room, Lin Yan's consciousness sank into the space, looking at the treasure trove of documents that had instantly piled up like a mountain, enough to drive any scholar crazy. Finally, a cold and satisfied smile appeared on the corner of his mouth.
"Alright, now it's peaceful." He said calmly, "Without these foundations, I think their culture and scholarship will regress by many years. After all, there are no e-books in this day and age."
After tonight, Japan's four major collections of historical documents will simultaneously discover a devastating and supernatural theft—not just the loss of a few rare items, but the complete disappearance of all their books, regardless of value or type, with no signs of forced entry or any clues left behind, as if the books had never existed.
This will become the most thorough, bizarre, and inexplicable gap in Japanese cultural history. And the one who started all of this is now lying peacefully asleep in the luxurious bed of the Imperial Hotel, waiting for the sun to rise tomorrow.