Chapter 1: Wishing Woe Unto You

"Mr Shi, I've printed out the requests that we've received through our website and email, and left them on your table for your review," said Secretary Zhou as she got up from her seat upon seeing Shi Ruijie enter the museum's office.

Shi Ruijie nodded lazily in her direction. "Got it. Thanks for your help."

"Director Shi said to remind you to be serious when reviewing the requests. He said that if you—"

Opening the door to his temporary office, Shi Ruijie could not help but interrupt her repetitive nagging. "Yes, I know. Accept requests with donations, requests which are beneficial to Shibao Ge and requests from individuals with credentials; and reject requests that are of little value to us."

Hearing the young man spout these reckless words, Secretary Zhou started to protest in alarm but Shi Ruijie had already closed the door behind him.

Picking up the stack of requests, Shi Ruijie started sifting through them to separate the legitimate requests from the frivolous ones. Shibao Ge, also known as Shibao Pavilion, was a museum in the middle of the huge city which was well-known for its vast collection of antique books. While some sections of Shibao Pavilion were opened to the public, there were still many old buildings filled with shelves and shelves of antique books that were closed off and only accessible by curators and researchers of the museum. Occasionally, the management of Shibao Pavilion granted a few individuals permission to access these forbidden grounds.

To gain entry into Shibao Pavilion as one such special visitor, one would have to submit a request to the museum. Once such a request is submitted, the museum staff would take a look at the requests before selecting those with very persuasive reasons. For example, many distinguished academics and professors had previously been granted access to the private collections of rare and antique books for research purposes. On the other hand, antique collectors and treasure hunters who merely wanted to satisfy their curiosity were usually denied their requests.

As someone who was bound to takeover the management of Shibao Pavilion one day, Shi Ruijie was ordered by his father to work at the museum every time it was summer break. One of his daily tasks was to evaluate the requests to access the unauthorised areas of the compound. 

He was busy glancing through a request made by a broadcasting company, which wanted to film a documentary on ancient texts, when his desk phone rang.

"Hello?" He picked up the phone with one hand while scribbling down a note at the bottom of the page with the other before placing the request in the tray for requests that required further consideration and discussions.

"Mr Shi, Miss Qian is calling again today. She wishes to speak to you," Secretary Zhou relayed her message in a very neutral tone, careful not to sound too exasperated.

Eyes narrowing upon hearing that name, Shi Ruijie felt his forehead break out in cold sweat. Ever since her request to browse certain antique books from Shibao Pavilion for research purposes was rejected a week ago, third-year university student, Qian Siyu, had been making calls to Shibao Pavilion's office daily. All the times that she had called, Shi Ruijie had been on site at the museum grounds. Being out of office, he had dodged multiple bullets. However, this time it looked like he just had to bite the bullet.

"Alright," he sighed audibly, "just put her through. I'll explain it to her."

The line beeped once before connecting to the other line.

"Hello, is this Shi Ruijie-xuezhang?" A melodious and gentle voice rang out on the other end. Shi Ruijie's original image of Miss Qian as a loud, demanding young woman cracked instantly.

His ears perked up at the words she used to address him. So it was a junior sister who had done her homework and knew who she was reaching out to. "Are you a junior from university?"

"Yes, I'm also a History major," she replied without missing a beat. Skipping all the pleasantries, she dived straight to the issue. "I just wanted to know why my request to review those three books I had listed down was rejected."

Shi Ruijie inhaled deeply before reciting the same lines he had repeated so many times before to so many others before her. "You must understand that access to our private collection has to be extremely restricted to protect the antique books. As such, we review the requests very strictly according to our internal policy. There has to be a substantial reason for the access to the collection."

"But, I've heard that a few scholars and professors managed to obtain access to Shibao Ge's private collection previously to conduct their research. I'm preparing for my thesis paper and so I had hoped that I'd be able to look at those books as part of my research. Due to the nature of my thesis, there are many references made to ancient texts—many of which are no longer in circulation in the public domain. I've tried visiting a few other museum libraries and have found some of the books which I needed, but there are still a few that I haven't located. I was told by the librarians that I could find those books in Shibao Ge's private collection—"

Shi Ruijie's mind had slightly drifted off in the middle of her lengthy appeal. He looked at another request at the top of his pile before chucking it into the tray of rejected requests, as if he were a sorting machine at a factory. It was yet another request from yet another university student who wanted access to the ancient books for research purposes. His eyes swept over the pile of rejected requests—most of them were similar requests from university students.

There was silence at the other end of the line and he took it as his cue to speak. "We're really sorry, but Shibao Ge's policy is that your request will have to be accompanied by a recommendation letter from your faculty before it will be considered. Why don't you ask whichever professor is supervising your thesis paper to write the recommendation letter?"

"Huh? But that's not what I heard." The voice on the other end of the line suddenly grew urgent.

"What do you mean?"

"Didn't you approve Zhang Liwen's request last week even though she didn't have a recommendation letter either?"

"Zhang Liwen?" Scratching the back of his head, Shi Ruijie tried to place a face to the somewhat familiar name. After a brief pause, he heard himself say: "Ah, you mean the student whose family owns ZT Electronics? We did reject Miss Zhang Liwen's request. But ZT Electronics also submitted a request, and it was their's that was approved."

"What does an electronics company have to do with antique books?"

"Well, if your family can donate a huge sum of money to our museum as well, then the VIP green lane will be opened to you anytime. Otherwise, if you have any relatives or connections who are reputable figures in society that can act as your sponsor, that would do as well."

It was only when he heard the girl on the line draw in a sharp gasp that he realised his words may have been rather inappropriate. First, it painted Shibao Pavilion as a money grubbing organisation (when it was not); and secondly, it may have sounded quite elitist and insensitive—especially if Miss Qian was just an ordinary, humble citizen.

"Thank you for your time. But xuezhang, I would like to leave with you a friendly piece of advice before I hang up." The previously warm sounding voice turned chilly all of a sudden. In a slow but calm manner, the girl uttered something before hanging up the phone.

Hearing the disconnected tone, Shi Ruijie's mind went blank. On their own, her every word was polite and innocent; but when strung together, they sounded like some sort of curse casted over him.

"Measuring a person's value with money or authority? You'll regret it some day."

***

That evening, Shi Ruijie returned home to find a parcel addressed to him sitting on his study desk. It was from an anonymous sender and had no return address. Upon asking his housekeeper about the origins of the mysterious parcel, his housekeeper said that she had thought it was a delivery for something that he had purchased online.

Feeling through the plastic wrapping cautiously, he had an inkling of what the object could be—a book. Three books to be exact. Strange, though. He was not expecting any deliveries today.

The books were written by Yu Juan, an author he was not familiar with. However, the title of one of his or her books did ring a bell... It sounded like the title of a web drama series which was currently being promoted online.

Picking up one of the books at random, Shi Ruijie studied the cover carefully. Untold Stories Under a Vast and Magnificent Sky. The art design on the book cover instantly informed him that it was likely a historical fiction novel. The blurb was less informative, being only a couple of lines of dialogue with zero context. Curiously, he flipped over the cover to the first chapter:

Under the vast and magnificent skies of Great Tang, a group of seemingly insignificant ordinary folks band together to forge a future of hope, peace and fulfilled dreams. This is a story about a group of youths with a love for their homeland, who by some reason of fate found themselves working together to fight against the corruption and greediness of those with power. It all began in a small idyllic town, some distance west of the capital Chang'an...

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