The rest of the day flew by. Julia spent her day with Tobias reading and giggling about the contents of their books. After dinner passed Julia went back to her room, but on the way, she passed the library. She peeked in and matched her enjoyment she saw that no one was there. 

 Julia came into the room with only one section in mind, information on the history of the empire and the goddess. Julia ran her hands across the textbooks' soft spines, the gold lettering glittering in the setting sun. She had favored one thing about this library and it was that it was only one of three libraries that remained uncensored. Meaning that she and her family had access to almostall information without the annoyance of the empire's propaganda. The only other libraries that have such information happened just to be the royal family’s and the church. Both of them are much larger and have a bit more in-depth information on their subjects. Julia’s family just happens to be the smaller in between. After a bit of searching, Julia found the needed books and, feeling satisfied took her books with her back to her room. 

Once she made it back to her room she immediately went to work. She rushed to her desk and cleared off the contents to make room for the copious amounts of research she was going to go through. She spent hours reading her books making annotations on the pages where she needed her information writing things on separate pieces of paper and pinning each to her wall. This consumed her night and her attention, all of this new information fascinated her. Julia was able to learn things that the novel never provided. Things about the goddess and the royal family’s history.

After toiling away for hours into the night, Julia stepped back to look at her work. Seeing dozens upon dozens of notes on her wall all tied together with one central note as a stand-in for the soon-to-be saintess. In which Julia only has five more years until she officially steps into the novel. At the top of the mess is the pile containing all about the church. 

As far as Julia knew the church is meant to be the only thing in the empire that stands for peace and no more bloodshed which they claim is “the will of the goddess”. But the uncensored texts said otherwise. The church acts as an under-the-table help to the royal family. 

Next was the royal family, it is common knowledge that this empire would be not what it is without the spilled blood of our enemies. But it fails to mention the previous emperor's lust for power and blood, and the fact they spilled anyone blood to get what they want. Which is only the surface of the lore of this world. In the novel the only exception to the horrible emperors was the original male lead himself, Prince Laurence. He was meant to be this symbol of peace and justice after the havoc Julia raised at him and the saintess, and yet according to the previous Julia, he was the one who ruined her life.

“How much longer until the cracks start forming Laurence? How much longer…” Julia muttered to herself.

But a faint rumbling of her stomach ruined Julia’s train of thought. Julia decided it was best to head to the kitchen to get a late-night snack. Julia quickly changed into her nightgown, grabbed a lone candle stick to light her way and then was off. Her trip was very uneventful due to it being so late at night. 

Julia gathered up some leftover loves of bread from dinner and made herself a little cup of tea. While she ate her food in the quiet of the night she could hear two voices in the pantry fighting. Or what sounded like it, it was very muffled, but she could only make out a few words.

“What was that girl doing in her room?!” One male voice said.

“I don’t know but I don’t like her snooping around, it's making our job much worse,” the female voice complained.

“How am I making their job worse?” Julia thought.

“Well just in case she snoops more you better hide it, we don’t need anyone getting suspicious of us, or he will cut off heads,” the man said.

“Suspicious?!” Julia thought again, growing more concerned.

“Yeah yeah, I'll hide her meds behind the flour and we will get it in the morning,” the woman said.

The two agreed with each other, and their voices trailed off, leaving Julia alone in the kitchen. The only thing that Julia could about think was what was behind the flour in the pantry. She rushed to find out when she knew the coast was clear. Once she went inside and she reached her hand behind the large bag of flour at her eye level. Her hand moved around until she felt a small bottle, which she grabbed to bring to her light so she could get a better look at.

Once she brought it to her face, she first noticed its smell. The same smell that has bothered her all day, the same smell of her mothers office, the smell of her mothers so called medicine, the uncomfortable smell of almonds. Its very smell made Julia’s face contort into a look of disgust. She left the kitchen with the bottle in her hand, and as she was walking down the hall she poured the contents onto a near by plant. But she kept the bottle with her as she walked back to her room to turn in for the night.

Unknown to her, once the liquid made contact with the plant it began to slowly wither into a rotten mess.