Chapter 13: Eleven

The dune-buggy rolled through the streets of the slums as its wheels traversed over asphalt roads that continually twisted and turned like a snake. There were sparse people about but the sun was just rising, and it was mostly calm. Rose reclined into the chair, watching the scenery pass her by.

An orange hue set over cruder and cruder buildings the farther she traveled from the city behind her. At some point, some had merely become singular boxes of wood that only had their size to confirm them as houses. She passed by a tower of iron that even her inherited memories had no idea of what it was. Soon, the car bumped and she found herself riding upon a sandy ocean. Sandy and rocky with towers of iron sparsely populating it.

A shadow descended over her.

There was a loud, jarring sound and she glanced to the sky. A massive, mechanical vessel floated above the sandy plains, its figure covering miles of land. It looked like the spitting image of a flying ship, except everything was metallic in some way, and what should have been the sails only had mana as its sides flapped with blue wings of the same energy, drifting.

Rose's emerald eyes were mesmerized by the thing and she increased the speed of the car, chasing and following it. This was a first as well. Even with its massive size, however, her motor could not keep up and with a shake—the ship shuddered and seemed to wiggle as if it were breaking through a barrier—it sped forth like a fish swimming in the air. As it left her line of sight, disappearing with an unknown speed, she wondered what it would be like to ride such a behemoth, and she wondered where it was headed to in such a rush.

Yet, as if the world had been disturbed by it, the sand to her right, miles away, shook violently and she saw a worm-like beast break out from the soil. It was as large as her car, ash brown with a rough skin, and as soon as it broke the barrier of the ground, it dived right back in with a maw that took up the ninety-percent of its face.

". . .alright then. . ." She was momentarily perturbed at the sight of the sandworm, a beast her memory made clear wasn't rare in these parts.

The dune-buggy cruised over sand and dirt, bumped over small and medium rocks as it shook her, and soon, she spotted a domed structure ahead. Metallic with fumes of smoke radiating from the hole atop of it and cars scattered around it. However, a beep rang and the vehicle stopped several miles from it.

She hopped from the car.

It was an arbitrary destination she had randomly selected on the map, a distance from the slums. All around her was sand, and she soon took to work and began digging two holes with the metal scrap she had brought. She wasn't doing it out of any sort of compassion, or kindness in her heart. She barely knew the homunculus and the human, but she thought they still deserved a burial.

Maria had given her valuable knowledge about this world, memories that were still helping her even now, and could tide her over for a while. Lux, on the other hand, as badly as she disliked what he had done to the woman, was still the one that brought her back and incidentally allowed her 'rebirth.' They were both important to her milestone.

The holes were finished, she was covered in dirt, and she dumped the two bags into their respective graves, covering them back with sand as best as she could before tossing the metal scrap away like nothing.

When all was said and done, she sat upon the front of the motor and glanced at the sky. The sparse white clouds drifted below a slowly tinted canvas as free as the winds would take them. She didn't want to ever be that controlled again. She didn't want to be ordered to eat like a dog, ordered to sit still and shut up as a man felt her body, ordered to be impaled by a burning bird, or ordered to go along with the silliness of patting her head.

So, as her core hummed a tune that only she could now hear, she planned how to navigate this world. And, in the back of her mind, there was a thought to find out what she was and how she came about. She could no longer be regarded as an homunculus, especially so when she could summon a Gear, she definitely had a soul but how that came about was beyond her.

'The Silent Witch. . .' She thought, that was her only clue so far. Her end goal was set at meeting her creator. There was a faint memory in her head, blue eyes, a shaking voice filled with warmth. That was all.

Rose hopped into the car and decided to try a hand at figuring it out without the auto-navigation system. It was clunky and odd, she found herself flying forward then back, but soon enough, when the sun had fully risen into the sky, she had gotten the hang of it enough to drive well in an open space. And she did just that, unbound by anything, as she kicked back to the slums with the backdrop of an orange sky.

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