Chapter 24: Twenty-Two

A stove spewed mana then lit ablaze into flames. Rose gingerly placed a metal pot on top of it, poured in some water, and looked at the item in her hand. It was a small thing she had taken from a larger box of 20, it was clear and filled with red leaves—which looked like small petals—it was what Elsa had called 'Rose Tea.' She poured it into the pot and watched as the heat melted the leaves, dissolving them into the liquid and turning it blood red.

The aroma wafted into the air and Rose felt as if her mind had calmed with just a whiff of it. She took the creation and poured it into a metal cup before receding back into the workshop.

She took a sip of the thing, the liquid entered into her and she felt her figure lighten. Fatigue drained away, fatigue she didn't realize an homunculus could have. It was more psychological than mental or physical, she concluded.

She sat down, dressed in only a dark blue sweater that reached her pale thighs as her small feet dangled, and tapped a few times on her pad, watching it ring before a voice quickly picked up as a face blinked into the air.

"Ooh, you called faster than I expected!" Elsa exclaimed.

Rose smiled. "I'm drinking the tea right now."

"So so? How is it?" The grinning face beyond the screen asked, it was covered in dirt at the moment, and she could hear the smacking of metal passing through as well.

Rose held the cup and shook it, "It's great."

The girl laughed.

"See? I knew you'd like it! Nobody ever hates Rose Tea. Nobody."

"I can imagine why, it's certainly an. . .interesting feeling. Although, that's 200 lixels down."

"I say it's worth it! Isn't it? You look like you're enjoying it a lot."

Rose pondered that statement and couldn't help but agree. The tea was just the slightest bit sweet, perfect for her particular taste, and the feeling of ease it brought to her was commendable.

"Yes I am," She said, "Thanks for the recommendation."

"No problem at all," An elated reply came through right away, followed by some clanking.

"That's quite a bit of noise." The homunculus raised a brow. "What are you doing right now?"

"Trying to get this—darn, mecha in order. I still need some more parts but drats, if I don't finish its core build today, I'm not Elsa Mont!"

Rose chuckled at that statement. "I'll wish you luck then, should I leave you alone?"

"No no—stay a bit, I could use some chatter. It'll keep me from smashing this thing in anger," The girl on the other side quickly replied, dried a bit of sweat from her forehead with a hand, and continued tinkering with a box of silver. There were mana lines running through her fingers and it seemed as if she were drawing on it.

Rose leaned back in her chair and dragged the screen to float in front of her as she sipped from her cup. The technology of this world was simple, efficient, and easy to use once one became used to it.

"Can you show me? I'd like to see," She asked.

"Sure!"

She watched as the scene moved. The place looked like a junk yard with scraps of metal littering the ground. There were a lot of things that looked like they were in various stages of being built but, the most prominent of all, was a humanoid behemoth. It was composed of discolored metals and looked like a hunk of a suit—it had a head, it had limbs, it had legs, there was even a small turret strapped to its back. It wasn't complete, however, but it looked decently shaped.

"I scraped it from a trash heap and now I'm just trying to get it fixed. It used to belong to Alos's military, I hear, must have junked it away after it was damaged," Elsa explained through the pad, "I've burned through 23K Lixels on this thing and even the turret's working now! Hard shit but I'm not giving up!"

There was pride in that voice, and determination, Rose liked that stubbornness. The girl moved and talked with freedom to her steps. It seemed, to her, the person named Elsa would be hard pressed to repress herself.

She sipped from her cup as she pondered those thoughts. Indeed, the tea was perfect.

She opened her lips, "How far is it from being finished?"

"Hmm—hard to tell, depends on funds really. But, the most important thing I need now is a Mecha Core. I don't know how to make one myself so, ugh, I'll have to buy it."

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"You sound like you don't like that one bit, it can't cost that much, can it?"

"Anywhere from 60 to 120k. . ." The girl muttered.

"Pricy." Rose sipped her tea again. 'That's enough funds to power me for 75 days at the low end and 150 days on the high end.'

"Yeah, it burns through my wallet but what can I say—I love this stuff." Elsa sat back down and brought the scene back to her face as she sighed.

"Is that why you want to enter Alos?" Rose asked.

"Yup! I wanna be a Mechanical Mage, I wanna tinker with metal and mana, I wanna build weapons from combining the two, man, I wanna get out of these slums and enter Alos's Mage Academy—there's only so much self-teaching can get you."

Her core hummed as she listened to the girl speak. There was information in her head about magecraft but almost all of it was only on the homunculi branch—and she couldn't imagine teaching herself any from scratch.

"That's commendable," Rose said, amazed at the girl.

"Yeah, I guess it is." There was a sigh before the girl jumped up, fist reaching the sky. "Alright! The day's almost over! I think I'll crack it a bit more, strum my guitar, and then head to bed, what about you?"

Right, she thought, humans needed sleep.

"I'll stay up and sip some Rose Tea."

"Sounds like a plan, enjoy, and goodnight then."

"Goodnight."

The screen blinked off and Rose sat, sipping the blood-red tea from her cup. The aroma, the taste, and the sensation it brought to her—that feeling of an empty mind—all of it she liked, very much.

'It's good,' She thought, wondering if she should make another cup. There were 19 left, 6 less than the amount of days she bought herself.

Then she wondered about the goals of the girl, comparing it to her own, which was still dependent on the past and on a figure she did not know, her creator, the Silent Witch.

'I still want to meet her and I still want to know. . .all about me and what happened, but. . .' The girl sipped the rest of the Rose Tea. 'I think I'd like to enjoy this world, this freedom, as well.'

Her cup clanked on the table, empty.

'Alos's Academy sounds interesting, and the other branches of magecraft even more so but I'm not particularly interested in going to school.'

A hand held her chin as her core hummed.

'I need to see more of this world.' She concluded she still didn't know enough about it to have a goal like that. "That will come in time, then?"

She wondered what type of people she would see, good, bad, or like Elsa and the S.O.S. There was a bit of anticipation in her as she brought up her pad and then the Mana Web.

'Alos's slums, jobs for a fighter.' She searched.

She was now looking for a non-secretive profession. Something to keep the flow of funds coming, after all, she doubted raiding transporters was an easy thing to come by. The first site that popped up was an amalgamation of job listings in the area, legal job listings.

'Beast Hunter?'

One of them caught her eyes.

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