Chapter 33: Into the wasteland
My body suddenly sagged under the weight of the things that had suddenly appeared on it.
’I don’t have time to check things yet. I need shelter.’
Letting out a misty breath, I looked around.
A desolate cityscape sprawled downward from my vantage point. Only skeletal wreckage remained of its previous skyscrapers, with most of its other buildings in states of half or complete entombment under the relentless snowfall.
It was a burial ground, in every sense of the words.
From what I could see, I was on a hill somewhere on the outskirts of the city. The highest buildings around were ruined, half-buried apartment complexes.
I wrapped a scarf around my neck tighter, trying to protect my face from the sharp winds that were sapping away its warmth. The current snowfall wasn’t too heavy, but its winds were particularly bitter.
Squinting to see through the whitish haze it cast, I found two other figures decked in heavy coats on the same hill.
I didn’t need to check to know it was Maki and Lily.
Cupping a hand around my mouth, while the other pointed in the direction of a half-buried one-story building, I shouted.
"Come on! We need to find shelter now."
Luckily, the wind wasn’t too strong, so my voice still carried.
One of the figures already seemed to have gotten her bearings and was in the midst of scanning the environment, while the other was still somewhat in a state of bewilderment.
Both, however, stopped at my words before turning to face me.
I kept my finger pointed at the building, waving my other hand toward it.
After that, I began wordlessly trudging my way through the thick snow in the direction of the building.
And sure enough, from the crunch of snow beneath my boots, I could tell they were following me.
It didn’t take too long to make it to the building, but my nose and eyebrows were already damn cold.
The reason I had chosen this house in particular was because it had doors and windows. Regardless of how cracked they were, they would help keep some of the cold out.
Unfortunately, a pile of snow was blocking the door. Before I could even begin looking for something to clear it with, one of the figures behind me stepped forward with what seemed like a broken-off piece of wooden board.
They began shoveling snow from the pile using it.
’Useful.’
I glanced to my side to find the other figure standing there. Beneath her grey scarf and dark hair, I found almost glowing purple eyes nestled within a pale face.
’Maki.’
There wasn’t any doubt about it. I could never mistake those purple eyes for anyone else.
I pointed to the door before asking,
"Do you mind clearing the house?"
She just gave me a confused look.
I sighed, raising my voice above the whistling wind.
"I said, do you mind clearing the house!?"
Her eyes widened.
She looked at the house, then back at me, before giving a thumbs up.
I let out a sigh of relief at that.
’It’s a good thing she’s being agreeable.’
I didn’t know how good of a fighter this Lily was, but I knew she couldn’t be better than Maki. The girl was definitely the strongest person on our team.
So it was best to rely on her for things like this.
By then, the other figure, who I now knew was Lily, had cleared just enough snow to let us crack open the door.
Maki wasted no time, reaching the door before drawing a rapier in one hand and a torch in the other.
She said something to Lily, then passed the torch to her and pulled another one from her waist.
Both of them lined up by the wall next to the door, before Maki laid her hand on the knob.
Then she twisted, pulling it open. The moment she did, Lily turned on her flashlight, pointing its beam into the opening.
Maki stalled for a moment, then turned her torch forward and stepped inside.
It didn’t take long before I heard her shout.
"Clear!"
Lily stepped in after her, and I quickly followed.
The snow pile only allowed the door to open just enough to let a person fit through.
As a result, something on my back that I hadn’t even realized I was carrying got stuck in it. I had to twist and pull at it before the damned thing finally slipped through as well.
I shut the door the moment it did.
The relief was immediate. The wind and snow were almost entirely gone in here. While some of the cold still seeped in from cracks in the door, windows, and roof, this much was manageable.
I sighed, releasing a small cloud of vapor.
The room I found myself in looked to be the living room of the house. At least it used to be. Whatever was left of its previous furniture lay rotten and strewn across the floor.
Lily sat resting on the remains of a dead couch, while Maki stood by a door at the opposite end of the room.
They were decked in dark camouflaged winter jackets and thermal pants, with dark scarves wrapped around their necks. Both were draped in an insulated white cloak hung around their shoulders.
I reckoned I was dressed pretty much the same. Besides that, I could feel a warm, flexible undershirt hugging me beneath my jacket.
I followed Lily’s example and sank into a nearby couch.
A weary silence settled between us. Though it was soon broken by Maki.
"Be careful. I only cleared this room. The others seem empty though."
Lily answered her tiredly.
"Do you want to check it now? I can help."
Maki hesitated a bit, then nodded.
"Don’t worry. I doubt there’ll be anything in them. I’ll be back soon."
With that, she walked out, leaving just me and Lily in the room.
’Let’s take an inventory of things.’
Feeling my back, I finally found the two main culprits that had been weighing me down.
One was a rather sizable outdoors bag.
The other was a metallic compound crossbow. It was also the thing that had gotten stuck on the doorframe.
’It’s just like the one from the training hall.’
Scratch that, it was exactly the same as the one there.
’No wonder the thing got stuck.’
Sighing, I placed it to the side before opening the bag.
In it, I found a few thermal patches, some medicine I’d requested for my burden, just enough water and ration packs to last three days, around twenty heavy crossbow darts, and a few other essentials.
I also found the walking stick I’d requested, attached to the side of my bag.
’They really do take care of everything, don’t they?’
Though of course those cruel bastards couldn’t just help me and be done with it.
While they did give me the medicine I’d requested, they only gave me enough for two dosages. Each would last roughly twelve hours.
It made me think about Song.
While I could technically still function without aids like medicine, Song required regular vitae injections to even function properly.
If they had intentionally given me less medicine than required, I had no doubt they would do the same for her as well.
I could only hope she would be wise enough to save it for the hunt.
I reached my hands to my waist, confirming the presence of two long daggers and a pair of small flashlights attached to the belt there. I also found a small antenna-like device clipped to it.
Although it looked somewhat strange, I already knew what it was.
’A repeater.’
Outside the range of Bastion’s network infrastructure, interfaces simply couldn’t send messages or receive messages between themselves, and they couldn’t connect to the internet either.
The signals they sent were too weak and carried far too much data to be transmitted properly by themselves.
However, repeaters helped make up for this shortcoming by strengthening and amplifying the signal before sending it out. They simultaneously served as receivers on the other end.
So even if interfaces couldn’t connect to the internet when outside Bastion’s reach, they could still receive messages.
Unfortunately, they had very limited ranges, especially ones this small.
So I couldn’t just start calling Song to check the situation on her side. Of course, this was already accounted for in my plan.
We both had to meet up at a designated area. Choosing one was easy enough, since we both had knowledge from the novel.
’I should worry more about myself.’
I found out last night that she had been grouped with Racheal. It was the equivalent of being handed a safe pass through the trial.
Well, as long as she didn’t do anything to piss her off.
That, I didn’t have much hope for.
It was just about then that Maki entered the room again.
"Like I suspected. Nothing."
She followed our example, dropping down on some couch foam lying on the ground.
Dropping her rapier to the side, she began.
"Why don’t we introduce ourselves?"