There was a deep screaming in her.
It felt as if she had fallen asleep, submerged into a void of nothingness. An odd sensation a first for a being that should not be able to be placed unawake. She could not see. She could not speak. She could not feel. She could not hear. And nor did she taste. All she did was hold a near-faint sensation that she still existed. Somewhere, somehow, though even the hum of her core was nonexistent, she knew that she was alive; merely disconnected from the world. Then, when a time unknown passed, she touched upon a wall of pure mana. It was less as if the energy was solidified around or blocked her but more so that the sheer density of it rang alarms in her head.
"Woah woah, Rose! Calm your damn flames!" Elsa's yell reached her ears.
At that moment, Rose's eyes shot open.
She glanced around.
Elsa and Lilias stood in front of her, well, actually, a good distance away from her as the sword in her right hand burned with the raging red of fire.
". . .what?" She glanced at the weapon.
<Igris> was summoned on pure instinct. She had felt fear, a desire to escape the pull of the dungeon, but she had crossed over, Gear already in hand to slash at an illusionary foe that didn't exist.
It would seem, to her, the two had not experienced quite the same heightened reaction. They looked at her oddly and her mind spun. Perhaps, she had been afraid only because she felt what was known as 'slumber' for the first time? As if she had lost connecting with her being? She didn't know.
"Are you alright?" Elsa asked.
Rose took a breath to calm herself.
"I'm fine," She said, "Sorry."
The flames of her blade quenched and died, from a dangerous deep crimson of blazing red back down to the soft glow of ember, like a setting sun; then, finally, to the simple warmth of a thin yellow that merely radiated light more than any desire for heat.
'Yet, that voice called out to me as 'Rose Igris Blake', She thought mildly as she took a step forward, walking from a back of stone, and stood in the middle of the two while glancing ahead.
". . .this is the dungeon?" She asked.
"Correction, this is the first floor of the dungeon."
Her hair caught the wind of a soft draft.
In front of them, the brown ground sloped down until it met a ravine which bisected through two large canyons. The sky was a murky gray and a sun hung low and far into the twisting length of the darkening spine of the world before them. Rose blinked her eyes, wandered them, and squinted through crooked, dead trees, ravaged undergrowth bushes, and found that she could not make out the end to the length of the place. What she did spot, however, was the rumbling sparks of lightning deep within the dark premises of the space; flashes of white glimpsing down from the sky with the faint roar of thunder following them.
Elsa whistled by her side.
"The first floor's already a killer," She said, surprised and entranced.
Of course the three had researched the dungeon earlier in the day before they even rode the bus into Sector 0 of Alos. Who wouldn't? Yet, they really could not find much information worth their time. Supposedly, various aspects of Great Dungeons disappeared from a person's memories as soon as they exited and only reappeared after entering once more. More noticeably, there were some floors that no one remembered what occurred within. One of which was the first floor they were currently on.
Essentially, the mana web was largely useless to try and gather information for the dungeon. The first thing Rose did was try tapping her pad and Lilias shook her head.
"It won't work," The girl said, "No communication technology has ever worked within a Great Dungeon. At least, you won't be able to connect to the outside world nor across floors."
The dragonian was right, Rose noticed, her pad could only currently call either Elsa or Lilias because the two were similarly within the same dungeon floor as well. Everything else worked as it would, but communications were siphoned off from the outside world.
Nodding, Rose took a step forward.
"Do we have any specific formation we will be battling with? Any strategies?" She said, feet sloping down to climb from the small hill of a rock they had found themselves. Behind them, a cream-colored wall raised into the gloomy sky.
Lilias drew her blades from the straps at her back, sliding them vertically off. Her tail swung atop her blue shorts and her dark-blue jacket blew in the draft of the dungeon's wind.
"Formation? Strategy?" She asked. "I simply slash. I suppose you may come up with one if you wish."
Elsa agreed with her. "Yeah come up with some if you wanna."
Rose looked at the two with a raised brow. Maybe they were bred differently? When she wanted to fight a sandworm, she researched it and came upon the best way to use her abilities to defeat it. When she wanted to enter the war torn slums to retrieve her belongings, she acquired a map, chose the best route, stalked it, then walked in. Yet, did these two merely like punching things? Elsa. . .she couldn't bring herself to deny but, Lilias, she now realized, with the addition of their previous battle that wasn't needed, simply liked clashing against foes, sword spinning.
'Perhaps,' She thought, 'She's trying to break the bottleneck of her swordsmanship.'
Rose shook her head and brought her attention back to the present.
"Alright," She said, and decided she would take charge then, "For formation, I'll stay in front. Lilias by my side, and Elsa, you'll provide support with the pulse pistol at our backs. If a creature gets too close to you, use your fists."
She entered into the ravine, stopping momentarily to take in their location. It was a good thing she was what she was because, though they could use the scanning feature of their pads to create a map while they trekked the dungeon, it was much faster that she simply memorized everything. A glance here. A glance there, and a map was constructed in her head, a perfect recreation like live three-dimensional pictures folded upon one another and stored within her.
She glanced at Elsa.
"As for strategy. . .do you still have the one-eye we used in the slum?"
"Yup yup. I have two of them in fact"
"Good. Rotate them forward and check your pad. If they come across anything, let us know."
"A okay."
Just like so, a One-Eye was sent forward, its spherical body gleaming slightly from the sun ahead as its blue orb shined. As previously, it could realistically only fly for five minutes at a time before it would have to return or be ripped apart by mana, as Elsa was still an armature mage. Yet, simply rotating between two was good enough, Rose thought, because she herself would cover that weak point with her eyes, and her senses latching on to the surrounding mana with <Igris> in her grasp. In that way, there was very little that could catch them off guard.
The trio left the comfort of the entrance to the ravine and delved into the open mouth of the dungeon's first floor. There was a guardian to defeat, or there was a door to reach. The first floor was unknown to them. Whatever it was, however, the group wanted to meet beasts, for two of them came for mana cores, and the other came to chase a foe.
So, my thoughts after reading this entire story to here in one go:
You have a remarkable talent for creating characters that are so immensely loathesome that I can do nothing but wish them death. Every villain has been truly villainous, unambiguously evil, and it has been a joy to see them fall.
Redeeming former villains, on the other hand, isn't working out so easily. I still have yet to see any redeeming features in Lilias, and she continues to read like a sociopathic bigot -- even the redeeming feature she was introduced with, a hatred for abandoning or betraying comrades, disappeared in the first volume and seems to have been nothing but an act. I hope you change this soon.
The overall tone of the story seems to be edging towards grimdark. Rose never really seems to run into any good people, or even just neutral people, other than Elsa. I would think there would be a higher likelihood for her to run into a person who's just trying to live their life, and doesn't want to help her or f*ck her over, but she really hasn't.
Bianca is one of three things: a sadist who enjoys tormenting the helpless, a manipulative bit*h who hits all of Rose's berserk buttons for some ulterior motive, or a massive f*cking idiot. The entire fight with Rose could've been avoided simply by telling her she's "getting her memories back" instead of being overwritten by the memories of somebody else, regardless of what the truth actually is. So either she knew what would happen by wording as she did, and did so to manipulate Rose, she knew and did so to hurt Rose, or she was stupid enough to think that telling somebody that she set them up to die would end in anything other than a fight.
Likewise, somebody needs to teach Rose the concept of spite. There are multiple occasions now where threatening to destroy her own core if she lost could have changed the course of events. With as much rage as she felt towards Bianca, it would've been entirely reasonable for her to try to coerce her by threatening to destroy her own core before she gets "overwritten". A spiteful "if I die, I'll make sure your sister dies with me" might have changed that entire conversation...
Every victory Rose has had so far has felt like a setup for a greater failure. It's very unsatisfying, and I hope she gets a clear, unambiguous win soon.
Overall I like the story, but it feels like it needs a glimmer of hope somewhere, a light at the end of the tunnel that isn't just an oncoming train.
@MaskedCritic Okay I just got to this review of sorts, so let me respond to them.
Lilias has definitely not been redeemed yet. That's intentional. After all, even Rose describes her as "someone I won't trust, but is helpful towards my goal." She's, at the moment, a clear tag-along.
Next, the case of Bianca. How are you so sure telling Rose about her true plans isn't a part of her plans? She knew what she was doing. And she did it well. After all, the last line of the chapter with her fight was "Come back when you're less pathetic" (or something like that) so she clearly wants Rose to be stronger. That's entirely intentional. Else, why wouldn't she simply just lock Rose up in a box for a few months then wake her back up?
Now, for Rose's spite to "destroy" herself. That has yet to be used because she won't do that. She would never do that, at least not with her current state of mind. She's someone that wants to live. Any use of that 'threat' is void because it would be clear to anyone with half a brain that she wouldn't really do it. After all, would someone who would do that go through the lengths of fighting so much for her life?
As for hope. Well, that, that will come.
The first volume's hope was, in my opinion Elsa. She was there for Rose during her fight with Shana Striker, she was arguably the reason the Reaper let her go, and she was the reason Rose could somewhat enjoy an aspect of her new life. The chats the two had together. The time they spent together. Elsa, to me, was the hope in volume 1, and the reason Rose joined the slum-war to fix her leg. As that volume was both about surviving and finding a way to live, Elsa was the hope. Though, I could have written it badly enough that it wasn't obvious, that much is true.
Volume 2, which is more about the identity of the characters, right now, however, the hope is not here yet, you are correct. However, trust me when I say that light will certainly exist. After all, I don't think it's wrong for me to say I've written quite a few chapters where there is light already.
@LotsChrono Regarding Bianca... that falls under the "manipulative bit*h hitting all of Rose's berserk buttons for some ulterior motive" possibility.
Rose destroying herself... I mean that less as her threatening to kill herself, and more in a sense of "if it gets far enough that your plan is successful, I will ensure you fail at the last second out of pure spite." Spite, I feel, is the most quintessentially human of all emotions. That willingness to just f*ck over somebody else, not for any gain or purpose but simply because you hate them, and to do it no matter the cost to yourself... you don't see that in the animal kingdom. For a character that is struggling with the concept of what it means to be alive, to be real, to be human... the ability to be spiteful is a way to show character growth.
@MaskedCritic Ah you mean in that sense, it certainly can be utilized that way, yup. Looks like I missed that aspect of it, using it as a 'fail-safe' for herself. I sadly can't think of every possible thing or I would have mentioned that earlier. Thankfully, however, she's still a homunculus and that "plot hole" can be easily written away.
Thanks for the chapter.
You're welcome~