A black sun burned brightly in the sky; an unnatural star illuminated the barren earth. A pink hazy sky loomed above, rarely interrupted by a wispy gaseous cloud. Dust blew across Erik's face stirring him from his slumber, he arose from the sandy ground to find himself in a small crater he made upon his less than graceful landing, the sand beneath him had melted into jagged glass. A mortal man would not have survived this fall, he was above such limitations. It was probably unwise to jump between two planes with such a vast distance between them without some layovers, but it was fast and he liked that.

  Standing to his feet, a warning message appeared, blocking off his field of view, the fall had not left him unscathed. His helmet did not survive, it was an early prototype and was to be put through destructive testing, it proved vulnerable to high speed collisions. Pulling it from his head he cast it into the sand, it may have once been a valuable piece of military technology but broken it was useless to him, and to a non-elysian it was less than useless; the desert sands would consume it anyways, adding it to the collection of relics buried in this ancient land.

  Erik performed a system test, making sure he was fully functional. He had no organic bits to worry of, yet unlike flesh the repair of steel and silicon could not be so easily accelerated via magic. Various systems within his body sparked to life before quickly dying, the blade and shotgun hidden in each of his forearm shot out tearing the sleeves of his uniform before folding back in, actuators in his legs were activated causing him to do a bizarre dance. The spellspheres located in his torso threw some errors but after a second test they cleared. The last system tested was the wings. Elysians, and androids in general typically lacked a conventional soul, while this made the use of magic a touch more difficult, the benefits outweighed the costs, and both the wing system and spellspheres compensated for such detriments.

  Six black bars shot out from his back, emerging just above where a matching set of spellstones resided inside of him. Four orange rings were wrapped around each of them, two on the top and two on the bottom. They radiated out from behind him, alighting themselves into two semicircles which imitated wings, the namesake of the system. It was a genius invention, and Erik loathed that it was not his own design, but one of his progenitors. It was quite fortunate in this case that they were dead, so he could claim it as his own. Acting as a synthetic soul, it merged both the magic armor that spell casters summoned for themselves with an inbuilt means of flight. It was replicable and replaceable allowing for the manifested wings to match the user's job and not as a unique manifestation of their soul.

  Erik preferred bar style wings, and a simple core exchange replaced the more angelic wings that came with this chassis. He moved his left hand, and the bars danced to his will in a short, violent display. They impaled and collided with imaginary foes, the adamantine tearing through plate and chain like paper spilling guts and gore across the field. He summoned one of the bars to him, grabbing it in the center and inspecting it. The new design was longer than the ones he was used to, and much narrower, this saved on material but he felt the size was less intimidating.

  Walking out of the crater, he looked to the sky; two contrails cut through the clouds. The closest one judging from its angle and distance belonged to him, the other belonged to his companion, Alice. Calculating the distance the clouds had traveled, and accounting for the trail's angle, he determined she had landed a few miles away.

  Looking out to the desert it was going to be a long hike, dunes shifted before him moving across the desert at a steady pace consuming whatever laid in their path; ever prevailing winds buried Erik's footsteps in the sand, even the land itself hungers, he thought to himself. After a few hours of walking he came across something sticking out of the sand, walking over to it, a shield bearing a long forgotten insignia stuck out of the ground. The desert was consuming its own history, for a moment he pondered what wonders and forgotten ruins could lie below, but he didn't care enough to think of this any further. He grabbed the shield and after observing it for a bit opened a small portal into void storage and tossed it in. Happy with his new souvenir Erik resumed his journey, pulling his feet out of the sand which was already burying them.

  Alice found herself laying on her back, facing a pink sky. The last thing she remembered was Erik telling her to jump as they warped to a different plane. They were falling, and he was miles below her, laughing at something before their radios disconnected. Her dress had gotten grabbed by the wind which caused her to tumble violently and she lost consciousness.

  She attempted to rise to her feet but her arms and legs refused to move. Alice began to panic and tried to thrash around, her body remained unresponsive, she was paralyzed. It was then that an error message appeared before her, "Warning: System Error, Damage Detected Please Wait for Further Updates". She was forced to wait for her systems to slowly test themselves and reboot, unable to move, the orange sun baked into her glass eyes.

  As the minutes ticked by, she started to regain her sense of touch, the sensation started in her feet and hands, making its way towards her core. The air was hot and dry, and something was blowing across her skin constantly. She was still a bit numb, but as sensation returned she soon recognized the feeling of sand being blown across skin. The exodermis that covered her body lacked pores, the sand simply rolled over the smooth synthetic skin finding no way to stick.

  Alice attempted to move again and a new warning appeared, "Warning, Damage to Life Support Systems Detected, Please Wait for Further Updates". She felt a sinking sensation, she wasn't dead, so the life support systems were doing whatever it was they did, yet damage to them was never a good thing. Alice had what Erik liked to refer to as an accident, though dancing around the topic like that was probably him trying to alleviate the responsibility from himself. Her body was less so a body, and more so an armored mobile life support system, little more than a soul and brain shoved into the modified mechanical body of an elysian.

  Eventually the systems that fed information directly into her brain told her she had received severe brain trauma, drugs were being administered to reduce swelling, and magic was being used to attempt to accelerate healing. She could not risk any additional trauma, the servos and linear actuators in her body locked themselves into place; she was not going to be allowed to move. She laid staring at the sky, and with nothing better to do Alice began to play with her vision. Changing between x-ray, infrared, ultraviolet, manalight, thermal, microwave, and a few others she had no idea what purpose they even served.

  X-ray, and microwave showed nothing, the sky above was empty and starless, it continued into the infinite as an empty void. She would've probably been scared by something lurking above her, but somehow the nothingness was far more terrifying. Ultraviolet, thermal and infrared just simply changed the colors of what few things she was seeing, the information meant nothing to her. Manalight was different though, as she looked to the sky Alice could see the magical energy of this world, the sun was not a star, but a manifestation of mana, wispy trails came off it and created Aurora like columns of light in the sky. The sickly orange light danced beautifully and Alice enjoyed watching the lights, finding some comfort in them as they reminded her of home.

  Distracted, she almost missed the small notification informing her that she was finally able to move again, the swelling in her brain was reduced with the aid of medication and brain signals returned to normal. Returning to standard vision Alice lifted herself off the ground and unsteadily rose to her feet, finding herself standing on a rather large rock. Jumping off the rock she landed on the sand with a loud crunch as it compressed under her weight. It seemed her weight suppression system was one of the last ones to reboot. Her body could easily support its own weight, most buildings on the other hand were not able to support her. Returning to a more sensible mass, Alice walked around a bit. Somehow she had managed to land on the only rock for miles, she almost believed it to almost be intentional.

  Erik was nowhere to be seen, she hoped he had landed somewhere not too distant. Their radios had disconnected, and it would be unwise to attempt to find him by blindly searching. He once told her when she was a kid, that if you were to become lost in the woods it was safer to stay where you were than risk wandering deeper into the woods trying to escape. Alice debated activating her wings to fly up to see if she could spot him, but the idea of going into the empty sky made her uncomfortable. She was left with only one option, to wait and hope.

  Alice turned her vision back to manalight and watched the lights in the sky, sitting upon the rock she had crashed into. She didn't know how long she was sitting for but it had to be several hours at least. Eventually a crimson red glow came over the horizon, it was someone's soul. Switching back to normal vision, she focused on the figure, her eyes zooming in on them. The uniform and distinctive elven ears were a dead giveaway, Erik was coming over the dunes, having found her through some means.

  It took a few seconds for their internal radios to reconnect, and they were able to talk to each other remotely again. Alice did not hesitate to begin yelling at Erik, she had no idea where they were, and it was his fault they were in the middle of this desert. He didn't respond, and she would've known if he had muted her. He was either not listening to her, or was trying to come up with a very good excuse for why they were here.

  Erik seemed to have gotten tired of walking as she watched him activate his wings and rise into the air, beginning to fly towards her. Internal sensors alerted her that he was approaching rapidly and there was a high chance of collision; she ignored them. They began screaming in her head as he got within a few hundred meters of her, yet she still ignored them. She fiddled with the cuffs of her dress sleeves trying to get sand out of them, disregarding the more and more intense warnings.

  A gust of wind kicked sand up into her face undoing her efforts and she instinctively closed her eyes to keep it out. Opening them after she felt that the sand had settled, Erik was standing next to her, he was a few dozen centimeters shorter than she remembered, and wearing a slightly different uniform than usual, but the general features were still the same. His golden blonde hair was filled with sand and his inexpressive amber eyes looked at her; the elven ears that stuck out from the side of his head twitched as sand picked up by the wind hit them.

  "I could've hit you," he said to her.

  "But, you didn't," she replied flatly.

  "There's a settlement a few dozen miles in this direction," he said, pointing off into the desert. The two began walking towards a horizon.

  Alice did not know how long they had been walking for, but it was a very very long time. The sun refused to set, hanging ominously above the horizon at all times, it was a sweltering 352.2r C, she didn't understand how any normal life could live in this hellish climate. The only sounds that she heard was the singing of the shifting dunes, the gentle hum of the cooling pumps in her body, and the hissing of internal coolant leaks inside of Erik's body. As per usual, he was using a body that was by all definitions broken, mostly due to poor maintenance. The leaking occasionally caused his left leg to spasm, likely due to the coolant running down the interior and causing shorts. Being as stubborn as he was, he either didn't care about the issues, or saw fixing them as a waste of time.

  Alice finally broke the silence, "Erik, how long have we been walking for," she asked.

  "Depends on who you ask," he replied.

  "I'm asking you," Alice said, not having the patience for his riddles.

  "Could be a few seconds, could be a few days, it's all relative isn't it,"

  "Relative to us...," she snipped, beginning to get annoyed.

  "Few days, a week give or take, I haven't really been keeping track,"

  "Erik..., you keep track of everything, how long have we been walking for,"

  "Less than a second," he replied, Alice could hear him trying to contain his laughter, he seemed to find this conversation very amusing.

  "RIGHT NOW ERIK, HOW LONG HAVE WE BEEN WALKING FOR SINCE WE GOT HERE!" she yelled.

  "Eight days, eleven hours, and... twenty-nine minutes exactly," he replied mechanically, changing his voice to that of an automated system.

  "Where the hell are we, and pray tell me, WHY have we been walking for EIGHT DAYS!"

  "We're in a desert, walking towards a village, town, city... thing..., some of the lesser races have set up."

  This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

  "Because...," Alice was becoming quite annoyed with Erik, who seemed to be relentlessly trying to dodge her questions.

  "I'll explain further when we arrive at the village, it's dangerous out here," he said, looking around the empty desert, "too many threats out here to discuss safely."

  With that the two continued in relative silence, the whirring of pumps and servos accompanying them.

  Alice set up a timer, and began tracking how long they were walking for since she and Erik last spoke. Minutes ticked to hours and then to days, she tried to question Erik again but he still refused to answer anything beyond basic questions, insisting they needed to keep moving. The two didn't need to eat or rest, and could probably keep walking for a couple of years before needing to take any form of a break.

  Unlike Erik, Alice liked to hold onto her 'humanity' or whatever people wanted to call it. She was born to parents of flesh and blood, and wasn't created as a cold and calculating machine of war.

  Humanity, Alice hated that word, she was born a lesser beastman noble, a princess in fact. The lesser moniker meant that she had little to no beastman traits, Erik told her the metric compared them to pureblood elves, though she found books often compared them to humans. Alice from a distance appeared to be a human or elf, but her tail, cat-like slit eyes and ears perched on her head were clear signs she was not. Upon her conversion to an elysian, she was given more animalistic teeth too, she often wondered why Erik made that modification but he always her it was simply 'someone else's decision'.

  Alice was, much like everyone else on her plane, a normal person. The only difference was the outward appearance. To the humans that invaded her plane though, the lesser part of 'lesser beastman, just meant they were less than them, and her people were enslaved. Just the thought of what happened to her people enraged her.

  While Alice riled herself up thinking of her home, she felt a feeling she hadn't felt in a very long time, she was hungry. She lacked a traditional stomach, and couldn't actually get hungry in the normal sense of the word. What she did have, processed whatever food she ate into a 'nutritional paste' that was fed to her brain and spinal cord as necessary; excess material was superheated and incinerated then exhaled as smoke and steam.

  Alice opened her void storage, and grabbed her purse, it hissed and crackled as the touch of her skin cooked and seared the leather. She made a decent bit of noise digging around in the bag, which attracted Erik's attention and for the first time in a while he spoke.

  "What are you doing," he said, turning back to see what she was doing.

  "Looking for something to eat, I normally keep a few protein bars in here," she replied, still looking for food.

  "Be cautious with your desires, lest they take hold of you," he said before going back to ignoring her.

  Alice did not know what Erik meant by that, and he was being obnoxiously cryptic as per usual, but his words made her pause to think for a second. She couldn't feel hunger, and eating was a pointless task at the moment. It was in that second Alice felt an unnatural pressure being lifted off her, and the sensation of hunger quickly left with it. She looked down at the charred and burnt purse she was holding, with some level of shame and embarrassment, opened void storage and stuffed it back in. She'd have to fix it later. Alice didn't know where she or Erik were, but she knew one thing, there was something fundamentally wrong with this place.

  A few more hours passed as the two continued walking, "we're almost there," Erik said breaking the silence.

  Alice nodded, thinking of something to say as the two rounded another dune, though her thoughts were interrupted as Erik stuck out his arm to stop her.

  Something is over this dune, I'll approach first you follow behind me, his voice said in her head.

  Staying quiet she nodded and the two carefully climbed the dune.

  How did you know something's there, she asked over radio.

  Manalight, Erik replied, you can see its soul.

  Through manalight Alice saw a humanoid figure though the dune, looks like a person to me.

  Looks can be deceiving...

  Erik neared the top of the dune, prepared for whatever was on the other side. He believed it was a human, its soul definitely was one of a human's, but there were ways of suppressing one's essence to appear as something else. He rested his left hand on his sword, ready to pull it out at a moment's notice, and came over the top of the dune.

  A human, as expected, was stupidly looking around searching for something. Eventually he turned and looked at Erik, jumping back in surprise.

  "You scared me there," he said.

  Erik looked down, taking in the man's appearance, he was in baggy shorts, a pair of woven sandals, a loose fitting top and a turban of sorts to keep sand off his head and face.

  "You gonna say something?" the man asked as Erik remained unmoving on top of the dune just staring at him.

  "Alice, it's safe to come over, it isjusta human," Erik called behind him, "Are you with that settlement, town... thing, you people built."

  "Resistance! Yes, I'm a scout. I run around and try to find people looking to join us for the push into the next sphere," the man replied, "My name's Markus, you are...?"

  "Erik," he replied mechanically.

  Alice finally made it to the top of the dune, standing a little bit behind Erik. He began to descend the dune and approach Markus, and she cautiously followed behind. Reaching the man he looked at them in awe. Two giants stood before him, appearing unfazed by the desert's heat, not even a drop of sweat on either of them. Though their faces remained rigid and expressionless, yet he could not help but feel they were looking at him with disgust.

  "What are you two," his voice trailed off

  "Elysians,"

  "I'm a lesser beastman," the two responded in unison.

  Erik looked at Alice, he wanted to say something about her answer to Markus's question, but it wasn't worth the argument that would ensue.

  "How far are we fromResistance~," Erik said, amused by the name they gave it.

  "It's a few miles that way," Markus said, looking at a compass-like device and pointing.

  Erik walked away without saying a word, leaving Alice and Markus behind. After a few seconds there was a thunderous crack and in a split second Erik flew off toward the town.

  "What was that?" Markus yelled, preparing to run after him.

  "Erik, after getting what he wanted from you, decided to leave for your settlement alone, no longer having any need to talk to you," Alice replied coldly.

  Markus looked at her, confused and a little insulted, "What did he say he was again,"

  "An elysian," she answered walking in the direction Erik had gone, leaving Markus behind.

  Running to catch up with her he spoke in between breaths, "you need... to have my permission... to enter Resistance."

  Alice slowed her pace allowing him to catch up to her, and much to her agitation he began talking to her.

  "So uh, can all elysians fly like that," he asked her.

  "No, typically only Archons and important ones," she replied flatly.

  "You said you're not an elysian, though you look similar enough to that guy... Erik?"

  "Depends on who you ask," she replied, feeling a sense of deja vu.

  "If I ask you?"

  "I am a lesser beastman,"

  "And if I ask Erik...?"

  "An elysian,"

  "If he says you're an elysian, can you fly like that,"

  "Yes,"

  "Are you an Archon then?"

  Alice, unsure herself, simply replied, "no..."

  "So you must be important then?"

  "I've been told as much,"

  "What are Archons,"

  "Leaders," she replied, her right ear starting to twitch in irritation, her tail swishing back and forth impatiently.

  "You're not one for conversation are you," Markus said, trying to get more information out of Alice.

  "No, I would prefer if you stopped talking," she said bluntly, fastening her pace to end the conversation.

  Markus tried to catch up to her, and in an effort to enforce their separation she activated her wings, thirteen narrow jagged black plates floated behind her, forming two sets of wings. They hummed with magical energy, their tips sparking blue as they emitted a weak electrical field. Alice would have flown away at that moment, but unfortunately, she and Erik needed Markus to let them into Resistance. Additionally, as much as she already hated the man, she hated the thought of going into the sky even more.

  The two continued in an awkward silence for an hour or so before the walls of Resistance appeared over the horizon. Relieved that her destination was in sight, she collapsed her wings. Much to her dismay, Markus immediately seized the opportunity to begin talking to her again.

  "So, I need to ask you a few questions before I can allow you into Resistance," he said rather mechanically.

  "Go ahead," she sighed, annoyed that she had to talk with him again.

  "Ok, let's get started," he said, pulling out a notebook.

  For the remainder of their walk, Markus pressed Alice on all sorts of stupid questions. Questions about demons and contracts, religious beliefs, fields of magic she was proficient in, all sorts of noise. She found the whole affair to be a waste of her precious time, and it reeked of bureaucracy.

  "One final question, do you intend to assist Resistance in its war effort?" he asked.

  "No," she replied quite bluntly.

  "Oh... ok... We're done then, I'll get your residency passes filled out as soon as we're in the city."

  Alice ran ahead of Markus as the impressive walls of Resistance grew into view, while she needed him to get through the gate, they were close enough she was certain she could just have to wait for him there.

  Soon Erik spoke to her over the radio,You finally made it.

  Yes, Markus is going to fill out residency passes for us when we go in.

  That is fortunate, I was refused entry without a writ, security is very high.

  Seems pointless does it not, it's just a city in the middle of the desert. Who's going to invade... the sand dunes?Alice audibly laughed to herself.

  It's understandable, they're preparing for war soon.

  Markus mentioned something about that, do you know anything about it?

  Of course I do,Erik said smugly,I'll tell you more once we're inside.

  Where are you by the way?

  Circling up above, the guards refused to let me in. I didn't want to wait down there with them.

  Approaching the gate Alice was confronted by two guards in heavy plate armor, the white metal was adorned with gold trim and enchanted with holy seals. They were stereotypical paladins, the staunch uptight sort, dedicated to the dogma. They drew their halberds on her, and after a quick conversation permitted her to wait for Markus in a designated area away from the gate.

  Alice walked away and went to go sit in the sand and wait. Lowering herself to the ground she was not allowed any respite. The earth rumbled as something began to rapidly rise up from beneath her. Within the blink of an eye, Alice activated her wings and opened void storage. Pulling out her rifle, she buried the muzzle break into the sand. Time slowed and as fractions of a second passed she waited, then she felt it, something made contact with her gun. Pulling the trigger, a 25mm round fired straight into it with a loud thunderous crack, it shuddered, possibly in pain for a second but kept rising.

  She leapt backwards and signaled Erik over the radio,there was something beneath me.

  Understood, I can see it from up here.

  A torrent of sand was thrown into the air, obscuring the thing from view as it surfaced. He instantly plummeted out of the sky and crashed into it, the sounds of bones and shell cracking echoed out. Erik jumped back with great force and landed next to Alice, sword in hand.

  The sand quickly settled revealing a horrid beast; on Alice's home plane of ?ten, they had myths of the hecatoncheires, giants with a hundred hands, a hundred tails and fifty heads. The creature appeared to be a hecatoncheires made of scorpions, a flurry of legs, claws and stingers. Though she could not see the creature's face, she felt the rage and hatred it looked at them with.

  Erik shot forward with unnatural speed and engaged the creature, it swung it's many claws and stingers at him, which he deftly removed one by one. Alice's wings dug into the ground to stabilize her while she lined up a shot with her rifle. While Erik was grabbing the monster's attention, she was trying to find its head. The flurry of limbs made it hard to focus on any specific parts, and Alice frantically searched for anything that resembled a head. Eventually she saw it, two large black dots, hiding behind a tail, they were eyes. All she had to do was wait a few seconds, and soon an opportunity presented itself. Erik's back was undefended, and seeing an opening the creature moved to attack him with the stinger that was hiding its head.

  He turned, engaging the tail and Alice yelled over the radio,hold it.

  She took the shot, the bullet whizzed through the air and pierced through the monster's chitinous skull. It fell to the ground limp, some of its many appendages still twitching with the last of its energy. Erik quickly set the creature ablaze with magic and Alice dismissed her wings, returning her gun to void storage. She made sure to replace the magazine, putting the partially loaded one aside.

  "What was that thing," she said to Erik, walking up to the burning corpse.

  "They're referred to as Demonic Beasts, it's what happens when an animal or otherwise is exposed to large amounts of demonic energy. Very aggressive and uncontrollable, the influence mutates and drives them mad,"

  "I see," Markus's questions about demons and devils were starting to make a little bit of sense to her now.

  Alice heard footsteps approaching behind her and Erik, the two turned to see Markus running up to them.

  Oh goddess not him again, she said to Erik over the radio.

  Be nice, we'll never see him again after tomorrow.

  Erik's words were ominous, but she didn't have time to dwell on them, as Markus began to flap his lips again.

  "I saw the whole thing, that was amazing, how are you two so coordinated, I mean we have hundreds of thousands of fighters come through here regularly and none of them are even remotely as capable as you two are," he said, amazed by their abilities.

  Alice and Erik stood in silence, both trying to find a way to either deflect or accept his praise.

  "You're welcome," Erik said in his standard mechanical tone.

  "Yeah, it was no big deal doing that," Alice said, trying to act normal.

  Markus was a tad confused by their responses but continued anyways, "where did that thing even come from?"

  "Under the sand, it was stalking you two since Alice activated her wings," Erik said, giving Alice a disapproving look, "It sensed the magic used to manifest them and was attracted to the potential meal. Creatures like that subsist on eating souls, the more powerful the magic user, the bigger the soul and the better the meal. Alice unfortunately made herself a target, though proved to be not such an easy meal."

  Erik's words were fairly cold, Alice could tell he disapproved of her activating her wings so callously.

  "How did you know it was following us?" she asked Erik.

  "The guards refused me entry as I lacked a scout to vouch for me, I doubled back and watched you two from above," he said, "manalight made the creature visible from beneath the sand."

  "You can use manalight!?" Markus asked surprised, "It's a very difficult spell to cast, using it so casually too..." he trailed off, murmuring something under his breath.

  "Alice can use it too," he said, clearly criticizing her actions, "but, it is not strictly her fault, I doubt she would've thought to check the ground below. I should have told her to be on the lookout for unnatural things."

  "We'll best be going," Alice said, trying to end the conversation, "So where are we anywaysErik,"

  He had still not told her what plane they were on, clearly he knew, and Markus hopefully knew too. This vagueness was starting to annoy her, Erik was treating this whole trip like one big secret.

  "We'll talk abou...," Erik started to speak, but Markus cut him off.

  "You don't know," Erik moved to try to stop him from speaking, "You're in Hell," Markus said stupidly.