Chapter 1048 - 1047: Postwar Ruins

Chapter 1048: Chapter 1047: Postwar Ruins

In the vast temporary refuge, Dragonkin who have awakened from their dormant mental state gather together, dragging their weary and scarred bodies. The giant sun gradually reaches the zenith in the sky; even in this cold land at the north and south poles, its warmth slightly dispels the chill entrenched in the ruins of battle—though the cold wind still blows ceaselessly across the land, Melita Ponia feels a hint of reassurance and warmth within the sanctuary.

She’s unsure whether this feeling comes from the towering walls around her, though battered, still standing tall, or from the sight of her surviving compatriots.

Among the dragon herd gathered in the sanctuary, some maintain their dragon form, receiving limited treatment or "repairs" in this state, while others remain in human form to conserve energy and resources, making space for others—the scale of these shattered walls is not large, providing very limited shelter, and if every dragon revealed their true form here, it would undoubtedly be insufficient for everyone.

Under a semi-melted Metal Tower at the center of the refuge, Melita sees Carladore the Red Dragon—standing in human form high above, his fiery red hair and beard strikingly noticeable among the crowd. Around him, several tribesmen attend to the injured, while others seemingly try to repair some machines they’ve dug out from the ruins.

"Melita!" Carladore spots the approaching Blue Dragon Lady from afar, exclaiming in surprise, "You’re still alive!"

"You’re alive too," Melita smiles at this elder from the Five Kings Council—he is a trustworthy old Red Dragon with whom Melita has often partnered in missions for millennia, "What about Takdam?"

"Dead, we’ve found his body," Carladore’s tone carries a hint of sadness, more numb than sorrowful, "The others too, only the two of us from team six survived."

As he speaks, the Red Dragon has sharply noticed Melita’s weak aura: "You need treatment and rest—how’s your implant? Any problem with it?"

"I feel the muscle enhancer beneath my left wing has burned out, and also destroyed is a whole set of nerve enhancing devices from spine to tail," Melita assesses her body’s condition, "The injuries aren’t too bad; I can feel I’m healing... the key is the implant, can it still be repaired now?"

"...We can probably only perform some emergency procedures, remove the damaged and harmful parts, and let the body heal those wounds naturally—of course, Healing Magic will speed up this process," Carladore says with a frown, "You should already know, we’ve lost Omega, and all automatic systems—there are only some temporary tools dug out from the ruins available, along with a few undamaged enhancers."

"Then remove my broken parts, thankfully the problem isn’t with the vital systems," Melita exhales, "As for enhancers... let’s save them. I’m fine, save the enhancers for the seriously injured."

...

A cave within the temporary refuge has been transformed into a medical center, used to treat those particularly severe injuries requiring major surgery on their dragon form. Melita, transformed back to her dragon form, lies quietly on a cleared platform, waiting for the medical center’s mechanic to remove the last damaged enhancer device near her spinal bone. She tries to block out the sting from her nerve endings, her gaze slowly sweeping the cave’s surroundings—

Supplies and equipment dug out from the ruins are stacked around the cave, disassembled powerless automatic devices thrown into the corner. An odd smell of mixed blood and oil pervades the cave; evidently the original ventilation system has lost its function, and even the lighting relies on several magic light spheres floating in midair.

Melita can’t recall how many years it’s been since she last saw such primitive lighting Spells in Talronde—before this, Omega was always like a nanny, meticulously taking care of Dragonkin.

"This is the last part, it might hurt a bit," comes a hoarse voice from near her back, "I’ll try to use Magic Power to suppress your nerve activity, but the effect is pretty limited, hang in there."

"Go ahead and remove it, mechanic," Melita slightly moves her neck, "My willpower is quite... oh my moth—I bli#@#$@@%%@!!"

"It’s removed."

"That’s not just a bit painful!" Melita awakens from the existentially questioning pain, surprisingly still having the strength to argue, "Are you sure you used a Spell to help numb the pain?"

"I did my best, but there’s an issue with the interface of your old model enhancer device—fortunately, it hasn’t caused irreversible damage to your nerves. Now relax a bit, I’m releasing a Healing Spell, your wound will heal quickly."

As the other’s voice fades, Melita can finally tangibly feel the pain in her back rapidly decreasing, even starting to feel her flesh slowly rejoining. She slightly breathes a sigh of relief, suddenly teasingly saying: "No matter the model, it doesn’t matter now—looks like we’re moving on to days without implants, right?"

"...Looks that way," the mechanic steps down from the platform, coming before Melita to organize, clean those blood-stained tools, her face showing exhaustion, yet her hand movements remain unfaltering, "The Omega System is gone, many implants directly connected with Omega now have hidden dangers—though they won’t fail in the short term, for safety, it’s best they either be removed or shut down. Besides, parts are scarce now, factories have shut down, many damaged implants can’t be repaired, eventually they’ll all have to be removed... the only good news is mechanics like me still remember how to dismantle them, we haven’t completely forgotten that knowledge."

Hearing this, Melita notices the young mechanic’s skilled handling of the tools, somewhat surprised at her proficiency: "You... seem to be quite adept with these old-fashioned tools for handling implants?"

"Taught by my grandfather, before he died, he often mentioned how this technology is useful... he was supposedly the last generation of mechanics involved in the design of Gomodo’s implants, after him, no one directly participated in mechanical design and manufacturing—everything was entrusted to Omega and automated systems in the factories," the young mechanic has finished processing everything, looking up at Melita, "Actually, a mechanic like me with some ’skills’ isn’t very common nor very rare... though not everyone has a mechanic grandfather, everyone has their own ways."

Melita blinks, softly muttering to herself: "I never knew..."

"Upper Talronde wouldn’t allow this kind of ’private work’, even most of the districts you’re familiar with in Lower Talronde wouldn’t encounter a dragon like me," the mechanic chuckles lightly, speaking in a relaxed tone, "This is more illegal than those corner workshops—unauthorized modification of implants is forbidden, but still has quite a market in the deepest districts, and Omega doesn’t care what happens in those districts daily."

"...I’m sorry," Melita says instinctively, though she’s unsure what she should apologize for, "I’m indeed not familiar with these matters."

"No need to apologize. We weren’t different before, and we’re no different now," the Mechanic smiled, putting away her tools. "I can barely handle the issues with your implants; for the injuries to your flesh, you’ll have to deal with it yourself. My healing spells are limited. If you still feel unwell, you can find Carladore."

With that, the Mechanic turned and left the platform where Melita Ponia was located—she had a lot of work to handle, and before every dragon with a damaged implant could rest easy, she didn’t have much time for idle chat.

After the Mechanic left, Melita Ponia looked up. The cold, old machines and damaged mechanical arms around her remained in silence. Without the support of the Omega System, these things would no longer operate automatically, injecting enhancers or maintaining her scales after surgery.

Amid a wavering light, Melita’s body reverted to its human form, and she climbed down the iron ladder along the platform edge—not daring to jump down or use flight spells. Without the neural enhancement device, she needed some time to readjust to this much weaker body.

She exited the cave and came to the open ground outside, where the slightly dim afterglow slanted down, illuminating the square scattered with ruins and debris.

Only then did she realize she had been lying in the cave for half a day. The gigantic sun, originally high in the sky, had gradually descended near the horizon—there would be a half-day-long twilight, during which the sun would gently dip and rise on the horizon before climbing again the next morning.

Melita inhaled a breath of cold air to slightly invigorate her spirit. Then she noticed some commotion ahead and began to walk in that direction.

A good number of humanoid dragons had gathered around the Red Dragon Carladore, but by the time Melita arrived, the minor disturbance had already settled. The dragon herd dispersed slowly, and Carladore breathed a sigh of relief before noticing Melita’s approach.

"Are you alright now?" the aged Red Dragon looked at Melita. "I thought you’d need to rest for another half a day."

"I’ve dealt with the implant issues. The physical wounds will recover slowly, so there’s no need to occupy space in the cave," Melita replied, a little curiously watching the departing figures. "What happened? Was there trouble?"

"The Dragonkin are not so incompetent," Carladore said in a low voice. "It was just a little issue while distributing resources and assignments... Without the help of the Automatic Systems, even small matters like this frequently encounter problems. It’s somewhat ironic."

An issue arose while distributing resources and assignments?

Melita couldn’t help but repeat Carladore’s words in her mind, her gaze slowly sweeping across the desolate camp. She saw exhausted clansmen and injured individuals in urgent need of recuperation, and the issues faced by this sanctuary were so evident: food shortages, lack of medical supplies, insufficient labor, and inadequate tools.

Indeed, the robust bodies of the dragons could support their kin’s survival on this windswept continent for a long time, but such survival seemed devoid of hope. Most parts of Talronde had turned to scorched earth, and ordinary Dragonkin, long accustomed to the meticulous care of the Omega System and automated factories, seemed utterly clueless about how to survive on this land returning to its primitive state...

For reasons unknown, Melita suddenly thought of the distant Loren Continent, remembering that humans there had also experienced wastelands and re-emergence.

"We should find a way to first ensure the basic survival of our people," she couldn’t help but say. "We can survive a long time without food, but eventually, we will still need to eat... Where is our food coming from now?"

"The food collected from the ruins can sustain us for a while. Although much was destroyed in the fires, some stockpiles remain intact in deep-buried factories and storage facilities," a passing Dragonkin said. "There’s not much we’ve gathered, but... our population isn’t large either."

"Those supplies will eventually run out. We still have to find a way to restore food production," Carladore said solemnly. "We don’t know where on this land crops can be grown, but the ocean can provide some food..."

"Also, we need to find a way to repair some factories—Omega is gone, but we can find ways to bypass the automatic circuits and manually restart those machines," another Dragonkin said. "We can’t dig enhancers and parts needed for implant repairs out of the ground..."

"We also need to build sturdier shelters. Many of the buildings here are on the verge of collapse, and there aren’t enough for everyone..."

Some passing Dragonkin began to discuss, but the discussion didn’t bring hope or encouragement; instead, it confirmed the dire situation for each dragon. Melita could feel the atmosphere clearly becoming more dismal. She never thought that the glorious, mighty Talronde would face such a predicament one day. Even though the current situation was better than the original fate of annihilation, surviving in these circumstances... didn’t seem all that fortunate.

She couldn’t help but ramble in her thoughts, then suddenly noticed something: "Carladore, has Nuoletta not returned yet?!"

"Nuoletta?" The Red Dragon Carladore seemed to recall the White Dragon Lady who had left the camp at noon. He furrowed his brow, instinctively wanting to call Nuoletta through the Omega System, but only until the empty noise reverberated from the Resonance Core in his mind did he realize he made a mistake again.

He raised his head, looking toward the southern sky of the camp. "She should have returned at least an hour ago... The place she went to explore isn’t far from here. Whether she found survivors or not, the round trip would be swift..."

"Did she go alone?" Melita asked anxiously.

"Yes, alone... We have limited manpower, and the southern area is very close, so she went by herself..."

Before he could finish, Melita was already striding away, quickly shifting into her dragon form: "I’m going to find her!"