Gavo ran with all her strength.
No, it could not even be called running.
Even an ordinary person's walk would have been faster than this.
But for a three-year-old girl whose right leg was fractured and whose body had just been pushed through brutal training, she truly was moving forward with everything she had.
She had to find her adoptive father.
That was the only thought left in Gavo's mind.
Driven by that terrifying obsession, adrenaline surged wildly through her body, forcing this nearly collapsing shell to advance toward the rugged garbage mountain in a motion that was almost more like crawling, moving against the lights of the settlement.
The sharp wind whistled past Gavo's ears, while pain blurred her consciousness.
It sounded like the most vicious mockery of some invisible thing, coldly tormenting her soul, which had already reached the brink of panic.
"Can the sun set a little slower... just a little... just a little longer..."
But the merciless sun continued sinking according to its fixed course. It did not alter its path in the slightest just because this pitiful child longed to find her father, nor did it care to spare her even one extra shred of light.
The night curtain that symbolized death twisted and danced across the horizon, waiting to carry the deepest hell and the cruelest suffering into every corner of the underhive.
She dragged her heavy legs, moving them one by one over the piles of garbage before her.
The sounds of trash shifting beneath her feet, once so familiar that she no longer noticed them, now transformed into bizarre whispers around her dazed body:
"Go back... go back..."
"Night is coming... it's dangerous... go back..."
"What does he have to do with you... if you keep this up, you'll lose your own life..."
"You haven't fulfilled your dream yet... you can't die..."
"Isn't that what you're thinking?"
Gavo opened her mouth, only to realize she could not refute those formless whispers.
Or rather, perhaps those whispers were the true thoughts coming from her own mouth.
"No... that's not it."
She muttered softly.
But the ravings in the void only grew more frenzied.
"Admit it. That's exactly what you're thinking!"
"It's fine. This isn't your fault. Just accept it."
As the invisible whisperer crooned in a soothing tone, the scene before Gavo's eyes began to twist and turn in bizarre distortion.
"You only need to turn around and go back. The food and water in that shack will be enough until your body recovers."
"Your talents are enough for you to find valuable scrap and sustain yourself."
"Your strength is already enough to let you survive alone in this stinking garbage pit."
"You don't need that malformed..."
"Shut up!"
Bang!
Before the venomous whisper could finish, Gavo slammed both hands hard against the lower sides of her ears.
Hot blood flowed from both ears at once, and the intense pain, along with the maddening ringing that followed, forcibly cut off those murmurs that seemed to have come from her own imagination.
Once Gavo drove away that bizarre ravings through sheer physical force, her mind returned to its old clarity.
At the same time, the hateful illusions vanished from before her eyes.
Under the final light of the setting sun, she saw the handcart lying silently ahead.
She had made it here.
But where was her adoptive father?
The pain in her ears turned hearing into a burden. Amid endless ringing and the agony wracking her body, she struggled to move forward, searching for her father.
But the garbage mountain was far too vast and jagged. In her near-crippled state, how was Gavo supposed to find her father here, not knowing whether he was alive or dead?
It was no different from dredging up a needle from the oceans of ancient Terra.
"God-Emperor... great God-Emperor... are you listening?"
"I beg you... I offer you my loyalty, my soul, everything I have..."
"I beg you... let my adoptive father... let my father come back."
"I beg you..."
Nearly driven to despair, Gavo screamed in her heart, just as she had prayed earlier for the sun to set more slowly.
Of course, it was all futile...
"Hm?"
Just as the sun sent its final ray through the cloud cover, a blinding reflection pierced through layer after layer of debris and obstacles and struck directly into the eyes of the bewildered Gavo.
As if called by something, or perhaps simply because she wanted to try anything at all, she desperately ran in that direction.
When she fell, she forced herself back up.
When she hit a steep slope full of jagged metal, she climbed it with her bare hands.
By the time the blood-soaked Gavo reached the source of the reflection, that glimmer had just vanished into the shadows.
She looked at the object that had guided her here.
It was the Aquila her adoptive father always wore around his neck, made from a scrap of discarded metal.
The moment she picked it up, she did not hesitate. Using both hands, she immediately began digging through the garbage beside the necklace.
[You are losing too much blood. Please bandage your wounds immediately.]
Ignoring the system warning, she refused to slow down even though the sharp metal debris had cut her hands until they were torn open and covered in blood.
At last, just as night fully fell, she dug her adoptive father out.
He still had a faint trace of life left in him.
Cold moonlight shone over the two of them, reflected crimson from the large amount of blood pooled on the ground.
Gavo wanted to take her adoptive father away from here...
But she truly had no strength left.
Thud.
At last, she could not support herself anymore and collapsed to her knees.
As her body tipped forward, one final thought passed through her mind:
"Dying here together with Father... wouldn't be so bad..."
"What a pity... I still don't know whether my buddy also came to this world..."
"If he did, then I hope his life wasn't as miserable as mine..."
...
As her consciousness drifted away, Gavo felt as though she were inside an ever-changing labyrinth.
Countless star-clouds flashed around her, forming vague and blurry images.
In that endless confusion, she felt herself sinking deeper into the distorted maze, unable to find a way out.
And just as she was sinking ever deeper, a brilliant golden light drew her eyes.
It came from a cold sun.
"You won't escape..."
A bizarre echoing voice, like a thousand people speaking at once, rang out from all directions.
Gavo ignored the mind-warping chorus and instinctively walked toward that cold golden light.
With each step she took, an enraged roar echoed through that disordered time and space.
"No! You are mine!"
...
"I told you, I knew there was something wrong with him back then."
"...Boss, should we save them or not?"
"Mm. Rabbit-Mouth, Fish-Eyes, you two go push the cart up from below..."
...
Itchy.
That was Gavo's only thought right now.
"Achoo!"
With a crisp sneeze, Gavo's consciousness gradually returned.
She tried to move, only to realize she could not.
Her limbs had been tied up tightly with clean strips of cloth like a dumpling.
When her vision finally focused, she saw the culprit who had made her sneeze.
Rabbit-Mouth was grinning smugly as he waved a long fuzzy weed in his hand, splitting his half-toothless mouth in a smug grin.
"You're awake, sissy."
That strange form of address instantly made the still-foggy Gavo realize something was wrong.
"Wait... where's my mask?"
(End of Chapter)
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