Chapter 1048 — Ruins of War

With that, the mechanic turned and left the platform where Metzen lay—she still had a great deal of work to handle, and before every dragon with a broken implant could rest easy, she had little time to chat.

After the mechanic left, Metzen lifted her head. The cold, old-style machines and broken mechanical arms around her kept their silence; without the support of the Omega system, these things would never again run on their own to inject her with enhancers or tend her scales after surgery.

In a drifting glow, Metzen returned to her human form, then climbed down the iron ladder at the platform's edge herself—she did not rashly leap down or cast a flight spell. Having lost her neural enhancement devices, she still needed some time to readjust to this much-weakened body.

She walked out of the cave into the open ground outside. The somewhat dim skylight slanted down, falling across the plaza strewn with broken walls and rubble.

Only then did she realize she had lain in the cave for half a day; the giant sun, once high in the sky, had gradually sunk toward the horizon—there would now be half a day of twilight, the sun would slowly dip and rise once along the horizon, and then begin to rise again the next morning.

Metzen drew a breath of cold air, rousing her spirits a little, then noticed what seemed to be some commotion ahead and set off toward it.

A good number of dragons in human form had gathered around the red dragon Karador, but by the time Metzen arrived, the small disturbance had already subsided, and the gathered dragons were gradually dispersing. Karador let out a breath of relief and noticed Metzen's approach.

"You're all right now?" the aged red dragon asked, looking at Metzen. "I thought you'd rest another half day."

"The implant trouble is settled. The bodily injuries will heal with time—no need to keep occupying a spot in the cave," Metzen said, while looking curiously at the retreating figures. "What happened? Someone causing trouble?"

"Dragons wouldn't sink that low," Karador said in a low, slow voice. "It was just a bit of trouble when distributing supplies and assigning work... Without the aid of the automated systems, we keep running into problems even with small things like this. It feels a bit ironic, honestly."

A bit of trouble distributing supplies and assigning work?

Metzen could not help repeating Karador's words in her mind, her gaze slowly sweeping across this ruined camp. What she saw were exhausted kin and wounded in urgent need of rest, and the problems this shelter faced were so obvious: not enough food, not enough medical supplies, not enough labor, not enough tools.

True, the mighty constitution of dragons was enough to keep her kin alive for a long time on this wind-howling continent, but such survival seemed utterly hopeless. Most of Tarronde had been reduced to scorched earth, and the ordinary dragons, long accustomed to the meticulous care of the Omega system and automated factories, seemed to have no idea how to survive on this land that had returned to primitiveness...

For some reason, Metzen suddenly thought of the distant continent of Loren, and of the humans there who had likewise endured wasteland and risen again.

"We should find a way to secure our kin's basic survival first," she could not help saying. "We can survive a long time without food, but sooner or later we'll have to eat... Where is our food coming from now?"

"Food gathered from the ruins will last a while. A lot of it was burned, but some factories and storage facilities buried deep underground still have intact stock," a dragon passing by said upon hearing this. "Not much has been gathered, but... our population isn't large now either."

"That stuff will run out sooner or later. We still have to find a way to restore food production," Karador said gravely. "We don't know where else on this continent we can grow food, but the ocean can provide at least some sustenance..."

"And we still need to find some way to repair the factories. Omega is gone, but we can work around the automated lines and restart the machines by hand," another dragon said. "We cannot dig the enhancers and the components needed to repair the implants out of the ground..."

"We also need to build sturdier shelters. Many of the buildings here are on the verge of collapse, and there are not enough of them for everyone to live in..."

Some dragons passing by began to discuss the matter, yet the discussion brought no hope or encouragement; instead it only made each of them more certain of how dire the situation before them was. Metzen could feel the mood in the gathering sink, visibly and steadily. She had never imagined that the glorious, mighty Tarronde could one day find itself in such a predicament. True, compared with the doom that had originally been their fate, matters now seemed considerably better — but to survive under such circumstances... hardly seemed like much of a blessing.

She could not help letting her thoughts run wild, and then all at once she noticed something: "Karador, has Noreta still not returned?!"

"Noreta?" The red dragon Karador seemed only now to remember the white dragon lady who had left the camp at noon. His brows drew together, and by reflex he immediately tried to call Noreta through the Omega system — yet it was not until hollow static came through the resonance core in his mind that he realized he had made the same mistake again.

He lifted his head and looked toward the sky to the south of the camp. "She should have been back at least an hour ago... The place she went to scout is not far from here. Whether or not she found any survivors, the round trip should have been quick..."

"She went alone?" Metzen asked, a note of anxiety in her voice.

"Yes, alone... We are short-handed, and the southern district is quite close, so she went by herself..."

Metzen did not wait for him to finish. She strode away, already shifting swiftly into her dragon form: "I am going to find her!"