"Well, while we're here, we might as well check for useful items in my house." I glanced at the invitingly wide open door.
"Sure, not like we got anything better to do." Sheep agreed.
Crossing the street, we found the house in the exact same state I left it in, that being a total mess. Of course, some things were probably moved around, but with the sheer amount of junk lying around, there was no way I would know what was out of place.
"You sure were needy in your past life..." Vastoria smirked.
"Says the princess with a mansion on a floating island." I shot back.
"Ladies, please." Sheep calmed the tension, "The faster we find what we need, the sooner we can go look for Gale."
Right, but what do we need? We entered to look for "something useful", but that doesn't really narrow our search down at all. Should we make a list? I feel like we're bound to get let down if we give ourselves any expectations though. Ugh, this is gonna be tougher than I thought.
"Then, I'll take the living room." Vastoria divided the work pretty evenly, "You two decide amongst yourselves how you'll divide the second floor."
"Alright, I'll look through my room and the bathroom." I turned to Sheep, "You take the closet and guest bedroom."
"Sounds like a plan." He nodded, "Vastoria, if you find anything, be sure to holler."
"Of course."
Walking up the stairs, the two of us immediately realized something was amiss. Namely, the hallway was so crowded that we couldn't even access the rooms without hopping over them like barrels in a construction zone. Some of the rooms were even barricaded up with piles upon piles of gadgets and clothes, but thankfully the rooms we were looking for weren't.
"Be careful, call if you need help with anything." Sheep warned me just in case, "And of course, if you find something interesting."
"Yeah yeah, just get moving." I hurried him inside the closet before trudging over to my room, "Phew, okay!"
The nostalgic looking bedroom wasn't all that spacious, in all honesty. Of course, it would be if it was kept tidy. I have to wonder, I woke up with it looking like this, so did someone misplace everything beforehand, or am I just a messy person in general?
"Just look at all this." I picked stuff up at random, "A knight's helmet, a bunch of rose paraphernalia, newspaper cut outs... a Blue cloak? Just what kind of a life have I led down there?!"
Kicking away a random gadget that most resembled a small metal ball, I was surprised to see it shoot out a piece of rope. It shot towards the wall at mach speeds, clinging to it by extending sharp metal spikes from its surface. The sound startled both me and Sheep in the other room.
"Everything okay!?" He worried hollered.
"Y-Yeah, I just ran into some Instarope by accident!" I reassured him, "All good!"
"Instarope? The heck is that stuff doing in your room?" He sounded puzzled, "Don't tell me you were an adventurer in your past life."
Geez, I have no clue. Instarope is a gadget used to grapple to hard to reach surfaces, or in a worst case scenario, a last line of defense. Adventurers love using those things whenever they get the chance, because it's cheap and provides great value to any expedition. Not to mention, it's effectively a rope you shoot out at high velocities, so who wouldn't want one in their arsenal at all times?
"As for what correlation it has with the rest of this stuff, however..." Glanced around until a gleam caught my Eye, "Gasp, no way!"
A family photo! Finally, I get to see humans for the first time in forever! Whoa, look at everyone, they seem so happy! I wonder, which one am I? Oh, I can't keep this to myself.
"Guys, come quick!" I shouted.
"Found something!?" Vastoria was already at the door, short on breath and heavily winded, "I came as fast as I could."
"How? You were downstairs, and I was...?" Sheep recalled she had wings, "Oh, that's how. Anyways, what'd you find, Migu?"
Showing them the large family photo that had over a dozen people on it, they both agreed it looked a lot more like a class photo than a family one, had it not been for the older people at the top. From the looks of it, they were arranged in a way where the youngest were nearest to the camera, and the oldest the furthest back.
"It's really well done!" Sheep gawked.
"...Come again?"
"Yeah, props to the artist, it looks so real." He smiled.
Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.
Oh right, he's ancient. I guess cameras weren't a thing back in his time.
"A-Anyways, do you think this is your family, Migu?" Vastoria continued the actual topic, "It's quite large."
"I'm both happy and sad that that's the case." I chuckled, exhaling from my nose, "On one hand, I'm glad to see I had so many people around me, but on the other hand, that makes it harder to pinpoint which one I am."
"The lady in the center, maybe?" Vastoria pointed, "She looks about the same age as us."
"No, you gotta realize that our Heavenly bodies don't match our human bodies." Sheep shook his head before pointing at the scruffy, Brownish haired guy holding her close, "Plus, she has a husband."
"He could be a brother." I reasoned.
"With how close he's holding her, I sure hope not." He shivered in response to that.
As we continued to merely look at each and every person in the photo, a sense of melancholy washed over me like never before. These people, are they truly my family? If so, which one of them is me? Am I even in the photo? Not to mention... All of them are here, in Heaven 2.0 just as well. Sigh, not like it matters, since they wouldn't even recognize me anyways.
"Oh, this guy's got Rainbow Eyes." Vastoria noticed.
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"Cool." I shrugged.
"What? That's gotta be a mistake on the artist's part." Sheep cocked his head back.
"Nah, it's real." I shook my head, "He was just flexing for the camera, I think. People can do that if they Focus enough."
"What the hell kind of world are you from where people can just make their Eyes go all Rainbow like that!?"
I'll let his ignorance slide, since he's from the past. Honestly though, my brain just automatically registers this fact as the status quo, so it's kind of baffling in its own right how people didn't know this before. Eye Color was always a prominent part of every person's lifespan, but I guess this wasn't always the case.
"I think I'm gonna put this in my pocket for safe keeping." I said, delicately folding it for easier transport, "It's a pretty big clue."
"Right, then let's continue with this pace and keep looking for even more breakthroughs." Vastoria smiled at me before walking out of the room.
"Geez, I'm still finding it hard to believe, that thing you said about the Rainbow Eyes." Sheep muttered as he turned to leave the room as well.
Just then, Vastoria's screech sent us into a frenzy. Rushing out of my bedroom, we saw her pinned to the wall by an unknown assailant in the hallway. Judging by the toppled junk next to the previously blocked door behind them, it's safe to assume was in there the entire time, waiting for his chance to strike.
"Let her go!" I shouted.
"Back, back I say!" Sheep instead chose violence over words, grabbing a nearby baseball bat and threatening to use it if the assailant didn't obey us, "Move away from her slowly, and don't you DARE make any sudden movements!"
"...Huh?" Vastoria squinted open her Eyes, allowing her to get a better look at the man that was in front of her, "E-Energy...?"
Oh no, they know each other! Hey, hold on, isn't that good though? That name... Energy was the guy that helped her reach the end of the Shrine before she went with us. He's missing a foot, and he's got one ugly looking scar where he got his Eye ripped out. Apart from that, nothing too out of the ordinary.
"...Oh, it's just you." He looked her up and down before recognizing the chest wound he gave her, "Thank goodness you stopped me. I hid inside this room the moment I heard footsteps downstairs."
"You're quite alert." I praised him, albeit with a nasty glare.
"You have to be when you're in the apocalypse." He said nonchalantly.
Apocalypse? Now I'm really confused.
"Never mind him, he's been through quite a lot in his life." Vastoria defended the guy's odd words, "But how are you doing? Is it difficult to walk with just one foot?"
"Yes it is, thank you for asking." He furrowed his brows, "And the lack of depth of field is also quite difficult to adjust to. I have you to thank for that one."
"S-Sorry..."
They're chatting like old friends. Well, I guess they are old friends, but it's still rude to keep Sheep and me out of the loop. I ran in between them with a pouty frown, fully intent on feeling him out to make sure he's not a threat.
"Oh?" He glanced down at me due to his taller height, "And you are?"
"Nice to meetcha', Migu's the name!" I proudly put my hand out, "Thank you for taking care of our Vastoria!"
"Migu?" She looked embarrassed.
"It was the optimal play." He put his hand in his pocket as he suspiciously returned the handshake, "We living gotta stick together. A human spared might save your skin later, but a dead man sure won't."
That's certainly... one way to look at it. Regardless, had it not been for him, Vastoria might still be stuck in the Shrine, and what's worse, we would have never met! I have to say, though he looks rough around the edges, I'm quite thankful for his contributions!
"I'm Sheep." He put out his remaining hand, "Heh, feels nice to meet a fellow amputee, am I right?"
"At least you can run." The guy belittled Sheep's injury, "Not to mention see where you're running."
"Oh come on, you're not fully blind." Vastoria crossed her arms angrily, "Besides, didn't you notice? With your cool looking face scars, no one even noticed your threads!"
"Threads?" I finally saw golden stitches going down the back of his head, "Oh, would you look at that? What's that-"
...for, I wanted to ask, but he was already undoing the stitches carefully to show us. Like a cartoon, even down to ignoring his skull, we could get a clear shot at the purely golden brain that dwelled inside. Stretching his vertical slit wide open to a gruesome extent so that we could see every inch of it, I couldn't help but feel the need to let out a shriek.
"Yahh! What is that!?"
"Migu, where are your manners!" Vastoria got mad at me for some reason, "This is his gilded part we're talking about! Proof of his scars from his time as a human, so show some respect!"
"Well, if we're talking about respect..." I pointed to the ground next to me, "Then why aren't you scolding Sheep for falling unconscious from the shock?"
She was so absorbed in defending Energy that she totally didn't notice him. In a way, you could say I took the news better, but it's also not a contest. As for the guy that caused all this...
"Yeah, none of you folks would've survived a day in the Living World." He smirked, smugly redoing his stitches like a champ.
Honestly, is Heaven just filled with weirdos, or are we just exceptionally unlucky? A-Ah, Vastoria, stop kicking Sheep. He's not gonna wake up from that.