Luce pulled the last rope tightly, securing the portable MRI machine into the last open space in the back of Arnold's truck. Alongside the portable bio-cell, there was just enough space left to install a seat for a third passenger.

"Alright," she said, closing the door. "It's all loaded up."

She stepped back as Josh and Arnold stepped out and around the truck. With that, they had finished loading up all the necessary medical equipments for Misty's brain scans along with supplies for the journey north. Josh came up to her and gave Luce a quick hug, which she reciprocated. Next to them, Adelle made a gagging face.

Luce asked Josh, "Are you sure you don't need me to come along with you?"

"I'm fine. It's easier to travel with just two Guides and a doctor. Besides, there aren't any space left in the truck."

Arnold walked up to them. "We'll have to load up on supplies when we pass Citi. We can't take the Slopes with the equipments' weight, so we'll have to go slow and take the long way around."

"Thirty days," Luce repeated the timeline they were told during the briefing. "You'll be back in thirty days."

Arnold shrugged. "As long as everything goes well."

They finished packing the last of the smaller equipments to the front seats and bit them farewell. In the end, Luce, Adell watched as the truck drove off into the dust, leaving her behind with Adelle, Miu, and Shou. For a while, they watched in silence as the travelling party miniaturised into the distance.

"So," Shou began. "Shall we have a party? Me and my harem?"

"I'm gay," Luce stonely replied.

"I'm gay too," Adelle whiffed back.

Shou clicked his tongue. "Damn it!"

Miu added, "I'm standing right here."

"Come along, Adelle," Luce said. "Miu, do you mind if we borrowed you elecycle?"

"Go ahead. But where are you going?"

"We're going into Citidale. I want to get Adelle oriented to seeing the culture and technology here and see if we can drum up some helpful leads. We've got thirty days. Might as well use them."

"How are you going to get past the gates?"

"Have they changed the design and guard routine in the last ten years?"

"No."

Luce looked at Adelle expectantly. "Then we'll have our ways."

"Ooo!" Shou piped up. "I'll come along with you. We can sit threesies!"

Before he could even move, Miu grabbed his ears and pulled him painfully back.

"And where do you think you're going, mister?"

"To - ow! To party with the pretty girls?"

"We have work to do. And are you trying to say I'm not fun, or that I'm not pretty?"

Luce left the two to their devices. After they were done flirting, she was sure the two would begin work on preparing Reggie to receive its new - about to be stolen - part. For now though, she wanted to check out Citidale to get a feel of how much things have changed. It would also be good for Adelle to get more accustomed to the technology. It would do them no good for the elf to be confused in the heat of infiltration or battle.

Adelle asked, "I thought you couldn't drive?"

"Not a car. An elecycle's a... bike."

"I am not cycling to Citi. I've seen the maps and I know how far it is."

"Just come with me."

They went to the garage where a single elecyle remained. The electric bike Luce was used to were sleek and alloyed shelled. But the one sitting in the warehouse was like everything else there. Makeshift. The front wheel was slightly larger than the back, and the fairing shell did not fit the chassis, with some parts cut out and welded in haphazardly. The pannier boxes behind were the only set of items that seems to be in its correct pair, though the grey plastic material clashed with the brown metal of everything else. Everything else was seemingly scavenged and put together as a makeshift ride.

"That's not a bicycle," Adelle noted.

Luce grabbed the key fob and a pair of goggles off a nearby shelf and put them on. She threw a second set to Adelle. "Put those on," she said, climbing onto the cycle.

"Why?"

"Just do it, will you? And climb up behind me."

You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

Reluctantly, the elf did as she was told. Luce pulled up her scarf as she flicked a switch on the cycle. The first door of the garage rose opened into the sub-compartment division. The floor of the compartment was filled with the rust and dust from outside that was trapped within. With a gentle twist of the throttle, Luce moved the bike slowly forward.

"Woah!" Adelle exclaimed behind.

"Hold onto me," Luce instructed as she brought the inner door of the decontamination chamber down and waited for the outer door to open.

"I don't need to hold on to you," Adelle replied smugly as the door rose. She pulled up her scarf. "I have an impeccable sense of ba-woah!"

The moment the second door rose up high enough, Luce skidded out into the burning wasteland. Adelle flailed behind for a moment before leaning forward and holding tightly onto Luce's waist. The girl in front smiled beneath her scarf as they slashed across the dust plains east. Citidale was not far. In fact, with just fifteen minutes on the cycle they could see its skyline scraping the horizon.

None of the buildings in the city were as tall as the ones in Citi, Dogon's fringe city. Most of them kept below the fifteen stories mark. Citidale was closer to the south, which meant a thicker concentration of Taint higher in the atmosphere. The buildings, once above a certain height, would be battered by the elements and hard to maintain, and thus, were kept lower to the ground.

They were in an area known as The Faults, where the heat was hotter and the Taint was thicker. Over thousands of years, The Fault had slowly grown along the continent. Dogon had been building its cities further up north, attempting to escape it. In the past hundred years, The Faults had caught up to and covered the fringe Citi, forcing further migration attempts north into war zones. Citidale - built with the genius engineering of long gone dwarfs - still stood within the apocalyptic landscape, though no new buildings were erected. The towers of white metal were the first buildings on the continent, and likely would be the last. An eternal shell to keep away the flames.

Before long, they had reached the Citidale outskirts. Long abandoned homes rusted away in the hot gale. Luce could feel the heat and dust scratching at her skin. Even through her scarf, she could smell the tang of metal. But the capitol was in sight. Unguarded by any artificial wall, protected from attacks by the very elements themselves, the white, windowless buildings stood as a ghostly beacon.

A tunnel rose up in the distance and Luce rode into the safety of it, away from the weather. White light lined the inside of the tunnels from tubes that glowed along the wall. She could hear Adelle gasping. An electrical grid such as this was likely something the elf had never seen before.

As they proceeded down the road with no sound aside from the humming of the motor bouncing off the walls, a curve in the road brought out a large steel gate that barred the way. A line broke the seams of the door like the open viewer of a sliding peep hole. It was a gap soldiers would use to shoot through should they be attacked. The gates were usually lightly patrolled, especially at times such as this where an attack from the enemy was not expected that far away from the main battlefield.

"Adelle," Luce called over the wind. "Get us through."

The elf leaned sideways to get a clear view through the open viewer. In a now familiar blink of her eyes, the elecycle reappeared on the other side in a puff of rust. There was a guard and an electrician standing at a power box opposite. But they teleported quick and far enough that with the silent electric motor, they simply continued on without raising any suspicion. Even if they had been spotted, the general guard rotation Luce was familiar with had no way of catching up to the speed of the elecycle. The vehicles used by the army were slower on paved road, and the army would never leave national defence to the civil forces and their paper thin cars. Also, having Adelle's teleportation abilities did make things like sneaking around ridiculously easy. They could easily outmanoeuvre any vehicles in traffic.

Soon, she turned off a ramp that let up into the city's main underground roads. The tunnels eventually joined up. Dozens of cars and elecycles moved in two opposing lines on the road, bustling along about their day at high speed. There were turns that lead into underground parking places scattered along traffic. Luce felt Adelle's grip tighten at her waist and she chuckled.

"Are you scared?" she asked.

"N-no! But... have we been travelling as fast as all of these people?"

"Of course. I can slow down if you're not comfortable." It's not often that she gets to experience Adelle being shocked or scared. The elf faced down grandmaster tiered magicians and fought those that could be gods. Little shook the independent woman. Luce was internally enjoying the experience.

"I-I'm fine," Adelle replied, her grip loosening. "Where are we going?"

Luce turned into the underground parking labelled 'A21'. A gantry stood in the way with an interface. She selected 'ELECYCLE' from the menu and the machine asked for payment. To the screen, she raised her wrist where a band Arnold gave her stored enough credits for her to move about a little. The screen on her band blinked, and the number '21,560' appeared. Another blink and '-150' flashed across the digital screen. A final blink showed the final deducted credit. '21,410'.

"Wow," Luce muttered. "Parking's gotten expensive."

The road in the parking lot lit up with green arrows. She followed the lighted pathway until they came to an empty spot set for their cycle. She backed into it and turned off the motor. The pair got off the machine and headed to the sidewalk, dusting off residue rust from the outside. Adelle let out a sigh of relief.

"So you just store your carriages in the space? How will you prevent it from being stolen?"

Luce raised the fob key. "Wireless lock. Only when this key is nearby can vehicles start."

"What's to stop me from just carrying the vehicles away?"

"They are heavy," Luce joked. "Most people can't teleport."

Walking around the lot, they came to a small, lighted room. The walls within it were made of thin, silver metal. Aluminium alloy, a common metal that Dogon worked with. Within it on the two side walls were buttons labelled 'G' and 'U'. Luce stepped in, but Adelle hesitated.

"What's wrong?" Luce asked, smirking. "It's just an elevator."

"Oh!" Adelle seemingly breathed anothe sigh of relief. "Like the one in The Tower. I knew that." She stepped in, her chest puffing out with pride.

Luce grinned, happier than she had been in a long time. She pressed the 'G' button and the elevator smoothly rode up. Adelle looked fascinatingly at the corners of the ceiling where wind from the ventilations spewed out. Finally, the carriage stopped. With nary a noise, the doors opened, and the light outside flooded in. Luce saw Adelle hesitate, so she took the latter's hand and pulled her out into the streets.

The floor was smooth concrete, with layered tiles of stone decorating the designated walkways. Shops with glowing neon signs were built along into the walls of the wide street, 30 meters wide and extending left and right into corner and curves. The ceiling was the white adamantium-aluminium mix made by the dwarfs of old, with hanging lamps of dark blue light dimly illuminating the place, giving the illusion of a night with bulbous teal stars. The air was dry and cooled with conditioning, and cool jazzy electric piano beats were played over the speakers.

"Welcome," Luce said. "To Citidale, the City of Hidden Dreams."