Three months later…
Sahara clenched some of the net, that was in both of her hands, and put it to her chest. She still wasn’t ready to openly think of Talon, Samuel and Zeus, but holding this net seemed to help her no longer shed tears like rain. In fact, only a few drops have escaped since that terrible day…
It had been a long three months in Sahara’s eyes, having to live by not the hour or minute, but by the seconds.
“Naruto caught a few more people.” Steven said to her.
Sahara quietly nodded and pointed to the dead, big beast, that she teleported into the area.
Steven turned from the beast and back to her, knowing what to do.
Yeah, Sahara sorta lost a lot of herself…She could hardly hear or speak anymore…She didn’t want to care, or think, or feel…Sahara just wanted to be busy.
At first, they had to wait to get out of the anti-beast barrier, because she had to regain spiritual essence. But, after that, Naruto, Steven and Sahara would take turns, by either teleporting or running, and they finally found the rest of the Purple Haven men, that had been with Prince Seth when she had teleported him and his princess to Green Haven.
Escorting them back, they took nearly an entire month, as they had nearly died upon meeting up with them, so they had to get food and water for them and let them sleep. After that, they still had to travel back towards Green Haven, to make sure that they stayed safe.
Sahara ended up making Naruto bigger, where she could sit on him and heal the poor, Purple Haven guys, while they could still slowly make their way back towards Green Haven.
Naruto could have traveled faster, but Sahara was unable to come up with something, to let them stay on his back without a problem, so Naruto had to go a lot slower. They still made pretty good time though, even because of this, and Sahara was able to heal all three of them back up to the best of her ability. Of course, that fact that Sahara didn’t speak made things a lot harder, but she wasn’t about to start because of this reason…She just wasn’t ready.
Upon the seeing boundary of Green Haven, Sahara gave the Purple Haven men a map, to where the Second Prince resided and then they turned back around. She hadn’t spoken to them at all, and Steven didn’t give them her name, so they couldn’t really say who helped them. All they could say was that there was a beast, a strong man, and a mute, rough looking girl that had helped them.
Yeah…Sahara didn’t care what she looked like in those days…She didn’t bother putting her hair up, most of the time it was knotty, and Steven had to comb it. She didn’t bother cleansing herself, but she was thrown in water once and told to clean herself…She was a mess.
What did it matter if she was smelly? What did it matter if her hair was a mess?
…It took them another month to get to Purple Haven, as they were no longer in any rush…It would normally take at least two months in travel, so they still did get there a lot faster time than normal.
Sahara teleported them once, for most of the way, then made Steven and Naruto to do the rest, not caring on time or speed.
They took their time, eating the beasts and getting extra water, while they could. Sahara’s storage became quite well stocked in that time actually. You’d think that with all the food that they were able to keep in that month would last a long time but…It didn’t…
They let Naruto do a run once a day, waiting until he returned to continue, and Steven and Sahara rarely talked…Or was it her that rarely talked?
Sahara had no idea what to say. She already felt like she was condemning him, yet Steven was adamant in wanting to follow her…And to be honest, she was glad and sad because of it…
She needed someone…To be on her own at a time like this, Sahara probably would have been ok…Just, having Steven close to her, she strangely felt warmth and slowly started to sort through her emotions that she had numbed herself too.
Honestly, this was the first time that she had lost so much. When her daughter was taken, Sahara was angered, but when she died, she wasn’t able to feel the loss straight away. She had fought till the better end and died.
This…This was different. Sahara wasn’t really very good at being emotional, she had gotten used to understanding them and being able to keep emotions at bay. When she was angry, it bottled up, when she was upset, she just found reasons to fix the problem, so that she wasn’t upset anymore. But how could she fix how she was feeling? She didn’t know how to…So, Sahara just had to slowly deal with it herself and surely, one day, she could find retribution for going through it all…One day…
The last month, they had started to get Purple Haven under control. This was where things got a little better for Sahara.
She was able to put everything that she knew from both lives, into preparation.
Obviously, food was the biggest problem and she brought in food, and as soon as she could, Sahara got food being grown and what not…You know, get the farms back up and going again and herded all the livestock to one area…Having to get seeds from different places, even from outside of the wall…
The next was to keep the food safe and them safe, which wasn’t hard, which is probably why she didn’t mention it earlier.
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Sahara had ‘dinged’ into seventh rank before coming to Purple Haven and Steven had gone to eighth rank as well. The people there didn’t go beyond rank three, so they either hated or loved them straight away.
She hadn’t the curiosity to use a pill, until after they were nearly at Purple Haven…But, finally, one small part of her did start to return and she couldn’t hold it back…
She took a white pill and found that it worked much like the first pill had. What she had done, had made it so that she was accepting all of the type of essence once again, and now she was certain, that the most spiritual essence received, when taking one of these pills, was that brown colored one. In fact, the percentage of the ‘brown’ looking spiritual essence that comes when taking the pill, Sahara guessed, could be close to about forty or fifty percent…
Afterwards, Sahara wasn’t far off eighth rank and even tried to explain to Steven what he could do to make the pills work to its greatest advantage once again.
It really was a cheat way to ‘level up’!
Normally, one has to be active and stretch their capabilities with their meditations, and it was a good way, because you grow stronger with techniques as well.
Sahara’s ‘cheat’ way, by using these pills, can easily put you as stronger very quickly, but without techniques…It was like gaining a muscle, but not knowing how to use it. The biggest problem was having the materials…But for Sahara, that wasn’t a problem!
Anyway, the accepting people from Purple Haven were ready to devote themselves to them, and they made them work with them. It was a lot easier to lead when you were the strongest one there, but Sahara did have some leadership skills, not that she cared to much to be a leader nor thought that she would be the best for the job…
Yes, it was with them and not for them. They all pitched in and tended to everything together…
The people who were running away and being idiots, were all collected by Naruto and brought back to Sahara…
She blocked their cultivation bases and sent them to work too…Word got out that Sahara did this, and a few people had come back willingly, because they didn’t want their cultivation bases becoming blocked.
It wasn’t like she couldn’t unblock them later, Sahara just needed them all to band together now. They needed to see that working together was a lot better and that they could accomplish more that way. Not only that, Sahara had the food! And…She wasn’t in the mood to take ‘no’ as an answer…As, she didn’t want someone to be killed just so that someone could eat while she was there! It was a sad thing, one that she didn’t like at all and so she was determined that no more deaths were to happen since she had taken residence there.
They had to learn how to look after themselves! As she wasn’t going to stay here forever, it was just a good place for her to stay right now, as this place kept her busy.
…There was another problem, in which had already become apparent to Steven…
Yeah, Sahara knew not long after they had left Green Haven…She just didn’t know what to do…
…She had become quite weak since the death of Talon, Zeus and Samuel and would end up having nightmares once again…And more often…
As much as she thought that Steven shouldn’t be near her, he has…Helped her so much…
She’d wake to sweat and tears…Steven taking her into his arms and hugging her tight…
For much of this time, Sahara hadn’t wanted to think about what she had lost…
But her nightmares, they remind her all the time…
She’d picture the same scene over and over again, but the person getting slashed in the throat would change…
It drove Sahara so insane that she could rarely talk anymore, because she was scared that she’d fall apart. She kept seeing herself go to talk, feeling her chin start to tremble as her lips would press together…Attempting to talk seemed like something that would make her cry for some reason. She didn’t know why an emotionless action would do something like that to her, but it was one reason indeed that she used to not talk…
It didn’t take long for Sahara to get used to becoming mute once again, since it wasn’t the first time, but she hadn’t even noticed that the want to cry had slowly gone over time, just like a sore that just needed time to heal…She didn’t know simply because she rarely talked and when she did rarely talk, she didn’t notice the absence of that feeling.
Steven, on the other hand, started to think that there’s a point in everyone’s life where they needed help. Even he had forgotten that Sahara was human and that she needed help, just like he and Zeus had needed it.
It was still somewhat…Unreal…
Their names were never brought up, and Steven started to see things that reminded Sahara of them and tried to keep whatever it was away from her. He even had tried to take the net away from her, but that was the only thing that she held onto tightly and stated a firm ‘no’ in response. No…This net will have a use…It will have a use!
Now that they were away from Green Haven, the only thing that reminded both of them, that it was indeed real, was her heart wrenching nightmares…
That and…
Sahara knew not long before they entered Purple Haven…When she had cleansed herself for the first time in nearly two months.
She was pregnant…
Sahara knew that in this life, she was only sixteen, but really, she was closer to fifty years in experience of life now…It was a hard feeling to work out, whether she was too young or too old to have a child…
Her body told her it was ready, already having started her menstrual cycle, but that didn’t mean she should do it…Right?
It was…Yet something else that she didn’t know how to deal with…So, she sorta tried to forget about it…She knew that could be immature of her, but she was still hurting…
Strangely, Sahara would lose herself, when she cleansed her body and see the little thing there, growing inside of her…But…
Sahara couldn’t help but think, would this poor, little thing die, just like everyone else close to her?
Actually, she had tried to abort…Even though she also felt bad about that…But she was scared…
How could she bring a child up in this predicament? How could their future be bright and safe?
But…It didn’t work. Sahara couldn’t use her spiritual essence on the fetus at all, she could only use her spiritual essence to see it but could never attempt any kind of technique.
…Golden, little magical specs would stop her from attempting anything, and she could only let this little one be. Even though Sahara was sad and unwelcoming, she knew, that deep down, she was happy and held some hope. She already knew that it was a little boy…She had a girl before, but for some reason, she was looking forward to having a little boy…
It was confusing, yet magical…
And another reason why it was absolutely magical, was that her daughter had been a blessing, as she had thought she couldn’t have kids in her last life. Seriously, if she hadn’t had gotten something called PCOS, Sahara might have had about three kids by the time that she had her daughter! But it looked like conceiving a child on this planet, with this body, was a lot different…A lot different! One night and bam, you’re pregnant! But then, why had the population not been higher in Green Haven?
The little man seemed to be growing splendidly and Sahara never felt so excited about being able to watch a child in the womb grow. She remembers seeing pictures on the internet and her very own ultrasound photo of her daughter…But being inside and watching it with your own eyes, was a hell of a lot different! And a hell of a lot more special!
His little heart was so tiny, and Sahara got ruffled about it a few times, wondering how miraculous the human body was…Hell, it was an emotional time!
Anyway, as she said, Steven was starting to see something strange…And that was because Sahara was eating more, vomiting and growing slightly…
I guess I should tell him…Mmm…
Sahara spent a lot of time looking at the sunset and stars lately…Was it because the same sun and stars could be seen where…He was…
All he had to be, was alive…That’s all. If he died because of her, she…
It always made her think…Why was she born, if people died because of her? Wouldn’t it only be right that she wasn’t born at all? That she hadn’t even existed in the first place…
It wasn’t the first time that she had asked these questions nor was it the first planet she had asked them on, yet Sahara still can’t answer them…
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