A Little Girl

The village burned down, as it should. The flames consumed the wooden structures, burning through the grass and engulfing the palisades. It only took the flames a few minutes before it engulfed the entire village, reducing it to ash.

The smoke rose high up the sky; it was a cloudy day at least. The smoke rose up to add more to the grim nature of the surrounding lands, where the dead were scattered all over. Artemis watched on as the village fumed, he felt relieved.

He felt as if he saved himself and his empire from destruction, whatever those were, they were a threat! Thankfully, he was the only one alive around these parts; there was nobody else to discover what he had destroyed.

He did not learn what the name of the village was but it was no longer important, it was gone and Artemis should just move on. A grim start to his adventure, not something he'd endorse but still a start. He dusted his uniform and pants and headed off along the dirt path once more, he wanted to deviate from it but he was determined on finding another path.

Ding! He could just fly. He had thrusters and all.

But that would ruin my experience.

He thought.

No, that is stupid, I must monopolize my abilities as best as I can to achieve my objectives.

And so he did, after a brief moment of activating his thrusters and positioning himself for launch, he ascended.

He did not reach too far, just enough so he could see the surrounding areas. He scanned his surroundings, there were hills further north, the forest continued towards the west and the plains to the east. The bodies also continued to the west along with the plains.

Maybe If I follow the plains, then I'd find a path.

And so he did, he flew west and followed the plains and the bodies of the dead creatures thereof. They littered the dead grass as far as he could see with his normal eyesight. Thoughts ran down his mind as well as thousands of calculations of countless variables, all being done at the same time.

He was at full alert, he felt threatened and choked. This place was cursed with something unbecoming. He did not want to think of it at first, but he thought to himself: Am I the one who caused this?

Maybe, he concluded. He was generally unfazed as always even if the bodies began to crank up.

Suddenly, as he was flying above the plains, he saw some shadows in the distance. Silhouettes appeared small and tightly packed but they were moving still. Upon further approach, they appeared like Ogres, he thought they were Ogres at first. But, they were actually not anymore.

Oozing Ogres.

Their skin was darkish green and oozed like the figure he saw down the well and encountered on the village hall. Their facial features were still there but were almost fully unrecognizable, he only knew they were Ogres after scanning their bodies. The scanner determined them as [30%] similar to Ogres.

30 percent, what small percentage of their original being remained after being transformed into the hideous creatures they were now. They moved in a tight formation, they were all following or something.

Rather, they were chasing something.

Artemis came closer and closer, he was up floating in the sky so he was probably safe unless the Ogres suddenly grew wings from their backs and flew at him. No, they had no such ability. He saw what they were chasing, or following.

It was a little girl, bruised and near-death according to Artemis' scanners. Artemis had no time to evaluate her appearance, instead, he charged in to grab her.

His reflex at the matter was unheard of, strange even but he did so anyway. He sped towards the girl as fast as he could and as safe as he can be to grab onto the little girl's body and carry her out of her dilemma

He did so with style, as one of the Ogres was about to touch her, Artemis swooped in and grabbed the little girl and hoisted her up against his chest and flew off. It was a gamble if he would not lose balance after such a stunt, yet he pulled it off. 

He held on to the little girl tightly, she was also holding onto him as tight as her remaining strength could permit. She was in shock, but a prince charming, an angel, swooped in from the heavens above to save her.

Well, Artemis was neither prince charming nor an angel, he was the opposite of both. Yet, despite it, he saved the little girl with what could've been her death. But, Artemis suddenly noticed that the girl was indeed near-death.

Her heart began to beat irregularly and her grip, he felt it loosen significantly. He had to descend, he had to save her or else his efforts would've been all for nothing. He descended to the ground and landed rather roughly but he quickly went to work.

He laid the girl onto the dead grass and scanned her body, as he was doing this he charged up his hands like a defibrillator and shocked the girl's chest. It was enough to normalize her heartbeat. She began to cough, it was a sign of progress but it was not over yet. Artemis' scanning completed and revealed to him the main problem.

She was being choked too, the particulates have begun to clog her blood vessels. It was bad, Artemis did not know how to save her from it. Should he perform a short but quick dialysis? It was risky, but it seemed like the only way he could do to save her. He opened a tiny hole in his right palm and a small tube with a needle at the tip came out.

He would use his body as a dialysis machine, it was Caitlyn's idea to give him such a seemingly useless upgrade. Yet, here he was, actually needing to use it to save someone.

He injected the needle onto the little girl's left wrist and began the dialysis. Her blood began to pump through Artemis' body, to avoid her actually losing blood, he sped up the movement of the blood in his body but timed it to match the pumping of her heart once it finished.

His plan was actually working, the particulates were being filtered out, slowly but surely. Seeing the results, he was confident that he'd save the little girl.

It should be short dialysis actually lasted for a full hour, her blood was still contaminated with the particulates, though in lesser amounts now. He stopped the dialysis and checked on her vitals once more, she was stable, for now.

Then, everything stopped.

Throughout the ordeal, the wind was blowing from the east and messing his hair. The clouds began to form up and blocked the sun to form a grey sky. It looked grimmer, with the dead grass and dead bodies of animals that surrounded them. He was holding onto a girl, who narrowly escaped death.

The feeling was surreal, to actually suddenly save someone was surreal for Artemis. But, the little girl was far from being saved. The particulates in her blood were still rising, the problem came directly from the environment itself.

He was not affected by the particulates, he was a machine and had no functioning bloodstream, nothing for the particulates to choke or clog. The little girl snoozed over his lap, it was at this moment did Artemis see her full appearance.

She looked like a normal peasant girl except for the hair and the eyes. She had a leather dress, ragged and dirty it may be, it still served the purpose of providing her warmth. She had fair skin, lined with bruises and wounds, scars even on her right cheek. She had thin eyebrows and beautiful pink hair that reached her back, and such beautiful blue eyes almost like Caitlyn's.

[IMAGES]

It was a cold day, no, the day was getting colder by the second. The dusk was nearing and death has stopped reeling, the moon will soon rise over these dead lands and Artemis needed to make a shelter.

A shelter for the girl he saved. What kind of shelter, the woods in the area were all oozing and none could be used to make a shelter of any kind. He also burned down the village, the entire village gone and so they really had no shelter.

I could mine, he thought. But he'd need to dig, smelt and so on. In total, with his current abilities, he'd be spending 2 to 4 hours to construct a shelter and he knew that he'd get carried away. Instead of a minimalistic shelter, he'd be constructing a fortified fortress made of reinforced stone, something similar to it.

"Crap," Again, the words escaped his mouth and conveyed his 'frustration' or something similar. The girl was no longer sleeping, she was now unconscious. She was stable but she needed rest and continued dialysis.

But if he could perform a 10-kilometer scan of the area around them using his enhanced sensors, maybe he could find a settlement nearby or a place where the trees are actually trees. Why did he not do this earlier? Again he did not want to use more of his abilities than he is supposed to.

Why is he even going through the trouble of saving some random girl he just so happened to come across?

This world was a chaotic world.

Laws and the society that uses those laws are primitive in nature compared to Earth's modern society. It should come as no surprise that he'd always experience death, chaos, and anarchy whenever he would go exploring. But this was his first time beyond the control and help of his drones.

A medieval society with mythical elements, in other words, magic and maybe some dragons if there's actually one, adding with Airship steam technology.

Artemis was undecided.

He continued performing minimum dialysis to the little girl to keep her from dangerous levels of particulate contamination. They stayed there, under the grey sky and then when the night came, they settled under the starless sky. The clouds remained there, grey and blocked the light from moons and the stars from shining upon the dead lands.

Artemis began to gently massage the girl's head. Particularly her hair, he has no clue how is her hair pink, it is very unusual to be born naturally with these type of hair colors, dyeing hairs is not even exist in this world yet, probably it is common in this world to be born with multiple hair color, her hair was soft but a tad smelly. She must've not have been able to wash it for a couple of days now. Or maybe, she was abandoned here.

Whether Artemis liked it or not, although the girl is yet to gain consciousness and talk, she was stuck with Artemis. The girl also had no choice in the matter. Artemis figured he should gather a bunch of dead grass into one big pile and burn them. He risked burning the plains but the little girl needed warmth.

Wait, he thought before executing his intentions of starting another wildfire.

He could just heat up his body to a degree that would provide the girl with warmth. Problemo solved.

Artemis was not processing ideas as fast as he used to. Maybe he was just being laid back, actually not caring for the girl's wellbeing but acting out of pure reflex of something he has no understanding of.

No matter, he has done what he has done and there was no turning back. The girl was now his responsibility to ensure her health and safety. Maybe the girl could serve as a valuable tool to help him in his journey through the continent, a guide, or a slave... scratch that last part, he dislike that word.

Either way, for better or for worse, Artemis would need to benefit from saving her somehow. But she wasn't fully saved but still, Artemis was planning ahead.

"Hm," The wind was cold, the night itself brought chills but Artemis' reactor warmed the girl just enough for her to be at ease. Artemis was not sure if she was still unconscious since he has stopped monitoring her vitals since she has been pretty stable for the past few hours.

There were no enemies, nowhere near them at least.

The girl must be awake or sleeping.

But he felt the child's tight grip around his waist.