Chapter 1: Anadoria at last
My dear reader, if you are weak of heart, this is indeed a tale that will test that weakness. What I am about to describe is the life of a girl who had a great heart. In the cave city of Mesta, which lay in the mountains, in the northwest of the Anadorian continent, begins this tale from a land of humans and monsters living together both in harmony and war. Great kings and queens, as well as many an anti-hero, found themselves bundled into the tales of Anadoria. This had them joining to create the paradise, or the ruins, of its native life for thousands of years. As great life forms seemingly originating from monsters of legends, by a necromancer, Dimnu Ester, or vampires that slew hordes of evil, there were also legendary humans who only wished for equality. This is not a tale for the joyful men and women, the sole reason being that the land of Anadoria itself could not predict the following Friday dates of couples in newly entangled love triangles or the consecutive wars brought out by heart-wrenching betrayals of quarreling lovers. In the dramatic land of Anadoria, there is bound to be a great horror-seeking power to rule such an exciting place.
There emerged a villain of Anadoria, who, indeed, thrived on his own notoriously glamorous hatred against him. During the trials through which Anadoria tested him, he was not the wisest, nor the strongest, and not even the most ruthless of villains; however, he was the most cunning. In the midst of the greatest conquerors, the maker's title became Wren Shape Shift, more commonly referred to as Wren S. Ift. His true name was erased from the records long ago for it held great power as the one who could articulate it, no matter how quietly, Wren would serve them willingly and be bound to the speaker's will.
Greater powers, such as the sentient Khul, emerged and took the nation. To include the aforementioned Dimnu Ester with an army of undead. These two were the greatest of rivals in the dominion over the city-states. The lesser powers were the "heroes" going on their adventures, saving the damsels in distress from the wicked princesses guarding the innocent dragons. This was a disaster for the ne'er-do-well, Wren S. Ift, who could not have righteous dragons, to which he was severely allergic, roaming the lands of Anadoria.
The advantages of creating powerful weapons set the mad shapeshifter in motion to begin constructing Adilita part-by-part. Sadly, Wren S. Ift never saw the end of his beloved project. As the art of war had taken Wren S. Ift's fancies, leaving not only Adilita to be left to rest in forgotten memories but the entire lone laboratory of Wren S. Ift's.
A century passed since the day of her production, the time of which Wren S. Ift abandoned his inventions; the powerful engine, Adilita, stirred as the depths of Mesta shook from a spell above. It was only then that Wren S. Ift's final plan, his creation, became sentient; and now, Adilita's programming began it's starting process.
There, in the ruins of the laboratory, the last model of androids lay untouched by the calamity aboveground from which the earthquake spell caused. Seemingly arbitrary words wrote themselves on a crystal tablet and the geometrical forces encircled around it as it assembled the consciousness of Adilita to be transferred into the android body.
"Kokoro.status...online. /Initiating/." Words appeared in Khulian Sigils. The core of Adilita began to hum, it had a circle highlighted with a crisp blue sheen, and the lights of the eye sockets started to shine. Adilita could see her surroundings and surveyed the events of her release as an intricate clockwork capsule unleashed her body. The first experience was the discovery of balance as she was gently placed on the floor to stand. Her left hand and her right hand were fascinating as she tested their motion and grew adjusted to moving them to her will. She was startled by the sound of a disturbed and broken bust of a man with a white rooster mohawk-like hairstyle that seemed impossibly natural. It was a hologram being played on a loop, never reaching a conclusion. In her curiosity, she reached out to see if she could touch it. It appeared as though the hologram A.I. had decided to play a recording from a classic data file of a princess calling for help from a space hero. Upon doing so, the loop repaired itself showing a tall, yet lean, aristocratic man. The cyber program in her memory bank identified a black spike collar and a silver river engraved locket embedded by a blood-red ruby with an energy signature marked Living Bioorganic Life Form. "... marvel of the greatest engineering I have made..." The hologram monologues endlessly on feats and wonders the designer went through causing the android to lose interest. She reached out to a crystal and it came alive at her touch as sub programming reeled through her system.
Adilita no longer needed to pay attention to the scripting running through her body. She opened a palm and made a fist resulting in a chaotic and destructive blast into the wrecker of a nearby broken android capsule. "... I see you have discovered your internal weapons system. Go ahead and give it a spin and don't forget the additional holographic camouflage which will..." The mere mention prompted the freshly awoken android to blend her features and create clothes based on a very short list of data in the creator's archive. She chose a shoulder-length brown hairstyle and a light skin similar to the color of the hologram. The hologram system of the crystal network reacted like a mirror making her nearly jump in surprise when saw it reflect her body. Her choice resonated with newly awakening intuition as her true traits from the selection of natural beauties in the archive. She smiled from her heart and twirled playfully from seeing herself dressed. The recording continued explaining features and battle settings; until finally, the light tone of her maker's voice became serious.
"I, sincerely, am proud of you, Adilita. You are my greatest feat of engineering; you have free will, a purpose that surpasses all. Nothing else such as you exist." Adilita tilted her head as she began to feel a bubbling of being completely functional; an unfamiliar and illogical, yet conducive to a newfound surge of positively charged energy. When the question arose as to what the nature of this particular emotion was from her sub-system. The answer was labeled 'Joy' from within her matrix. She discovered that all further processes would be answered similarly from now on.
"You were made as an instrument of war. Not only war but for the sole purpose to love, you were not made to be a tool."
'Activate #code/heart.overdrive.' The hologram flashed the command sequence.
Surprised by the flash, Adilita stepped back, her foot nudging the hand of a damaged prototype android arm. The mention made her aware of herself and the difference between the inanimate module casing and her self-awareness. The revelation stirred the final charge, she could feel the gridlock of her android body unleash and saw the gears in her arms, legs, and chest as they looped and unlocked. The sight mesmerized Adilita. It was like watching an ant crawl up your hand as the shock of this unknown experience then caused her to panic and shake her arms as if it would stop her transformation.
With no one to guide her but an insensitive pre-recorded hologram, Adilita collapsed from the invisible outpouring of power that coursed through her. "W-what...what is l...l-love?" The brunette asked and the data started to spiral through her cyber system in answer similar to the method it answered 'Joy'. "Wss-stop." She pleaded to the hologram as the impossible to calculate in mathematically equational terms of nearly magical-like energy sheared and surged through her as the cyber frame suggested malfunction if not stopped. Crystallized hardware threatened to overheat from the mysterious force that consumed her and caressed her. Pistons, valves, and liquid chambers geared down mercifully causing her to devolve to her base. The shock alone left her panting as the camouflage reactivated itself, making her appear sixteen again. On her hands and knees, she desperately began to draw data from the majority of the laboratory complex causing her cybernetic mind to evolve rapidly. However, the feeling from the efflux did not go away. As she learned runes, language, and her own design which she ripped out of the crystals, causing them to break and crack, she began to be more self-aware.
Adilita gasped and realized that the surge was emotional itself, that there were too many blending together to control them as she had done with the Kokoro overdrive transformation. She immediately felt the willpower that had once interested her to open and close her hands like naive toys became stronger as the cybernetic cognitive functions matured. The stolen sigil code from the crystals changed her android body on a level of cybernetic transformation not yet encoded by her maker. The generics of her design were perfected and tuned making her sleek, more advanced, and more well-suited to her holographic appearance rather than a factory model appearance.
"I am Adilita Kokoro." The sentient android proclaimed with determination and tried to stand, only to stumble face forward into the image of the hologram. "Where are you?" She asked in deep-seated curiosity to the one who made her feel this way. A mixture of passionate rage for the suffering and love exploded into the narrow-focused glare she gave. Wren S. ift's hologram smiled sourly with a deep foreshadowing gaze of a journey to the edge of the abyss.
"That is your mission. It is to locate me and find the meaning of love. I will tell you everything." It told Adilita Kokoro.
"I promise."
The holographic journal ended. A map of the tunnels appeared in place of Wren S. Ift, leading to a city far above. Adilita felt awe from the map's architectural design and the mysterious city that was detailed around her. The moment lasted a second before another quake shook, urging her to wake up from her awestruck daze and run full force towards the nearest corridor. The collapse of a few large boulders forced her from a four-point position into a full spring run to escape the ensuing collapse.