"3.21. Nice, pft."
Lucian was still in the aftermath of the battle between the mages and the workers who use advanced weaponry—well, since he killed the remaining mages, it actually would not be right to just call it an aftermath of the battle. But whatever anyone wanted to call it, Lucian was satisfied.
He didn't actually just kill the mages, no. He asked them to perform several more spells so he could absorb whatever radiation it was emitting — unfortunately, the traces of radiation from their spells weren't high at all.
The biggest thing he absorbed… came from the large gun that was attached to the helicopter. He had already checked everyone's corpses to see if any of them left any clues about the new world he was living in. But alas, everything important might have already been squashed along with the helicopter.
"Hm…"
In short, Lucian had no idea where he was, where he was going, or what he was actually going to do in this world from now on.
"Weird," Lucian then let out a small but very deep sigh as he looked around, "The guys I've read who were transmigrated to another world seemed to know exactly where they're going. I…
…don't even know what to do now aside from just growing stronger and eating — where do I even start to find that lightning god?"
Lucian then looked at both horizons, and they seemed to be exactly the same. He was in the middle of a vast Wasteland with absolutely nowhere to go.
"Hmm…" Lucian squinted his eyes before grabbing the Geiger counter with him and then climbing the boulder the mages used to crush the helicopter. And even with the higher elevation, he could still see nothing but a brown Wasteland for miles and miles on end,
"...So much for the surface, Eduardo. There's absolutely nothing here. Maybe this is why I shouldn't just kill and absorb everything I see…
…I should just return to the sewers and go from—"
Lucian leaped from the giant boulder, but instead of going down, he found himself going up as he was suddenly plucked by the heavens. Well, if the heavens had sharp talons, that is.
Lucian was careful not to let go of his Geiger counter and blades as he looked up at the creature that picked him up into the air, only to see a bird only a little larger than him — its wingspan, however, probably spanned a meter wide.
"...Woah," Lucian wanted to act surprised, but he was just not in the mood at all to be dramatic at the moment. Lucian had lived for eons, and if there was a skill he learned by being alone for the most part of that, it was to entertain himself — there was even, perhaps at one point, where he had forgotten how to even feel any emotions.
He tries his best to suppress that at all times; after all, what is the point of living if he can no longer feel anything? He would just… wither away.
And right now, it was suddenly happening again as his eyes slowly turned cold and dead. He just hangs there emotionless upon the bird's talons, letting his blades and the Geiger counter dance along with his hair and his napkin cape.
"Oh…?" Very soon, however, Lucian started to blink several times as the view of the Wasteland started to reflect in his eyes. And there, he could finally see the history and the wounds of the land he finds himself in.
The Wasteland, as he already surmised, spanned for miles. It seemed lifeless, but not at all as Lucian could see creatures walking around everywhere — some of them the size of large trees. But perhaps even more so than the creatures, the most noticeable were the craters.
There were dozens of them, each wider than the last, and there were probably more across the horizon.
"Interesting…" Lucian placed his hand on his chin, "...Technologically advanced people and mages at war, a Wasteland that spans for hundreds of miles as a result of that — this world might be more interesting than I thought it was, Eduardo…
…just imagine the fun I could have here."
And very slowly, the smile returned on Lucian's face as he pointed the Geiger counter toward the red bird; his strands of hair that were holding his blades, getting ready to just slice it in half. But after a few more seconds, Lucian let out a sigh and shook his head.
He just told himself that he would not needlessly kill the creatures here, he wasn't about to break that oath in less than an hour.
And so, once again, Lucian just let himself be dragged off in the air; this time, however, he was wagging his legs in excitement as he thought of all the things he could do… even though there wasn't actually anything entering his mind.
"Oh!?" And after what seemed like an entire hour, Lucian started to see where the bird seemed to be taking him; it was a large and tall plateau — he could see other birds and weird-looking creatures there. There were branches of trees there, but it would seem they were already swallowed up by the earth; as dead as the rest of the Wasteland.
The bird then flew onto one of those dead branches before just landing on a small nest and just carelessly dropping Lucian there.
"Where are you going!?" The bird did not even spend a couple of seconds there before just flying away again, "You think I'm not enough to feed all of your children — which by the way, are still in eggs!?"
Lucian then let out a small sigh after reprimanding the bad mother; watching it just fly away in disappointment. Lucian then looked around the nest and the part of the plateau he was on for a few seconds before just moving beside the eggs and laying beside them.
"What's up?" Lucian whispered as he placed his arms over the eggs and started talking to them, "My name's Lucian. What are your—Oh?"
And before Lucian could finish his words, the eggs started to crack.
"I guess… I shouldn't be here when you guys go out, huh?"
***
Several minutes later, the mother bird returned to its nest after trying to find more prey to feed her hatchlings. But alas, live creatures as small as Lucian were hard to find in the Wasteland — scavenging is the main resource here.
And so, it just returned to its nest hoping that her children had their fill with Lucian for now. And Lucian was indeed already gone, but the weird part of it all was that her eggs were still completely intact and his children were still not out.
"Chrp…?" The bird tilted its head to the side as it hopped toward one of its eggs, very lightly tapping it with its beak so she could feel what was happening, "Chrp…"
The bird then hopped back as the egg finally started to hatch; very slightly cracking in front of her. And soon, it watched as its very first child peeked out from its shell…
…only to see a completely different species smiling at her.
"Chrp..!?"
"Surprise, bitch!" And without even any remorse or hints of mercy, Lucian broke out of the shell and leaped toward the innocent bird, grabbing it by the beak while locking its wings with his hair,
"This is what you get for leaving your children alone!"
The bird tried to struggle, but it could not even move its wings for even a single millimeter. It did, however, quickly stop struggling as it saw its children very slowly emerging from the bottom of the eggs; which were actually already broken.
"What…? You thought I really killed them?" Lucian then rolled his eyes as he let go of the bird, "I'm not evil, Madam. No, no. Look…
…I even fed them with that blue bird who kept trying to invade your nest."
"Chrp…?" The bird then tilted its head as it looked to where Lucian was pointing, only to see its offspring feeding on a blue bird that looked exactly the same as her, "Chrp…!?"
It then quickly spanned its meter-long wings and flew toward its offspring, slightly scaring them and causing them all to return to their shells.
"What are you doing!?"
"Chrp!!!"
Lucian then watched as the bird started rubbing its head onto the head of the bird Lucian fed its offspring with.
"Oh… Oh," Lucian blinked a couple of times as he looked at the offspring, only to see them with hints of blue on their still-growing feathers, "Oh! Wow, that's the father of your children, okay. Wow…
…I'm going to go now."
And without even waiting for anything to happen, Lucian just grabbed his blades and Geiger counter and leaped out of the nest without any hesitation — swinging on the dead branches with his hair until he reached the ground.
"Hm…" Lucian breathed out while nodding his head, "...That was depressing."
Lucian then just slithered away mindlessly for a few seconds as he thought of what he just done. But after a few more seconds, he just shrugged his shoulders and smiled.
"Oh well, off to a new adventu—"
"Hik…"
"What was that?" Lucian then quickly pointed his Geiger counter as if it were a gun as soon as he heard a slightly high-pitched whimper coming from the large cracks of the plateau.
"Hik…"
Lucian then very slowly and very carefully slithered his way deeper into the crevice of the large plateau; the whimpers, getting stronger and stronger as it started to echo throughout the narrow cave.
He continued to slither inside while waving the Geiger counter, and soon the light of the sun faded away; replaced by the green glow that was being emitted by his left eye.
"Wh… who's there!? I… I am warning you, I'm… I'm armed! Please… please, just leave me alone!"
Lucian halted his crawls as he heard the voice of a child, or perhaps it was a woman — it was hard to tell with how strong the echo was.
"I told you to leave me alone!"
And all of a sudden, a shadow leaped from the corner right in front of Lucian, holding what seemed to be some sort of wand… and pointing it into the air.
"What the—You surprised me!" Lucian almost grew legs and jumped from shock as this robed figure just suddenly leaped in front of him, "Ugh… my blood pressure."
"Where… where is that noise coming from…?"
"Here."
"What the—Am I losing my mind…?"
"Here…
…I'm down here."
"Huh…? Huh!?"