(48)
Since the Elder was very deliberately ignoring Nestra, she used the opportunity to stare. It was only fair play. After all, the enclavers were doing the same to her, and without shame either. She wasn’t sure if it was because of her clothes, her ethnicity, or her dreg status. Most of the attention felt neutral in a ‘brand new BaiHua animal exhibition’ kind of way, but some of the gray robes were openly hostile. A few spat when she walked by. The fact that the Elder let it happen spoke volumes about their priorities.
Her path led her closer to the Sword King Enclave’s living quarters. The smell of laundry and food soon covered that of wet earth. Some of the younger children squealed when she arrived, with other menial workers clearing the path in front of her after bowing to her guide. Nestra climbed down a set of stairs to a cooler part of the compound. She spotted rudimentary classrooms on the side through half-open doors. Those guys were still using blackboards and chalk.
Everywhere gave her the same feeling of concrete impersonality. The interior design favored one, and only one material: bare concrete. Efforts had been made to adorn it with well woven tapestries, stickers, the occasional paintings, but it all remained very barebones in a sad sort of way. Obvious cracks and smudges also gave the building an unfinished appearance. It smelled musty, dusty, with hints of cheap soap, and then there was the light.
Mana light, fed by a mana stone, inside of a cheap tin casing. One thousand two hundred creds of energy used as a fucking light bulb.
They didn’t even use glass to make the light, well blue or whatever. Pretty. Instead it was the ‘morgue corridor yellow’ variety. Nestra shook her head. She wasn’t sure what to think about it, but it was just miserable making one’s lair so dry and functional. What was the fun in tearing through monsters if one didn’t have a den to bring the meat back to? A safe place to collect trophies and other pretty things? It made her miss her Nestracave. It had a huge freezer, a kitchen robot, vines, a pile of pillows, and a naval gun. This marked her as an Aszhii woman of the world. What the enclavers had was just sad.
A furious glare from the Elder reminded Nestra that she was surrounded by superhuman twats with short fuses who could easily hear her tsk. She had reached her destination anyway: a nondescript door with a label on top that her visor translated as ‘The Archives’. The Elder wordlessly turned and left.
It was always such a treat when assholes gave Nestra the silent treatment, as if it wasn’t what she was hoping for all along.
Nestra knocked on the door because she was polite like that. No one replied but she went in anyway, only seeing a gleam woman with an expression of naked curiosity on her face.
“Oh, I was wondering who could be knocking,” the woman said in perfect English.