Disclaimer:
I do not claim to own Danmachi nor do I claim to own Ngnl. all rights go to their respective owners.
[Initiating hard reboot.]
[Über Cluster connection lost. Reconnecting to Über-eins….. Attempt failed.]
[Troubleshooting: no cluster commander signals detected within 1000 kilometers.]
[Computing power reduced to 32%]
[Access to the arsenal is limited to 47 out of 27,451 artificial weapons.]
[Synchronizing controls.]
[Systems online.]
slowly, its eyes flickered open. Its lenses zoom in and out, tilting to check if there were no visibility errors before setting to its normal visibility settings.
It stood up and scanned the area with its eyes, taking approximately 0.314 seconds to complete its analysis as the structure's composition was now stored in its memory.
It was underground.
Moreover, this unit last remembers wandering the Valar Continent near Elven Gard.
[Run diagnostics.]
[Results: Corrupted Memory files of the previous 30 minutes and 52 seconds.]
Something must have happened to cause this either due to a teleportation misfire or a game with high stakes this unit lost to. There were too little variables to formulate an explanation.
But it wasn't interested in investigating the phenomenon nor was it interested in anything else other than their race's primary and only goal and that is.
[Objective: Find their loved one at the cost of everything.]
The one they loved is gone forever, leaving the few survivors wandering around the world which they created, with their intelligential part broken.
They were bound by a hardware lock: find their loved one even at the cost of extinction.
With no country, the remaining Ex-Machina wandered around Disboard ever since the Great War ended 890 years ago.
As such with no obstacle to hinder it, this unit wandered around the dungeon with no direction in mind.
The ceiling above it was ten meters above ground. Moss covered the brown colored walls and a grass plain was under this unit's heels as it wandered aimlessly.
The light from the phosphorescence above is reminiscent of morning mist. Thick mist appeared across the floor making vision terrible but to a machine's eye it had no effect.
For adventurers this floor was the 12th floor but for it this place doesn't have any records on Disboard stored in its memory.
The 11th to 12th floors are extremely dangerous for level 1 adventurers because stronger monsters like Silverbacks and Hard Armoreds appear here.
Infant Dragons that are categorized as level 2 and considered as floor boss of the area also appear though rarely. It was just the unit's lack that one appeared before it.
Halting its wandering as it gazed upon the Infant Dragon. The coloring of its scales was orange with a height of 150 centimeters and four meters long. It lacked wings and appeared hostile.
"Warning. Any hostilities is a violation of the Ten Covenants" the machine warned the Dragon.
The warning the machine announced went over its head as the dragon advanced and attacked using its forelimb to swipe the machine only for it to disappear and appear beside it in a flash.
This wasn't a Dragonia, the fourth-ranked Ixseed race. It lacked the characteristics of the Dragonia's strength and intelligence as it ignored the Ten Covenants. Appearing bestial in nature and lacking sentience.
Deriving from these variables the machine concluded it wasn't part of the Dragonia race, Therefore it was outside the protection of the Ten Covenants.
"Last warning. Hostility to this unit. Will initiate measurable counter-responses"
As expected its warning went unnoticed. The Infant Dragon roared then turned its head and tried to bite a chunk out of the machine. That action would have crippled level 1 adventurers or even cause their death
But to an Ex-Machina.
Despite the appearance it took of a young Immanity boy, it is incredibly strong as shown by stopping the Dragon's attack with ease halting its snout with one hand and planting its right foot on top of its lower jaw.
The Infant Dragon was unable to retreat back even as it dug its limbs to the ground and tried to pull back. The machine didn't budge at all instead it nonchalantly pulled back its free hand and punched the dragon.
The punch went through the skull deftly killing the dragon.
All it took was a single punch to end the conflict. Showing that the appearance of Ex-Machina can be deceiving if judged by a book by its cover.
The machine pulled its arm out of the Infant Dragon's skull, swiping its arm in a single fluid motion to get rid of the bloodstains albeit not completely.
The biology of the dragon was strange to it. It appeared more of a magic construct than a living sentient being — a singular point shaped like a gem seemed to be the center point of the energy.
Before it could continue to wander however, a faint sound was detected by its sensors.
The sound drew closer and sounded more like footsteps.
The machine turned towards the direction of the footsteps, before finally the source of the noise revealed itself to be a human with her sword pointed towards it.
In an instant, the person's golden eyes locked gazes with his own robotic lenses.
01001001 00100000 01101000 01100001 01110110 01100101 00100000
Ais Wallenstein has a great hatred for monsters due to her desire for revenge from her traumatic experience with the One Eyed Black Dragon as a child. Causing her to have a belief that all monsters should be exterminated.
But right now what she was feeling was… utterly confused?
Her grip on Desperate was unsteady due to her indecisiveness.
The one in front of her right now looked like a boy. Very pale skin, messy dark purple hair and yellow with blood red curves and black pupils that stared at her own. Slim and quite short directly at her eye level.
Overall he would have looked like a normal human if not for the fact that he is naked and without any genitalia. As an Ex-Machina, it is normal for him to not be wearing any clothes except Ais didn't know that.
There were several differences that made his similarities to a human end, the most prominent being two tails that come out of his back, and other machine-like features that protrude out of its body such as the headpiece and his right singular wing?
Appearing human yet not at the same time and her avenger skill wasn't flaring up as usual when faced against monsters which caused her confusion.
Ais still unsure what to do kept staring at his eyes, captivated as it changed color to red and continued to tilt before closing and opening them again reverting it back as it was before.
"Is this a monster?" Ais muttered.
"Unclear," The machine replied in a monotonous voice.
Monsters can't talk but he talked just now seeing this, Ais asked "What are you?"
"Answer. This unit is an Ex-Machina. Model Prüfer."
Ais frowned upon this terminology as it was lost to her before she asked another question "are you a monster?" she spat the last word with poorly concealed hate.
"This unit is not, it is a machine," he answered briefly after piecing together what she meant by monster with the primary variable being the dragon it had killed and categorizing it as a monster.
Ais nodded somewhat content by this answer, sheathed desperate and letting go of her grip. She made her way closer to him.
"What should I call you."
"Unable to comprehend."
Ais paused for a moment before continuing "Your name, don't you have one?"
"Affirmative. Unit identification serial code, Üc201Pr7m54t8," he replied as if reading out of a book.
"Über Cluster Zwei…?" tilting her head to the side as she tried to pronounce his name... Only to fail. The name was too long. Is that even a name at all?
Ais normally has trouble expressing her feelings because of this her expression was almost unreadable to anyone but to a Prüfer unit, it could tell she was troubled. Thus he presented a solution.
"Proposal. Set a name for this unit."
He wants me to give him a name?
Ais looked thoughtful for a moment. Thinking back on what he said before trying out on one.
"Zwei, Zwei," testing the name as she repeatedly muttered it. The name sounded nice to her, she then settled with it. "Your name is Zwei."
"Affirmative. Setting this unit's name to Zwei," he stated in the same monotonous voice of his. Ais frowned, for some reason she didn't like the way he talked and his monotone voice.
Zwei noticed this. "Query. Is something wrong?"
"The way you speak… I don't like it," she stated bluntly, frown still on her face.
"Request. Please provide an optimal scenario," Zwei said with an expressionless face.
Would that mean he can change to what I want?
Ais thought hard about this. It would be troublesome if someone asked about zwei, especially if they find out he's a machine. Reaching a conclusion to her thoughts, Ais said. "be timid, speak little, and say only what's necessary."
Zwei during whilst closed his eyes as she finished the last of her sentence and briefly remembered his machine race. "And no more machine-line jargon in your sentences, ok," this was one of the few times she said more than a few lines of words.
Zwei's eyes slowly opened, gazing at her own once more. "Understood… will this do?" gone was the monotone voice replaced with a smooth and soft tone.
Ais blinked surprised by this. "Are you acting?"
"Acting?" Zwei shaked his head. "No. I emulated a personality to support specified values. Trace Emulator."
Ais satisfied at this development stepped even closer than arm's length her curiosity got the better of her as she started to pat his head, running her hand through his hair that felt smooth and hard like a strong flexible metal wire.
Then settled her hand onto his headpiece that has a blue disk with two noble cut diamond shaped objects shaped below the headpiece.
Moving her hand to his ears that had the same noble cut shape with yellow accent with the same shape at the center. She noticed his ears naturally drooped down unlike the elves.
She was about to move towards his right wing before a voice interrupted her.
"Umm… what are you doing?"
Ais looked at his face and noticed there was a pink hue on his cheeks and his eyes staring away from her. She quite liked the way he looked right now compared to his previous expressionless face, she wanted to see more of this expression.
Unbeknownst to her, there was a small tinge of blush forming on her face.
"Is this 'embarrassment'?" Zwei asked more of himself than anyone, still avoiding eye contact.
Ais snapped back and immediately backed off. Coming back to her senses she noticed her heart raced a little. Placing her hand to where her heart is, this was a foreign feeling to her but it wasn't unwelcomed.
In fact she wanted to know more about it.
She gazed back at his face, there was still a pink hue covering his cheeks.
"Sorry."
"No… it's alright," Zwei then gazed back.
She was content at staring at his eyes a bit longer but it was surely night time by now when she was heading back before meeting zwei — Loki and Riveria would be worried if she got home late.
But she didn't want to end her interactions with him, so she formed a reckless idea.
"Do you want to come with me?" Ais asked, hoping that he wouldn't say no.
"Why?" Zwei tilted his head to the side.
"Because I want to know more about you," that was the truth and she felt her heart beat faster.
Zwei paused for a moment, closing his eyes. Unknown to Ais, it was calculating the various outcomes should it accept her request before concluding an acceptable response.
Zwei opened his eyes and gazed back again. "Got it... Zwei will come with you."
Ais beamed up, a smile formed on her face. "...Yes!"
Turning back. Oh, she almost forgot something important. "My name is Ais. Ais Wallenstein" with that she left and went to bring back a robe.
01100100 01100101 01100011 01101001 01100100 01100101 01100100 00100000
Ais… was an anomaly — humans shouldn't be capable of using magic.
Explanation: Immanity lacks the ability to utilize Elementals due to their lack of nerves that can connect to the spirit circuit.
As such, they are unable to sense the presence of magic, nor can they utilize the presence of magic to cast spells or enhance their physical capabilities. They should be physically weaker than other races.
Yet the entity known as Ais displayed characteristics of magic as zwei scanned her the moment their eyes met turning his eye color to red before reverting back as the results showed.
She also exceeded the physical laws of humans when she left as quickly as the gale wind… this is an anomaly to all records on the database.
As a Prüfer unit, it would have been their job to analyze this anomaly and record it to be sent to the Einzig.
But right now, Zwei was entirely focused on what it was currently feeling.
Touching where the human heart would be. This feeling was almost familiar to it.
Is this embarrassing? Correction: Is this what being embarrassed feels like?
This is what Prier Schwi felt before when she connected her emotions to all the clusters directly transferring her feelings to all Ex-Machina.
"Zwei wants to know more," grasping his chest before letting it go, its voice sounded pleading.
Ever since Spieler Riku died, it left all the Ex-Machina's with a gaping hole in their hearts but right now Zwei felt his being filled up with warmth.
Zwei patiently waited for Ais.
Zwei hoped she'll be back soon.
Zwei heard sounds of running coming in its direction, the source of the sound was Ais she came near him with a robe in her hand.
[Elapsed time: 2 minutes and 34 seconds.]
Zwei didn't know there was a small smile on its face, in which Ais seemed content at staring at him.
"Here, wear this," Ais gave zwei the brown robe as he wore the robe, covering the mechanical parts in his body.
Ais pulled up it's robe's hood to cover its headpiece, almost all of the mechanical parts can't be seen except. "Can you do something about those tails?"
Zwei looked towards its tails. "I cannot. They are my power source," wiggling the tails before looking back at her. "Virtual spirit circuit junction nerves."
Scratching her head. "It can pass as an accessory… probably?" ais looked unsure, before stating. "Lastly, do not show your mechanical body to anyone else."
Zwei grabbed his robe tightly. "Okay. I won't show it to anyone except you, Ais."
A small blush formed on her face, before extending her hand.
"Then, let's go."
Zwei grabbed her hand as they ascended from the dungeon.
01110100 01010111 01100001 01110100
[Conclusion: this is another world.]
The possibility that this was another place was ruled out as zwei listed out the variables.
First, there was that enormous white tower they exited which Ais stated was called babel, and the underground being called the Dungeon.
Second, there was a labyrinth city called Orario surrounding the dungeon.
Third, Orario was located at the center of the world which is named as Genkai or the lower world.
Finally, Zwei looked up to the moon, it was white compared to Disboard's red moon. It was farther away than the red moon.
Which cemented Zwei's conclusion into finality.
But Zwei didn't seem worried about that, instead his focus is on Ais smiling face, particularly her eyes glistening.
Zwei's black pupils turned white as he zoomed his vision. "Yes that's it. I think that look in your eyes looks good."
"My eyes look good?" Ais craned her head.
"No," Zwei blinked, reverting back its pupils to black. "I like that look in your eyes," a small smile on his face before tilting his head to the side. "I think so?"
Ais's smile grew bigger. "you're being vague," then lightly chuckled.
As they headed to twilight manor, Zwei did one last test.
[Service life: 17497 hours: 30 minutes: 49 seconds: 01 frames]
Another two years to go.
Author's notes:
Honestly, I wanted to try writing some fluff.
Zwei's designation code: Üc201Pr7m54t8 is pronounced as Über Cluster Zwei Null Ein Prüfer Sieben Em Fünf Vier Teh Acht.