Again, I was outside Tin Flower's workshop. This time however, with my mind in a much better state than before, I was able to take a proper look at Canterlot and its surroundings. Even in the dim light of approaching dawn the no longer familiar city was still glowing as brightly as it was at the night I saw it for the first time. Modern Canterlot was unbelievably huge, from a delicate little city of gilded ivory spires on mount Diamond Point steep cliffs it had bloated to a humongous megapolis, covering all lands from foothills of the mountain to borders of still existing and recognizable Everfree Forest. It was hard to make out that far, but it looked like Canterlot had been expanding to the North just as widely, circling what once was its original location with a vast lake of a neon fire and the ancient stone peak now indiscernible behind towers rising to the heavens. With the black veil of Luna’s night being driven away by sunrise drawing near, it could be clearly seen how stark was a contrast between the gleaming buildings of Canterlot pulsing with intense lights and flickering out like embers smoking slums of the Edge. As to accentuate this difference, a thick concrete bulk of a wall loomed over gloom and dirty landscape of the capital’s outskirts.

And unlike the glowing city on the other side of the wall, visible for me stripe of the Edge circling Canterlot was distinctly divided by invisible lines into sectors, as it was mentioned before by the fillies. The sector, surrounding the hill I was on, resembled nothing but a scrapyard - huge piles of twisted and broken metal parts of once whole feats of engineering were a dominant sight of a rust colored bleak landscape with only a few bulky buildings in a distance glowing with a soft pulsing orange haze. Here and there, almost indistinguishable amongst all the garbage, were little huts made from the very same corroding rubbish.

Far on my left snowladen summits of Foal Mountain were dominating horizon over extensive landfill, though, I didn’t recognized them at first. Almost the whole entirety of metal dump laid between me and distant range. Before I had a thought about a possibility of such an action, I tried to squint by reflex, and, to my surprise, my vision blacked out but returned after a moment with a soft click, now significantly zoomed in. Taken aback by sudden change, I tried to blink and with the same click and momentarily blackness picture before my eyes reverted to the normal. Huh, very interesting - I can get used to it. I focused my gaze on the Foul Mountain ridge again and squinted.

Nowadays, short stone peaks were generously pock-marked by gaping holes of countless tunnels drilled in their sides, most of these pitch-black maws surrounded by machinery with rusted wagons and makeshift shacks covering dark granite slopes like a caked blood, twinkling with occasional smoking fires. According to Red Wire’s words it was Nebula’s sector, and it seemed to be dedicated to mining operations, though, I couldn't remember this mountain being rich with any minerals. Rather strange.

On the right, the junkyard sector ended abruptly with a huge depression in landscape, which looked like a canyon of a truly colossal size. With sudden realization it came to me that I was looking on what had become of Rambling Rock Ridge over a half of millenia. It looked very much like Nebula’s territory but it seemed to be completely abandoned - half of the tunnels carved into the moss covered walls were crumbled and from what I could see in the gloom of this early morning, not a single piece of huge machinery stayed intact - all of their dark silhouettes looked twisted and broken; as if with purpose. Not a single speck of light or a pillar of smoke could have been seen over this scar on Equestrian land, and the lowest places of the artificial trough were filled with small lakes of very thick, unnatural looking fog.

To my sheer amazement, the Everfree Forest was looming over the desolate crevice looking absolutely the same as I remembered it. The somber and menacing thicket was standing in a place where a whole sector of the Edge could have been, but it seemed that no technology was able to defeat the taint that gave birth to this nefarious place. It was truly ironic, that the most chaotic place in Equestria was refusing to change. I tried to squint harder to take a look at the wall between the forest and the city; my vision zoomed in even more. Noticeably taller than in the other sectors, a concrete wall stood between the city and the unrelenting forest. It didn’t seem to be handling the strain from the sheer amount of time and close vicinity to wild nature very well - I could clearly see the structure crumbling and huge jagged holes in its bulk, allowing black vines to slither towards the city towers, which stood in estrangement, as if afraid of being attacked by the dark trees. It looked like the Everfree had won a battle with Canterlot quite a while ago - a considerable space between the half destroyed remnant of the wall and the gleam of the city was left unoccupied, filled with nothing but darkness and moss covered debris of what, I assumed, once were buildings who dared to challenge the ancient grove.

With a blink, I zoomed back to normal and glanced at the girls, who had been quietly discussing the best route to Wire's home. Both of them were now covered in dirty tattered cloth rags, some of them having an odd plastic look. On top of being very dirty, Tin Flowers impromptu clothes appeared to be soaked in machine oil at some point in the past. And just like the little fillies, I was muffled in dirty strips of cloth with a cloak draped on my shoulders and head, giving me a look of Clover The Clever from Hearth’s Warming Pageant. I could understand why I had been hiding under these tatters, since I wasn’t quite legal apparently, but was it so cold that Flower and Wire had to put clothes on, too? I could feel no cold, or warmth for that matter, and I was uncertain about the current season - the only trees I saw were at the Everfree forest, and that place was never known for following natural order of things. There was no snow laying on the ground, at least, yet the skies were covered with heavy clouds… Anyway, the fillies looked like they had came to some decision and finished talking, so, very curious about modern Equestria, I decided to ask them about it.

"Why the Edge is so different from the central part of Canterlot?" Giving a brief look at stone bulwark in the distance I added one more question. “And why it is divided from the city with the wall?"

"Because the Edge is both an industrial area and a colony for those who committed minor criminal offenses," Tin Flower said from where she was sitting with Red Wire. I thought I heard the unicorn say something along the lines of "Ugh, it's gonna be a long walk...", but I was too perplexed with Flower's answer and continued with my inquiries.

"What? How does it even work? Who controls the production?" My head instantly started filling with countless questions. I couldn't wrap my mind around such a bizarre concept - criminals supplying the industrial demand of such a huge city. There can’t be that many felons, right?

"Gangs. And before you ask, the Crown controls them with food rations," Chimed in Red Wire, slowly walking towards me, followed closely by her earth pony friend. "The Crown sends a production plan to the Edge's sectors. If it is accomplished, the TCE will send food rations to gang leaders. Maybe." She sat beside me and gazed at the distance ignoring my shocked look. "You can say that we are all controlled with hunger."

I was speechless, I just couldn't believe what I was hearing! Even during the war, when a demand from the army was higher than what Equestrian industry could supply, ponies were still treated fairly. Nopony in Equestria had known hunger for centuries.

"This is horrible!" I finally exclaimed. The fillies sitting beside me merely shrugged as if they didn't care in a slightest, but they looked utterly defeated, their eyes hollow. I realized that they weren’t just young and thus small in size, but actually were severely underfed. I decided not to ask how often in the past their sector failed to meet the Crown's demands.

"And what is considered minor criminal offense?" I asked instead, deciding to steer conversation from a sensitive topic of food.

"Being homeless is the most common one, methinks. When the TCE needs fresh workers in one of the sectors they send the police to comb through the Outer City - there are always lots of ponies in the streets," Answered Tin Flower. "Most of the time though, nopony cares about what happens in the city, it's hard to be caught doing something illegal."

Banishing just for being homeless? It didn't sound like the Equestria I lived in, not in the slightest. I had a hard time believing that a settlement of such size didn’t have enough place for everyone. And, after all, Canterlot wasn’t the only city in Equestria. Each time the girls opened their mouths I ended up having more questions than I began with.

"And creating equinoids is considered one of major crime offences." Red Wire glared at her friend. The earth pony answered her with the same glare, and before they could start fighting again, I decided to ask another question.

"How is it punished?" I wondered if it was being banished and thrown in the dungeon in the place pony was being banished to.

"The offenders are sent to a correctional facility, spend months in iso-cubes waiting for their memories to be wiped and after are sent to the TCE’s Gardens to work for the rest of their lives, if you can call that life of course." Red Wire stated, clearly pronouncing every word and looking directly into Tin Flower's eyes as if she was answering her. Turning back to me, she added, "The alternative is to be sent to the Crystal Mines at the far North, and nopony has ever returned or even been heard of again. Usually it happens to the Pink Butterflies."

I thought that controlling the population with hunger was shocking but this was the whole new level - it was a travesty of a justice system.

"But that is inequine!" Suddenly a grim realization dawned on me. "Wait... were you two banished, too?" I asked them carefully.

"Nah," Tin Flower was the first to answer with a flick of her steel hoof. "I've lived in this hole all my life. I think it was my great grandparents were deported to the Edge, probably for being homeless. Not everypony here is a felon, some of us are just descendants from them."

I glanced at Red Wire, who turned her face partly away from me. Her face looked pained, her natural eye watering. I wanted to ask her if she was alright, but Flower put her metal hoof on my shoulder with soft clicking sound and shook her head, silently mouthing: "Don't."

We all sat silently for a while, each deep in their own thoughts and emotions. I was trying to comprehend this nightmarish reality which looked like as if Equestria never actually won the war, but instead - lost. I broke the silence with yet another question.

"How can the authorities be so indifferent about the fates of their subjects?" Bearing almost the same name as back in my time - the Crown - now it was anything but the government I once served. Did the absence of the Princesses make it so?

"All they actually do care about these days are brothels, sucking the TCE's cock and keeping the Purists under control. And they are good only at the first two." Red Wire answered me angrily and curtly, no more looking distraught. "And let's get moving while it is still early.” She rose from her hooves and started to briskly trot, almost canter, in the direction facing away from the city.

"Anyway, the Crown doesn't actually control Canterlot, if you ask me. It's well know even amongst a folk from the Edge," Added Tin Flower, motioning with head to follow her friend.

Now I was confused. I thought of the TCE as some sort of company... and who are these "Purists?" Catching up with the fillies I continued the barrage of my incessant questions at them.

"Wait... then who rules Equestria?" It didn’t seem like Wire was very eager to talk, and the small earth pony was too busy keeping pace with the long legged unicorn to respond with anything different than huffs, so it took some time before I got any answer.

We were trotting down the winding path between high piles of metal scrap, occasionally passing rusty sheds, none of them looking inhabited. To be honest, none of them even looked habitable, most of them were miserable tiny houses, half-ruined and sporting huge gaps in the walls and roofs. Some to the point that I had trouble telling if they even were structures made with purpose or just random remnants of machinery.

"Canterlot," Red Wire corrected me without turning, still pushing forward with some grim determination. "Canterlot and the Crystal Mines. Canterlot is the last inhabited city in Equestria now, anything beyond the Edge is either poisoned or frozen waste for kilometers. Nopony lives there anymore. And nopony has full control over the city - it's a constant fight between the TCE and each group of the Purists. And The Tunnels are another story completely." As usual, this created more questions than it answered. What happened with all the other cities? Is it why Canterlot is so overpopulated?

"Who are..." I started to say, but it seemed like Wire knew what I was going to ask her next, so she interrupted my question with another bit of information.

"The TCE stands for the Transcontinental Company of Equestria. They control all the production and almost all the trade with help of the Crown's police forces, and they are also protected by the Crown - police basically only work for them. The Crown is the TCE’s puppet most of the time," Red Wire said to me while slowing down a little, unicorn’s are not known for their exceptional stamina after all. However, thanks to my new body's nature, I didn't feel tired from fast walking at all - it was probably the first positive thought in my head today. Anyway, something in Wire's words caught my attention and I asked for clarification.

"Most of the time? But not all the time, right? Does it mean the Crown actually does something for Canterlot?" I now was trotting beside Red Wire with Tin Flower still huffing and cursing under her breath behind us.

I saw the reason why we had slowed down - the path we had been following was obscured with rusted girders lying around, half-buried under their sloped angles. We spent a few minutes wading through the obstacles, with me helping the fillies climb over the massive steel beams. After the forest of huge metal bars thinned out, Red Wire continued to tell me about the forces in charge of Canterlot.

"Yeah, there are two things the Crown personally cares about. The first one - the brothels, as I already said. It is totally unofficial, of course, but everypony knows anyway. “ She crouched under one the bent steel girders giving me time to interject with a furious exclamation.

“Wait, I didn’t mishear the first time? Brothels? But that’s an absolutely barbaric practice - they were always prohibited in Equestria!” Absolutely disgusting. Goddesses help me, the more I had learned about this modern world the less I wanted to know.

“You better not say that outloud, Twilight, the Crown protects them more than anything in the whole Canterlot. You want to go on a vacation to the Crystal Mines? Do something stupid in a brothel, like, I dunno, hit one them whores and you a goner." Red Wire shifted to her "annoyed by everything" demeanor from the somber determination face of earlier. I wanted to ask about what the second Crown’s interest was, but Tin Flower, who finally was able to catch up with us, joined the conversation from my other side.

"Funny thing, nopony actually knows anything about that other thing the Crown cares so much about, because usually nopony is left alive to tell about what happened," stated the little mechanic.

"She’s right - occasionally some shit happens and the Crown sends squadrons of Royal Guards and they slay anypony involved - no witnesses, no evidence left..." added Wire while shaking her head. "It has to be something very important, because the Royal Guard doesn't even deal with Pink Butterflies, and those fucks destroyed one of the Thunderspires once."

"So it is actually good that the Crown doesn't care for Canterlot, because when they do, it involves the Royal Guard and nopony wants that," finished Flower. "The Crown may appear like puppets and tools, but they shouldn't be messed with."

“Who are they, actually?” Oh, please don’t tell me they are descendants of Blueblood!

“Most of them are distant relatives of the Princesses as far as know.” I groaned internally - it might explain a lot. “And they formed government right after all the Princesses were gone.” My fears were confirmed by Red Wire, with a shrug she added, “Most nopony has seen the Crown’s members, those assholes almost never leave the Sky Palace and ponies don’t try to bother them unless they want to have a date with the Royal Guard.”

We walked in the silence of early morning for a while, the only sound was the wailing of the wind in metal pipes somewhere amongst the rubbish and some occasional distant roar of machinery. I wondered what kind of industry could exist in a such place. I saw columns of smoke rising from the pipes of huge buildings and a heat haze in the distance, but I couldn't tell their function by glance. During the war I had spend all my time in the research facility and wasn't able to witness the rise of equestrian heavy industry, so I was totally unfamiliar with any of it. My musings were interrupted by Red Wire's question.

"You probably want to know about the Purists, dontcha?" With a long sigh, Wire asked her friend as well, with irritation in her voice. "Couldn't you just put a some sort of memory crystal inside her?"

"First of all, that’s not how it works. Second - the TCE holds memory crystals for equinoids tighter than Orange Grime and our food rations. We have to teach her everything," Flower answered calmly.

"For fuck's sake..." Wire rolled her eyes. Upon noticing me stare daggers at her, she stammered. "Yeah, hehe... Ahem... So! The Purists!" She began to stammer and fidget, embarrassed with her outburst and failing to notice a metal pole protruding from the ground. The horizontal beam caught her hoof, but before Wire met dirt with a muzzle, Tin Flower had caught her friend, I had tried to catch her too, but my movements were still too slow and sloppy.

“You better be careful, Wire, if you don’t want to be left with only a crystal eye,” said Flower, steadying the slightly disheveled unicorn filly.

Without a word Red Wire cantered ahead of us, silently fuming, looking angry at the whole world. After a few steps she turned her head back and grumbled “Thanks”, not looking at any of us in particular and continued her disgruntled walk.

“Well, I guess it now falls on my shoulders to tell you about the Purists, eh?” Tin Flower wrinkled her nose. “Though, I don’t know as much about them as Wire, I’ll try to do my best.”

She hopped over another one of the trap-like metal poles and landed with an audible clank - her metal hoof hit some metal part half-buried in ground. For a very brief moment she inspected her artificial limb and after a sigh began to tell me about the political powers in Canterlot. "It is a bit complicated... There are three groups of ponies who don't use any prosthetics at all and keep only the most talented ponies in their ranks... well, except for pegasi. The Purists refuse to install any prosthetics at all to completely avoid Transference Paradox and practice their magic at fullest, in turn, it allows them to do stuff nopony else is able to do like controlling weather, growing food or really fancy magic."

We rounded a corner and were greeted by more endless tall piles of metal scrap. I froze in a mix of shock and fear - a metal skeleton of gargantuan proportions materialized before us. Without missing a beat, the little fillies entered a cavity formed within the ribs of the macabre remains. With sudden realisation it came to me that these were not the bones of a dragon-sized creature, but a rusted and severely deformed frame belonging to some sort of a machine.

“Twilight, are you coming?” Came Flower’s voice from within of enormous shell.

“Ah… yes.” Even though I knew that it was just a framework of a pony-made contraption, I still felt uneasy in its vicinity. Steeling myself, I followed the girls and entered twisted hull.

It wasn’t as big inside as I expected, and resembled a train cart, but not like those from my past. Albeit being nothing but a wreckage, it still looked more modern and advanced than any train I ever saw. The interior appeared to be completely ruined, not by merciless passage of time, but by some purposeful yet destructive force. And all of the surfaces were covered with thick layer of rust, of course.

“What is… was this machine?” I meekly asked wondering about the purpose of this engineering marvel, while walking a few steps behind Tin Flower.

“One of the subway train carts from very old times. Still holds together, even after an explosion.” Almost wistfully she added, “Stuff is built from fuck knows how many times recycled steel back then.”

Throwing upon her choice of words I inquired. “What is a subway? Is it some kind of railroad?” Seems like I wasn’t very far from truth with my first guess.

“You could say so. It was a very fast underground railroad network, but it doesn’t exist anymore. I mean, the tunnels which didn’t collapse are still there, but after the Pink Butterflies decided to blow the subway to smithereens, not a single train cart was left intact. Most of them were salvaged from the debris and sent here for recycling, they were made from the best steel after all. There is a rumor, that none of the carts had their power cores inside the engines when their remains were brought to the surface - it’s a big deal, those things were huge crystals, some of the biggest around. They weren’t shattered or anything, just gone, every one of them, without a trace.” She turned to me, but looked above my head. “I made my hoof from one of these.” With her last words she pointed up, and following her direction I saw a girder which looked pretty much like anything else around us, except that on the one of it’s ends had been cut clearly and had less rust on it.

My eyes returned to Tin Flower, her artificial limb in particular, and it all clicked in my head. This whole sector wasn’t just a scrapyard - it was an enormous recycling facility. I was going to confirm my guess with a question when the earth pony filly decided to continue educating me about the Purists.

"So... there are unicorns sitting in their floating towers, enchanting crystals and blowing shit up all the time. They are the most insane and upstuck of all the Purists. They call themselves Arcane Nou… Nukes..."

“Noxiae,” I finished for her. “Arcana Noxiae was one the oldest mages’ organizations in pony history, predating even the Princesses age. It means “secret lodge” and it was organized by the most upper-class and influential mages, but it broke up when Equestria was founded.”

She shook her head at my words. "You are not far from the truth, they do think themselves as the most elite ponies in Canterlot and are jerks to everypony. The thing is, since those unicorns are the only ones who can enchant gems and put a protective shield over the city during winter, those horned assholes can afford being like that. As far as I know, the TCE and the Crown hate them, but can't really do anything." Unlike Wire, she was totally ignoring my displeasure with her choice of words, no matter how hard I glared at her.

We exited the cart’s remains a while ago and were now trotting by a relatively clear path, Red Wire was still ahead of us, albeit she didn’t look angry anymore, at least, not more than usual. Fortunately, she wasn’t almost galloping like before, allowing Tin Flower to walk at a pace comfortable enough to talk with me.

"The earth pony Purists work with the TCE at the hydroponic gardens, growing food for the whole city. There is not much to tell actually, they are very close allies with the TCE, getting rather fair treatment at the Gardens. Other ponies, who aren’t so fortunate, usually don't last there for more than a decade or two." With a shrug of her shoulders she added, "Never wanted to join them, not like I have a chance anymore". I gave her steel leg a glance, but she seemed absolutely comfortable with her artificial limb. How long ago was she injured, I wondered. Unaware of my musings about her life's story, the earth pony filly continued to lecture me.

"And the pegasi are the most chill guys. They don't really care for prosthetics or talent. They work at the Thunderspires, producing electricity from storm clouds for the whole city and welcome everypony who is willing to do this job. Of course, any pegasus who doesn't have feathers for their brains understands a danger of going inside a raging thunderstorm with metal parts stuck to their body. Though there are rumors about ‘lighting wranglers’... but it's just a urban legend." She furrowed her brows for a moment gathering her thoughts. "Actually, they don't even distinguish "pure" ponies amongst themselves, just a bunch of pegasi living together in their fog nests around the Spires."

We walked around another train cart’s remains, this one looking a bit different, more like a common train. Though it still looked like somepony exploded a bomb inside, albeit with more success. Ahead of us I saw a dim orange light in a distant shack - Red Wire’s eye lit up as she begun to trot slightly faster.

With a sigh Tin Flower concluded her lecture. “Each group of the Purists thinks they are the most important and thus should be more privileged and given full control of the city, but none of them care about the common ponies.”

“Sounds like the tribalism conflict of pre-Princess era all over again. The unicorns even call themselves Arcana Noxiae…” I muttered to myself, shaking my head. What had happened to Equestria? It didn’t feel like five hundred years into the future, more like one thousand and five hundred years to the past... how could ponies fall so low?

“Huh? What’s a tribalism? I heard something like this near one of the brothels once…” Tin Flower responded to my apparently not so quiet muttering. Cringing at the mention of the brothels I asked her back.

“Wait... have you never heard a story of origins of Equestria? It a story every parent tells to their foals!” I exclaimed in disbelief and glanced at the little mechanic.

I couldn’t feel pain with my metal and plastic body, but the look Tin Flower gave me was like getting hit in the face with an anvil. I should have guessed, now thinking of it, this was rather obvious. Before I could say anything to try and fix this horrible situation, I all but slammed into Red Wire.

“Shit! Twilight, look where you are going! Or did that criminal put food scanners where your eyes should be?” She steadied herself with a huff and added, “Anyway, we are at my place. Wait here, I’ll be back in a a few minutes.”

Red Wire galloped away to her family’s dwelling, while I stood there I was completely petrified, thinking of what I should say to make things right. I could start with a simple “sorry”, I suppose…

With a very deep sigh Tin Flower beat me to it. “Don’t sweat it, Twilight.” She paused and I glanced at her - the little filly’s face bore a forlorn look. “It is a delicate subject here. Ponies don’t live long lives in the Edge. And nopony likes to be reminded of that,” she solemnly finished, sitting on the ground with her shoulders slumped. After another sad sigh she shook herself and perked up a little, looking around.

“We should take a cover.” She motioned her head in a direction of a half-rotten metal cistern. “This is a rather calm part of the sector, but let’s not take our chances.”

I walked into our rusty hideaway, crouching under a jagged hole in the metal wall, and sat beside Tin Flower as we both faced Red Wire’s house. It even had a glass in a window frame, though it was so dirty with soot, that I could barely see a trembling flame inside and the occasional movement of a little unicorn silhouette.

“Usually it’s either accidents or terrorist attacks. Red Wire lost her father in the same accident I lost my parents. There is no evidence, but she believes it was the Pink Butterflies.” Tin Flower shifted in her place, light from Wire’s hut reflecting in her wavering eyes, giving them look of freshly welded steel. “Hard to blame her, she had already diffused one of their bombs once at that factory. Folks even started gave her name “Red Wire” after that, her actual name is Geode Gleam.”

“I’m so sorry…” Was all I could squeeze out of myself. This was truly horrible, much more than any issues in modern Equestria. She only shook her head.

“Wire has it really hard. First her family was deported from the Outer City, then she lost her father and eye…she had a hoped of joining the horned Purists once, you know, she was very good at magic. And then she lost her brother during that winter.” She paused, her expression unreadable. “She lives now with her older sister and blind mother. Roche Dust lost her eyes and Hollow Druse had her hind legs torn off in that damned explosion. Sometimes it feels like I’m luckier than her.”

Two full families were thrown into the grinder of the Edge and out came four forever mangled ponies with their lives on the chopping block of heavy industry, given no choice but to suffer in hunger and injustice in this prison of rejected metal. This was not Equestria, this was worse than Tartarus itself.

Though, something didn’t quite make sense to me - if I could, I would have furrowed my brows. “Why is her mother blind?” Tin Flower gave me a blank look. “I mean, Red Wire has an artificial eye, why couldn’t her mother get a prosthesis as well?” Seeing even little filles with such a complex prosthetics made me think that they were rather common.

“Wire’s folks could afford only one “crystal eye”, and only through Hollow Druse’s connections with stripes. Such eyes are special, each handcrafted by a skilled unicorn and not from just any gem. Druse made one for Red Wire, it was before she lost her hind legs and became unable to use magic anymore, at least not as well as before,” Tin Flower answered. But now I had trouble understanding the reasons behind the distribution of prosthetics.

“But why didn’t her mother have it? It’s better to have one eye than be completely blind, right?” Life with an one eye for both adult mare and filly would be hard, but it was still better than to be home-ridden for the rest of life, or at least as I thought so.

“Miss Dust already had a few prosthetics, and one more, especially so deep integrated, would surely make the Transference Paradox claim her - she would start losing her memories,” Tin Flower said in a grievous tone. “And don’t think that blindness was the only injury miss Dust received back then. She shielded Wire from shrapnel with her body, so I doubt she will be able to work even with two eyes.

It made sense, more or less. It was obvious now, that gem-cuttery and bionics had radically changed since my time, to the point that I had very little understanding of even the basics of new technologies. Moondancer and I were once prodigies in that field...

“Who are these “Pink Butterflies”? You’ve mentioned them before, are they another major organization in Canterlot?” I finally asked the question that had been nagging me for a while.

“Stupid crazy fucks, that’s who. And don’t give me that look, Twilight.” Flower met my glare with defiant expression. “They have no power in Canterlot, Pink Butterflies are the group of eco-terrorists from the Everfree who despise any technology. Butterflies don’t mind using bombs, though, and these crazies are quite generous then it comes to explosives.” The little mechanic scowled in disdain and added, “They mostly target Canterlot, but sometimes they remember about us too.”

The moment I thought it couldn’t get any worse, this strange new world managed to unpleasantly surprise me with some new atrocity. Absentmindedly, I thought that it was a weird choice of name for a group of ponies known for such a gruesome activity.

“Why doesn’t the Crown or the police do anything about them?” I asked Tin Flower while we were still sitting in wait for Red Wire to return.

“Because they don’t give a fuck?” She scoffed. “In the city, police prevent as much terrorism as they can, but here in the the Edge, it is in our hooves.” She paused for a moment, furrowing her brows in thought. “Butterflies are based in a some kind of old fortress in the heart of the Everfree Forest, so it’s hard to get them. Although it’s not like the Royal Guard tried even once.”

“The Castle of Royal Sisters… the very place where Princess Luna was banished to the Moon and cleansed of Nightmare Moon’s taint one thousand years later,” I recalled. It felt like it happened in another life, and from some perspective, it did.

“Nightmare Moon? Who was she, some kind of warlock, like the Ebony one?” Tin Flower reacted to my reminiscence with a question “Were you at a war with her too?”

“Not exactly. My friends and I were the ones who confronted her in that very castle.” I sighed, awash with a strong sense of nostalgia. Those were simpler times, the Elements worked, and she still was there. “I knew all the Princesses personally back then,” I finished, banishing the sad thoughts. I didn’t need to lose control over my emotions right now.

“Wow, that’s really impressive.” Tim Flower looked at me with newfound respect. With a smirk she added. “Looks like you have some stories to tell as well.”

Thinking about the Princesses made me realize that I still didn’t know anything about their fates, also there was one very important issue directly connected to the absence of the demi-goddesses.

“What happened to Princess Luna and Princess Cadence? And if you say that there are no princesses anymore, then who raises the Sun and the Moon?” I bet it was the Arcana Noxiae, considering how similar they were to the first iteration of this organization and that they had the most powerful unicorns amongst their ranks.

“Ummm… you better ask Wire, cos I only heard about Luna from some old mare tale when I was a little foal, and only that she used to raise the Moon during the Age of the Princesses. And speaking of that, it’s now done by some of the Crown’s mages. A super powerful magic amplifier is used for that or something,” Tin Flower answered uncertainty with a shrug.

At last Red Wire appeared from her family's house, a folded glistening cloth on her back and two small bundles dangling in her teeth. She carefully closed the door behind her with telekinesis and trotted in our direction.

“Oh, by the way, don’t call her Geode Gleam, she doesn’t like that,” Whispered Tin Flower.

“But why?” I saw no reasons for Red Wire to dislike her real name, it was no less fitting.

“Shhh!” Hushed Tin Flower as her friend got closer.

The scarlet maned unicorn came closer to us and I could see that one the bundles in her mouth was a canteen in a cloth casing swinging back and forth on a short belt. The other, bigger bundle, was some item wrapped in oily paper. Upon reaching us she took the flask and unfurled the package with her magic - inside was a thick tuffet of thin, sickly looking, strange mushrooms.

“My sister brought fresh shrooms from stripes yesterday. Want some, Flower?” She divided them with a golden glow of telekinesis and offered half of the bunch to the little mechanic. Wait, what? Are they going to eat them?

“Are these like the shrooms from that one time?” She sniffed them with a visible mistrust. “I don’t want to feel all funny and have weird dreams again.” Goddesses, they are actually going to eat them...

“Nah, stripes just gave her the wrong ones the last time, these are fine, I’m sure. We better have something before we go to the Outer City.” Wire floated the canteen with her magic towards Flower. “I’ve also got some fresh water from the filters.”

Tin Flower finally finished examining the mushrooms, took the canteen in her hooves and took a sip from it. “I miss mold, too bad it all died last winter. That stuff was tasty at least…”

“Nah, it tasted like a dirt,” Retorted Wire. “Does it mean I can eat yours?” She floated bunch of shrooms towards herself a bit with a smile.

“Of course not! Gimme, I haven’t eaten in a three days.” Flower snatched the fungal sprouts from a golden glow and dug into them as if they were ambrosia.

The girls sat there, silently munching on their miserable meal. At this point I wasn’t even surprised that these fillies considered the mushrooms a food and the mold a delicacy. I stood a bit lost in what to do or say then a thought occurred to me.

“Do I need to eat or… be charged?” I asked none of them in particular. The idea of a cable being plugged into me didn’t sound appealing, to be honest.

“Nope. Equinoids don’t eat,” answered Red Wire, Tin Flower was too preoccupied with devouring her share of food to answer. “You don’t even need your power cores to be recharged for quite a while, they are brimming with magic.” She shook her head and sipped from the canteen. “Heh, whoever enchanted them was a helluva sorcerer.”

“Um, it was... me?” I sheepishly said, and received raised eyebrow in return from the red maned filly. Truth be told, I didn’t know I poured that much magic into my recording enchantment, and couldn’t tell if I should be thankful for doing it. “I was Bearer of the Element of Magic, after all.”

“Were those some kind of powerful artefacts? We can use a bit of strong magic here, heh.” Joked the Wire. Looks like food and a visit home improved her mood, I wished I could share it with her.

“They don’t work anymore,” I said, trying to keep my voice from wavering while Red Wire began to wrap back her remaining part of the mushrooms for later.

“Huh. Why’s that?” She tilted her head, oblivious to torrent of emotions inside of me.

“I don’t know.” I did. ”They stopped working when Sombra emerged,” I answered in a hollow voice.

“Maybe it was some of his curses.” She shrugged, binding her bundle with a string.

It wasn’t - I knew better. The truth lashed my mind like a whip, but I remained silent. I sat there fighting with my memories and emotions, trying to suppress them - I needed to stay focused.

“Well, we should get moving,” Red Wire said, putting the canteen and the packed mushrooms in a tiny saddlebag hidden under her rugs before standing up. “Stop stuffing yourself with food, you are worse than Orange Grime!” She yelled at Tin Flower, who was still shoving hoof-fuls of the shrooms in her muzzle.

“Fufh off!” Mumbled Flower with a full mouth. ”Anf gife me feh fanteen.” She pointed at Wire’s saddlebag with her hoof.

Red Wire rolled her eyes and flung her friend the flask. “Try not to choke on it, believe or not I like you alive more.” She turned to me. “She will catch up, let’s go, Twilight.”

We moved in silence for quite a while. Despite my curiosity, I didn’t want to ask any more questions, at least for now, to give the girls some rest. Additionally, when Flower caught up with us, Red Wire commented that we still had a lot of ground to cover and had to speed up, so now we all were trotting at a brisk pace, a bit too fast for a comfortable conversation judging by the short legged mechanic’s huffs. Anyway, I had enough new knowledge to digest.

Modern Equestria was so different from what I remembered, but it was a logical outcome, after all. Five hundred years had passed, and the war pushed our limits back then, so we had a few outstanding breakthroughs in science and magic. Also, the emergence of the Crystal Empire brought back some long lost technologies and spells as well. I didn’t give much thought about the future back in my time, or at least about the distant one - we all were much more concerned with the war. However, I sure didn’t expect Equestria to not just stop progressing, but to degrade so horribly over a half of millenia. Yes, modern ponies had access to quite a lot of advanced prosthetics, even more refined than she thought possible; they were building astounding cities and even... creating artificial life forms. Though, I wasn’t entirely sure if that actually was a good thing.

Yet, the quality of life had suffered greatly - the so called “Edge” was an ironic name for an enormous area dedicated to not being a frontier of technology, but rather working ponies to a death. Canterlot was stagnating in corruption and at the same time torn apart by nothing more than a barbaric tribalist conflict, an echo of a dark era long gone. And something was telling me that most of those “advanced” technologies weren’t actually that progressive - judging by our pace and progress in the research of bionics, we would had artificial limbs and organs developed in a few decades after the war. I couldn’t understand how all these amazing technologies brought only decadence to pony nation, driving it apart where it should have been prosperous.

I now understood how Princess Luna was feeling when she returned from her banishment, but for her Equestria was just unfamiliar and strange - for me it was horrifying and even repulsive. And what happened to her? What happened to Cadence? From Tin Flower it sounded like they were not only gone from this world, but almost forgotten. Although it was hard, I could try and understand the regress of pony race. However the memories of the Princesses, the living demi-goddesses who once walked amongst us… just gone? I couldn’t comprehend that - not only ponies, but zebras, griffins, rams and almost any other sentient creature knew and revered the Princesses, even the proud dragons. Now, it seemed like Sombra was remembered better than the greatest creatures who ever existed. It was depressing.

Speaking of depressing - as we walked, the scenery around us started to gradually change. Piles of a metal scrap began to thin out from our winding path, they became lower and more rusty - the ground beneath our hooves was distinctly orange from an abundance of iron oxide. I could only guess, but most likely all this scrap-iron was very, very old, maybe from the times when the recycling sector was just founded. Though I couldn’t feel wind, I was able to hear the air whistling in the metal pipes, playing erie tunes through corroded holes. With every gust, I could see flakes of rust torn from ancient remains, dancing around us as if wondering why we dared to disturb this ossuary of decaying iron bones.

While I couldn’t say I was feeling comfortable in this grim place, at least I didn’t have as much trouble as the girls did - a while ago they covered their muzzles with cloth masks and were now squinting from all the dust and rust flung at them by the wind. Sometimes, I could see the stronger gusts of wind threatening to kick the lightweight fillies hooves out from under them. After passing another unremarkable pile of junk, they abruptly stopped.

“We have to put on the protective suits if we want to go further!” Yelled Red Wire over the howl of wind. She passed one of the folded protective suits off her back to Tin Flower, who took it with silent nod.

We all took shelter from the unwelcoming weather in the remains of some kind machine hull, so corroded that I couldn’t even remotely tell what it once was. I could hear the wind whistling through tears in the metal carcass and flakes of rust bombarding the thin wall between us and the tempest outside.

“Flower, will Twilight be alright without the suit?” Asked Wire while putting on the protective gear herself, it’s once brightly colored rubber cloth now faded and worn. The environmental suit looked slightly familiar - I never had need of one of those, but I knew that we had departments in the RCRC where ponies were spending day after day clad in chemical protection, studying toxic substances.

Tin Flower, who was doing the same, gave me a critical glance, examining me.

“She will be alright, but we shouldn’t stay for too long near the Dump or stray from the borders.” With a nod Flower put her gas mask on. “Let’s do it quick, it’s all itchy inside and smells of unicorns.” Needless to say, the suits were adult-sized, so they were awkwardly sagging from the fillies in a lot of places, though it seemed they weren’t very bothered by it. I wondered if it wasn’t the first time they had to wear protection from hazardous materials or environments.

“Hey!” Came a muffled yell from Wire, who had already put the gas mask on her muzzle. But before the angry unicorn could add something, Tin Flower dashed outside by her friend with a snort. The offended filly gave me a glance, looking rather strange with the one of her mask lenses bulging and glowing because of the artificial eye underneath. I only shrugged in answer, Red Wire rolled her eye and we came outside.

Just as before, we walked in silence, now because of the loud howling wind and the gas masks muffling the fillies’ voices. The girls were obviously struggling with wading through the dust storm around us, and even I was starting to feel the sheer force of the wind trying to push me. We turned at a pile of scrap-iron and suddenly, there were no more rusty heaps ahead of us - the Toxic Dump laid before my eyes.

Saying that it was bleak and depressing would had been a compliment for this vast expanse of desolate land. As far as I could see in the raging storm, it was a barren desert, occasionally gleaming with rainbow stains of oil, alloys and various chemicals amongst charred, acid burned dirt. For hundreds of years recycling facilities were dumping slag and toxic waste, poisoning the once fertile soil of Equestria to the point that even air above it became dangerous. What a bright future we had, brought unto us by progress and technology. Even war wasn’t capable of doing this.

We didn’t stop for long, and the fillies instantly rushed to some sort of pillar that was pulsing with a bright light through the torrents of dust. With one more glance on the apocalyptic looking landscape, I followed them.

Surprisingly, up close, this strange construction didn’t look as rusted and decayed as I expected it to be and it seemed like the storm wasn’t that bad near the pillar. The contraption had a rather simple design - a tangle of metal girders made only to serve as a pedestal for a large, slowly pulsing crystal. Unable to hold my curiosity any longer I asked the fillies, who huddled near the foot of the structure, resting from the battle with the tempest and the heavy suits of protective gear.

“What is this thing?” I asked examining the glowing gem. It was size of a pony head, emitting a steady, teal light and pulsing with bright, but not blinding, flashes in even intervals.

“One of the beacons of Arcana Noxiae,” Red Wire stated, who unlike Tin Flower, had already partly recovered. “They mark the outside border of the Edge.” With those words she pointed in the distance. After a moment I saw the identical lights blinking through the storm further away. “They are enchanted to hold back the storms and serve as reinforcing points for the magical shield. And don’t touch it, beacons are cursed to kill anypony who decides they are smart enough to lay a hoof on Noxiae’s stuff.” I instantly jerked my extremities from the shiny gem - I had no intention of finding if the curse worked on equinoids as well.

To shield Canterlot from what? And why didn’t pegasi do anything about the storms? I sighed internally - here we go again, I can’t understand a thing. At least Wire’s curt explanation answered my question why nopony still hadn’t taken the valuable looking gems away. Tin Flower, who had recovered, noticed my confusion and once again decided to take on the mantle of teacher and educate me.

“The weather is not like it was in your times, Twilight, and ponies say it gets worse every year.” She paused for a moment, gathering her thoughts, though it was hard to tell her expression under the gas mask. “Some say it’s cos of pegasi and the Thunderspires, some say it is the last of Sombra’s curse. Others even think it is a magical storm created by the rams from the north. Anyway, it sucks, because it’s cold all the time and each winter we pray for the shield to hold on.”

Even under the dirty lenses of the gas masks I could see Tin Flower’s gaze harden and Red Wire’s eye glistening with moisture. With a shake of her head, the little mechanic continued to talk, looking on the ground in front of herself with empty eyes. “A couple of winters ago Pinks came up with a great idea to blow up all the beacons in one the sectors, can’t remember which one. The horned Purists of course didn’t expect that to happen and the magic shield generator winked out for seventeen days from a backlash.” She gulped and in a hollow voice she carried on with her story. “It was enough to kill over half of the population of the Edge with the cold, it was freezing even in the smelters…” I heard Red Wire quietly sob. “The TCE’s Gardens took the biggest hit, they still haven’t recovered. A lot of ponies died from hunger the next year.” She looked at me, and our eyes met, hers were round with horror and looked haunted. “I will never forget the howl of the wind back then, it sounded like it was alive… and wanted all of us dead.”

I couldn’t bear it anymore, I approached them and after a moment of hesitation hugged the shivering fillies carefully, trying to shield the girls from the merciless, piercing winds. To my surprise, they accepted my embrace readily, taking shelter from storm in the cover of my metal body and cloak. We sat like this for a few minutes. However, this precious moment couldn’t last forever - we had yet to traverse through the rest of bordering territory and the whole of Nebula’s sector.

We moved quickly and silently, in short rushes from the one beacon to another, all the time I was providing cover from battering winds with my senseless body, be it a fast trot between the enchanted pillars or a momentary rest under them.

Finally, we made out to what seemed to be a border between the sectors and entered a familiar maze of rusted scrap-iron. With the storm raging and toxic winds left behind us, the fillies took cover inside the remains of another ancient and half-rotted machine in order to take off their environmental suits. I followed them inside to with a couple questions on my mind.

“Why didn’t we go to Nebula’s sector from the Toxic Dump, and why do we need to use tunnels? Can’t we just cross the border? Is it guarded?” I unleashed the barrage of questions on the disheveled fillies who just got out of their suits.

“Hold your horses, Twilight, not so many questions,” Grumbled Red Wire, pulling out the canteen and mushrooms from her saddlebag.

“It’s not a good idea to cross the borders out of nowhere, gangs do not like it, so we have to use the tunnels if we don’t want any problems. The same goes to coming from the Dump side,” Answered Tin Flower, who was folding the suits.

“Yup, what she said,” Commented Wire as she offered the canteen and a tuft of the shrooms to her friend. They both sat munching on their meager meal, finishing the remaining supply.

After a quick respite we all emerged from our improvised shelter, the girls stretching their limbs. I moved my hooves and heard joints squeaking - albeit I was made from metal now, the Toxic Dump took a toll even on me, I should ask the Tin Flower to take a look later. Recalling in my memory the view of the Edge, we still had a long walk ahead of us, but at least it wasn’t through the dust storm anymore.

“If we keep this pace, we will make it to the Outer City before the dark,” Said Red Wire, looking in the direction of Canterlot, it’s tall buildings visible even from here.

“And why do you little shits need to go to the city, huh?” A deep voice asked from behind the nearest pile of scrap. A moment later three large stallions emerged, a unicorn and two earth ponies, metal and muscle bulging menacingly under their tight armors, two hornless ponies at the back holding a sledgehammer and a huge wrench in their mouths. In the front was the unicorn, the biggest of them, he had something resembling a stubby pistol on a belt, dangling across his shoulders.

We stood frozen in place, look of pure horror plastered over the filles’ faces. The huge unicorn stallion lazily looked around and his eyes fell on me. He squinted with malice.

“And what have we here?”

I didn’t need to know everything to guess who they were. These stallions didn’t look like just anypony from this sector - they were obviously members of the gang. These thugs had a militaristic look, intimidating and confident, but not in the same way as soldiers - I could tell, my brother was a general after all, he and his battle comrades had an air of safety and reliance around them, not like the threatening presence of these gang members - ponies who indeed looked like criminals justly exiled from a civilized society.

None of them were devoid of prosthetics - I wondered if everypony in this city, except for the Purists, had at least one part of a body replaced with an artificial counterpart. Unlike Tin Flower’s simple foreleg or my rusty appendages, their surrogates appeared to be more of a direct augmentation than anything else. One of the stallions at the back - the sledgehammer wielding earth pony - was sporting two artificial forelimbs, covered with thick steel armor plates. The pony on his right had a metal jaw, and both of his eyes were covered with a glowing visor embedded in the skull, wires and tubes connecting both prosthetics with the back of his head. Their leader, the biggest unicorn I had ever seen, almost the size of Big Macintosh, didn’t seem to have any limbs replaced, but deep scars, occasional tubes and ports on a visible surface of his body were telling that he, most probably, had his organs replaced with synthetic ones. I didn’t know if it was a prosthesis, an adornment or something else, but this unicorn’s horn was covered in a metal contraption glowing with crystal panels, expanding it’s length drastically.

All three ponies wore armours made of metal plates and… leather. I didn’t want to know where from did they get that rare and controversial material, or at least as it was so back in my time. I wouldn’t be surprised if over the centuries leather had become something more common - such a change of mentality would fit perfectly in modern Equestria. Their steel breastplates were colored black with a bright orange smear across - probably a sign of affiliation to the gang leader - Orange Grime.

The gun wielding brute briefly examined me and with a furious glare turned to the girls who had been slowly trying to move back.

“It’s a custom made tinhead!” He pointed his weapon in my direction, while yelling at the fillies. “If the police finds out, the whole sector is going to eat shit because of you two degenerates!” With those words he spat on the ground. His two companions tensed and prepared their improvised weapons.

I stood paralyzed, my eyes jumping between the thugs and the girls, having no idea what to do. It was obvious that we had no chance to run away from them, not only we had nowhere to escape - with the Toxic Dump right behind us - but unlike the girls, these brutal stallions looked very well fed nor were they as tired as Wire and Flower who had been struggling through a violent weather for the last hour. There was the another alternative, of course, which was as much more dangerous so I wanted to avoid it. The situation looked completely hopeless. I could have tried to buy some time for the fillies to escape, but it was just as risky as any other option, and something was telling me that even if Wire and Flower could manage to run away, it wouldn’t save them from being found later and dealt with.

“Grab these dipshits, we are taking them to Orange Grime, he will decide what to do.” The large unicorn barked to his companions over his shoulder. The two large ponies instantly moved to strangle the girls. While Tin Flower, without any enthusiasm in her eyes succumbed to her fate, the other stallion was met with furious resistance from the little unicorn.

“Leggo, you asshole!” Red Wire tried to fight back , kicking and biting in desperation.

Holding the little filly by the neck with steel forelegs so hard that plates on his limbs dug deeply in her skin, the stallion loudly whispered in Wire’s ear with a vile smirk. “If you can’t keep your pretty mouth shut, horned cunt, I have something to fill it with.” Upon hearing that, all the color drained from Red Wire’s face and she instantly went limp in the iron grip of the thug in surrender, tears flowing from her eye.

I had to do something! This was going too far… but what could I do? I had no hope of defeating this trio of, no doubts, experienced in combat stallions, not with this body, which I still had trouble to control. If I had magic I would have a chance. Maybe if I tried to get the gun from this unicorn...

“What are we gonna do with the tinhead?” Asked the stallion with the metal forelegs, nodding in my direction; Red Wire choking in the vice hold of the thug while Tin Flower silently tensed in the clutches of the steel-jaw pony.

The huge unicorn lazily shifting his grim gaze to me and said, “I’ll take care of it.” With a thunderous snap, he racked the bolt of his gun.

“Nooo!” Screamed Tin Flower. With a jerk she freed herself from the grasp of the brute’s hooves and tried to dash to me, but without even looking in her direction, with one swift movement of a heavy hoof the unicorn thug punched her in the jaw and sent the filly flying through the air. She landed heavily on her side, still conscious, but stunned. With blood trickling out from under her eye. Flower tried to stand up, but fell back to the ground, the little mechanic’s teeth clenched while blood mixed with tears. Scoffing, the huge unicorn turned to me and pointed the barrel at my face. I never had thought about such a thing as my death before, but this surely wasn’t the way I expected to go. Though, it suited this wretched world. I might still have doubts about being the real Twilight Sparkle, but I didn’t want to die, not like this. The most horrible thing was that I couldn’t even close my eyes, but rather only wait for my demise. I just waited for the flower of death to blossom from the pitch black hollowness of a gun barrel’s abyss. Who knows, maybe it is all a nightmare and I’ll wake up on the table of my lab in realEquestria…

Something whistled sharply near my ear as the unicorn’s head exploded, a shower of blood, brains and bone shards covered my face, painting the whole world red. Through a crimson haze I saw how for a moment the still alive thugs froze in their places, before their leaders decapitated body fell on the ground, they scattered, the steel legged stallion wildly cursing.

The fillies and I stood paralyzed, not moving a muscle while trying to comprehend what just had happened. The remains of the thug’s head slowly slide from my metal features and fell on the ground with a disgusting wet noise. I was so glad right now that I didn’t have a stomach, because I would have been turned inside out otherwise.

I rushed to the injured Tin Flower, who was still lying on the ground, at the same moment saw a movement behind one of the scrap piles in front of me. Without warning, a hooded figure appeared before us. Before the cloaked pony had removed her headwear I saw a pair of polished metal wings, half hidden in rugs, covering the body of this mysterious pegasus. And as curious as her wings were, there was also the object on her side - a long coil covered metal pipe affixed to a simple saddle - I had a suspicion that it had something to do with the contents of the deceased unicorn’s skull covering my face.

“Pepper Mercury!” Exclaimed Tin Flower. Her and Wire’s faces stretching into smiles, a spark of hope igniting in their eyes. Apparently they knew who my saviour was.

Without saying a word or offering a single glance, Pepper Mercury flapped her wings, rust and dirt rising as she took off. She leaped to the headless body of my almost executioner and swiftly picked up the fallen gun, shoving it under one of her metal wings.

With an unreadable expression she turned to us, pointed the contraption on her side in our direction and in calm voice said:

“Y’all are coming with me.”

Author's Notes:

It is finally here, one month later from that was planned, and, I'm really sorry for that. Such a delay was caused by the sudden change of the editing team, as you may have noticed. Now everything is fine, and soon we will begin our work on the 3rd chapter (which is already finished), and hopefully it will take not much longer than one month. And I'm writing the 4th chapter as well.

Also, Gekasso made a special blog for the illustrations:
https://aftersoundproject.tumblr.com/
Don't be shy and check it out!

Anyway, I hope you enjoyed reading this story so far.

And the last:
I invite you to join Aftersound Project discord server where you can chat with Geka and I, discuss the story, get to see announcements, little snippets of the future chapters and new illustrations.
https://discord.gg/R5Ky8K4