9 The missing girl II

"Ugh... My head..."

Those were her first words after finally awakening from her slumber.

The last thing in her memory was the vague image of herself and her friend falling into the ocean desperately trying to find something to grab onto in order to survive.

Little did she know, her efforts turned out to be in vain, and that the life she once knew was no more.

The young and confused lady opened her eyes to find herself in the middle of a grassy field on the top of a hill.

In the distance, the sun could be seen about to set on the horizon. Its beauty was mesmerizing, and for a second, nothing else mattered but the magnificent view before her.

But even though its light was so strong, the girl did not felt any sense of warmth. As the enormous ball of light proceeded to be swallowed by the land, the girl began to notice a couple of things wrong with her situation.

Her skin felt stiff, her body felt heavy, her movements felt clunky, and for some reason, she was feeling hollow inside.

"Wha- What's going on!!??" she asked while waving her arms in despair.

As she did so, she realized that her limbs were not the ones she was used to seeing. They were black, cold, and stiff.

"What the f*ck!!?? What is this!!??" she screamed while trembling and falling on her knees.

Her legs as well, were in the same state as her arms, as was every other part of her body.

What was once skin, was now replaced by metal. Her entire body was covered in a suit of armor drenched in the color of the night itself.

The girl hurried to take off the pieces as if her life depended on it, but beneath it was completely empty. No meat, no bones, no nothing.

"Wha- What!!??"

She came to realize she wasn't wearing armor, she WAS the armor.

Once the piece of metal that would cover an arm was removed, the girl no longer could feel her fingers or her palms, so she dashed to pick it up again and put it back into place.

As she did so, the sensation began to return. She tried to open and close her fist and the pieces of the armor obeyed as if they were her actual body.

For a moment, a brief sense of relief came to her, followed by much confusion and fear.

The girl began to hug her knees and many questions started to form in her mind, "What's happening? Where am I?? What's going on?? How did I get here?? What happened to me? Why am I like this?? Why? How? What? Where?"

She continued to mumble to herself until the sun was fully out of sight and the night was finally allowed to take its place of dominance in the sky.

"This isn't real! This isn't real! This isn't real! This isn't real! This isn't real! This isn't real! This-"

The girl tried to calm herself down and relax, tried to tell herself that this was all just a dream and that she would soon wake up. But much time passed and nothing changed.

[Hey!! Hey! You there!!] a voice began to shout.

"Eh...?" the girl gasped as she turned around to meet with a strange person calling for her.

She was so agitated that she didn't even take the time to study her surroundings. Once she turned, a huge oak came into her view, larger than any tree she ever saw before.

"Whoa..." she mumbled.

[Hey!! Don't ignore me!!] the voice called again. It seemed to be speaking in a different language, but the girl still managed to understand what was being said.

"Huh?"

For a moment, the girl thought that the tree was speaking to her, but on a second look, it appeared that a man was waving in her direction.

"Ah!" she whispered. The sight of another person began to fill her with hope, "Ah, please! I need-"

[Finally, you noticed me!!] the man stated.

The girl was about to rush towards him, but before she realized it, the man began to dash at her as well and faster than she could react to, strikes her to the side with the swing of an object, forcing her to roll on the grass like a barrel.

"Kyaahh!!" she cried, not out of pain, but out of shock.

[So you are the legendary armor...] the man commented.

He was now assuming a battle pose. He had short black hair and mustache, a green shirt on top of a white shirt, brown pants, and black boots, and for some reason, he was carrying a mace.

Not only that, his attire looked strangely medieval. These were not boots or shirts that the girl was used to seeing.

She was also not sure why that man decided to attack her.

[What are you doing?? You crazy??] she shouted in objection. Her lines were somehow being automatically translated into the language the man was speaking.

[Eh...? You can talk??] the man replied while widening his eyes for a moment, [Interesting...]

[Of course I can talk, you maniac!! What the hell do you think you're doing??] the girl complained while stomping her feet.

[What does it look like I'm doing??] he asked while dashing at her one more time while raising his mace, [I'm taking the legendary armor for myself!!]

[Aaaghhh! Stoop!!" the girl cried while raising her arms in an 'X' stance to defend against the attack.

The man did not care and just started waving his mace over and over trying to take her down, but her armor was way more resistant than she expected. No matter how much he raged, she wouldn't even flinch.

"Holy... The legends were true after all..." he commented after taking a moment to breathe from his rampage.

"What legends?? What's going on?? Who are you?? Why are you attacking me?? What is this place??" the armor yelled.

"Man, you're annoying... You sound just like my ex-wife... Never shutting up..."

The armor girl flinched after hearing that comment, "Excuse me!!??"

The man started his attack again, but instead of simply blocking, the girl tried to evade his swing. To her surprise, she was faster than she thought and easily escaped him.

But while she found herself safe, the man ended up losing control of his momentum and ended up attacking the giant oak by accident, and the moment his mace touched its wood, a shocking sensation came into the girl, causing her to flinch and fall.

"Ugh!!!" she cried.

It was a feeling of being stabbed with a small toothpick, only in several parts of her body and all at the same time.

"What an annoying armor... Just let me take you down, you useless piece of metal!!" the man screamed.

She checked for wounds on her body but found nothing. The girl did not understand what had just happened, but she knew one thing, should something happen to that tree, something even worse would happen to her.

It was unclear how or why, but her and the oak were connected, and she needed to protect it.

The man came swinging at her one more time, but the girl decided to stop playing and just grabbed his mace in the middle of his movement and stoped him with one hand.

"What the-" he gasped.

The girl did not have a face, only a helmet, but even still, the man could feel that she was glaring at him while holding his hand, "You. Are. Annoying!"

Exactly after saying that, the armor closed her palm into a fist while still holding the man's weapon and completely shattered the mace into pieces, along with all the bones in his hand.

"Guaaaahhhh!!!" he howled in agony while rolling on the ground and grabbing his injured hand, "You piece of garbage!!! I'm gonna tear you apart even if it's the last thing I do!!! You hear me!!??"

The girl began to lose her patience. She was not having a very good day and this guy was doing everything in his power to make it even worse.

"Yeah... Good luck with that..." she whispered before raising her leg backwards and proceeding to kick him in the stomach, forcing him to roll down the hill all the way to the bottom like a snowball.

Once she could no longer see him, the girl decided to drop on the terrain while trying to let it sink in everything that had transpired.

"Ah... What the hell... Is going on..." she murmured.

As she finally had a moment of peace to think, she attempted once again to search her memories, but everything felt like a blur in her mind.

The only thing she remembered was falling in the water with her friend because of a very rude guy that wouldn't take the hint and just go away. Very similar to the mace man from a while ago now that she thought about it.

But aside from that, she couldn't remember how she got here or much before that. She couldn't even remember her own name.

Only thing she knew was that she was drowning, and, since she was never good at swimming, one sad conclusion began to form in her mind as she looked at her metal hands and tried to remember what her old palms looked like.

"I... I died... Didn't I?"

She didn't want to admit it, but no other explanation made sense for her.

At that moment, when she fell from the bridge, she lost her life, and now, she was here.

The question was... Why?

While thinking about that, the girl took another look at the giant oak that seemed to be connected to her somehow.

"Why did I get hurt when you were attacked...?" she asked, feeling a little silly for talking to a tree.

She tried to approach the tree and pressed her hand against the trunk, and for the first time since she awoke, she felt warm inside.

"Did you bring me here...?"

The girl began to wonder, what if she didn't die? What if this oak saved her before she lost her life and in return forced her to become her guardian? Did that mean she would need to repay for her life by staying there forever? Was she locked in that area, unable to leave or abandon that oak?

One thing she knew...

Her life would never be the same again...