The City of Peace: Senma

The entire city seemed to be encircled in some sort of holographic dome which gave off a barely perceivable glow, bathing the city in a pale golden light and giving the air a musky feeling. Although at first she had expected this world to be much more futuristic because of the technology she had experienced so far in fact it was quite fantasy-like.

Silhouetted against the strange glow of the dome there seemed to be a machine which resembled an airship being pulled by two ferocious looking monsters which couldn't be identified or seen very clearly because of the height. They flew through the sky with an impossible speed and swiftly a section of the dome opened to allow them to pass through into the sky beyond, disappearing as quickly as she had noticed them.

Her eye was drawn to the area in front of her, the houses were all low on the ground with no buildings in the direct vicinity exceeding more that 3 metres tall. They were all made with a strange metallic material which had a similar texture to her arms but were cut and arranged in a brick fashion, they were coloured a very pale grey and seemed to be slowly absorbing the light emitted by the dome.

All the buildings had high pointed roofs made from the same material but painted a dark bronze colour, their curving edges reminding her of the oriental Japanese temples that she had read so much about in her previous life. The streets didn't seem to have a specific order to them, as if the houses hadn't been planned and instead had been built rather suddenly, sprawling over the ground quite unevenly.

However in the far distance she glimpsed at least 6 spires clumped closely together which were so tall it was a wonder that they didn't pierce the mysterious dome. They each radiated the same glow that she had come to recognise as a trait of the machines in this world. They weren't only forged by hand, but by spirit as well.

The entire city seemed to build up to the spires, with the area she was in, being at the lowest point and the gradient slowly increasing the closer you got to them. The quality and height of the buildings increased as well, with some of them being well over 10 metres tall. The spires must be something very important and powerful to warrant an entire city to be built around them she thought.

There were people milling about everywhere, and to her disappointment most of them resembled normal humans, none especially had animal or demonic traits which had been common in novels she had read, but she could only judge by what she was observing from her tiny window. And to her further sorrow she couldn't see many people with metal limbs like hers, however there were machines everywhere.

Many of the tiny flying insect-birds that her Father had used before were darting about in the air, responding to different whistles and calls from places far beyond her vision. A lot of people were using the Link that she had previously been shown by her Father as well, it seemed that everyone in this world was connected to machines in a way.

Sitting back down on the bed as comfortably as she could she looked at the Link she still held in her open palm. It didn't seem very significant but with what she had experienced so far she knew that she was completely wrong. Overcome with curiosity she placed it on her forehead and entered the ethereal world.

The blue light of the hologram flooded her senses, leaving her blinking quickly to try and adjust to the abrupt change in light. She needed general information, at the moment she was completely lost about how anything worked in this world, a little box in the corner of the screen showed her current location as The City of Peace: Senma.

The history of the city might give her some insight into the current situation, and so using her mind to navigate she found a book titled "The History of the City of Light". Surprisingly the book didn't materialise in front of her like before and instead only existed within the hologram. Shaking off her confusion she willed the page to turn and was immediately plunged into a cinematic simulation.

"At the beginning of time there existed only two entities, the Gods who went by the names of Sen and Ma, Sen loved war and fighting and everything that came with it, whereas Ma loved machines and the power and magic they held. There was constantly discord between them and they could never find it in their hearts to agree to peace. Their duels shook the very foundation of the universe and a new world, between the folds of space and time, was born.

Instead of an opportunity to collaborate and repent for all the destruction they had caused, they took it as a sign that they should continue to fight. Many fascinating species existed in this new world but they were all pushed close to extinction by the duels of Sen and Ma. However one day the folds of time and space were damaged by an unknown power and monsters beyond their wildest dreams streamed through the gaps, mercilessly killing all life.

A braze human who went by the name Hei pleaded with Sen and Ma to help fight off the beasts, and finally moved by his sincerity for the first time in eternity they called a truce to defend the world born of their opposing passions. After a war lasting many years the monsters were pushed out and the tear in the sky repaired by a majestic machine forged from Ma's own mind, 6 spires that could manipulate space and time. In light of their victory they gifted the area around the machine to Hei, a city he could build and rule over for as long as he lived, Hei named the city after the Gods that he had come to regard as friends: Senma.

They disappeared into oblivion never to return, but left the spires as a reminder of their truce and a warning to all those who came after, and over many years the city prospered. Countless people decided to follow the path of either God and the two ruling occupations were born: Warriors and Smiths. And it was decreed that whoever reached an exceptional mastery of such would be granted the power to manipulate the heavens and everything that existed beneath it."

Pulling out of the simulation Kayla gasped, so this world had such a history she wondered. Suddenly she felt that her life here would turn out to be much more interesting than she had initially thought.