"No. I haven’t."

Morgaine replied quietly.

"My ranking rose because I was challenged. Then they watched me fight, and then they challenged me more and more and more, and I kept overwhelming them."

"I’ve never challenged anyone."

She said, as White nodded quietly, finishing off a cigarette before picking up another.

"Can you tell me about it?"

He asked all of a sudden as she leaned inward to light his cigarette.

"About that world you came from. A world where fighting is only used to kill."

He asked as his cigarette caught, smoke spewing forth.

Morgaine had never been asked that question before, leaving her with almost no idea how to begin the explanation, but he helped her.

"Who were the enemies?"

"Celiprocaptors."

White had a good memory for creatures’ names from his two lives, but still couldn’t recall anything like that.

"They’re like giant spiders with blades for legs. They move very fast, flashing forward, and in one cleave, a head rolls down."

She explained.

"Now I know where you got your lowering stance and cleaving-forward move from."

He said.

"I don’t like being attributed to them."

She replied.

"I’m just saying they’ve rubbed off on you, maybe more than you know."

He said as she exhaled.

"And your people, did they always have gems like yours?"

"No."

She said.

"I was the only one."

"Must’ve made you quite the special one amongst them."

White teased, but Morgaine’s eyes instead gleamed with disbelief.

"And how do you know that? They really used to see me as special."

She said.

"It was a little tribe on a high grassy hill."

She began, and White listened quietly.

"It’s similar to that place Nova used to choose to read her books."

"My people were a small tribe, a total of thirty-seven people. Seventeen men, twenty women."

"We all knew each other, and even though we lived in different homes, we were still one big family."

"The men went out to hunt, and the women stayed home and raised the children."

"That was how things were... at least from what I remember."

"But sometimes one man wouldn’t show up. Then another, and then another."

"We were running out of hunters, and eventually all that remained was just one man."

"He’s the chief... and my father. He looked over us all until we grew up."

"He somehow always returned, and when I became ten, he started bringing me out to hunt."

"I realized on my third hunt that I could grow claws. Since women were never taught to fight, I never really went back home to show my skills."

"It was something frowned upo by the women of the tribez even though it was also what our livelihood depends upon."

"That’s why the word sparring never really made sense to me, though I began to understand it when Morgaine asked me to help her train."

"Now I know... and maybe if I had a lot of that, I could have saved them..."

She paused after this, burning through about three cigarettes before continuing.

"I failed."

"You lost your father..."

White whispered.

"No. I lost everyone. It wasn’t a hunt. It was an attack."

"There was an unexplainable swarm of Celiprocaptors. I can’t remember exactly how many, but I do remember looking down the field and all the green had turned black."

"The women were easily slaughtered, and the children met the same fate."

"I was running away, covered in blood, and ran into my father."

"He passed me by, telling me to run while pressing something into my palm, the bark of some tree or something."

"The fear and his shout... I just kept running and never turned back until I couldn’t run anymore and collapsed."

"When I woke up, all I had was that bark, and it held what I now know to be a map."

"Turns out my father had been trying to find us a way back to the other humans, but the path was so treacherous, I couldn’t imagine all those women and children surviving even the first day."

"It took four years of surviving in the wilderness before I came across the blue barrier, and there... I found this world."

She recounted, and White understood.

It tied back to the history of when the Supernaturals first attacked.

Not every human could be transferred. Some were stranded and had no access back to where civilization restarted.

Exploration missions to search for them had only happened a few times before being stopped.

The Supernaturals had surrounded humanity on all sides. Venturing out meant crossing into their territory and risking even more human lives.

Morgaine’s tribe was an example of those trapped humans, unable to return to their real civilization.

"What did you swear to yourself after that?"

He asked as she paused.

"Having everything taken away by the Celiprocaptors, I can imagine an angry little girl swearing to one day wipe them all out of this world."

His words were teasing, and it made her laugh because they were true.

"You’re right. There was a time when returning to the Celiprocaptors was all I thought about, especially when it was clear I couldn’t properly fit into this world because of how I looked and how I was raised."

"But there is someone who took away that anger and made me... me. Grandma Mia. She was deeply loved in the orphanage, and she tried to take all of my pain away."

"Did she?"

White asked, finishing another cigarette.

"She did."

Morgaine admitted.

"While J still want to erase every Celiprocaptors from Earth, that’s not my true dream."

"What is your true dream?"

White asked, lighting another cigarette. She picked one up too, and he helped her light it. Smoke drifted beneath them before they leaned back and released it into the air.

"There are still Humans out there beyond the barrier, still trying to link back here."

"I wish to find them... and guide them back here."

"That’s what I plan to do after leaving Xtremecyber."

She said watching as White looked at her as if she weren’t real, then smiled.

A smile so beautiful and genuine that it sent a weird feeling in her chest making her heart beat increase.

"I..."