The next day, Nevigne had recovered a good portion of the mana she had lost in over five centuries. They packed their things and searched the abandoned base for some valuable tools they could salvage. Ironically, they were scavenging the scavengers.
They were inside one of the main buildings in the camp. This was where the captains and Muratian officials resided when the base was still in operation.
In one of the storage rooms, Fidelis found a pair of travel boots and a nice bead bracelet — likely belonged to some human slave before being confiscated. Other than these, the storage room mostly had empty oil containers and greasy machine parts.
"Fidelis! Look!" Nevigne's voice echoed from a different room.
He took the bracelet and the boots before leaving the room. He went into the main hall where he saw Nevigne with an enthusiastic expression.
She held an ancient royal sword in its intricately carved scabbard. Strips of gold lined the royal patterns in it. The blade was slightly pulled out by Nevigne, and he saw that the sword hadn't lost its sharpness over the years. Must have been forged by the legendary volcano dwarves.
"Is that for me?" he asked.
"Yes. You know how to use one of these, right?"
Fidelis chuckled before lifting his hands holding a pair of travel boots and a bracelet. "I got you something too."
The two exchanged the items they found and Fidelis immediately felt the sword. The handle felt easy in his grip, it was as though the sword was made for him. A sweet hum came from the steel as he was unsheathing it, revealing the gloriously forged royal blade, shining in the daylight.
"Beautiful," he muttered, wondering which kingdom and which era this sword came from.
Nevigne inspected the boots but the bracelet was already on her left wrist. "I'll use this when my sandals break," she said.
For the next half an hour, they searched the whole camp and left with two bags — one sling bag which Nevigne carried and one backpack for Fidelis. Inside these bags they carried with them other weapons and tools that they would eventually need. And with that, they moved to their next destination.
They walked through a valley. On each side of the dry mountain walls, there were empty stalls. This small gap in a mountain had been made a market by the scavengers sometime decades ago before moving on to their next harvesting area.
After passing through the valley, they arrived at a vast expanse of a wasteland. Crevices were all over the landscape. There were traces of a thing that burnt holes through mountains, and countless broken weapons were scattered everywhere. But the most striking feature of this historical battlefield was the remains of a sitting giant, resting its head on a mountain.
The bones of its body and legs were stretched across the land. A hill had formed on the chest of the giant and a tunnel had been dug under it through the rib cage. At the peak of the mountain, its giant skull could be seen. The giant had been sleeping for so long that plant life had thrived all over its skeleton.
Nevigne and Fidelis were now heading north. They are estimated to arrive in the next continent in over a year.
"We've come a long way," Fidelis stated while stretching his shoulder. "Honestly, I didn't expect a failed hero to return to Eden. Are you the only one who survived the battle in heaven?"
After a moment, Nevigne replied. "I don't know. But everyone that I once knew is either dead or still trapped in hell."
"What was it like in hell?" the archangel asked.
The elf glanced at him. "It was hot and uncomfortable. And there's an annoying wench that I never wanna see again."
Fidelis laughed. "That's all you have to say?"
Instead of answering his question, Nevigne asked: "What was it like in heaven before God went mad?"
Fidelis lingered for a moment, his laughter was reduced to a faint smile. "It was... well, heaven."
When Nevigne didn't respond, he continued.
"It wasn't as much of a paradise as you might think. I see it more as a work place. That is where we ensure that balance is maintained in the universe, and that humans, no matter on which planet, have divine protection."
"Because humans are God's chosen people," she said. "And that we are created in Its image."
Contrary to common knowledge, elves, and other humanoid races were not a different kind to humans. They were simply a subspecies branching off from the main race.
"That's right," Fidelis replied. "It loved you so much. I don't understand why that had to change."
"And that's why you rebelled?" Nevigne said softly, careful to not sound condemning.
Fidelis looked at the graying sky. "I never... I just wanted to change Its mind. I didn't know that God could break like that. From that point on, it was as though God Itself disappeared and was replaced by something sinister."
But that wasn't the case. Heaven simply lost Its mind.
"You were trying to get God to love humanity again, weren't you?" Nevigne said.
"I was created for the sole purpose of loving mankind," he answered.
Somehow, Nevigne wasn't convinced by his answer. She didn't think that Fidelis loved humanity simply because he was created to do so, but she refrained from saying it aloud.
The fact that he chose to join her proved that.
They were under the tunnel of the giant's ribs when the first drops of rain hit the soil. Before they emerged to the other side, they waited for the rain to stop under the shade of leafy vines and small trees on a gigantic bone.
"This is going to take a while," Nevigne muttered after seeing the rain suddenly burst into a heavy downpour. Loud thunder dominated the skies between the rumbling raindrops that were filling up the crevices in the land.
"Nevigne," the archangel called beside her.
She turned and saw him standing alert.
"We got company," he said. It was then that Nevigne saw two insectoid scavengers hiding in the dark part of the tunnel.