Horizon:Volume 1 Chapter 01

Chapter 01: Chanced Meeting

Your life is

Made to meet

If that’s the case, then, what is the meaning of meeting

Allocation (Life)

●

Below the white sky, the movement of the first-half of the morning in the Musashi city was ending.

Everywhere in the city, the businesses were changing and connecting from the very first in the morning to the afternoon.

In the neighborhood of the central region of Tama, the bakery/café Blue Thunder was also starting its preparations for noon. The cafeteria section was closed by using a string tag and only the bread shelves in front of the counter, which was the bakery part of the shop, was doing business.

But it's too early to prepare to open the shop at noon. The woman shopkeeper was doing the preparations inside,

“P-01s, go water outside and after that you can go. I’m counting on you again at the early evening.”

“Jud.”

After P-01s nodded, she left the counter and went outside the shop.

Main street. The cleaning of the road was already done and there were people passing by. Occasionally large two-wheeled carts or horse wagons used for transport passed by, causing the structure of the street to tremble.

It’s time for business, but there are some tourists here and there.

“Looking at this situation, soon, it’s Mikawa. The market will probably become busy soon.”

P-01s muttered. P-01s thought with her own function that it has a long time since she had been to Mikawa before.

… Once in a year, the first Mikawa.

Musashi travels around the all of the of the Far East in a year.Musashi stops at each region’s settlement and makes commercial and transport business, but from what I heard from the shopkeeper, a year isn’t enough to travel around the Far East.

P-01s thinks about these words that were said last year.

Last year it looks like P-01s boarded Musashi from Mikawa.

It appears that way because there are no memories from before that.

… When I became aware I was in the street of Tama.

My civil registration was already done by someone. The civil identity I had was authentic and my domicile was in Musashi. But when I went to the domicile, it had turned into a street.

There was a lot of uncertainty but as my civil identity was authentic, the first person who talked to me, the shopkeeper of the bakery/café, became my guardian and because of that I was allowed to live here.

What I think now is the same thing I thought back then,

… Who made P-01s?

The shopkeeper went to various public offices and companies to ask about this, but there weren’t any products that corresponded to it. There weren’t any reports about the loss or reports to search for missing automated dolls. The engineer who inspected over me said,

“I've seen flux types from IZUMO and England but, … In this case there are too many unclear aspects.”

That was all the engineer said. The shopkeeper tilted her head after hearing about the unclear aspects, but from what the engineer said, an automated doll is an aggregation of spells and mechanisms and as there are a lot of secrets in the component parts from the companies, you can call them as an aggregation of unclearness. Furthermore, the engineer said,

“The soul is in the throat.”

I have heard that automated dolls are dolls which have a soul in their bodies.

A doll won’t move by itself, but with the disposition of a soul inside it that can absorb and use the energy from the Earth plate (Ether vein), fluid (ether) so the drive system can be activated and it can move.

In my case there was a component, which looked like an ornament and is probably the soul, at the base of the throat and the vocal chords components.

From what the shopkeeper says,

“Maybe the emotions of a very important woman are in the ornament.”

Is what she said, but the truth is still hidden.

What I know is that I’m an automated doll with no memories and from an unknown place.

“——”

P-01s was in front of the shop and moved her hands to the water tap beside the door.

She moved the pail under the water tap using her gravity control without touching it.

The ability of gravity control is a characteristic power of the automated dolls. It’s a necessary ability to the soul inside something to move its container and to make contact with other things. The automated dolls have the disposition of devoting themselves to the people using mainly this power.

P-01s stopped her body at the street and using her extended hand, she put water in the pail and picked it up.

Wait.

She started watering the street using a ladle.

This is part of her usual routine. Once in the morning, once before noon and once more early in the evening.

The same custom. The same work. The same things I have to do. If I’m doing that I don’t have to think about me and this really helps.

… But to put it bluntly, I can conclude that I’m running away.

And after thinking until this point.

"Water."

A voice was heard. Coming from the ground, from the side of the street, a small, black, round creature was emerging,

"Want water."

●

P-01s with the pail with water in one of her hands was getting closer to the direction from where the voice came.

It was a corner lot from the shop. In the street gutter. To connect the sewer there are wood covers, which were always closed, but coming from below raising the wood covers in the process, there was a black, round creature with 5 centimeters forcing his way out.

The black figure looks like an agglomeration of fur wet by muddy water,

... They are algae according to the self-assessment.

The algae were like an animal, hanging the bottom of its round body in the verge of the street gutter and using his sense organs, he looked around.

"Are we okay? All clear?"

“It’s okay. All clear.”

In front of the nodding P-01s the black algae was there, the black algae animals are organisms with shared consciousness that work in Musashi and other cities by processing the water from the sewers. They use a process similar to photosynthesis, in each they eat the “dirt” and purify them into “not dirt”. Because of that each country makes a contract with the gathering will of the black algae animals providing them food and in exchange they purify the waters in the sewers.

It’s one of those black algae animals, but when they are soaked with dirty water they will stay that way. The dirty water spilled onto the black algae animals can be purified as one of their components, but the same doesn’t happen with the smell.

They know that if they leave the sewer, the street gutter and go to the street they are going to be hated.

But they are here. The reason is,

"Water."

“It stagnated again?”

"Yes, again, a little, so with some water it will go away."

The body of the black algae appeared to be a little dry. P-01s concluded that this was because of the lack of water.

In these regions the sewer pipes get deformed. Because each ship of Musashi is enormous, the match is how much of the external shell deformation the internal structure can absorb but,

… The endgame comes stronger on the middle parts, especially into the surface side.

The reason that there are several ships that have an aerodynamic structure by the mid-surface side is for that purpose.

Now the black algae animals want their subsistence, the dirty water.

But the flux of the dirty water is bad stagnated, blocked and it’s necessary to someone to have the same function as a brush, to force the stagnation and the blockage out.

Normally it’s supposed to ask the person responsible for this in the office, but

"Nobody others probably serious."

“—Jud., I understand.”

P-01s sprinkled water on the black algae animal.

The black algae animal narrowed his sense organs and after being saturated with water,

"Thanks."

It went below the street gutter and another one came.

"One more please."

P-01s nodded and sprinkled water.

So another black algae animal came, then another, they kept coming.

"Last."

The seventh one was splashed with water. The seventh black algae animal thanked P-01s, but when he was going to enter the street gutter,

"Okay?"

“What is okay?”

"Smells right?"

Asked, P-01s tilted her head. The black algae did smell, it smelt of sewers.

Only I can smell it because they are showing only a part of their bodies from the street gutter, but if they get out completely the other people will become aware of it. The truth is clear. That’s why P-01s said.

“Jud., to put it bluntly it smells.”

"Why?"

The black algae animals asked why she is helping them if they smell so bad.

"Always helping but others until now got in trouble said no why?"

To this question P-01s answered immediately.

“Your smell isn’t something you created to harm the others. This smell is a result of our actions. And you never go out of the gutters completely to prevent the spread of this smell. So, I can conclude that, —There isn’t a reason to P-01s deny you.”

So, the black algae animal said.

"Friend?"

“Jud., if that’s the name of the relationship between those who acknowledge each other.”

In response to the words of P-01s the black algae animals stayed silent for some time. But after a few seconds,

"Name please."

“—My name is P-01s.”

"Thanks for always."

As if nodding the black algae animals submerged his body,

"Wash hands please."

After the animal went away the cover of the street gutter was closed.

P-01s raised her body that was bent over down. She did like the black algae animal had told her and washed her hands with the water left from the pail and looked over to verify if there was anywhere dirty, but the black algae animals have absorbed all the dirty water dripped.

As if it were a substitute, something fell.

“?”

The something was a person. A black male uniform from the Musashi Ariadust Academy. Short long black hair with a thin body, but without any forces,

“——”

After shaking a little, they suddenly fell to the ground without even having the chance to put their knees on the ground, a direct hit.

There was a sound, a cloud of dust raised and P-01s,

… If a cloud of dust raised, this means that my watering wasn’t enough.

While thinking that, she said towards the shop.

“Shopkeeper, there is a client. As always Masazumi-sama is, —on the brink of starving to death.”

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