Eol adjusted the cloth covering her mouth, squinting through the dust and fog. The recent dust hazes were worse than usual, and it took careful planning to keep her orifices free of irritating and potentially infectious particles. But even with all that effort, some made their way past her barriers.
Hand positioned to shade her eyes, Eol stared across a barren, sickly yellow wasteland, the feiry hot afternoon sun beating down her back. In the distance, she could just make out the grayed silhouette of some shacks standing together - a makeshift community? Walking closer still, she saw the barricade surrounding the tops of the shacksand the guards. Perhaps it had a little more organization than first met the eye.
She quickened her stride and, just in case, gripped her gun. Organized or no, she had no clue how they would receive her. The dustclouds parted and she stood before the barricade's gate, half a dozen weapons pointed at her by sentries in mismatched armor and rags.
"What's your business, stranger?" a voice from above demanded. Eol looked up and noticed that there were people on top of the wall, too. Walled and guarded? This place definitely wasn't the average settlement.
"Just passing through. What is this place?"
"Sornul. Hm, I guess it'd be alright to let you in. But we've got our eye on you."
Someone appeared behind the chainlink gate and unlocked it as the sentries stepped back to let her pass. She put the gun in its holster and walked in.
"Welcome to Sornul, miss," a man said as the gate crashed closed behind her.
Going further in, , she saw that the collection of houses were big plates of junk hammered together to make tall and crooked housing. The people eyed her with a wariness that seemed to grow with every step forward she took. Still, they just went about their business.
Eol glanced around again at the nervous, fatigued faces and pitiful shelters that looked like they might be blown away with the dust. She half-wondered how they've survived for this long, what with the wars that destroyed the world and the ensuing takeover of the Monarch.
She asked for directions and went straight to what was called the market district. Really, it didn't deserve to be called a district, but Eol shrugged it off. At this point in time, she didn't have the option to be picky about where she shopped or what it was called.
The 'market district' was a cacophany of stalls and mats manned by people displaying what few goods they had in an open pavilion. They yelled out, food, weapons, supplies, in chorus, desperately competing for buyers and outdoing one another with boats of their products' quality or prices. It was more than just words. In fact, it was their livelihood, perhaps as far as the difference between life and death. In these difficult times, Eol didn't doubt it.
She walked up to a stall selling bertel meat -she tried not to notice the other traders' visible disappointment - and dropped a couple of giblings on the plank's top. The woman selling it eagerly scooped up the coins and handed the meat over.
Purchases tucked away, Eol continued weaving her way through the hamlet. She noticed a small group of people clustered around a house. Despite her knowing not to bother them, she still couldn't help her curiosity and neared them. As she did, she saw that they were all talking to a middle-aged man wearing a coat, hat and wielding bags.
"Ya sure 'bout this? Ain't gon' be a walk in the park, gettin' to Mackshell. On foot, no less!"
Eol took another look at the man supposedly leaving. If he wanted to go all the way to Mackshell, then chances were he would die before he made it halfway; the region was just that dangerous. It was by a combination of luck, hard work and stubbornness that Eol survived until now.
