Ava and Aphrodite: The First Human in 8000 Years (Featured)

Chapter 87: The Truth

What Ava saw when he hacked in, was unlike anything he'd ever seen before. This time it wasn't an odd ethereal realm where he had no body or form, his senses weren't blurred and the world around him wasn't a mushy digital landscape. No. This time, he was standing on his own two feet.

His body had taken form, he was standing on a white bridge that led far into the distance, it was hanging atop a void of nothingness. Next to him stood a short woman with half-moon shaped eyes and long black hair. Her body was petite and her face was puppy-like, it looked familiar. Her long, white dress was as vibrant as the world around them.

"Aki- I mean. Ava. You made it!" she said. She stared at him looked at his body up and down.

"Uh, hi. Do I know you?" Ava replied,

"Huh?" said the woman, "oh, right. I'll start from the top. This pathway uses the original programming language from 8000 years ago, it's also built using the architecture of my hacking rather than yours. What you're seeing is something that I constructed, so you're also seeing things the way I do."

"Wait- you're..."

"This is what I looked like, all that time ago Ava." said the woman, "When I was Saori Tenkawa."

"Sylvie!?"

"Right. Heh." she smiled to herself, "I wish you could see what you look like right now Ava."

"What do you mean?"

"You manifested the way my old self remembers you." she chuckled, "you're shorter than you are in your Serv form you know."

Ava looked all over himself, he was wearing all-white too. A white shirt, white trousers, white shoes.

All white.

He pulled his sleeves up. He had rather pale skin all the way up. Not a shell like he was used to.

He'd taken the form of a human.

And this odd looking woman in front of him. That was really Sylvie? He was used to all Servs being the same height, having the same skin colour, having perfect skin and perfect proportions. But she was unique. She was small, she had a little scar on her forehead, and her hair was much longer than he was used to.

Looking at her, he didn't know what to think. She was a unique creature, like Aphrodite. An alien. It was unnerving, but at the same time, nostalgic. Some historic part of him probably remembered her.

"So when you hack, it looks like this?" asked Ava, "why?"

"No. It doesn't always look like this." Sylvie muttered, "I just... I just wanted it to look like this." she said,

"Why? Why'd you construct the pathway to be so solid. It doesn't seem efficient."

Sylvie looked away.

"It doesn't matter. We should make our way to our goal." she walked along the path.

Ava followed after her, still confused. He looked around, slowly, fragments of rocks started to float up from the void. Every rock seemed to have a different structure on it. A room from a house, a bed, a lab, even something that looked similar to a castle of some sort.

"What the- what are these things!?" asked Ava, following behind.

"Memories." Sylvie replied, "that room, it's my bedroom. The lab, it's where I worked as the senior programmer for the Serv project. That other thing is a temple."

"What's a temple?"

"Religious ceremonies and the like are held there. I wasn't very religious but my dad was. He insisted when I got married it'd be-" Sylvie paused, "anyway never mind."