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ARDEN HAS LIVED BY the sea for as long as she can remember, but it's not as glamorous as it may seem. The air is full of smog and it's a wonder that plants and animals are still alive from the near toxic fumes produced at a constant rate. However, the same could be said for the people living by the sea.
Day in and day out she sits on a hill of dry grass and watches over her herd of sheep, wooden staff clasped in her hands and blue hood drawn up to cover her golden wheat hair and pale skin; abnormalities in a world of people with brown or black hair, and with tanned skin. It's peaceful at least, but sometimes she wishes for some adventure.
She's heard stories of civilisations existing under the blue expanse of salted water; of people who live beneath the waves and coexist with the beasts in the dark depths. However, she knows that her life resides above the pristine water - tending to the animals and selling milk and cheese and wool from her herd.
Arden is considered one of the lucky ones due to her not being trapped within a factory building during the days and nights she tends to the sheep. She gets to see the giant iron and copper and bronze ships with cities atop their decks dock at the water's edge, and see the different array of people that come to visit her home of sweeping planes and the multitude of factories further away from the edge of the sea.
However, she still stares out at the ultramarine waves with wistfulness and a desire to become submerged in the water and swim to the cities below - if such a thing exists. Arden believes in their existence, and, while she still has not met a person from below the waves in her nineteen years by the sea, she hopes that she one day will, and will then be able to experience such a life.
In this world that has been destroyed by war after war after war, it is rare to find people living so close to the water's edge when there are five remaining habitual cities remaining from the six that once were. However, after what happened in the sixth, not many people feel too comfortable living within their walls.
They're quite content with their world of sea and metal.
