9:00 AT, Day Twenty | Grassland-Mesa Biome Transition

  I lean my head against Ray’s shoulder, feeling the steady rhythm of her breaths. The soft leather seat of the truck rubs oddly against my armor.

  “Geez, couldn't they have made these trucks a bit comfortable? It's all weird against the armor.” Ray says quietly.

  “Well, you're plenty comfortable to lean against, darling. You should try it sometime.”

  “Well in that case, you can lean against me anytime you wish!” She says, excitedly.

  “I was already going to do that. After all, you are the cutest in the universe. It is only natural that I should want to snuggle up next to you in this fashion.”

  “Ko, you're a big jerk, you know.”

  “Well perhaps I will just have to show you how cool I am. We've got a raid coming up right? Ima show off so much you'll have no choice but to call me cool!”

  She grabs my hand and gives it a squeeze. “Dont go doing anything crazy just so show off.”

  “Oh come on, it's me ya know. When have I ever done anything crazy?” I ask sarcastically.

  She turns her head and gives me a look. The type of look that says ‘oh really now?’

  “Why do you look like you don't believe me? All of my actions are completely sane and not crazy at all.” I respond.

  “Hmm, if that's true, then you must be calling me a complete lunatic.” She says, with a hurt expression.

  “Well you are a complete lunatic.” I say, earning a flick to the forehead.

  “Stupid dumb jerk.” She says, turning away from me. Under her breath I can hear her mumble just loudly enough, “Why must you be so klacking cute? It's unfair.”

  I wrap my arm around her waist and lean more of my weight into her. She may seem mad, but she also wraps her arm around me, pulling me in even tighter.

  “Milords, we are just about to enter the mesa, if you look out the window, you can glimpse the vast beauty.” Our driver says.

  I take a look out the window and my jaw nearly drops.

  In front of stands a massive wall of rock. It stretches high into the sky, only to come to an abrupt stop.

  The cliff is covered in beautiful vegetation that goes well with the nice color of the rock.

  “How in the Kek are we going to get up that thing?” Ray asks.

  “I believe we have to scale the cliff, darling. It shouldn't be too hard, we are the Moonlight Duo after all.” I explain.

  “Oh yipee! I've wanted to go on another mountain climbing adventure ever since we climbed that volcano back on Valker. This is gonna be so much fun!” She exclaims, giving me a kiss in her excitement.

  “Darling, you do realize that the two of us can just fly to the top, right?”

  “Oh boo, that’s no fun! Let's climb it for realz!”

  “Fine then, but I'm not catching you when you fall.”

  Thirty minutes later

  “Kooo, this is so hard, why did we decide to climb this cliff again?” Ray says.

  We have barely made it a quarter of the way up, and she is already complaining. Typical. I hold onto the plasma spikes and look down at Ray, who is a few dozen meters below me.

  She really seems to be struggling, I can see her chest rising and falling rapidly. “You're the one that said we should climb instead of fly. Are you really that out of shape?” I ask.

  “Noooo, I'm in perfect shape! See, watch me do this, no problemo!” She says, suddenly speeding up her climbing speed drastically. Quickly passing me and making it about a third of the way up.

  That's when she moves too fast and the spike doesn't fully implant and she loses her grip on the cliff.

  She falls, and I in perfect hero fashion, defy gravity with inae so that I can lean outwards and catch her in my arms. I quickly help her grab onto my spikes with her feet and she wraps her arms tightly around me.

  Her face is super close to mine, so I give her a kiss. This causes her to blush profusely, but she cannot hide, considering the current situation.

  Even suspended several hundred meters in the air by a few spikes in a cliff face, kisses are important. After all, I wouldn't want any super duper cute girlfriends to feel like they are being ignored. Headrubs would be ideal, but that's a bit hard to do while suspended in this fashion.

  “Ko, you're such a jerk.” she mumbles, while holding me even tighter.

  “Oh, right. I did say I would let you fall. Oops, I'll remember not to catch my super cute girlfriend next time.”

  “Dont you dare, darling. Or I might revoke your headrub permissions.” She says, leaning her head against my chest. I can feel the heat from her warm breath, reassuring even though we are basically hanging onto this cliff by a few nails.

  “For klacks sake, the headrub permissions! That would be so devastating, the entire headrub economy would never recover.” I say, giving her head a few pats with my free hand.

  “So, are you gonna climb, or are we just gonna hang here for the rest of eternity? Not that I would mind the latter option.”

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  “Come on, can't you just let me absorb the feeling of my darling Ray clinging to me? It reminds me of the good old days.”

  She gives me a deadly look. “I thought we swore never to mention those days again.”

  “Hmm, what days are you talking about?” I say with a smirk.

  “Ko, you're such a jerk.”

  With that, I manage to maneuver Ray onto my back and we continue the climb. This time, together, as we should have been from the start.

  We finally reach the top of the mesa and are greeted with a beautiful sight.

  A gigantic flat plateau. I can see for several kilometers all around, it's all pretty much flat. I do wonder at the fact that it is called a mesa rather than a plateau. Perhaps the game masters don't fully understand the nuance of the words. It should definitely be a plateau instead. Oh well, they call it a mesa so I guess by their own taxonomy, it is technically a mesa.

  There are a few spindly trees and rocks that dot the landscape. Not too far away, there is also a herd of what looks like gazelle.

  Ray climbs off my back and looks around. “Woah.”

  “Woah indeed.”

  “Hey darling, you up for a bit of a chase?”

  “Of course, darling. Let's go!”

  We draw our weapons and head off.

  Oh wait, I should probably mention that after much hesitation, Ray decided to change her weapon. Apparently she really liked Nero’s blades and she now wields two curved swords. Combine that with her tendency to go a bit wild on the battlefield, and she really has become a force to be reckoned with.

  It brings a tear to my eye, to know that my super duper cute girlfriend is so strong. Perhaps one day I can just sit back while she does all the fighting. She would likely let me too, I would just have to pay in extra headrubs of course.

  Though that wouldn't be the worst thing. I feel like the day when I retire from the battlefield is not anywhere near. Oh well, I guess Ray and I will simply have to change our dance around a bit. People will grow to fear the name Moonlight Duo upon the battlefield, that's for certain.

  Ray charges at one of the beats, which the system calls Liur. her blades streak for it, aiming to end it in one quick blow.

  However, before her blade impacts, it lets out a great puff of air from its mouth and shoots backwards.

  I stop in my tracks and fall to my knees, consumed with laughter at the sheer absurdity. Like seriously? Dodging by basically burping, that's gotta be a new one. Whoever these game masters are that designed the thing must be geniuses at both comedy and combat.

  Ray also stops for a moment, befuddled at how it dodged her attack. Naturally, I charge in and finish off the beast. I believe there is an ancient saying that applies well in this situation, ‘teamwork makes the dreamwork’ I believe it was.

  “Darling, you've gotta be faster! It seems like the announcement was not lying. These beasts are definitely going to be a step up above the others. We've gotta approach them more carefully.” I say, grabbing a hold of Ray’s arm and giving it a squeeze.

  “Hmm, I guess you're right. You didn't have to steal my kill though.” She says, with a faint hit of poutiness on her face. I kiss it away and it turns into one of her dazzling smiles. “Now then, let's handle the rest, shall we?”

  I pick up the trophy and then we head off and finish off the rest of the pack. One Major, 5 Normals and 12 Minors. Quite a nice haul, I'm sure we can buy a nice toy with the income.

  We head back to our escort, which has finished ascending the cliff. They even managed to lift the trucks using a bunch of carefully placed ropes and guides along the cliff. Human ingenuity and stubbornness sure is something else.

  We settle back into the truck, this time Ray takes a seat on my lap. I wrap my arms around her and she relaxes nicely into me. Even though the environment is quite warm, it's always nice to have her wrapped in my arms. After all, cuddles with your super duper cute girlfriend are the best, second only to headrubs.

  We drove for quite a while, our destination was something interesting that our scouts had found. We were told to go investigate it personally. Naturally when Ray heard the words ‘road’ trip, she basically dragged me into the truck and got all cozy.

  We chatted a bit about the environment. This arena truly is amazing. It's clear that the budget was insane, and whoever designed it really did their research on Earth. It's eerily similar in terms of climate and biomes. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if they somehow snuck down onto Earth for some personal observations.

  I can't imagine they were able to capture the feel of Earth so well with just orbital or longer range images and data.

  Human history is full of people trying to attribute stuff to aliens, deities or other supernatural things. Sometimes there isn't even a scientific explanation. So perhaps some of the conspiracy theorists were right. More likely though, people just haven't found the answers and people’s overactive imaginations grew a bit out of control.

  Though I do have my doubts. The IEC does say that they do not interfere with pre-ascension species. But I highly doubt that there haven't been a few rouge scientists that sneak away for a bit of closer observation. After all, they are scientists, it's natural for them to do stupid things in the name of curiosity.

  We come upon the destination. Out the window all I can see is a massive rock, towering high into the sky. It's quite odd, considering how flat everything else is.

  There is a barrier a ways away from the rock, and several scientists are gathered around discussing what the rock could possibly be.

  Linda, who has been taking somewhat of a field manager role as of late, quickly notices us and rushes over.

  “Milords! The barrier is very strange. It is saying that it needs a contestant to activate whatever it is.”

  “Intriguging, well then, I guess I'll go touch it. Perhaps everyone should stand back a bit.” I suggest.

  Everyone quickly moves several hundred meters away. I feel quite alone as I walk up to the barrier and place my hand upon it.

  The moment my hand touches the barrier, the ground starts to violently shake.

  The giant rock cracks open like a big egg. After a great fanfare of tumbling rocks, the rock reveals what appears to be some form of rock golem.

  It is massive. Easily one hundred meters tall and made out of a rock that looks quite durable.

  I quickly dash away and as soon as I meet back up with the others, a screen appears in front of me.

  ‘Do you wish to begin the challenge: Legend Raid for Geoff The Titan?

  Recommended Party: At least 15 great-level challengers and 200 high-level challengers.

  Current Party (57): Contains 1.6% of recommended combat strength. Estimated Difficulty: Death.

  Estimated reward for Legend Raid: 2500 Ri, 5000 Ti, Slayer of Geoff The Titan commendation and 25 Legend Equipment Drops (Extreme-level) + 2 per participant (114).

  Yes / No’

  “Woah, it's a legend!” I exclaim loudly.

  Immediately all of those gathered gave a sigh of relief. I think they were expecting to all die the moment we activated it or something. But it's just a legend that felt a bit shy and wanted to hide in a rock I suppose.

  “Hey Ko, are you thinking what I am thinking?” Ray asks, grabbing my hand.

  “That we need to get a force out here right away so we can take this thing down?”

  “Thats exactly it! Like, those rewards are insane. Two drops per person and twenty five extra? They weren't kidding about increased rewards.”

  “Yeah, but look at that party requirement. It seems it really is much more dangerous. If this guy is that strong, I can't imagine what lies in the center of the arena.”

  “Ooo, I hope it's a giant dragon that breathes fire and stuff, that'd be so cool!” She says, excited at the prospect of fighting a dragon.

  “Yeah, that would be cool. Let's get ready to fight this Geoff guy first though.”

  “Sure thing, darling.” Ray says, leaning her head into my chest as I wrap my arms around her in a tight hug.

  No matter what comes next, Ray and I shall overcome it together. A giant rock that wants us dead? No problem. A psychopathic pink haired girl? Easy. After all, we are the Moonlight Duo. So, bring it on.

  End of Chapter 112

  Next: Chapter 113 | Geoff The Titan

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