"Oh, come on. Stop pampering him," Luna chimed in, giggling. "I finally made this perpetually confident, and frankly, oftentimes, outright arrogant guy blush profusely like a timid teenager. This is a monumental day for us. Let’s keep him in this state of existential dread just for a little bit longer."
"..." Kaiden could tell.
She was recording, using her eyes as the camera, catching every second of her achievement in perfect clarity to be rewatched a thousand times in the future.
His chewing slowly resumed.
His eyes narrowed.
’So this is how you decided to play, hmm? My little gremlin. Two can play that game.’
And in that exact moment, Kaiden made a silent, solemn vow.
Their next steamy night?
It wouldn’t be peaceful for Luna once again.
No.
It was going to be her life’s hardest challenge to date, where she would fight for sheer survival with every iota of her being.
It was going to be a bratty girl ravaging time.
...
The good mood at the table continued as the ladies joked and had a good time. But then it was time to return to Calypso’s original question about the Ashen Losers.
Luna swallowed, wiped her mouth with a napkin, then flicked her wrist. The artifact strapped there chimed softly as a translucent hologram unfolded above the table. Lines of light stacked themselves into neat columns, numbers ticking into place as the updated standings resolved.
"Okay, so," Luna said, pointing with her finger. "Some guilds actually did work while others apparently tripped over their own egos."
The list shimmered, revised:
1. New Dawn – 16,240 P
2. Iron Halo – 15,180 P
3. Silver Talon – 14,420 P
4. Black Meridian – 13,180 P
5. Ashbound – 11,420 P
6. Ember Line – 10,060 P
7. Frostwake – 9,080 P
8. Runewoven – 8,320 P
9. Riftward – 6,460 P
10. Dawnfall – 5,680 P
11. Stonewake – −2,740 P
12. Verdant Coil – −13,960 P
13. Hollow Crest – −25,880 P
14. Night Bastion – −38,320 P
15. Pale Covenant – −49,600 P
"See that?" Luna leaned forward, jabbing her fork toward the top. "New Dawn climbed again; they are still at the top. But considering their resources, I was expecting more from them. Anyhow."
Her finger slid down through the hologram, stopping sharply at fifth place. The name Ashbound pulsed faintly under her touch.
"These idiots. It’s incest galore over there. The whole thing’s a mess. Guild owners and high-ranking officers are all of the same bloodline. And get this, most of them have ash-themed abilities. Ash constructs, ash flames, ash shields, ash whatever-the-hell. I’m convinced something went wrong at creation."
She waved her fork dismissively, making hand gestures as if she were conducting an alchemical experiment. "Like the Maker was cooking up their bloodline and, oops, knocked over a jar labeled ash straight into the mix. Boom. Congratulations, your entire family tree is now a walking fireplace accident."
"Ah," Calypso nodded. "And they also upload to the ... whatchamacallit?"
"Internet? Yeppers. They are uploading to like a million hubs all at once, not understanding our appeal and what made us successful at all. To them, we are just successful pornstars who can fight as well as be moderately entertaining, which, in their heads, is something they can replicate on a bigger scale with their budgets and connections, thinking it will lead to reaping benefits as we do, just once again, on a bigger scale. So they just go for showing it off to as many eyes as possible while burning a small nation’s budget on the marketing."
Aria’s lips curled upward with her silver eyes glinting as she leaned her chin into her palm. "By the way," she added lightly, voice carrying that soft, smug lilt she rarely used, "We still haven’t spent a single dollar on marketing. Not one."
There was a beat.
Bastet’s purr slipped in right after, low and pleased. "And our numbers are far higher than theirs. Organic growth tastes so much sweeter, doesn’t it?"
Luna snorted. "Oh, it absolutely does. Watching large corporations light money on fire - turning it to ash... hehe - just to fall short of the indie guys is one of my life’s greatest pleasures."
Kaiden cleared his throat before interjecting in the ladies’ chatting with absolute authority in his tone. "I hope I don’t need to say it, but you’re all forbidden from watching their content, even for research purposes," he said firmly, eyes flicking around the table with unmistakable jealousy.
That earned a ripple of laughter.
Nyx covered her mouth, shoulders shaking. Calypso’s lips twitched upward. Aria leaned closer to him, clearly delighted, while Bastet’s grin turned openly indulgent.
"Yeah, yeah," Luna replied easily, smiling widely. "Relax, big guy. The last thing I want is to see whatever that unholy tape is. My mind is already messed up; it doesn’t need that nightmare fuel." She tapped the side of her head. "Knowing how possessive you are, I sent messages to a few contacts of mine right after we departed and had them do the research for me while we were busy turning monsters into paste."
Kaiden nodded with his mind visibly relaxing. "Good."
He returned to munching his food as if he didn’t just have an extremely jealous outburst that might’ve ruined any normal relationship, making the girl feel suffocated.
But this was no normal relationship.
The table went quiet for half a second.
Then Aria laughed softly, fingers lacing with his. Bastet’s purr deepened, satisfied. Even Calypso hummed approvingly.
Luna watched the reactions, her grin turning strangely fond. Truth be told, some people would’ve found that kind of possessiveness suffocating. Controlling. A red flag wrapped in charm.
None of them did.
They loved it.
They loved the way Kaiden drew hard lines when it came to them. Loved that his jealousy was so suffocating. Loved how he decided to claim them for eternity and refused to yield their affection to anyone.
At first, Kaiden wasn’t like this.
When they just came together after the porn shoot where they met, he didn’t particularly mind having a male audience. But as time passed and he truly, extremely deeply fell for his girls, something clicked in him. A switch was flipped, and he detested the mere idea of sharing even just their captured image, should it be in a compromising manner.
And just like that, the brief pit stop at the campsite came to an end.
The days that followed blurred together into a familiar, brutal rhythm.
Mornings began with steel and spellfire. Hordes were torn open under their advance, monsters cut down in efficient, practiced motions as Kaiden led from the front, his stances cycling with ruthless precision.
Aria’s moonlit arcs carved clean paths through enemy lines, Bastet’s solar dominance turned choke points into execution zones, Luna’s stormbound movements crackled with speed, and Nyx made sure nothing escaped intact. View counts climbed steadily as clips spread, the stream never losing its edge because it ensured it never fell into the pitfall of being mere awakened combatant streamers.
They expended extra effort to retain their fun and approachability even in this situation, with light exchanges around campfires, playful banter, laughter, and the like, when the situation allowed.
Evenings were for recovery and refinement. They returned to the Runewoven guild hall bloodied but grinning, armor clattering to the ground before having meals rich enough to make their bodies hum with energy.
Between bites, Luna pulled up combat footage, pausing and rewinding with sharp commentary as they dissected positioning errors, cooldown timing, and kill efficiency. Adjustments were made. Routes optimized. Mistakes shaved down.
Nights, however, were... less professional.
The first one, in particular, left Luna barely able to walk the next morning.
For the whole day, she hissed cutely at Kaiden every time she sat down, wincing strongly, and shot him venomous glares throughout the day while also threatening violence with all the conviction of someone who absolutely could not - would not - follow through.
Her poor little body was put through a real ordeal that night, one she had never experienced before. It seemed that her lover decided that she was not only going to have steamy lovemaking with him that night, but also that she would conduct a Navy SEAL-like endurance test at the same time, training her endurance and durability.
By the time she woke up, Luna, to her horror, found that she had gained an extra Endurance stat.
Kaiden, for his part, held his chin high, listening to her adorable hissing as if it were music to his ears.
Sometimes, correcting misbehaving girls was simply the duty of a man with a large and diverse harem. It was a hard job. But he was glad to do it.
Then it was back to the grind.
Fight. Eat. Analyze. Fuck like rabbits. Rest. Repeat.
A week passed like that, becoming the sinners’ most productive week to date.
And then, on the eighth day of the competition, while standing over the cooling corpse of a beast, Kaiden heard it.
[Ding!]
Level 50.
They’d arrived.
It was time to confront the second bottleneck.
...
Author: Apologies, I am in the middle of a 24-hour journey back home, and one long Chapter was the best I could produce in my limited time window.