With a blade in hand, Luon readied himself for battle.
“This is quite unexpected. I didn’t think you would be able to find me. Well since you found out may I ask you to lower your guard a bit, I have no ill intentions,” said the girl who just appeared out of nowhere.
‘Invisibility spell, and a high level one at that,’ thought Luon as he recognizes the person before him.
Her name was Kiri Zen, and she was a subordinate of Belle. During the commander battles she served as one of the soldiers playing the role of the scout, and at the start of this expedition, she manages the other followers under Arisa, Shizuka, and Belle.
When she performed the role of a scout, she had displayed a frighteningly powerful stealth ability that she inherited from her family. Luon was curious about what kind of gene could grant people the ability to become invisible naturally, but he couldn’t find anything about it.
With the advent of interspecies mingling, genetics was heavily researched for various purposes. It was already challenging enough to trace back the source and ancestry of every being in the universe, but the fruit of their efforts had already been plucked. Studies revealed that genetics is a major factor in dictating the racial skills of a child.
Kiri wore a slim tight, black military uniform that covered her voluptuous body, her seductive figure unlike Shizuka, Arisa, and Belle had more depth and was well developed. If one of those girls were able to hear Luon’s thoughts they would smack the nonsense out of him stating that they weren’t small it was just that she was too big.
Kiri tapped and lifted her black cap letting down her long black hair and elegantly reenacted the universally renowned gesture decreasing Luon’s wariness of her. With her hat in her hand, she smacked her chest once and firmly said, “For a new era.”
Although it was easy to mimic action the meaning behind each step spelled honor, pride, and dignity. If someone had dishonest thoughts while making this gesture, they would be considered as a shameful stain on the Alliance, and this dirt was hard to remove. In fact, when the Alliance was made everyone fought and respected each other, people treated others as brothers and sisters like a newly constructed flag it was clean and void of dirt. However, after centuries passed of continuous war times had change, corruption, negligence, and suppression occurred behind the scenes.
At this moment Luon lowered his blade as he felt that she genuinely had no intentions of harming them. He believed that within the distance they have between them he would still be able to react safely.
Tyron on the other hand, although still expressionless, began to drool a bit. The moment Kiri appeared in front of them Luon had sensed Tyron’s gaze had focused in on her. Luon thought he was carefully watching her every action only seconds later did Luon find himself wrong. Tyron began salivating when she struck her chest with her fist causing her weapons of mass destruction to dance a ballad of death, stunning the innocent young man.
Sensing the change in atmosphere Kiri placed her hat back on and said to Luon, “Classmate Luon, my young miss would like to speak to you, I hope that you and your companion can follow me to meet her.”
“Alright, we’ll go with you but let me ask you this. For how long have you been watching us?” Luon questioned as he was unperturbed by her appealing body and seductive moves that she had unknowingly done. Tyron, however, was slightly slouching.
“I’ve been here since the start before you guys have arrived as I was monitoring the nest,” said Kiri as she tapped her finger on her chin, and tilted her head in a naturally attractive manner.
Luon then thought that her stealth ability seemed more than what it had revealed, she must have intentionally exposed herself after contacting Arisa for instructions. Luon’s detection ability may not have picked her up earlier causing Luon to feel slightly ashamed. He didn’t know if his skill had revealed her presence or that she gave herself away, and Luon found it troublesome to shamelessly ask to do it again to test that theory out.
Kiri started to walk towards a direction dragging along a depressed Luon and a slightly flustered Tyron. The two of them carefully inspected their surroundings, but most of the time they were staring at her back, mainly her rear, well at least Tyron was.
As they were walking along Luon focused his hearing and managed to hear some clicking sounds coming from Tyron’s BMPU. He messaged Tyron using his BPMU asking what he was up to and Tyron replied, “I was taking some pictures and sharing this experience with Bendan and Gizmo. The other day me, Bendan, Gizmo, and some other guys were talking about which classmate had the most erotic body, and she was in the top of each of our rankings, minus the guy who voted for the small girls.”
Luon sighed as he realized that despite his classmates experiencing multiple life simulations they still endeavor in the art of voyeur. Seeing how Luon no longer pursued in the topic, Tyron continued to share his joy with his comrades.
The odd group traveled for a while, and sure enough, they spotted a few more students that were Kiri’s comrades at the same time the three rich ladies servants.
Kiri led Luon and Tyron to a tent situated in the middle of a camp, inside Luon found Arisa waiting for them on a chair as she was notified beforehand of their arrival.
“Welcome, although Belle and Shizuka aren’t here I think we have some things we can talk about. How about you two sit over there,” said Arisa as she pointed out a few seats. While Luon and Tyron sat down on the designated chairs, Kiri situated herself diagonally behind Arisa and stood up staring blankly at the space before her.
“Now how about we share some information first. I’ll ask one thing, if you give an answer, you may ask me one thing. Let me go first, why are you guys here?” asked Arisa.
Luon thought about it for a second. He was sure that Arisa knew that his massive point lead was from constructing an outpost as she could have just checked the ranking board, so he decided to point out that he’s after the second outpost beyond the herds of Inzektors surrounding it. With the number of subordinates clearing out Inzektors in this region it was easy to assume Arisa and her friends have already found it.
“I’m here to construct an outpost. Are you girls going to stop us?” questioned Luon.
Arisa became dumbfounded at how easy Luon spilled his intentions, she chuckled and said “I don’t have the authority to completely decide whether or not we should deal with you, although we can’t kill you with the teachers watching us, we can knock you out and tie you up. Wouldn’t it be exciting to be bounded by a group of girls all around you?”
Luon didn’t reply and merely stared at her foolish remark while Tyron who was spectating on the side pondered for a bit and slightly nodded.
Arisa then continued, “Alright I was just joking, you can slay as many as you want and if you want to contribute in building the outpost than go right ahead. Without asking Belle and Shizuka for their opinions, I don’t know how to handle you guys so you can do whatever you want as long as you agree to a couple of conditions.”
“And what’s that?” asked Luon.
Arisa stood up from her desk and pointed at Kiri as she said, “First off, Kiri will be assigned to monitor to you as we can’t have a man running amok unmanaged. At the same time under my authority, she will repel any troublemakers within my troops. Secondly, first come, first serve, if one of us was attacking an Inzektor you cannot steal it and the same would apply to us. Finally, you cannot do anything to harm my people, and in exchange, we won’t plot against you, a non-intervention pact. So do you agree?”
Luon thought for a second and asked, “Can you elaborate on how I would harm any members of your group? In what way can I do so if we’re going to be temporarily allied.”
Arisa smiled and said, “Why there are many ways. For example, it may be impossible for you to do but you can ally with Zythos, and he might have a few tricks up his sleeves. Human-made lethal traps, knocking out Kiri and outright murdering people while blaming Inzektors, and even worse – M.P.K.”
“MPK? Do you mean when a monster kills a person?” questioned Luon.
Arisa nodded and said, “Yes that’s exactly what I meant. Especially since we’re dealing with Inzektors, you may encounter huge swarms of them. I want you to not lead them to us if you’re chased. It’s better for you just to run away from us.”
Luon sat back on his chair and thought for a moment. Arisa’s terms and conditions were very fair, and there were no loopholes from what he heard. Although having Kiri around was distracting, the fact that she would help deal with troublemakers was a plus since both groups are hunting the Inzektors near the outpost.
While Luon thought whether or not to agree to the proposition, Arisa got Kiri to make some tea for herself. With expert movements, Kiri went to the side of the tent and using some kitchen utensils they had set up, she began to brew tea. After a few minutes, she brought a tea set along with a plate of sliced fruits found in the forest to the table.
Kiri bent over and began to pour the liquid from the teapot into Arisa’s cup and as she did Tyron got a glimpse of a dark, vast and soft ravine, his eyes brimmed with desire as his inner hunter senses attempted to subdue the raging wild beast inside of him.
Tyron closed his eyes and silently messaged Luon while his mind was in turmoil, “Agree with the conditions. Logically there is no reason for us to cause trouble and the same goes for them.”
Luon who received Tyron’s message thought for a moment and found his words to be very truthful. There was no harm in allying with them, so he nodded and said to Arisa, “Alright I agree to your terms for a non-intervention pact. As long as we get a share of the points, I am satisfied, but let me ask you another question before the deal is sealed.”
“Alright, ask away then,” replied Arisa.
“Do you intend to vie for the first ranked position?” Luon asked. Right now Luon was currently in first place. In the first place, Arisa did not need to rank first. At the end of the competition other than status, the winner would only receive money and an excellent piece of information written in their portfolio. Arisa was already a wealthy lady, so instead of working hard on the survival training, she could have just slacked off.
Arisa giggled at his reply and said, “So what if I am? Money, fame, and dignity? I have no needs for that. I just joined the training camp to test my strength against the Inzektors. It isn’t my fault the Inzektors are weak and fragile as a piece of glass, and everyone else is as slow. as a turtle.”
“So you’re only ranked second because you just like fighting?” Luon was shocked to out that the number of points she had casually accumulated surpassed those try hard students.
“Yup, just trying out my moves. Are you satisfied with my answer?” questioned Arisa.
Luon nodded and said, “Yeah, that’s all I wanted to know.”
“Great so our alliance is effective immediately, it would be helpful if you began hunting on th-”
“Hold it right there! I have something to say about this!” While Arisa was finalizing the deal, an intruder barged in.
