Demonic Po*nstar System

Chapter 952: Secret Lesbo Final Boss

Kaiden and Nyx came down eventually.

The gravel took them back somewhere in the middle of all that noise, and she did not let go of him for the walk out of the crater, one arm hooked through his and her face turned pointedly away from four hundred people who had just watched every second of it.

”You’re a hopeless clip farmer,” she said into his sleeve.

”It’s not my fault you were recording.”

”...Ha-ha.” Nyx’s narrow eyes suggested she wasn’t amused by his comeback.

”Hey, at least we’re sharing the spotlight.”

”We are not sharing anything, Kaiden Grey.” She pinched his skin hard as evidence of her disapproval. ”You’re going to be the guy who kissed his lover in the clip, but I’m going to be the woman who got hopelessly kissed until she melted and her powers literally lifted her and her assailant into the skies...” Her grip tightened. ”There’s a major difference, and I’m going to be explaining it to you for the next couple days. Minimum.”

”I’m all ears for my beloved space babe’s wondrous voice.”

”I’m not being taken seriously one bit, am I?” Nyx scoffed, but she could only hold it for a single second before her whole face gave out and went bright.

Keeping the act of being an innocent maiden could only interest the pink-haired beauty so long. She could spend her time better, such as leaning her head onto her lover’s shoulder while humming a happy tune under her breath.

...

The day did what days do when nothing is on fire. Kaiden signed things, walked the lot twice, settled two arguments about squad rotations, and spent most of the afternoon pretending he could not hear four hundred people replaying nine seconds of footage on their handhelds.

By evening the lot had gone dark and the command tent was the brightest thing on the compound again, but for the first time in three days nobody in it was investigating anything.

Ms. Rook laid the last signature page in front of Scarlet at twenty past seven.

Scarlet signed it with the pen held like a knife.

[Eclipse - Guild Roster]

[Registered Personnel: 476 → 477]

[Z: 7. SSS: 1 → 2. S: 3. A: 26. B: 74. C: 131. D and below: 89]

”Eclipse has two SSS-tiers,” Doug said, to the roster, to himself, to every guild filing he had ever touched in a career that had not prepared him for the sentence. He took his glasses off and put them back on. ”There is no other guild on this continent with two.”

Kaiden pulled a folding chair around backwards and sat on it with his arms over the back, close enough to the map table to be in the conversation and far enough from Doug to be out of the paperwork.

”You may all thank me at your leisure,” Nyx announced from the map table.

”Fatty’s been working you since the Claimant?” Luna’s head came off the cot.

”Sixty-two messages,” Scarlet said, kicking her boots up on Doug’s table until Doug moved them off it. ”A day.”

”Fine. Fatty, I’ll give you this much, you’re the perfect bait.” Luna pointed at Nyx with her whole hand. ”I don’t know if it was the strategy or the enormous milk jugs, but something in that pitch worked on a woman who’s told entire governments to eat shit, so-”

”Are you insinuating that I’m a lesbian?” Scarlet interjected with a flat face.

”You’ve never once been photographed with a man and basically every rich and/or powerful prick on the continent wants to court you.” Deterrence had never worked on Luna and it did not start working now. ”So either your standards are insane or-”

”In case you haven’t figured it out yet, pipsqueak, I’m a hopeless addict.”

”Pipsqueak?”

Scarlet ignored the question entirely, which Luna fully intended to revisit.

”I don’t know about you guys, but when I level up...” She had her elbows on Doug’s table now, talking at nobody in particular. ”Something goes off in my chest. Every single time. First one, hundredth one, doesn’t matter.”

”...Okay, yeah,” Luna admitted, betrayed by her own body.

Every single awakened combatant knew the joys of progressing one’s stats. It was a truly liberating feeling, as if one was shedding their mortal coil and ascending to a higher state of being.

”And then you meet a monster that nearly killed you last year and it takes nine seconds.” Scarlet snapped her fingers. ”Nine. And some guild master pays you stupid money for it while they cry into their own contract, because they couldn’t do it themselves-”

She stopped and looked at Kaiden.

”Your mom’s the exception, obviously. Don’t tell her. I’m begging you.”

Nobody said anything.

Vespera stood four feet to Scarlet’s left with the folio closed against her hip, and she did not look up.

Kaiden took a slow sip of coffee he had let go cold twenty minutes ago and elected to say nothing at all.

The Flame Monarch’s grin came off her face one muscle at a time. She turned her head very slowly to the left, confirmed the thing she had already worked out, and held perfectly still for two entire seconds with her mouth slightly open.

”...How long has she been standing there.”

”The whole time~” Nyx purred.

”Why did no one tell me?”

”Because we didn’t know you were about to badmouth mother-in-law?” Aria spoke up, instantly embracing the role of the perfect daughter-in-law, ready to defend Vespera. Whatever it took to earn her lover’s mom’s acceptance, the yandere valkyrie was ready to pay up.

”I wasn’t.”

”Do you need me to repeat your words? I got them memorized,” Aria smiled, cute and innocent.

Scarlet recovered the way she recovered from everything, which was at volume.

”Aaaanyhow. Point stands. I’ve got no time for men. I come home from work and I want the news, a bottle, and a map of somewhere that hasn’t bored me to death yet, and that’s my wonderful life. Wouldn’t want to change a single thing about it.” She swung an arm around at the tent, at the cot and the folding chairs and the four hundred people asleep in trailers outside it. ”Or such was the case until you lot happened...”

”...Us lot,” Luna repeated.

”A private dungeon under our feet. Seven Z-tiers on one roster.” Scarlet spread her hands like she was showing them something they’d all somehow failed to notice. ”You lot are a buffet.”

She licked her lips. ”The juiciest of buffets.”

”...” Being on the receiving end of this hopeless battle junkie’s mania was quite the experience. Not many of them had a response to offer, save for Calypso flexing her biceps and giving Scarlet an ’I totally get you’ nod.

Every guild on the planet had spent years working the same theory, which was that the Flame Monarch was holding out for a better number and would eventually get around to naming it.

She had never been holding out. For as long as she’d had the power to chase it she’d been running after a feeling from one job to the next, and she had just said so out loud in a field tent with her elbows on somebody else’s paperwork.

Nobody in there missed that she’d said ”you lot” like it was a place.

”Also the paperwork woman terrifies me and I’d rather be on her side of the table.”

Ms. Rook did not react in any way that could be entered into a record.

”Okay, but.” Luna was not done. ”I’m still not convinced you’re not a secret lesbo final boss. Imagine the killer move, the flaming tongue technique-”

Scarlet tilted her head. ”Why are you this invested in my love life, pipsqueak?”

”Because I’ve spent days on guild drama and federal paperwork.” Luna threw both hands up. ”Finding out the pink bimbo’s ginormous mommy milkers are what seduced an SSS-tier is the most interesting thing I’ve heard in a long time.”

”I’m still here, by the way,” Nyx said, cheeks slightly pink.

The suggestion had done real damage. Nyx had spent her teens fangirling over this woman and she had never fully recovered from it.

”I am Kai’s,” Nyx announced. ”Forever and ever, and that is the entire list. Stop trying to stir up nonsense.”

”Uh-huh. And yet.” Luna’s grin went feral. ”You were pretty happy holding Scarlet’s hand while Kai was pummeling you.”

Then she turned on Scarlet.

”And you were pretty happy sitting there holding her hand while she got railed from behind, cheering her on and calling it art.”