Deep within the lush, green forest, even with the ongoing battle, the loudest sound was the enthusiastic cheer of a silver-haired girl.

  "Go, Melissa! Finish them off!"

  With one arm wrapped around her companion’s neck, Sophia repeatedly decred her support with bright joy.

  “Why...” Melissa gritted her teeth as she leapt, her feet pressing firmly against the branch of the tree above. “...do I feel like I’m having déjà vu?”

  Letting out an exasperated sigh, Melissa scanned the forest floor, her amber eyes darting sharply across the underbrush.

  “Where?”

  She muttered, and a slender finger pointed toward a patch of vegetation.

  “In that bush. Five meters and eighteen centimeters from our position.”

  “Got it.”

  With a fierce confirmation, a bluish ntern tied to her waist with a makeshift vine swung slightly. In one swift motion, blue fmes condensed into a thin arrow, slicing through the air toward the bush in the blink of an eye.

  As if it had a will of its own, the blue fire didn’t spread to the leaves but instead pierced straight through the vegetation with surgical precision, striking the hidden reptile.

  The fading hiss was proof of their victory. Holding Sophia in her arms, Melissa dropped back to the ground to inspect the kill.

  “Ugh... That’s seriously disgusting.”

  Hugging Sophia a little tighter, Melissa watched the floating red panel beled [Bck Serpent] vanish, revealing the creature’s mangled form more clearly.

  The serpent, just over two meters long, had part of its head crushed as if struck by a hammer. Its violet blood bubbled where it made contact with the blue fmes, reminding the girl of boiling soup.

  “Don’t make that face. You’re the one who said you wanted to train with the ntern instead of your secondary css,” Sophia pouted, hopping out of her lover’s arms and gently touching one of the serpent’s scales with her right hand.

  With that single touch, the monster's entire body vanished into thin air, and Sophia quickly turned her attention to her inventory.

  “That makes five. No more purple markers on the map around us—we’re safe now.”

  As Sophia casually reported the results of their first battle outside the dungeon, Melissa stared at the rich girl, jaw slightly sck.

  “You’ve got a stomach of steel if you can look at that without flinching, Snow Curls,” Melissa muttered, resting her free hand against her forehead.

  Having been responsible for most of the cleaning back at the orphanage, Melissa had dealt with her share of dead rats and birds—neither pleasant in sight or smell. Still, those past experiences never made the next encounter any less repulsive.

  “Is it really that strange?” Tilting her head with no particur emotion on her face, Sophia tapped her inventory panel and pulled out a small, ivory-colored fang. “The Bck Serpent’s fang rarity is F, same as the Moss Bee stingers.”

  Thanks to the inventory system, the girls could extract valuable monster parts with a single touch. For Melissa, it was just a convenient feature. For Sophia, however, it sparked thoughtful curiosity.

  “Maybe the way we kill them affects the quality of the materials?” Sophia murmured. “If we get the chance, I’d like to try killing one without damaging the body so much. I want to see if we can get a fang that contains venom, or maybe something ranked higher. Depending on the condition of the corpse, another part of the body might be considered valuable by the system. Right now, the rest of the serpent is just sitting in the inventory with no cssification, like our clothes.”

  Though still slightly grossed out by the destroyed monster, watching her beloved analyze the serpent’s fang with such gleaming eyes was a sight the brown-haired girl couldn’t bring herself to dislike in the slightest.

  “Wait… Melissa, are you hurt?”

  While managing several system tabs in search of any irregurities, Sophia finally noticed that the shared health points between them had dropped by eight.

  Upon hearing those words, Melissa gnced over her body and finally noticed a small red cut on her right ankle.

  “We boosted our agility with our Mythic Skill, and even then one of them managed to hit me? I guess since our Resistance stat is so high, I didn’t even feel it,” Melissa commented indifferently, swinging her leg back and forth to check the wound. Even with the movement, only a little blood trickled down, so she didn’t consider it particurly painful.

  “Don’t treat injuries, even small ones, so carelessly! Every part of you is important!”

  Hearing the irritated shout, Melissa nearly fell backward as Sophia suddenly lunged at her. In an instant, her entire vision was overtaken by soft, snowy white and a warm tongue slid into her mouth.

  They had done this several times already, but not even that could save Melissa from blushing furiously and feeling a sharp, electric shiver climb from the base of her spine to her neck.

  Soft pressure in the form of breasts pushed against her chest, pinning her to a tree.

  “Mhn…”

  For the next five minutes or more, Melissa could do nothing but moan helplessly under the heated "treatment" her lover was giving her.

  “I know the intensity of the kiss affects how well the healing works, but… did it really need to go that far?”

  Between heavy breaths, Melissa struggled to focus on the dizzying image of the silver-haired girl—disheveled, face red, and panting just as hard.

  “Am I hearing a compint?” Sophia pouted, puffing out her cheeks as she gripped the fabric of Melissa’s red hoodie, frowning.

  “It’s not that, okay? I just didn’t expect the diligent girl who always cared about ethics and decency at school to secretly be such a shameless kisser, that’s all.”

  Melissa was pretty sure that if they weren’t out in the open, far from any shelter, that kiss—which had left a thick strand of saliva connecting their lips—wouldn’t have been the end of the affection Sophia wanted to give.

  Or at least, that’s what she thought.

  “Hyaah…”

  Before she could react, a slender finger slipped beneath her skirt, tracing vertically along the most sensitive part of her inner thigh. Slowly, Sophia moved her chin to Melissa’s shoulder and whispered sweetly in her ear.

  “My number one delinquent seems to be looking for trouble… But since I’m such a nice person, I’ll let it slide—just this once.”

  With a single step back, Sophia tightened her grip on Melissa’s hand and pulled her into her arms, lifting her off the ground.

  [Love, the Final Fortress has been activated. Select an attribute to boost.]

  Staring at the floating message that had been avaible for a while now, Sophia directed the ten bonus points from the skill into Strength and began walking through the forest with Melissa in her arms.

  “Idiot…”

  Walking along with a bright smile on her face, Sophia continued listening to Melissa’s quiet muttered insults as the embarrassed girl hid her face with one hand and looked away.

  “Yes, yes, but I’m your idiot~”

  Humming cheerfully, Sophia shifted her gaze back and forth between her blushing partner and the floating system panels.

  Thanks to her Mythic Skill, she now had 22 Strength points, enough for someone physically weak like her to carry another person with ease.

  During the fight with the bck serpents, even defeating five of them hadn’t been enough to level up once, so she wondered if they needed to find stronger monsters like the Fluorescent Forest Guardian or the Dream Eater.

  “It’d be nice if we found another dungeon… but I guess it won’t be that easy…” Sophia murmured.

  “In any game, gaining experience isn’t limited to just those pces.” Since she was the one being carried this time, Melissa already knew it was her job to check the map for any threats around them. Even with some difficulty, she slid her finger across the touch panel to scan the area. “If we figure out how the monsters reproduce or are formed, we might be able to find nests or spawn points where several of them appear.”

  “Makes sense. Sounds like our best option,” Nodding, Sophia remembered to reactivate her Strength boost as soon as the five-minute limit ran out, and then continued along the path Melissa was guiding her through. “I’d just really like to prioritize finding a town first. We need more information about this world—and more importantly, a reliable food source.”

  As they studied the map, the girls noticed that small animals and insects weren’t marked as points of interest like monsters were. So Sophia wasn’t too fond of the idea of hunting wild animals for food without the proper tools.

  “I’d like that too, but nothing besides trees, grass, and leaves is showing up on the map. We’ve walked seven kilometers from the dungeon! Damn it, that woman left us in the middle of nowhere!”

  As Melissa huffed in frustration, Sophia tightened her grip on her fingers in an attempt to calm her down.

  Their fruit stash from the byrinth would st a few more days. Assuming Dianthus hadn’t dropped them too far from civilization, they should be able to make it before running out.

  Following the only instruction they had received, the girls continued heading north. Even with their boosted stats, neither of them had experience navigating dense forests, so they hadn’t made much progress even after several hours.

  “This change in elevation... it’s a river, right?”

  Still in Sophia’s arms, Melissa noticed a break in the forest terrain and quickly realized what it was.

  Without wasting a second, Sophia hurried toward the spot Melissa had pointed out. Soon, the thick canopy above gave way to a gently flowing stream of water.

  Once they reached the riverbank, Melissa stepped out of Sophia’s arms and crouched beside the water. Dipping her free hand in, she felt the icy flow run between her fingers.

  Just as she was about to bring one of her fingers to her mouth, she caught Sophia’s angry gre fixed on her.

  “Eh… Sorry...”

  Quickly wiping her wet finger on her skirt, Melissa remembered how furious Sophia had been when she casually drank saltwater back on the dungeon’s second floor.

  “I’ll forgive you, but only this once,” Sophia pouted, watching the surface of the crystal-clear water. “The water seems safe. It’s not cloudy or full of obvious impurities. Still, let’s at least boil it before drinking. That should help get rid of any lingering taste too.”

  Nodding in agreement, Melissa was about to open her inventory to look for something they could use to boil the water when a sudden tug on her hand drew her attention.

  When her eyes locked onto Sophia, she noticed a serious look on the girl’s face. One of her fingers pointed across the river.

  “A sound. That direction. It’s close.”

  Without questioning it for even a second, Melissa pulled Sophia tightly against her chest and shielded her with both arms. Thoughts raced—should they run or stay hidden? But before she could decide, her amber eyes caught movement deeper within the forest.

  Pushing through the undergrowth with backpacks on their backs, two figures—a man and a woman, both middle-aged—emerged and walked toward the water. The moment they noticed the girls, both took a single step back, their hands drifting to their waists, and confused expressions spread across their faces.

  “Hello… are you travelers too?”