Chapter four

" I wonder what Sally's up to, she's probably worried sick. Haah, if only she had come with us." Maple sits in the chair at the head of the guild table when she receives a message.

|| Gained 450 exp ||

|| Maple Tree Guild || Lv 0 || 450/10,000 ||

|| Gained new stat, Guild Point ||

|| Gained 10 Gp ||

" Huh, exp? Must be Chrome." She wonders. " What's this about a 'Guild Point ' though. Never had those before." Maple is shaken out of her thoughts however, when Yui and Mai walk up to her.

" Maple." Yui calls, with her sister right beside her.

" Hm?" Maple raises her head and faces them." What is it?" She asks.

" Uh...We wanna go outside. Can we?" Yui asks in a single breath.

" But Chrome isn't back yet." Maple tilts her head, assessing her guild members.

" But he's taking too long. Mai's already getting bored." Yui waves her arms exaggeratedly. Mai in shock that her sister would use her as a shield.

" I guess he is. If only I could contact him with our usual chat box..." A blue screen appears stopping Maple mid-sentence." Oh."

|| Message •

Chrome

Yui

Mai

•Sally•

•Kasumi•

•Iz•

•Kanade• ||

Tapping on Chrome's name, Maple feels a strange connection. Like there's something, or someone at the edge of her consciousness.

Taking a quick breath, she calls.

" Chrome? " The silence is unnerving for the next few seconds. Until.

~Ehh? Maple? Is that you?~ Chrome's voice rings within her head, sounding surprised.

" Yay. It worked!! Chrome I found the chat function." Maple exclaims in joy.

~I can tell.~ Chrome chuckles.

" Yui and Mai were wondering if we could come out now. How's your scouting going?" Maple asks with Yui and Mai hovering around her trying to see if they could hear Chrome's voice ( inside Maple's head )

~I'm on my way back already. You guys should definitely come outside. I've got just the thing that we need.~ Chrome quickly answers, his voice sounding more excited than usual.

" Ok." Maple breathes a sigh of relief, which doesn't escape Yui as she stares

at her nervously.

" What did Chrome say?" She asks.

" He wants us to come outside. He wants to show us 'something' I think." Maple gets up from her seat and leads the twins ( with smiles on their faces) outside.

Getting outside, they're welcomed once again by the green of the forest. Birds chirping in the distance and a peaceful breeze passing soothingly.

Yui is the first to notice a red blur as it rushes towards them.

A sudden rush of adrenaline, and instinct takes over.

{Due to their extreme build, Yui and Mai had decided that the best way to avoid dying in one attack was to attack first and attack fast. This had caused them to have a preset reaction to any known and unknown threats. Hit it with a hammer as fast as possible.}

Boom

The sound of Yui unknowingly breaking the sound barrier reaches Chrome's ears a moment after the comically large hammer stops, a few inches away from his shield.{Chrome had immediately raised his shield to block.}

" What the, Chrome? What just happened? Yui was so fast." Maple yells, still trying to process what she had witnessed.

" Well this saves me some explaining." Chrome smiles nervously 'i wonder what would have happened if she really did hit me.'

That was a thought that made him shiver.

" You're gonna have to take a seat for this." Dropping to the floor Chrome lays on the grass for a few seconds before Maple and the twins sit down next to him." We're no longer in the game." After a few seconds, he says.

" Yeah, we know. Why is Yui so fast now.?" Maple asks, looking a little annoyed.

" Alright then. I'll explain." Chrome begins telling them his thoughts.

Chrome explains how, after leaving the game, they left behind their weaknesses and restrictions since they no longer follow game logic.

Many of the things they couldn't do in the game is because the game is designed that way, hence extreme builds were possible.

Hp(Health Point) no longer relates to them anymore because now they're real life flesh and blood.

Mp( Mana Point or just mana now) will probably play a much bigger role than in the game.

Strength will probably vary depending on the person.

" Ehh? What does that mean?" Maple asks.

" I'm specifically talking about you Maple. In the game you placed all your stats in vitality. If we were to take that literally. That would be the toughness of your skin, the durability of your bones, how condensed your muscles are, and when we add mana to that, You basically have the stat build of a giant whose main purpose is to soak up damage. And I don't need to tell you how strong those are."

" Agility follows a somewhat similar logic. Those who're immensely fast won't always have the strength to match but those with immense physical strength will definitely be faster than the average person, it's why Yui can move like that."

" Vitality follows the exact logic as Strength. Yui and Mai placed so much stats in their strength, the structural integrity of their body needed to house that amount of power. I don't even want to know what their bones are made of."

" Dexterity is probably gonna be related to agility alone, so no good there."

" Intelligence is probably gonna be just that."

The explanation over, Chrome is back on his feet.

" This is all just my hypothesis on the situation. You have to remember, our game avatars are no longer just avatars now. They're our bodies, and we bleed just like living things do."

A roar in the distance, and Maple is on her feet, the twins just a few seconds behind her.

" They're finally here." Chrome smiles.

""" They?""" Maple and twins all ask at once.

" My little experiment." Chrome chuckles.

The ground begins shaking as a dust cloud forms in the distance.

" Girls, get behind me." Maple immediately yells.

|| Martyr's Devotion ||

A blinding light literally erupts from Maple as a glowing golden circle forms on the ground and begins to grow outwards.

At first the circle is the same as it was within the game, stopping at ten yards but then it continues to expand, and expand, and expand, and expand. Until unknown to Maple, it had covered the entire forest.

Everyone is shocked at the size of the circle after they had lost sight of the end of it.

" I somehow expected that, but it's still not what I expected." Chrome struggles to smile.

The dust clouds finally clear, bringing their attention back to it.

" That looks like a 'bear?' " Yui tilts her head.

" Or a ' gorilla'?" Mai tilts her head.

" I just call it a gorilla bear." Chrome then laughs.

Maple is still shocked about the size of her || Martyr's Devotion || when she notices.

" There's no wings, or halo. And my hair is still the same." She mumbles grabbing a lock of her dark colored hair.

With the dust clouds clear, they find themselves staring down a horde of monsters. With each of them looking like the amalgamation of a bear and a gorilla.

At the head of the horde, stands three unusal monsters.

Standing a whole meter taller than the rest. Their blackened fur releasing a wisp of grey smoke.

Their pale grey eyes more attentive than the rest.

They looked just like the monster Chrome had brought back to life.

" We're gonna use them to test your abilities." Chrome declares.

" What? " Maple is surprised, still trying to keep up with the events.

" Okay." Yui and Mai cheer. Immediately bringing out their hammers from their inventory.

" Now let's see you guys try hitting with just a little of your strength first..." Chrome begins calling a few of the monsters forward.

|| Double Impact || || Double Impact ||

" Ehh?"

Booommm Booooommm.

Booommm Booooommm.

BOOOOOOMMMM

The entire forest seems to quake as half the monsters immediately explode and disintegrate from the force of the attack of the two tiny girls with comically large hammers.

Chrome's eye can do nothing but twitch at the impulsive destruction as even one of his undead monster didn't survive the very first attack skill Mai and Yui had ever learned.

" Oh my gosh, that was amazing." Maple cries in amusement, a stark contrast to the confused look she had on a moment ago.

" Y....yeah. glad to see your strengths aren't changed. I said to hold back though." Chrome smiles nervously.

" We're sorry, I just felt the need to really hit something. Like I just had to." Yui apologizes.

" Same here, it was too hard to resist." Mai apologizes as well.

" Hmmn, kinda like the same thing that came over me." Chrome mumbles.

" Alright my turn." Maple draws her short sword and raises it to the sky.

A chill runs down Chrome's spine the moment Maple draws her sword. He immediately calls.

" Maple don..." But it's too late.

Maple yells.

|| Hydra ||

And the world felt very wrong.

First a dark purple haze oozed out of Maple like a geyser and then.

ROOOOOAAAAARHHHH

ROOOOOAAAAARHHHH

ROOOOOAAAAARHHHH

ROOOOOAAAAARHHHH

ROOOOOAAAAARHHHH

ROOOOOAAAAARHHHH

ROOOOOAAAAARHHHH

ROOOOOAAAAARHHHH

ROOOOOAAAAARHHHH

A cacophony of roars filled the air as an impossibly large nine headed poison dragon, materialized from the haze, roaring towards the heavens as it kept on growing.

The dragon kept on getting so large, the nine heads eventually pierced the clouds.

" Maple!! Turn it off." Chrome yells while covering his ears along with Mai and Yui.

" Ahh, turn off. Turn off hydra. It's not working, I don't know how?" Maple yells and as if on que, the hydra vanishes.

They're greeted by silence as except from Chrome's undead monsters, the hordes of monsters had died from the roars of the nine headed dragon. Blood pouring from their eyes, noses and ears.

" That was intense." Chrome falls in relief, still trying to catch his breath.

" You've definitely gotten stronger."

Mai and Yui still visibly shaken nod their heads to Chrome's comment.

" It had nine heads. It's was so scary." Mai whimpers.

" Maple's so amazing." Yui hugs Maple with stars in her eyes.

" Huh, hehehehe." Maple chuckles nervously.

" We should leave. We've basically alerted everyone around here to our presence." Chrome gets up after doing a few stretches.

" I guess. But where do we go?" Maple asks, as she lifts a giggling Yui over her head in a shocking display of strength.

" We'll head east. The forest opens up that way, we need to find civilisation." Chrome answers.

" But how do we get there?" Mai asks.

" We can use the gorilla bears, they're like my pets now. Oh wait, they're dead, I still have two of them though."

" Speaking of pets, I forgot about Syrup, let's see here, we can't summon them till the guild's level one." Maple drooped.

" What's that about." Chrome asks.

" Hmm? Oh here, have a look." Maple shows Chrome the blue screen.

" Oh I get it." Chrome helps Mai climb up one of the undead gorrila bear while Maple and Yui climb the other on their own.

The giant tree that is the Maple Tree Guild disappears in a puff of smoke as Maple stores it into her inventory.

" Convenient." Chrome comments.

On board two undead creatures that would easily be able to decimate a small town each, the Maple tree guild members embark on a journey to find civilisation. Pushing past their doubts and fears and looking forward towards the adventures to come.

They didn't know, or rather they couldn't have known.

Of the small hint of power they had shown.

Of the hydra that had challenged the world.

That a kingdom had melted to the ground in a rain of poison.