RAIDS ONLINE: RAGNAROK BEAST

"Let's go to the water, Big Sister!"

"Yeah!... Water! Sea! Ocean!"

"Wait, stop running, Ram! Mie!"

The next morning, Ram and Mie enjoy playing on the beach together with Amy. While Luel remain sitting under the shade of their parasol looking at them from the distance.

It's not that Luel is not enjoying his time on the beach. After all, how could he not when he's looking at his beloved Idol, playing on the beach with his nieces like a big sister or, rather, like a young mother?

...Get Amy to join the family already!...

With his thoughts going in that direction, Luel suddenly remembers Rammie's words telling him to be more active in courting Amy.

Luel tries to disregard that thought for now since he's not sitting on the beach with his own choice. He's waiting for the arrival of the RAIDS ONLINE player Horizon or, to be exact, the person named Kaida.

However, while Luel is waiting, he occasionally runs toward Amy to stop some occasional guys trying to hit her.

"Hey, beautiful lady. Are you looking after your sisters?"

"They can play on their own so how about you play with us instead."

"Well, they're not actually my sisters but my children."

"Don't bother Mom!"

"Mhm!... Dad!"

"You bastard! Get away from my wife!"

It was only an act that Ram and Mie had asked for Luel and Amy to play since they kind of started to miss their parents. Yet it became effective in warding off anyone who would try to hit on Amy.

"So she's already married and has a children. Damnit."

"What a lucky bastard."

It's not that the guys trying to hit on Amy are doing it because they recognize her as an ex-Idol. After all, Amy is wearing a disguise with a pair of sunglasses and a large summer hat that almost covers her face.

However, her attractive slender body figure that can be seen even through the white swimwear covering her two-piece black swimsuit is still attracting a lot of guys strolling around the beach by themselves without a girl of their own.

"That's already the 8th time."

As Luel heads back to their parasol while making a count of how many times he has run to the beach to ward off those guys trying to hit on Amy, he sees someone already waiting for him sitting on his spot under the shade of the parasol.

"So you're Lucent, I mean Luel, right?"

A young-looking black tone skin girl with short black hair wearing blue surfing attire.

That look immediately made Luel recognize the identity of the person waiting for him.

"Thanks for accepting our invitation, Ms. Kaida."

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Different from Amy's approach when she decided to first meet Luel in real life to invite him to join her team, Luel decided to contact Horizon or, rather, Kaida during their travel before reaching the North-Seacoast City.

...It's because you didn't put your contact number in your personal information when you bought your RAIDS ONLINE VR GEAR...

Or so Amy's defense for not contacting Luel back then before meeting him.

...It's because I'm not the one who bought the RAIDS ONLINE VR GEAR, but my older brother...

Or so Luel wanted to say but kept it a secret from Amy.

Luckily, Kaida immediately replied to Luel's message and agreed to an offline meet-up.

Luel still has his insecurity about meeting other people. But since it will only be between him and Kaida, he resolves to do the task that he needs to do if he wants the Guardian Beast team to win against the Rank B Ragnarok Beast Icarus.

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"You can just call me Kaida and ignore the formalities, Luel"

As Luel sat beside Kaida under the shade of their parasol, Kaida looked in the direction in which Luel had come from, towards Amy, who was still playing in the shallow water together with Ram and Mie.

"I see, so Amy quit being an Idol because she got pregnant with your children."

"WHAT?!... "

"But isn't it weird? She quit two years ago, but those twins seem like 4 or 5 years old. So you're hiding your relationship and children from the public for three more years..."

"Wait, stop! I think you're clearly misunderstanding something here, Kaida."

"But you're just shouting that Amy is your wife, Luel."

"That is just an act!"

Luel has to explain to Kaida about his relationship with Amy to clear Kaida's misunderstanding. Then, after explaining his side, Luel asks the thing he's wondering about.

"How did you know she was the ex-Idol Amy?"

Luel told his real name so as not to be rude about BlueHeroine looking into Kaida's personal information registered on the RAIDS ONLINE server. However, Luel keeps BlueHeroine's real-life identity to protect Amy.

But now, Kaida easily guesses Amy's identity even though Amy is wearing a disguise.

"I went to some of her group's concerts before, so I can easily tell who she is just by the way she wears her disguise, the proud and confident way she carries herself, and the tone of her voice."

"So you're basically her fan?"

"Same as you, Mr. Husband."

Disregarding Kaida's teasing, Luel feels quite relive to have something in common between him and Kaida, which he can use as leverage to invite her to join the Guardian Beast team.

But Luel has to set aside his discussion with Kaida for a bit to deal with something more important.

"Please excuse me for a bit, Kaida."

"Huh?..."

...Hey, miss. How about leaving those children for a bit...

"Get away from my family, you unthoughtful bastard!"

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"Pfft, Hahaha... That's quite fun to watch, Luel."

After reaching the 12th time Luel ran towards Amy, Kaida finally decided to help ward off the guys trying to hit on Amy by calling her group of friends and asking them to secretly surround Amy's location and stop anyone with the obvious intention of hitting on her.

"I would appreciate it more if you had done that a bit earlier."

"Then it won't be any fun, Luel."

From Kaida's actions, Luel was able to comprehend that Kaida has the same cheerful and playful personality as SilverPup.

She's someone who definitely gets along with SilverPup. Or so Luel thought.

Therefore, it made Luel arrive at the conclusion that Kaida didn't stop playing RAIDS ONLINE because she got into a fight with SilverPup, trying to feed her into other high-ranking Ragnarok Beasts just to gather more information.

"Now that Amy and the twins won't be bothered by anyone, we can get back to our discussion, right Luel?"

Luel already told Kaida in his message about their intention to invite her to join the Guardian Beast team or at least ask for her help in the fight against Icarus. So Luel didn't have to discuss that part yet as he thinks that Kaida has probably already made her decision.

What Luel needs to talk about is something that would convince Kaida to join their team. And the only thing that Luel can think of is to talk about why Kaida quit playing RAIDS ONLINE in the first place.

If Kaida didn't quit RAIDS ONLINE because of SilverPup, then there's only one thing left that Luel can think of.

"Kaida, you quit playing RAIDS ONLINE because of the Player's Nightmare that you saw after breaking through the 50 percent Link Force boundary, didn't you?"

Kaida suddenly became quiet and looked serious after hearing Luel's question.

"If it's alright, please tell me what you saw..."

"You're wrong, Luel."

"Huh?..."

"I didn't quit because I saw the Player's Nightmare. I quit because I didn't see anything."