Somewhere in Vultures Byte, 3 frustrated crows were recuperating in the upper branches of a large tree. Similarly to Lyra’s crew, they were also wallowing in the disappointment of not being able to secure any ribbons before the timer reaches zero.

“Dammit, Holly! Why did you let that disgusting plucker get away when you could have easily taken him down with your Voice of Authority!?” Zegle was angry at his timid teammate.

Holly was bandaging his wounds that were taking longer to heal. “I’m sorry, Zegle. I was afraid back there.”

“Afraid? You worthless wench!” He raised his hand to slap her face off but Zef caught it before it landed.

“That’s enough Zegle. All that matter is that we escape with our lives. You should be thanking Holly not berating her for saving us.”

“Tsk, dammit.” Zegle upsettingly withdrew his arm away from Holly’s grasp. “I’ll wrap it myself.”

Teetering to the edge of the branch where he was currently situated, Zegle began staring afield in the direction of the Final Stage. In the distance, he spotted a crow duo heading there at burst speed. “Looks like everything is about to reach its climax very soon.”

Gnihzur and Kwaserah were flying extremely low through the dark forest as they headed toward the Final Stage. They did this because they didn’t want to be discovered by potentially lurking enemies.

“Just up ahead, Kwaserah. We’re almost there.”

“I can see that.”

The Final Stage was slowly coming into view. It was a majestic sight to behold. From below an expansive circular concrete based platform was being upheld by myriads of thick tree roots that were intertwining each other romantically. Lush vegetation was present at their summit, bolstering the grand impressiveness of the Final Stage.

“There it is Kwaserah. We can almost… Huh?” Gnihzur noticed a hostile presence heading directly for Kwaserah and hurriedly cut his sentence short, moreover, dashed in front of her apace.

“Look out!” Gnihzur was attacked by Mou. He tried to block his punches but got blown away into a puddle.

“Gnihzur are you ok?” Kwaserah landed on the ground in angst, getting ready to make haste toward Gnihzur’s proximity. However, her advance was quickly halted by Mou who reached out his lascivious fingers and lovingly grasped her chin.

“Don’t worry about that nobody, my darling butterfly. Just focus on me now.” Directing his Rose Heart forwards, Mou started rubbing its alluring soft petals against Kwaserah’s face in order to stimulate her salacious response.

“Ugh…” Kwaserah gave off an unexpected moan; slowly but surely she was being enchanted by Mou’s seductive techniques. “What is this exciting wetness that I’m feeling between my thighs?”

Perceiving Kwaserah’s sensual expression. Mou began caressing the jaws of her lips with his outstretched tongue. “You feel it don’t you, those little butterflies in her belly?”

“Yes, I can feel them.” Kwaserah seemed as if she had already fallen into a deep trance. This made Mou very elated.

“Relax, I’ll take your mouth’s virginity right now.” Mou went in closer for a delicious kiss of Kwaserah’s lips but was rudely interrupted by Gnihzur.

“Get away from her!” Gnihzur tossed out a punch.

Mou evaded his blow by adroitly shifting to the side. Reaching a safe distance, he observed the repulsive appearance of Gnihzur who was currently shaking Kwaserah out of her salacious enchantment.

“Kwaserah! Kwaserah! Snap out of it!” His facial blows did much to spur her awake from her trance.

“Huh, what happened? What was I about to do…?”

“Tsk, you vermin!” Mou became livid and hostile towards Gnihzur. “How dare you interrupt my sexual prowess? I was about to steal this beautiful crow’s virginity!”

“My what?” Kwaserah covered her private parts upon listening to Mou’s explanation.

“Curses!” Mou glared at Gnihzur intensely. “You greedy bastard! You want her all for yourself, don’t you? How selfish can one guy be?”

“What?” Gnihzur was foolishly puzzled by Mou’s bleeding utterance. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Don’t play dumb with me, you disgusting gigolo! There should be only one womaniser in this story and that person is me!” Mou quickly manipulated his crimson Krowqui Circles to produce 3 bloodthirsty roses.

“My roses are lethal!” One after the other, Mou started throwing his crimson Rose Hearts at Gnihzur.

He easily managed to dodge the first 2 Rose Hearts but ran out of luck during his evasion of the 3rd one. It collided directly with his chest area. This wasn’t all that it did; Mou’s Rose Heart also burrowed into the soul of Gnihzur’s chest and then yanked out his beating heart.

“Come back to me my stolen heart!” Mou summoned Gnihzur’s stolen heart into his thieving grasp. The rough elastic pattern of his skin could feel Gnihzur’s heart pulsations. Ba-dump! Ba-dump!

“Gnihzur!” Dashing her feathers in alarm, Kwaserah made haste over to the puddle where Gnihzur was prostrate on the ground with a gaping hole in his chest. “Gnihzur! Say something!” She cried and cried but to no avail. Gnihzur’s body was still unconscious. “Gnihzur! Gnihzur!”

“He can’t hear you, my cute butterfly.” Mou was slowly directing his footsteps towards Kwaserah.

Turning to face Mou with burning tears in her eyes, Kwaserah vehemently inquired, “What did you do to him, you villain?”

“Why the hostility. Don’t ruin your beauty by being so upset.” Mou showcased Gnihzur’s heart that was still rapidly pulsating in his hand. “I merely stole his heart, the centre of his being. Without this here, he’s nothing but an inanimate doll.”

“Then give it back right now! If you won’t willingly comply then you leave me with no other choice but to force you!” Kwaserah was about to launch a flaccid wing attack at the feathery object of her dismay, however, she had to put a pause on her ability’s execution when she perceived Mou threatening her by applying more pressure to Gnihzur’s stolen heart.

“Stop right there! This heart is very fragile you know?” Mou spared Gnihzur’s unresponsive corpse a glance then added, “Just one little squeeze is all that it takes and he’s done for.”

“Wait don’t do it!” Kwaserah became very concerned for Gnihzur’s livelihood. From here on out she had to thread calmly. Looking the object of her torment in its eyes, she asked him, “What is it that you want from us?”

“You know damn want I want, pretty lady.” Mou’s lascivious gaze drifted to the centre of Kwaserah’s loins.

“Huh?” Hearing Mou’s reply coupled with the lascivious licking of his lips, Kwaserah thought that he wanted to seduce her again, thus she hurriedly covered her erogenous lady parts. “I won’t let you do lewd things to me again.”

“That was my earlier intention. However…” Mou spoke while his focus was fixated on the timer being fed to his ocular nervous system via his Digital Feather. “Sadly, there isn’t enough time to play around with you. Now hand over the ribbons! If I ask again you can kiss this beating heart goodbye.”

“Alright! Alright!” Kwaserah knelt down before Gnihzur’s motionless corpse and quickly retrieved the ribbons. “Here you go, you obscene bastard.” She tossed the ribbons at Mou’s feet.

“Good girl.” After picking up the ribbons, Mou didn’t get long to admire them due to Kwaserah’s impatience.

“Now give him his heart back!” She demanded.

“Sure.” Mou heeded her demand and tossed the heart. “Heart Return!”

The beating heart travelled the airflow until it settled itself back inside Gnihzur’s chest. The gaping hole was becoming less and less apparent as he regained consciousness.

“Gnihzur…?” Upon identifying Gnihzur’s fluctuating eyelids, Kwaserah’s unsettled expression became more at ease.

“There, he’s waking up, are you satisfied now?” Mou regretted only one thing as he tied the ribbons around his body in matching colours with the others that he stole from Lyra’s group. “It’s a shame that I wasn’t able to take your virginity. Well, maybe some other time. Huh?”

Spreading his wings and was about to fly away, Mou sensed an irregular rustling of bushes being affected in the area. “Something is coming…?” The moment these words escaped his lips, a bright lightning bunny approached him from below.

Mou adroitly flipped backwards to avoid getting shocked. His feet landed in a shallow puddle partially covered with fallen leaves.

“Damn, I missed my chance.” The electricity surrounding the blue bunny began to disappear as Chirako’s presence gradually became apparent. His mysteriously slender body was shackled with a variety of ribbons. This many ribbons garnered Mou’s undivided attention.

“Well, well would you look at that… it’s a treasure trove of ribbons.” Mou quickly compared Chirako’s ribbon count with his own. “What a coincidence, It seems we are tied.”

“Huh?” Chirako also took notice of Mou’s ribbon count. “We’re of equal value. However… soon that will change.”

Mou felt a bit of chill emanating from Chirako’s greedy gaze. “A sneaky bird like you didn’t just abruptly appear in this frame. How long were you spying on us for?”

“Long enough to find out that you’re a sex-crazed maniac.” Replied Chirako boldly.

“I’m not even going to bother indulging you on that part.” Mou ignored Chirako’s earlier derision and asked, “Well, now that your surprise attack failed, what next will you try, a frontal assault?”

“Something like that.” Chirako wasn’t afraid of anyone.

“Kwaserah, what’s going on?” Gnihzur rose from his earlier stupor to witness the heated ongoing stare down between Mou and Chirako. “Those two…?”

“Gnihzur be careful.” Kwaserah helped him to his feet; he was still a bit shaken up by having his heart stolen by Mou.

“So are you that brave to try it?” Mou tried to test Chirako’s mettle.

“There’s only one way to find out.” Chirako activated his Water Lightning Blade in his right arm.

“Hm…?” While observing the irregular flickers of the Water Lightning Blade, Mou noticed something off in Chirako’s Krowqui output. “I can tell that you were in a heated battle not so long ago. Your Krowqui must be pretty darn low, am I right?”

Chirako responded with a mysterious smirk that temporarily threw off Mou’s cognition.

“What are you smiling about?”

“You’re about to find out.” Chirako suddenly released his Water Lightning Blade into the air. This sly move of his made the present onlookers looked above briefly.

“Why did he abandon his weapon?” Due to Mou’s distraction, he failed to realize in time the stream of lightning sizzling underneath the sporadic leaf heaps with Chirako’s feet being the main generator. “What?” When he finally figured out what was going on, it was too late.

Chirako’s separated stream of lightning suddenly gained more intensity as they crashed directly into the puddle where Mou was currently situated in.

“Where did this puddle come from?” Mou was shocked before actually getting shocked!

“You’re right, my Krowqui is running low but it is more than enough to temporarily immobilize a small fry like you.” Chirako bent over with his palms stamping the ground. This generated added electric current to his already executed technique. “Lightning Stream!”

“Wait, no!” The terrifying surge of electricity travelled through the puddle and up Mou’s wet feet. He incurred a severe electrocution that almost cost his life. When the bout of electricity subsided, Mou fell face forward into the muddy puddle.

“Not a bad splash.” Chirako went over to search Mou’s corpse for ribbons; he took all that he could find.

“These should guarantee my win. I have 52 points in total. The Final Stage is just up ahead.” After briefly glancing at Gnihzur and Kwaserah; more specifically at Gnihzur, Chirako wrapped the stolen ribbons around his neck before he flew off in the direction of the Final Stage.

Kwaserah and Gnihzur watched as his mysterious figure faded in the distance.

“Who was that crow?” Kwaserah thought openly, “He must be quite strong if he managed to acquire that many ribbons.”

“He is.” Gnihzur admitted, “With that many ribbons he is definitely going to win this Guild Test.” He look dejected as he said this. Glancing briefly at his Digital Feather’s interface which depicted the remaining time didn’t do much to cheer him up.

“Kwaserah it looks like we’re out of this competition for good now.”

“I’m already aware of that.” Kwaserah also looked a bit disappointed. “I exposed my secret for nothing.” She was referring to her radiant butterfly transformation that her parents banned her from ever exposing carelessly.

“But there is a bright side to all of this.”

“How so?”

Kwaserah directed Gnihzur’s attention to the muddy puddle where Mou was still faced deep in. “At least that pervert got his just deserved payback for what he did to you and me.”

“That molester…” Gnihzur glared at Mou. He felt a subtle nuance of anger surfacing when he remembered clearly just how lewdly he fondled Kwaserah’s lusciously curved body.