The day the Lunar Rite began.

  Leo escorted Vivian to the Ring’s Plaza of a Hundred Flowers. The chanting of the priests buzzed in the air like a cloud of blowflies.

  The atmosphere only solidified when Isabella made her entrance.

  She arrived on a levitating barge, over ten meters long—a floating Hanging Garden. Colorful datura flowers swayed eerily in the windless, artificial gravity.

  The gathered priests offered high-decibel praise, and the believers wept tears of joy, kneeling in a synchronized wave.

  It seems that in the Ring's worldview, Newton's Second Law is worthless before Divine Grace.

  Miranda arrived last. Her entrance was even more ostentatious.

  She sat atop a colossal elephant, shaded by a massive silk canopy. She looked like an ancient Indian Moon Princess riding in a heavy howdah.

  With every step the beast took, holographic halos rippled out from under its hooves—so "holy" one dared not look directly at them.

  The screaming from the crowd bordered on mass hysteria.

  Vivian, shouldering her "Fortress Chanel," grabbed Leo’s hand, her pupils dilated. "Master, is that... the mount bestowed by the Supreme One? My sisters have indeed received God's favor."

  Clearly, her dopamine was spiking—a typical quasi-religious hallucinogenic reaction triggered by visual shock.

  Leo knew she would automatically filter out—and despise—any technological vocabulary.

  But he couldn't help dissecting it in his head: That is their life support system. The Flower Barge is just a hovercraft. And that elephant? It’s a heavy-duty ICU ambulance wrapped in a holographic skin.

  Vivian rolled her eyes at him, shook her 'Fortress Chanel,' and forced an interpretation: "Oh, so it is a divinely bestowed pack... Lord Leo, ours is still the most exquisite and compact."

  Leo didn't make a sound. He just silently adjusted his center of gravity.

  Nonsense. Almost all the survival gear is in my backpack—it’s the size of a small pickup truck. Even at one-sixth gravity, the titanium exoskeleton creaked every time he took a step.

  If I had known, I would have built Medea’s Dragon Chariot. Now I have to be a human camel.

  It seems the more absurd the form, the better the effect on the flock.

  He sighed. "Let's go. Walking helps calcium deposition."

  An hour later, a shuttle ferry delivered the four of them—along with the flower barge and the elephant—to the starting point at the Tycho Crater ridge.

  The "Lunar Rite"—a competition that was effectively a contest of technical cheating—had officially begun.

  Leo soon spotted the swarm of detectors lining this seemingly desolate pilgrimage road.

  Engaging eye-tracking mode, he manipulated the data on his retinal terminal.

  Traffic maps of the lunar surface popped up.

  What surprised him most was the real-time viewer count.

  1.23 Billion concurrents.

  Besides the 500 million Holy Order believers on the Moon, traffic was flooding in from Earth, Mars, and the Asteroid Belt.

  I didn't expect the Silver Ring's influence to be this massive. The entire solar system is watching.

  Voice barrages stacked like snowflakes beside the three Fire Keepers, accompanied by a sacred holographic aria.

  "Praise the Silver Ring! A walking miracle!"

  "This is asceticism! The road of atonement! Look at those firm steps!"

  "The Fire Keeper's sweat is nectar; her panting is the Gospel!"

  However, Leo found several encrypted channels where the tone was... different.

  "Raising the bet: The chick with the backpack won't last the first leg. Odds 1:5. Her life support is too fragile."

  "I want a 4K close-up when her suit ruptures and she asphyxiates..."

  Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

  "Dream on. They all have Personal Fields, constant temp and pressure. Plus emergency medical teams. It's just a circus magic show."

  Sure enough. At any moment, there are the cynical smart-asses watching from the sidelines. If I hadn't been dragged into this, I'd probably be one of them.

  "Master?" Vivian sensed Leo's pause and turned back, her eyes frighteningly bright. "Are you listening? It sounds like the voice of prayer."

  Leo hurriedly muted his bone-conduction speakers. "Walk properly. Beware of demons descending. Don't disappoint your believers."

  "Demons? How do you know?"

  Because the density of holographic projectors ahead just increased by 300%, and the air smells like dry ice and ozone... that's stage smoke.

  "Don't chatter. Get ready. Big scene coming up."

  "Wow..."

  Sure enough, two hours later, as they marched into the shadow of a crater, a command from the broadcast director flashed on Leo's retina. A "Hellfire Sulfur Dragon"—over twenty meters tall—materialized out of thin air, accompanied by countless "Ghouls" clawing out of the ground.

  Vivian braced for a fight to the death. Miranda and Isabella feigned solemnity.

  The holographic figure of the Red Cardinal suddenly appeared at ten times his normal size, delivering a Holy War speech to the audience. He made the monsters wait a full five minutes.

  Only after the believers let out a tsunami of cheers did the "battle" officially begin.

  Miranda arranged her skirt. The camera immediately captured a perfect 45-degree close-up of her profile.

  "Where the Light reaches, Filth—" She dragged out the syllable. The director queued the BGM—a tympani roll reaching a climax—"—Dissipates!"

  Snap! Her elephant exploded a ring of dazzling soft-light filters, framing Miranda like a goddess descending. Then, a "Holy Light Rain" with maxed-out visual effects showered down.

  The giant dragon twisted and struggled exaggeratedly to the music, then exploded into sky-filling golden particles. Even the corpse was rendered into festive fireworks.

  On the other side, Isabella was "dancing" with the Ghouls.

  She stood barefoot on the barge, swaying with the datura.

  The atmosphere was a holy dance: "The world is muddy, but I alone am pure."

  The Ghouls acted as backup dancers, bathing in the golden pollen she scattered. They showed no pain; instead, pink flowers bloomed from their bodies as they froze in poses full of religious metaphor.

  "Sin redeemed. Life eternal."

  The director captured Isabella's elegant smile, instantly adding a glistening tear effect to her eye.

  The audience erupted in frantic cheers.

  Leo shook his head. Holographic projection protocols, a massive light-and-shadow stage show... even the dragon's scream was pitch-corrected to C Major. Are there too many fools, or do the liars just know their market?

  However, Vivian hadn't moved. Her expression shifted from confusion to humiliated rage.

  "They... what are they doing?" Vivian trembled. "Why grant the Devil Dragon sacred golden light? Why dance with the corpses of evil? Why not give them True Destruction?"

  Just then, the director generated a massive "Fallen Angel" in front of Vivian.

  The horned monster waved a flaming greatsword, roaring at her.

  "This is just a warm-up mob. Do a simple prayer pose," Leo reminded her, stepping up to perform a "Guardian Shield" effect.

  Vivian didn't listen.

  "This is real. This is the Holy War! Die, Fallen Angel!"

  Vivian stripped off her gloves. The air inside her Personal Field distorted instantly.

  The Geiger counter on Leo's wrist skyrocketed.

  The nanites rioted. A ghost-blue arc of Cherenkov Radiation darted between them like out-of-control high voltage.

  Everything froze.

  The Fallen Angel flickered. The director screamed. Miranda and Isabella, mid-pose, stared at Vivian in shock—like looking at a madman who brought a live grenade to a stage play.

  Everyone is acting, and you're playing for real?

  Leo’s heart stopped.

  This crazy woman is going to nuke the stage, the holograms, and the other Fire Keepers!

  "Insolence! Kneel!" He roared the "Divine Punishment" command.

  Simultaneously, he punched in the backdoor code, cutting the power to the local projectors.

  Zzzzt. The aggressive Fallen Angel flickered like an old TV unplugged, then vanished.

  No aesthetic beauty. No climactic finish. Just... gone.

  The broadcast room fell silent.

  Vivian looked blank.

  "It... committed suicide out of guilt, right?"

  Leo rushed to shove her gloves back on, his voice a low hiss.

  "Yes! Don't release 'Holy Fire' at the drop of a hat! For this trash, prayer is enough! Without my permission, no random fires! Understand?"

  The chat room exploded.

  "Did you see the blue light? What... what miracle is that?"

  "Divine Command Theory in action!"

  "Is the Third Sanctum guarded by a new Primal Dust Guardian?!"

  "No, it's the Silver Keeper! He erased existence with a thought! Top-tier combat power!"

  ...

  Beep. Leo cut the broadcast feed and killed the surveillance uplinks.

  The world was finally quiet.

  The Lunar Rite transitioned from an absurd stage show into a tedious 300-kilometer pseudo-vacuum hike.

  For the next few hours, boredom reigned.

  Miranda dozed in her elephant chair. Isabella lounged on her boat. Leo and Vivian brought up the rear.

  He used the massive backpack to shield her from direct sunlight, maintaining her thermal stability. Vivian was quiet, lost in thought.

  The ridge climbed higher, growing rugged with boulders and fault lines.

  Near sunset, they reached a vantage point.

  The central peak of Tycho Crater pierced the black sky like a silver lance. Inside the crater lay the Upper City; outside lay the infinite wasteland, littered with the metallic wreckage of a war three centuries cold.

  Vivian stopped. She drew a Silver Ring in the air toward a piece of twisted titanium debris. "Praise the True God, for finding us the Promised Land amidst the persecution of False Gods."

  Leo watched coldly.

  Just a bunch of exiled charlatans who tried to counterattack with nukes and had them blow up in their faces.

  ironic that the mortal enemies of the past are now thick as thieves over smuggling routes.

  "Let's go, Lord Fire Keeper," Leo said. "Sunset is coming. Temps will drop. We need to reach Camp One."

  Dialysis. Filtration. Maintenance. Mixing drugs... tons of work to do.

  The rest of the road was as dull as a treadmill march.

  Until they neared Camp One.

  Leo stopped dead.

  A piercing alarm screamed in his bone-conduction headphones, accompanied by the roar of jetpacks.

  Ring Security. Their comms were full of combat codes: "Danger." "Heretic." "Contact."

  Simultaneously, a spaceship under optical camouflage decloaked directly overhead.

  It was a pure geometric form. Seamless. Vantablack.

  Something definitely not in the script had descended. Not a friend of the Silver Ring, but a predator.

  This is not a drill.

  Leo’s heart hammered. He dropped his pack, drew his combat unit, and stood in front of Vivian.

  Is this the real challenge?