CHAPTER 62: TEST STREAM [I]

"Uhm... Welcome, Lucius," Luna said with a slight smile, wiping her hands with a rag that was already stained with grease.

All in all, she was glad he wasn’t sick anymore.

The color had returned to his face, his eyes were sharp again, and his steps didn’t look heavy like they had yesterday.

"Thanks for yesterday," Lucius said, setting the drone gently on her work table.

His lips curled as he glanced at the mess of tools, gears, and scattered notes across the desk. "Ooh, and I see you’re working around?"

Luna rubbed the back of her head.

It didn’t seem very lady-like, the oil smudges on her fingers and the way her hair was tied into a messy bun, but technology had to be made somehow.

She aimed to be like her role model. Dominica Wyrmsworth — an Awakener-scientist whose legend claimed she built the world’s first functional combat drone in the corner of a cave, using nothing but scrap metal, a lantern, and her bare hands.

Every innovator in the Awakener tech space knew the story.

Luna had grown up reading her biographies like bedtime tales.

"Erm... Yes," she admitted softly, adjusting her glasses and trying to push her bangs back into place. "I have to work on the technology I can use somehow."

Lucius’s eyes lingered on her with approval.

That was the entire reason he had picked her up in the first place.

He knew what her future held.

Eventually, like he’d mentioned before, she would become big on the Awakener Net, her inventions reshaping how people fought in dungeons.

For now, though, he would use his streams to promote her technology bit by bit.

"I really think it’s nice," he said. He crouched slightly, inspecting the sleek body of the drone.

"Looks like you worked really hard for it... Do you think it’s ready for a spin?"

"Not exactly," Luna admitted, pushing up her work glasses nervously.

She pointed toward a cluster of glowing runes etched into the inner chassis. "See, I don’t really know much about mana, so I haven’t been able to get the mana circuits correct. There are a lot of mana batteries in here, and Emilia said I could use as much as I want, but the issue is the compactive synchronization ratio. If I can’t keep the energy harmonized, the drone jitters, loses altitude, and sometimes..."

And then she launched into an avalanche of jargon.

Words like "frequency destabilization," "conductive resonance pathways," and "modular stream harmonics" fell from her mouth so quickly Lucius felt like he’d been shoved back into a university lecture.

He blinked.

He nodded.

And in truth — he didn’t understand a damn thing.

When she finally stopped, cheeks flushed, Lucius tapped the drone with a single finger.

"If it’s the issue of the mana circuits," he said calmly, watching as faint threads of violet space-energy seeped from his fingertip and crawled into the drone’s core.

The glow inside the circuitry shifted, no longer flickering and stuttering but flowing like a steady river.

The drone gave a low hum, hovering a few inches above the table with perfect stability.

Space itself had paved the mana lines correctly.

Luna exhaled in relief, her entire body sagging as though he had just lifted a thousand-pound weight from her shoulders.

"Thanks so much, Lucius," she whispered, her voice trembling with genuine gratitude.

Lucius smirked at her. "Shall we go for a test run?"

...

Moments later, Luna found herself pressed against his chest, both arms gripping onto him tightly as they stood high above a building in the middle of the city.

The wind tugged at her bun, loosening strands of hair until they whipped against her face.

Her heart raced because Lucius had carried her up here as though she weighed nothing at all.

When she had agreed to test it out, she hadn’t thought he would take it this seriously.

"I’m preparing for a stream," Lucius explained, his voice casual as though dangling from a skyscraper was the most normal thing in the world. "We might have to go into a dungeon, so you’ll need protective wear."

Her brows furrowed.

Protective wear existed for civilians who accidentally got caught in dungeon territory. It was light armor powered by a weak mana shield, good enough to withstand one or two glancing blows from a monster before breaking.

But it was also absurdly expensive.

"Are you sure you should spend that much on me?" she asked softly.

He could just do the streaming alone. She wouldn’t be offended.

Lucius considered it for a moment.

He could go solo. In fact, he’d probably perform better without having to watch someone’s back.

But that wasn’t the point.

He shrugged. "What kind of man wouldn’t spend on his woman?"

Maybe it was because of his newfound power but he could say cringe without wanting to kill himself now.

Luna froze. Her heart skipped a beat, her cheeks igniting like fire.

Her glasses nearly slid down her nose.

’His woman?’

She didn’t trust her voice enough to reply.

Instead, she hastily fished the prototype streaming glasses out of her satchel and shoved them onto his face.

"We’ll be streaming on one of my burner accounts since this is a test run," she said quickly, trying to cover her fluster with professional seriousness.

Her fingers fumbled with the straps as she adjusted them over his ears. "It probably won’t get traction. Besides, this is just to test if the drone will work."

Lucius grinned at her panic but said nothing.

As she tightened the fit, the drone floated from his hand, wings spreading with a satisfying metallic click.

The mana glow pulsed evenly now, bright and strong.

It drifted up, hovering smoothly in the air, and the glasses flickered to life with Luna’s custom interface.

The stream had begun.

And without hesitation, Lucius stepped right off the building.

The sudden rush of air was deafening.

His coat flared wildly, black fabric snapping against the wind.

His hair whipped around his face, black strands slashing through the skyline like fire.

The cityscape spun below, neon lights and traffic blurring into streaks.

The drone followed flawlessly, capturing every angle — the fierce gleam in his eyes, the confident smirk on his lips, the deadly calm posture of a man falling at terminal velocity and looking like he was born for it.

"Luciussss!!!" Luna’s scream tore from her throat as her stomach lurched into her chest. "Not like that!!!!"