Chapter 391 - Moon Station (Patreon)

##### Author's Note ####

Shoutout to Sebas for giving me the idea for this room!

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"You have got to be kidding me," Cris's frustration was the first thing that Hera heard as she entered the Moon Station room. The reason for the comment was that, on this side of the doorway, there were 20 flights of metal stairs going up this large silver structure. Looking up, Hera couldn't even see where they would arrive when reaching the top. However, according to everything she read about this place, they were in the right location. As weird as it sounded, this also made a lot of sense and kept with the doorway theme. Two connected doorways would always be in similar locations. For instance, a doorway on a beach would always lead to somewhere with sand and water, even if it was an oasis in the middle of a desert or an attraction in a theme park.

Unfortunately, the theme for this passage seemed to be stairs. Alex jumped on the spot and frowned as she hit the ground, "So that name is a lie."

"What?" Hera asked.

"The name, Moon Station. Isn't the moon supposed to have a different gravity? I thought we might be able to jump and keep going," Alex sighed.

"Oh... You're right. Maybe it's something about this station. Like it has some gravity generator. Or this is all just fake," Hera looked up and tested the gravity.

"Aren't gravity generators supposed to be impossible?" Tim asked.

"Purely with technology, yeah, but any mage that can use some gravity spells should be able to do something like that. Besides, this is a room. The MAZE can do whatever it wants here," Amanda shrugged.

"Then why didn't it put an elevator here?" Cris was on the floor, trying to rest before continuing.

Now that they didn't have to worry about some weird magic trying to mess with their minds, everyone sat down to let their legs recover for a while. In the Steps of Heaven, each break had to be calculated, but now, they could stay here for as long as they wanted. At first, Cris wanted to stay there just for 10 minutes, but her legs had other ideas. Taking a break after such a long walk made them unable to get up for at least half an hour. Only then did the group start climbing the 20 flights of stairs.

When reaching the top, they were greeted by a large set of double doors that slid open, revealing another set of doors on the other side of a small chamber. Small in comparison with everything else. The staircase could be the size one would expect, but the metal structure was massive. It should easily cover a 50-meter radius with the stairs right in the middle. Each steel door was 4 meters tall and 8 meters wide. They would connect at an angle, almost like two puzzle pieces fitting together. Right in the center of that, there was a triangle-shaped red light. As they got closer to that door, the light started blinking and turned green. Following that, the sound of air escaping the entryway and a gust of wind brushed over Hera and the others as the steel barrier opened. On the other side, the group could see another set of doors with the same triangle-shaped light in the middle. The only difference was that the angle of connections was opposite the first steel gate.

Hera and the others waited a moment for the second door to open, but it wasn't moving. Only when they walked forward did something happen. Alex was in the back of the group, and she had to jump in when the gate began to close. The steel doors had a sensor that would recognize when someone was near and stopped as Alex passed through. When she was at a safe distance, the door closed, making the same noise of air passing through as it did when it opened. After the noise, the triangle on the other side of this room started blinking its red light before it turned green, and then the door opened without any noise.

"Is this an airlock?" Tim asked.

"Maybe, but we still could breathe back there. I don't get why this place would need an airlock," Alex replied.

"Just to make it more realistic?" Amanda suggested.

"Could be…" Hera nodded, but before she could say anything else, the doors opened completely. Beyond that threshold, about 100 people were walking around, and a small group by a table seemed to watch that gate intently.

"Hey! The first challengers arrived!" a man called and pulled his tablet while approaching Hera's group. He took one look at them and stopped, "Hang on. I don't remember you guys. Did you come from here?"

"From here?"

"Yeah, did you leave her to do the Steps of Heaven challenge?" the man asked.

"Challenge? No, we just came here," Hera replied.

"Oh, really? Good for you. Actually, are you OK?"

"Tired, where's the hotel?" Cris asked.

"Turn left here and head straight until the other side of the base. It's not as far as it sounds, I promise."

"Thanks," Cris was a bit dejected.

"Hang on. Can I borrow you guys for a minute? Even if we just started the challenge, I feel like it wouldn't be fair to not include you guys."

"Include us on the challenge? What is that all about?" Alex asked.

"OK, first of all, let me introduce myself. I'm Isaac, and I work in the guild here. A couple of days ago, we set up this challenge to see how long it would take people to climb the Steps of Heaven and how many potions you would need to take. It's just a thing to keep everyone entertained, but we managed to even get some rewards. The person who uses the least amount of potions and climbs the fastest time will get a pair of moonwalkers. Aside from that, we have rankings for just the fastest climber and the one who used the least potions. Each can get a couple of days in the hotel for free with 3 meals included. If you guys want to participate, there is a small fee to be eligible for the prizes, but if you want just the bragging rights, you are free to just tell us how you did it."

Since it wasn't anything they had to pay unless they wanted the prize, Hera agreed to share what they did. This put them in first place for the challenge ranking. Not that this was impressive since they were currently the only team in the ranking. Isaac explained that to avoid anyone getting an unfair advantage, they all went out from the same room and would come all the way back here by going to different rooms. Isaac also took the chance to explain to Hera and the others how this room worked. It had 2 doorways and 3 dungeon entrances. The doorways were located at the bottom of the staircase outside the airlock, and the other was right in front of them. However, this second doorway that was in the station proper was connected to 12 different rooms. At the start and at the end of each hour, the doorway would be inactive for 5 minutes before changing the location to where it would lead to. It seemed that the passage would follow the rotation of the base, even if no one could tell for sure where they were.

Two of the dungeons behaved in a much similar fashion, but they would only change dungeons once every 12 hours. If someone was inside when the dungeon changed, nothing would happen, and they could leave the dungeon normally. The only issue with that was that staying in a dungeon after the exit was closed made whoever was inside get a debuff, and they wouldn't be able to enter that specific dungeon again for another 2 days. The third dungeon was static like almost every other dungeon in the MAZE, and it was a quest that heavily relied on luck, and almost no one ran it. The dungeon was about how a piece of the station broke apart, and you had to wait for a rescue shuttle that could take from a few hours up to a week to arrive. During that time, some shadow monsters would be attacking the people inside, but at least they would have enough food and water, as well as bathrooms and a warm bed which was a rarity inside dungeons. The other two, or four dungeons, were on the moon's surface, and unlike when one was in the station, they would be affected by moon gravity. Oddly enough, only one of the dungeons actually had people requiring space suits. The others had people moving around and breathing normally, even if there wasn't supposed to be any air on the moon.

Hearing all that explanation, everyone in the group became interested in doing the dungeons. Even Hera was considering staying here for a bit longer to do them. After all, how often does someone have the chance to walk on the moon?

Still, their first step was to go to the hotel and rest. Even if no one wanted to sleep now, they all wanted just to keep their feet up. Isaac suggested for them to spend some time in the zero-G chamber. It was a place where people could go just to stay without gravity, and it was great to rest your entire body like that. They followed his suggestion after stopping by the hotel to get a few rooms and leave their stuff before heading to the zero-G chamber.

It was a tall circular chamber with several rails on the walls and some straps that one could use to avoid floating around in the middle of the room. There were also a couple of people there to help anyone who got stuck in the middle of the chamber. While they were there, Hera called Silah to show the room to her girlfriend.

"Hera!" Silah smiled as the video call connected.

"Hey! How is everything back home?" Hera asked.

"It's OK… mostly. I mean, some people are still acting weird," Silah sighed.

"Really? Man, this sucks. I hoped that wouldn't be the case."

"Yeah, but it's not like they are doing anything bad, so I guess that's something," Silah stopped talking, "What is going on with your hair?"

"Oh, this? Remember when we watched that movie about astronauts? When they leave earth, and they lose gravity?" Hera asked.

"You left earth?! Hera, I know you said you were going to go far away, but this is too much."

"Well, technically, you are not on earth either, but I didn't go to outer space. I'm in a room called 'Moon Base,' basically it's the MAZE version of the moon, and they even have this chamber where there is no gravity," Hera explained as she showed the area to her girlfriend.

"Wow, that is really cool. Sanrick would love that. He really likes space things," Silah chuckled.

"Sanrick?" Hera asked.

"Yeah, my brother."

"Oh right, sorry. My bad," Hera stopped for a moment. Despite being with Silah for over a year already, she couldn't remember the names of her parents or her siblings.

"Don't worry. It's rare for me to call him by his name anyways. Oh, Kahala was asking about your boots. Are they working well?" Silah brushed the comment aside.

"Yeah, they work great. Well, there are some situations where they don't. Like, if we are in a place with too much sand, the glide is… weird. It seems like the enchantment is a bit too sensitive, so even small clumps of sand in the air are enough to make me go up. Then again, if I use that well, I might be able to fly in a sandstorm or something. Is she teaching you some fun things?" Hera explained.

"Yeah... She showed me this technique where I can bend the metal…." Silah kept talking shop. She would always get excited when explaining something she had just learned and, although blacksmithing wasn't something that Hera enjoyed all that much, she loved seeing her girlfriend like that. They talked for about one hour before Silah had to go, leaving Hera alone with her thoughts for a moment. Before saying bye, Hera let Silah know that they might stay in this room for a couple of days since everyone was curious about the dungeons. The blacksmith understood that even if she didn't like the idea of Hera staying away for longer.

"Man… I suck," Hera sighed.

Amanda was right by her side, reading a book, but that comment seemed to grab her attention, "Why do you think that?"

"I'm not a good girlfriend, and I just realized that."

"How come? Because of the whole trip thing? You said that… I want to say Silah? Wasn't that excited about the idea."

"Well, that too, but I just realized that I barely know anything about her family."

"So? You are dating her, not her parents."

"Yeah, but it's different for them. They live in the same city since forever. Like seriously, before Blue and I went there, they didn't have a way to leave the room."

"Still. What's the problem?"

"They matter a lot to her. I should pay more attention to them," Hera explained.

"I don't think so, but if you think that's the best option, you can still change how you act."

"I guess so," Hera nodded and let her mind wander. It's been just 10 days since she left, but it felt like a year, and she wasn't even at her destination yet. Hera could only hope that all this wasn't going to end up in a dead-end.