I woke up sometime later to find Chloe standing over me with a worried look on her face. "Halberd! You're finally awake!"

"What happened?" I asked as I sat up and rubbed my head. It hurt pretty badly, but not as bad as it could have been.

"After you were blasted off by that explosion, I managed to find you and drag you on to the ATV and then back here to home," she said. "But that thing... What was it?"

"I don't know," I said honestly, as I had no idea what that thing was or where it came from. "But we need to be more careful from now on."

I rolled over in my small bed and sat up as I looked at Chloe. "We need to find out where that thing came from and why it was after you."

She nodded her head in agreement as she sat on the edge of my bed. "But first, we need to figure out what that thing actually was."

I nodded my head in agreement as I got out of bed and walked over to the kitchen table where my laptop was. I quickly booted it up before opening up a search engine and typing in 'Mecha Dog.' But nothing came up that looked even remotely close to what we had just fought. 

"What about 'Giant Robot Dog'?" Again, nothing came up close enough for us to ID it. " Well, shit."

"What are we going to do?" Chloe asked as she came up behind me and wrapped her arms around my waist.

I sighed as I leaned back into her embrace. "I don't know... But we'll think of something. It is over, but I think this is a clear indication that you need to learn how to use some weapons. You have the same ability to learn any weapon, so we are going to have to teach you to defend yourself out there. It clearly isn't safe even in the safe zones, but what actually happened? You were waiting for me at the entrance of the dungeon, right?"

"Yeah," she said as she nodded her head. "I was just waiting there for you to come out when that thing came out of nowhere and started chasing me."

"Did it say anything?" I asked as I was trying to piece this together. "Did it give any indication of why it was after you?"

She shook her head, "No, it didn't say anything. It just kept barking and growling like a normal dog would, but much louder and scarier."  

I nodded my head as I leaned back into her embrace again. "We'll find out what it is, but for now, we need to focus on other things."

"Like what?" she asked as she looked up at me with a confused expression.

"Like learning how to use a weapon," I said as I looked down at her. "I'll teach you everything I know, and we can start tomorrow morning."  

"Are you hungry?" Chloe asked me, and my stomach rumbled. "I am sure that we have enough to get whatever you want."

I was about to say something, but then I remembered the golden coin I had gotten and pulled open my inventory, and chuckled.

"We have 10246 Mana right now, so yeah, I think we can get whatever both of us want," I laughed, and Chloe jumped from behind me, making a choking noise, and I turned around to see what was wrong, but she put up at hand.

"What did you just say?!" Chloe asked again, rubbing her throat with one hand and with a distressed look on her face that made me grin.

"I said that we have 10246 Mana right now," I repeated, still chuckling.

"Where did you get that?" she asked as her eyes bugged out of her head. "People that are level 150 might have that much! You can't be more than forty!"

"True, I am only level 38," I said, and Chloe's eyes bugged out.

"How much did you say we had again?" she asked as she looked at me with a calculating look in her eyes.

"10246 Mana," I said with a grin on my face knowing what was going through her head. "Why do you ask?" 

Chloe's eyes lit up as she jumped up and started running around the room like a kid on Christmas morning before coming back to stop in front of me with excitement written all over her face. "I know exactly what we are going to do!"

"Oh? And what is that?" I asked, crossing my arms over my chest with a raised eyebrow.

"We are going to go out and eat at a fancy place, but first, we have to get you a mask and nicer clothing for both of us! This is our very first date!" she exclaimed as she grabbed my hand and pulled me towards the door.

"A date?" I asked as I was a bit confused, but then it hit me like a ton of bricks. "Oh! A date!"  

I quickly put on my armor as Chloe went to get ready, and after a few minutes, we were both standing in front of each other, both wearing black dresses that complimented our figures perfectly with high heels to match. Chloe had her hair done up in an elegant style while mine was in a mess on top of my head. 

We looked at each other for a moment before erupting into fits of laughter, and I wrapped my arms around her waist as she did the same to me. "We look ridiculous!" I exclaimed between fits of laughter. 

"I know!" she said as she buried her face in my chest, and we just stood there like that for a moment before finally composing ourselves.

"Well," I said as I took a step back from her and offered my arm to her. "Shall we go?"

She giggled as she put her hand on my arm, "Yes, let's go!"

We walked out the door arm in arm to our garage, but this time I took my armor off, and we took a fancy-looking car out instead of the Mad Max ATV. I was driving while Chloe was in the passenger seat, and we were both grinning from ear to ear as we drove off toward the city.

"Go this way! This is the safe route that monsters can show up on! We can just enjoy the drive for once!" Chloe exclaimed as she kissed my cheek and then stuck her hand out the open window.

I chuckled as I took the turn she had indicated, and we both just relaxed in our seats and enjoyed the scenery. After a few minutes of driving, we made it to what looked like a fancy four-story shopping mall. After fighting monsters so much, it was strange to be going back into normal populated areas. 

I parked the car in a secluded spot before we both got out, and I grabbed my armor just in case, but Chloe put her hand on my arm to stop me.

"You won't need that here," she said with a smile as she linked her arm with mine again. "Let's go shopping!" 

We walked into the mall hand in hand like any other couple would while people gave us odd looks, but we didn't care as we walked around looking at all the stores. We went into a few of them to look around before finally finding a store that sold masks and other things for costumes. 

"This is perfect!" Chloe exclaimed as she pulled me into the store. "We can find everything we need here!"

The store was full of all kinds of different masks and other things for costumes, and we spent a good amount of time looking around before finally finding what we were looking for. I went to the back of the store and found a strange black mask that was much more expensive than the others. It had two red eyes that glowed in the dark, and when I put it on, it completely covered my face.

"This is perfect!" Chloe exclaimed as she came up to me and tugged at the bottom of the mask. "It covers your whole face! And those red eyes are so creepy!"

I chuckled as I took off the mask and handed it to her as we headed back to pay 1200 mana for the Mask of Darkness. It had the ability to shroud my presence if I stood in shadow, but it had a 24-hour cooldown, so not overpowered but useful.

After that, we both got new clothes and then headed back to the car to get changed. I found my eyes being drawn to Chloe's body, and when she noticed, she leaned over from her seat and slowly kissed me. 

"I know what you're thinking," she said with a smirk as she sat back in her seat. "But we are not going out to a fancy restaurant smelling like sex. Keep it in your pants until we are back at home, and I will make it worth your wait!" Chloe said with a  wink before she finished changing.

I sighed as I leaned my head back on the headrest and closed my eyes, but all I could think about was Chloe's naked body and how much I wanted it.