As Marie logged in and entered the virtual world of The GAME, she was greeted with the expected daily challenge screen. Only, the challenge today wasn't to explore some far-flung new cityscape, or to retrieve an item from some weirdo in a factory, or to rescue a hapless victim from a kidnapping scheme. This time, the challenge was different.

Successfully seduce the character you have the lowest love meter with.

A frustrated sigh escaped her lips. "Are you serious? Like, c'mon!" she complained, crossing her arms. There could be only one character that quest refers to.

Marie could see the chat going crazy in the corner of her eye, where the window had been stashed out of the way. Her whole audience thought this was hilarious. Great.

Well, content was content. Marie could work with this.

She put on a bright smirk for her Metaverse audience, determined to overcome this less-than-ideal quest and collect the rewards it promised. She never turned down a challenge.

"Fine, then. We'll romance her today. It can't be *that* hard, right?" Marie mused aloud, beginning to flip through menus to spawn the perfect backdrop for a cute date. "Sure, I've dropped her off a few cliffs ... and called her a few names ... and trapped her in a few locked rooms." She trailed off, thinking about all of the times she messed around with her self-described nemesis, all but torturing the game character just for fun.

"But she's just a program like anything else in the GAME. I can game her too. Right, chat? I can press her buttons and make her go gaga for me! It'll be easy! She probably doesn't even remember any of that." Her confident demeanor returned with a big smile. Surely this would be as easy as figuring out a few of her favorite things, gifting them repeatedly, and then enduring a final kiss, right? Definitely.

Marie settled on a glowing cyberpunk market for today's world, neon signs reflecting off the digital pavement and holographic vendors calling out to passersby. She adjusted her virtual avatar's outfit—a crop top with pixel art design and baggy cargo pants—and set off to discover what role her nemesis was playing within it. "Here goes nothing," she muttered with a grimace. "Can't believe I have to be nice to that bitch. Someone up at GAME headquarters has it out for me, I swear."